“I presume it is telepathy that enables you to communicate even to a monster with no ears,” I said.
“The thogg’s proboscis is the nerve cluster which allows it to see and hear. But it is to the beast’s brain that my thoughts are delivered,” Miss Aheb said. “However, if you must know, these mental commands are reflected in the actual language of the Pyramidiles. Not words, but numerals.”
“Gematria,” I uttered. “The substitution of letters with their corresponding numbers. The little written record there is indicates that theirs is a language of mathematics.”
“I’m impressed, Mr. Phillips,” she seemed to genuinely enthuse. “Your studies of my gods are quite extensive. I don’t think in words to the motorman, for instance. I think in numbers. Were you a little brighter yourself, you might have deduced the meaning of the trolley before you even got here.”
My expression clearly showed I did not understand.
“1, 8, 5, 2,” she said. “One, denoting the first letter of the alphabet, Mr. Phillips.”
“The letter A.”
“And 8?”
“The letter H.”
Her smile beamed, as the rest of the truth dropped to my gut.
“5 is E, and 2 is B,” I quailed. “1,8,5,2 equals AHEB.” How could I not have seen that before?
“Very good,” the woman mocked. “And were I to think the numbers, 11, 9, 12, and 12, and then make an indicative gesture toward your beloved sister?”
11, 9, 12, 12, I thought desperately, then calculated each number’s letter-equivalent: “K, I, L, L…”
“Yes, Mr. Phillips! Kill. The thogg would then, by my mental command, kill Selina. Or, how about, say, 6, 21, 3, 11?”
I quickly made the translation, and gulped, “Fuck.”
“Um-hmm. How would you like that?” she continued to mock. “How would you like to watch the motorman fuck your sister?”
The thought sickened me to unto death. “I beg you, Miss Aheb. Don’t do that. I just watched a dozen of his kind do the same.”
“Indeed, or perhaps I could order the motorman to fuck you, Mr. Phillips.” She chuckled shrilly, in a manner that actually caused the chandelier’s myriad crystals to clink musically together. “The sight might very well amuse me.”
“Let my sister have her freedom, and I’ll consent to that,” I directed.
“Ah, there you go with your chivalry again.” The bright eyes within the maligned face narrowed on me. “Tell me, is that what you want more than anything? Selina’s release?”
“Indisputably, yes!” Was the obscene woman toying with me, or did I stand some unfractionable chance of getting my sister out of here? I stepped boldly forward. “Let’s bargain. Quid pro quo.”
“So you’d like one thing exchanged for some other, hmm?” she tittered inhumanly. “You regard your sister with the utmost importance, Mr. Phillips, but surely you understand that I do as well.”
“Then what could be more challenging than a wager?” I argued. “It’s easy to be courageous when one has the powers of telepathy and immortality, not to mention”—I jabbed a finger toward the motorman—“the services of a thing like that at your beck and call. Hear me, Miss Aheb. To whatever degree this evil Abhorrescence has imbued you with a likeness to the Pyramidiles, you’re still human, are you not? Humans are known to be intuitive, subjective, and often even sporting. You can’t deny the appeal of a good wager, can you? So let’s do that, Miss Aheb. Accept my challenge.”
A finger dawdled over a well-sucked areola as she deliberated over my “challenge.” “Win or lose, I see nothing to be gained on my part. How fair is that?”
My mind clicked like an ancient abacus, desperate for a resolving quotient. “If I win the wager, then Selina goes free, yet I stay in her stead.”
Selina objected, “Oh, Morgan, I could never let you!”
“Silence!” I raised my voice to her, then returned my proposition to the grotesque madam. “I will replace her as the trolley’s conductor as well as the deliverer of your necessary seminal rations via the periodic ingressions.”
“Is that all?” she complained.
Never one given to crudity, I opened my trousers without hesitation, and displayed my genitalia which, I now had on unimpeachable authority, was larger and more enduring than that of most men. “Being a woman so carnally inclined, I would think you might find some gratifying utility… for this.”
Miss Aheb’s sinister eyes went wide at the vulgarian display, just as I suspected they might.
“My,” she uttered. “The rumours are no exaggeration! It was reported to me quite early, Mr. Phillips, that you are quite the sexual exemplar.”
Some attendant braggadocio on my part seemed in order. “My prowess in the act of fornication reduced five of your highly experienced prostitutes to putty earlier in the evening.”
“So I’ve heard, while I’ve also heard that the quantity of your dispenses of seed are most excessive.” She rested her chin on her fingertips. “That would prove useful around here as well.”
“And whenever you’re feeling a thirst for pleasures of the lesbian variety, this thirst can easily be quenched by any number of lascivious harlots residing here at the club.”
“You make a most interesting point…”
“Then it’s settled,” came my declaration. “I shall replace Selina and her duties as a servitor of the Pyramidiles.”
The ill-skinned woman shrilled in amusement. “Not so fast! As you’ve said, Mr. Phillips. One thing in exchange of another. But I must insist that you earn the privilege of the exchange. You’ve neglected to propose an actual wager.”
“A physical fight,” I said and re-trousered my member. I looked at her in close to a glare. “You’re more than just a woman, madam. You have superhuman powers which would seem to level the playing field. That is my wager. I’ll bet that I defeat you.”
She guffawed. “How quickly the chivalrous gentleman turns to a cad. So you want to fight a woman?”
“But you’re a monstrous woman, Miss Aheb. The odds are clearly in your favor.”
“So if it’s a fight you want, it’s a fight you’ll get,” she intoned. “A fight to the death. Is that sporting enough for you? The way I see it, this can be the only way your mettle will be proven sufficiently enough to earn the exchange.”
Great Pegana! I thought. She’s going to allow it! “Yes! I want it very much!”
“But it won’t be a fight against me, Mr. Phillips. I simply must insist that you fight my motorman.”
My spirits couldn’t have plummeted any lower. “The thing is an alien monstrosity! That’s hardly a fair fight!”
She coyly shrugged and har-umphed. “Take it or leave it; and mind you, if you leave it, I’ll have you consigned to the terrascape”—she purred akin to a cat—“where the service thoggs will greatly appreciate your skills in the act of fellatio”—and now she laughed outright—“as I’m told those skills are rather expert.”