Graduation Under Fire: Part Two

Originally posted on Tales of the Parodyverse.

Characters in this story are owned either by myself, or other posters on
the Board.

They left the port of Nubil the following afternoon.

There had been a couple of delays. First, Miss Canterbury had insisted on certain supplies being purchased - mostly items like soap, flannels, blankets and somewhat better food - that the platoon quartermaster was rather reluctant to supply. She had also insisted on the girls being unchained.

Most of the time was taken up in arguing her case. Unexpectedly, she was supported by Captain Fleischer, who noted that (a) he had put her in charge of the girls, (b) there were not that many places for them to escape to in the jungle that did not involve the inside of one of the local carnivores and (c) personal hygiene was important. The latter comment was made with a rather stern look at his adjutant, as his troops were clearly none too clean themselves.

The shopping expedition was surprisingly swift - the previously surly traders suddenly seemed only too eager to serve this Englishwoman, flanked by the forbidding German Captain and her somewhat aloof maid. The soap was barely better than the bars used to scrub floors, and the food was hardly the quality she would have liked, but it was all better than nothing.

The second delay was caused by Dr Kleinverstand, who had been trying to arrange some native guides and porters. There were none to be found. The locals were not only reluctant to talk about the jungle, they flat refused to go anywhere near it, and no amount of persuasion, bribery or threat was sufficient to encourage them. It took some time for Captain Fleischer, who appeared to be the voice of reason, to dissuade him from further attempts.

At last, they were off.

In some ways, the jungle was a relief after the brooding decay of the port. True, forcing your way through the trees and undergrowth was harder than walking the streets, and the night accommodations were far from conformable, but at least the jungle felt alive. The jungle seemed well supplied with game trails, and they appeared to be making good time.

Miss Canterbury was becoming something of a connoisseur of jungles. At least this time she did not have to deal with the sadistic Wertham and the alien Expiditer. Oddly, she smiled at the memory. That little adventure had been a group of Nazis searching for powerful secrets as well.

For the first afternoon's travel, the Captain and the Doctor took the lead with a handful of soldiers to do the hacking. She followed with her maid and the girls; and the remainder of the soldiers brought up the rear.

They made camp in a small clearing, not far from the river. Dr Kleinverstand seemed in high spirits now that he was on his way. Captain Fleischer seemed indifferent. The troops seemed nervous - it was evident that they were not as well-trained as the troops she had encountered in her previous adventures, and they were certainly not prepared for the jungle.

The girls, on the other hand, seemed to be resigned to their fate. Her maid, aloof and silent as always, circulated amongst them, distributing soap and towels for the evening wash. She noted with amusement that, after a few acid comments from the Captain, some of the troops were washing as well.

She slept in the same tent as her charges. Her intention was to protect them against any soldiers with... amorous... designs, although she had no idea how she would manage that. It turned out that she didn't need to.

Early the following morning she woke to the sound of her maid preparing breakfast. Leaving the tent, she found the Captain asleep against the front pole, her maid's blanket draped over him. Both the captain and the blanket were slightly damp from the early morning mist.

"Thank you."

"For what?" asked Captain Fleischer, as they tramped through the forest.

"Guarding us last night."

The Captain gave a short laugh. "I am very well aware of the disposition of my troops." he said. "The dregs of the German army, led by a commander with... unpopular... views, to escort a scholar whose theories are considered unsound even by our current intellectual... elite."

He paused, noting the look on her face.

"Not all of us are bloody-minded butchers, goose-stepping across the pages of history, Miss Canterbury."

That evening, the Captain joined them for the evening meal, noting that their cooking was probably better than the troops. Having seen the stores, Miss Canterbury was inclined to agree. Her maid silently filled an extra bowl and handed it to him.

They are in silence. Eventually, Miss Canterbury put her bowl to one side.

"You are not exactly what I expected, Captain."

"The middle of the war is not where you would expect to find a Gentleman, Miss Canterbury." he responded.

She smiled, thinking of Mumphrey.

"She had the same smile, too." he said somewhat wistfully, startling her from her reverie.

