Isis Orb

  He went on, seeking the boundary wall and thus the way out. There was a man with a book, Principia Mathematica. Hapless recognized it as a math book. This must be a mathematician.

  “Pardon me, sir. Do you know the way out?”

  The man ignored him.

  Hapless tried again, this time getting in his face. “Please, sir—”

  The man tapped his ear and shook his head. Oh, he was deaf!

  So Hapless made an elaborate gesture of trying to walk away. Would that get through?

  The man looked at him somewhat blankly, then made a sweeping gesture that Hapless somehow recognized as a mathematical construct: a sine wave.

  The deaf mathematician communicated in sine language. That made a certain sense, but since Hapless didn’t speak it, it was no help. He had to give it up.

  “Thank you, sir,” he said, keeping it polite. “My best to you, and to your wife, who I presume speaks cosine language.”

  He tried to turn around to go back, but remained in a skelter of obscurities. Where was the boundary? He had no idea. What use was it to solve a pun, if he just came up against another pun?

  Then he remembered: Think outside the box. The comic strip was like a box, hemming him in. He’d never get free of it if he followed its rules.

  But what was there to think of? His problem was immediate. He needed to get out of here, instead of being constantly flummoxed by drifting puns. Actually, it wasn’t the puns that were messing him up—it was the environment. Things kept changing, so that he couldn’t get a fix on reality.

  Then he remembered the bit of dialogue the centaurs had had about reality. That the Mundanes believed that it wasn’t fixed until someone observed it. Crazy—yet wasn’t that the case here? Could he fix it by observing it? By making a snapshot? That was certainly outside the box.

  He concentrated. SNAPSHOT.

  Something changed. He looked around. The environment was locked in place. The deaf mathematician was fixed in his sine. The two dragons were frozen in mid race. Beyond them the Eye Doll a Tree was still.

  He had made an observation and collapsed the alternates into a single static reality. Only he remained free to move around.

  Good enough. Now he was able to make out the boundary wall. He strode to it and through it, emerging into Xanth proper.

  Except that there was no one there. Where were Merge and Myst? The villagers? It wasn’t frozen; he could see tree leaves fluttering in a breeze. What had happened?

  “I went out the other side!” he exclaimed. He would have to go back.

  So be it. What good was gumption if he didn’t use it? He stepped back through the wall and was back in chaos. Everything had changed.

  This time he faced what he recognized as an emulation of the Void. It was spitting out birds. Hawks, in fact. As they emerged it slowly got smaller.

  What could he make of a black hole that let hawks escape?

  Then he got it. “Hawking radiation.”

  But this time he knew how to handle it. He concentrated. SNAPSHOT.

  It froze. He walked on through the tableau, past myriad stilled puns.

  And there were the mathematician, racing dragons (now a bit farther into their race), and the Eye Doll a Tree. And beyond that were the five Companions. They were caught in an attitude of concerned looking. They were trying to find out where he had gone.

  He tucked the cyclopes doll into his belt, then resumed his place and took Feline and Faro’s hands. He focused. RELEASE SNAPSHOT.

  The chaos resumed. “Let’s get out of here,” he said loudly.

  They backed out out as a group and were in Xanth proper again.

  “What happened?” Feline and Faro asked almost together.

  “I let go to grab a cyclopes doll,” he said, showing it. “A pun for the villagers.”

  “You vanished,” Feline said severely. “We couldn’t find you anywhere. Then you were back.”

  “It’s a middling size story.”

  “We had better have it,” Faro said.

  Hapless narrated it. “So you see, I drew on your dialogue,” he concluded, addressing Faro. “To think outside the box. And it worked. I made a snapshot that enabled me to get around in the comic strip without being swamped by its environment. I think that’s the breakthrough we need to handle the Goddess Isis.”

  “Perhaps it is,” Zed agreed thoughtfully. “We had better all learn the technique.”

  They practiced it, one by one. First Feline entered the strip alone. She seemed to flounder for a generous moment, but then the strip seemed to crystallize around her.