"I beg you pardon?"

"I was once engaged to a woman such as yourself. I devoted my life to her. She left me when I received this." - he indicated the scar across his face - "A little accident during my training."

Miss Canterbury remained silent. There was not really very much she could say. The Captain stared into the campfire.

"So I devoted myself to my country instead. And now it is being led by a lunatic advised by bigger lunatics. All I can do is wrap what little honour I have left about me, follow my orders, and wish for a better day."

The Captain watched as the maid collected the bowls.

"She doesn't say much, does she?"

They travelled for four more days, always to the north, always following the river. The jungle grew thicker and more oppressive, the clearings seemed darker and darker, and the animal calls at night became stranger and stranger.

On the afternoon of the sixth day they found the temple.

Dr Kleinverstand spent the bulk of the afternoon scrambling over the temple. The troops made camp at the bottom of the ziggurat. They also, at the Doctors orders, constructed a crude stockade where the girls, over Miss Canterbury's protests, were penned.

In the evening, the Doctor joined them around the campfire, his usual sneer twisted into a ghastly grimace of success.

"This is the place." he declared. "The measurements are right, the orientation is right and it matches the description."

"And, of course, vast stone pyramids are so common in the area." commented Captain Fleischer ironically.

"Ah, my sceptical Captain. Tonight, I will perform the ceremony to summon the Aryan gods from the stars. I will be their new High Priest, and all their power will be mine! I will have my revenge on all the petty little intellectuals that mocked my studies!"

Miss Canterbury rolled her eyes heavenwards. Then froze.

"You need further proof? Look to the sky!"

The Captain looked up. The moon shone with a livid, unholy light. The familiar constellations had been replaced by gross splotches of light, wheeling in their orbits, a mockery of the stars.

Nobody noticed the maid staring at the Doctor, her eyes blazing.

The soldiers were lined up on the top of the temple, in two sets of ranks, one each side of the altar. In the unnatural light and shadow they took on an aspect more sinister than the decaying statues.

Down near the stockade, Dr Kleinverstand was preparing to pick his first sacrifice. With something of a heavy heart, Miss Canterbury realised that Mumphrey was not going to make it this time, and it was really up to her.

The Doctor approached the stockade, flanked by two soldiers. Miss Canterbury was preparing to place herself in the way, when she realised that her maid was already standing there.

"Ah. A volunteer." said the Doctor. "Take her."

Before Miss Canterbury could get over her surprise, the two soldiers had grabbed the maid, and started dragging her up the stone stairs to the altar, with Dr Kleinverstand leading the way.

She started towards the temple, but was stopped by the Captain.

"What are you doing?" she hissed. "That's my maid he is planning to sacrifice!"

"As I observed before, she is no more your maid than I am." he replied. "That fool of a Doctor may not have worked out where we are, but I have."

From the top of the Temple, the sound of chanting could be heard as the Doctor began the ceremony.

Atop the temple, Dr Kleinverstand intoned the syllables of the ritual of summoning. Beside him, the maid lay on the altar, struggling with the two soldiers who held her by the wrists and ankles.

If he had been a little less intent on the ritual, he would have noticed that the maid wasn't screaming.

She was chanting.

The Captain started to unlock the stockade. As he did so, he tried to explain what he thought was going on.

"Your so-called maid was seen in the company of an older woman near where the Doctor was holding his little sacrifices. The guards thought she had been freed by the woman, but it is equally possible that they were talking to the girls."

"The same way the Doctor was trying to question the locals." commented Miss Canterbury.

"Exactly. The locals, who are barely co-operative with us despite threat or persuasion suddenly bring out their best wares when she accompanies us."

He looked up at Miss Canterbury to make sure the points were going home.

"Finally, we have this temple. A long esoteric document trail to attract the wrong sort of Scholar; a supposedly hidden temple that is only a weeks travel into the jungle, following a fairly distinct river, and with regular clearings along the way..."

The stockade gate finally opened.

"This is just the business end of a very elegant trap."

At this point, the chanting from the temple reached a crescendo. Then the screaming started.