  She stepped out leading a witch by the hand. “She’s so sentimental,” Feline said. “I had to get her out of there.”

  “But she’s a witch!” Zed protested. “Witches aren’t sentimental.”

  “That’s sedimental, catsup,” the witch snapped, not at all sentimental. “I’m a sand witch.”

  “Oh. I guess I missed the pun.”

  “I’ll show you. Hit me.”

  “But I was trying to rescue you, not abuse you.”

  “Do it anyway.”

  Feline shrugged and slapped the witch across the face. The blow landed, but had a peculiar effect. The witch’s face dissolved into sand, followed by the rest of her body. In two thirds of a moment she was a pile of sand on the ground. Feline, caught by surprise, was half standing on it.

  “Oh!” Feline said. “I didn’t mean to do that.”

  The sand mounded, humped, and rose into a human figure. “I can’t be abused,” the witch said. “I just dissolve into sand. I lie there, picking up everything in sight from the ground.” She smirked. “You have nice panties, dear.”

  “Sedimental,” Zed agreed with three-fifths of a smile.

  “Anyway,” Feline concluded. “I made the snapshot technique work, and the witch is the proof.”

  “My turn,” Faro said. She stepped into the comic strip.

  As before, there was a scant moment, then the strip coagulated around her. She had snapped it. She emerged hauling a man by the arm. “This is Phil,” she said.

  “You bet I’m Phil,” he said. “Phil A Buster. I never stop talking. You’ll never get anything done, ha ha.”

  “I’ve heard of him,” Zed said. “I thought he lived in Mundania.”

  “I live everywhere that anything needs to be accomplished,” Phil said proudly. “I keep talking until there’s no point any more.”

  “Well, move it, Buster!” Zed snapped.

  “Oh, bleep,” Phil said. “There’s a motion on the floor.” He walked away.

  “Sorry I didn’t get a better example,” Faro said. “I didn’t realize how bad he was.”

  Next was Zed. “I’ll try not to get a person,” he promised. In due course he emerged with a colorful egg.

  “Uh-oh,” Faro murmured. “That looks like a darning egg.”

  “What’s the problem with a darning egg?” Zed asked, setting it down.

  The egg proceeded to wobble along. “Oh! Darn, Darn, Darn!” it exclaimed.

  “Oh.” But Zed, too had mastered the snapshot technique.

  Nya went next. “No darning eggs,” she said as she stepped through.

  She emerged with a delicious looking piece of pie. “Don’t eat it,” she warned. “It’s humble pie. Its best use is for arrogant folk who seek to enter the Good Magician’s castle without undertaking the challenges.”

  Myst took the pie, promising to deliver it to the villagers without nibbling it herself.

  Then came Quin. He emerged hauling a statue. “Statue of Limitations,” he explained. “It tells folk what is impossible.”

  “Can we capture the Goddess Isis?” Hapless asked.

  The statue looked at him. “You can, but you may wish you hadn’t.”

  That was not encouraging. But what could they do but go on?

  Chapter 15:

  Isis

  Next day, rested, they bid parting to the villagers. Hapless opened the box.

/>   There was a lovely woman in shorts and a halter, wearing hair curlers and sandals, sitting on a crude wooden throne. The words were ISIS ORB.

  “Can that really be her?” Hapless asked, surprised. “I thought she’d be in a shining royal gown.”

  “It must show her when she’s not making a formal presentation,” Feline said. “I suppose even goddesses don’t wear their finery all the time; it would get soiled.”

  “That must be it,” he agreed. But he still wondered.

  The path, to their amazement, led straight to the comic strip. Could she be in there? Or did they merely have to pass through it to reach her?

  “I am glad we practiced how to handle the comic strip,” Zed said. “We did not know we’d be using that knowledge so soon.”

  “But we shouldn’t need it while we’re on the path,” Faro pointed out. “It protects us from bad things.”

  “And what happens once we reach her, and the path ends?” Feline asked.

  “We’d better have our mission in hand,” Zed said.

  Hapless studied the picture. Isis’ legs were crossed, and she was showing a fair degree of thigh. He did not want to admit how much that turned him on, or the way her halter showed extra flesh around the edges. She was one superlatively sexy creature, regardless of her clothing.

  Feline snapped the box shut. “We’re going to complete our Quest, not see the sights.”

  “I suppose this is farewell, again,” Merge said sadly. Myst stood with her, misting.

  “No,” Feline said firmly “Come along, both of you.”

  “You want us along?” Merge asked, surprised.

  “Moral support. We fear the goddess may be the bad girl, since Carmen wasn’t. It may take both of us to shield him from that. Men can be wickedly tempted by bad girls.”

  “Even by their pictures,” Merge agreed. “Even in dishabille.” She had evidently noticed Hapless’ attention. What could he say? He was attracted.

  “That’s right. We need to be sure Hapless does the right thing.”

  “Then we’ll come,” Merge agreed gratefully, and Myst was sunshine again.

  Was this smart? There could be serious danger. Yet he was glad to have them along.

  “We should not have to link hands this time,” Zed said. “But we should remain alert.”

  “Oh, yes,” Faro agreed.

  They formed a single file line and followed the path through the wall and into the comic strip. There was chaos, but now it was safely off the path. The details were blurry, as they were through the comic strip wall. They had, in effect, walled off a path-shaped section.

  “I’m almost disappointed,” Feline said.

  “I see a pun!” Myst exclaimed happily, pointing to a foggy outline.

  “What is it, dear?” Merge asked, squinting.

  Hapless squinted too. The thing looked like a wooden box overflowing with dolls. Except that the dolls were moving. They were small people. Some of them clutched pencils, which they used to sketch pictures on any available surface.

  “A chest of drawers,” the child said.

  A subdued groan went through the party. “Let’s move on,” Zed said. Centaurs generally were not partial to puns.

  They ignored other puns along the way, though Myst tittered several times as she observed them.

  The path did not pass through the comic strip and emerge on the other side. Instead it turned to follow the strip lengthwise. Where was it going?

  “Surely the goddess could not live in the strip,” Feline said, voicing Hapless’s thought. “The puns would drive her crazy.”

  “Unless she is already crazy,” Merge said. “Some say the gods are mad.”

  “Would that make her easier or harder to deal with?” Faro asked.

  “Excellent question,” Zed said. “It may be a presumption to assume that she will be rational.”

  “She looked rational in the picture,” Hapless said.

  “She looked sexy,” Feline said. “That’s not the same.”

  “You, of course, being in a position to know,” Zed said with a smile.

  “Females know it; males don’t. That’s why they are so foolish about women.”

  “And it is a woman we are up against.” Zed pondered briefly. “It occurs to me that we gave gathered power and practiced countering illusion. But what about dealing with a sexy woman? Some call Isis the goddess of sex.”

  “Fertility,” Faro said. “That, too, is not the same.”

  “But close enough. Maybe we should consult with Carmen, now that she’s on our side.”

  “If you wish.”

  They paused to gather around, the path coincidentally becoming wide enough at this point. Coincidentally? There was more to these paths than showed.

  Feline touched her Totem and the gorgon appeared, garbed in an exceedingly tight halter and extremely short skirt. Skirt? But she wore her tail. The skirt actually made it look like legs, at least where it stretched across the hips. Hapless assumed she also wore the kerchief and dark glasses; his eyes were too firmly locked on her torso to make sure. “I thought you’d never ask.” She flounced the skirt, though there was hardly enough to flounce. The eyeballs of the males flexed in perfect harmony.

  “So will the goddess try to freak out the males?” Feline asked.

  “No. She’ll be more subtle. She’ll flash them just enough to make them docile, then deal with the females.”

  “Deal with us for what?”