"Miss Canterbury. If you follow the river back, you may be able to take these girls back to civilisation. Take this..." he said, drawing his gun.

"Hold it right there, you bounder!"

The maid was no longer held prone on the altar. The remains of the soldiers holding her down were distributed across the top of the temple. The other soldiers were running from the stairs, trying to outdistance the spreading wave of protoplasm that was sweeping across the stonework. It was evident that they were not going to make it. The protoplasm washed over them, scouring the stonework clean as it descended.

Dr Kleinverstand wasn't fleeing. This was less to do with bravery, and more to do with the fact that his legs were mired in the protoplasmic slime that was slowly seeping up his body.

The maid sat on the altar, calmly watching until the slime had totally covered him. Then she stood, pointed, and said a single word in a language that was ancient when the universe began.

It was the last thing that Dr Kleinverstand ever heard.

Captain Fleischer looked at the newcomer.

"This, I take it, is Him?" he asked Miss Canterbury.

She nodded. The Captain smiled like one seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, and offered his gun to Mumphrey.

"Sir Wilton, I offer my honourable surrender." he said.

There was a moment of stunned silence.

"I do read the intelligence reports, you know." he said, a trifle petulantly.

It was at this point that the protoplasm flowed down from the temple and across the campsite. It divided as it passed the trio, and rejoined as it swept through the stockade. Where it passed, only the chains and stockade bars remained.

The maid strode down the temple stairs towards them. She pointed at the Captain, and spoke a phrase in the same language she had used on the temple.

"No."

Everyone except Mumphrey looked round. Just coming out of the jungle was an old woman, leaning heavily on an ornate staff.

"He has many good qualities, but his place is here."

I concur, burbled the protoplasm surrounding them. The one called Wilton has a prior claim.

"Perhaps introductions are in order." said Mumphrey. "May I present Bridgit of the Briganties, High Priestess of the Kabuki Shoggoth. I'm afraid I don't know your charming young companion..."

"Ebony, currently of nowhere. My replacement." supplied Bridgit.

"...and of course, the Kabuki Shoggoth itself."

Charmed.

"And this is Captain Fleischer, soon to be late of the German Army." said Miss Canterbury. "Now take accept his surrender so we can get on with things."

The gun was duly accepted.

"Now," said Mumphrey, "all we have to do is work out a way of getting the three of us back to Blighty without either side noticing and asking awkward questions."

Simplicity itself, bubbled the Kabuki Shoggoth, as it expanded its biomass.

"No, not that wa..." began Mumphrey, somewhat too late.

The creature expanded across the clearing, removing all traces of the campsite and the stockade, then shrank down to nothing.

The clearing was empty once more.

Epilogue the first: The Wedding

It was two years after the war when the most scandalous wedding in the area took place. The grounds of Wilton Hall were turned over to a party in defiance of the post-war austerity. The village gossips had much to discuss. After all, the couple were from completely different classes.

The bride was radiant; the groom so pale that his scar was almost invisible.

After all, it was not every day that the daughter of the area's most notorious poacher married the Lord of the Manor's Gamekeeper.

Epilogue the second: The welcoming

Ebony could barely conceal her excitement and nerves. The new priestesses robe still chafed her shoulders, the chain of her amulet rubbed against her neck and the amulet itself was still cold from its forging.

Before her on the sand lay six black female figures in ragged clothes, and a handful of white figures in the remains of black uniforms, ragged where the insignia had been ripped away.

One of the figures began to stir.

Ready? asked the Amulet.

"Ready." she replied.

Epilogue the third: The Temple

The jungle clearing was illuminated by the full moon. The bulk of the clearing was occupied by a truncated stone pyramid, atop which crouched a crude altar, stained dark with the blood of uncounted victims.

Across the altar lay a headless corpse. The jungle conditions were already taking their toll - scavengers had picked over the body, and it was already beginning to decay. Soon, nothing would be left but the bones, and even these would disappear. In this place, only stone survived, and then only at a cost.

In the depths of Nubilia, the temple brooded, waiting for its next victim.