  “She’ll want to know exactly why we’re here. She’ll know we’re on a Quest, because she’ll see the path, but she won’t know our specific object. Then she’ll decide whether she wants to cooperate.”

  “And if she decides not to cooperate?”

  “Then we’ll use the Totems, of which I am one, to force her to. Then we’ll be dealing with an angry goddess.”

  “But if we win our case and get our wishes granted, will it matter?”

  “Yes, because we will not be able to safely release her. It will be like letting a bomb detonate. Hell has no fury, etc.”

  “Thank you,” Feline said. The gorgon made a final flirt of her skirt that came yea close to freaking out the males, then faded.

  “Now we know,” Zed said as he cracked his eyeballs loose first left, then right. The other males were no better off.

  “I believe her,” Quin said. “We’re in for mischief.”

  “I’ll try to talk her into cooperating,” Hapless said. “Maybe she’ll listen to reason.”

  The others burst out laughing. “She’s a goddess,” Feline said. “Why would she bother with reason?”

  It seemed he had, as usual, said something foolish. Which made him wonder, for the Nth time, why he had been selected for this Quest. He was probably the least capable, physically and mentally, of them all.

  Merge picked up on his mood. “There’s just something about you,” she murmured.

  “Yes,” Myst agreed.

  And what could that possibly be?

  They resumed their trek. Now the path slanted upward. It did not emerge from the roof of the comic strip, if there was a roof; the height seemed not to matter. They rose above the rest of the strip like a coaster-roller ride, heading into the sky.

  “Look!” Myst cried. “A castle!”

  They looked, and it was true: in the sky ahead was a magnificent castle with turrets and pennants galore, a lovely sight. Its foundation was lost in dark mist, but its pinnacles were bathed in golden sunshine.

  “There was no castle here when we entered the comic strip,” Zed said. “It has to be illusion.”

  “It’s Isis’s castle,” Myst said. “I love it!”

  Hapless remembered something. “Caution,” he murmured. “Remember our practice with illusion. Look, but do not indicate that anything is amiss.”

  Then he and the others made mental snapshots of the castle. The result was amazing. It was a crude wooden structure with a tin roof, sitting on the ground. Nothing at all fancy.

&n
bsp; But the illusion made it a glorious multi-tiered edifice floating in the sky.

  “Your faces,” Merge said. “You are seeing something I am not.”

  “We’d better pause here,” Hapless told the others. Then he brought Merge and Myst into a close huddle. “You did not get practice nullifying illusion. I think you need to learn it now. Simply concentrate on making a snapshot of what you are looking at, freezing it in place. That will make a still picture without the illusion. Only what’s physically there.”

  They tried, and tried again. Then the child got it. “It’s wood!”

  “Yes. Wood enhanced by illusion. That must be so that we won’t try to enter the castle and fall right through it; there needs to be something to touch.”

  Merge tried again, and again. Then at last she got it. “Oh, my!”

  “We will pretend we see only the castle,” Hapless said. “Since it is obviously fashioned for our benefit. But we will also know the reality. That may make a difference, if things get difficult.”

  “Such as if we see a smoky dragon charging us,” Zed said. “And it’s really just a broomstick.”

  “So we don’t jump out of the path and lose our protection,” Feline said.

  Merge nodded. “Thank you for the warning. I would have jumped.”

  “Yes,” Hapless said. “She will maintain the illusion as long as it seems to be fooling us, and we’ll maintain the semblance of being fooled as long as we can.”

  “And you thought there wasn’t a reason for you to lead the Quest?” Feline asked. “You’re the one who figured out the snapshot technique.”

  Hapless shrugged. “Lucky guess.”

  “Maybe.”

  They went on, openly admiring the castle. “The goddess must be really good with magic, to make such a castle,” Myst said brightly.

  The castle loomed close, just as impressive as it was from a distance. The front entrance was (seemingly) solid stone, with a massive glass door in which they could see their reflections. As illusions went, it was impressive, because it meant it was interacting with them instead of being fixed in place.