To Keep the World Turning

Leif Ericsson

A grateful tribute to the memory of Sir Terry Pratchett who brought laughter and light to round and flat worlds alike. Walk easy, Sir Terry, wherever the next journey takes you.

The question "can a turtle cry?" is a subject of long-standing philosophical debate, a question which often seems on the verge of being answered until some very clever person postulates that the drop of water in question is probably just left over from the sea. Then, after thoroughly drying the turtle, its generally stoic expression, far from showing signs of sorrow, would probably best be described as "annoyed." This has led to the interesting hypothesis that, if turtles do cry, it is quite probable they only do so while underwater. Perhaps that is the only place they feel safe enough to weep.

On the Discworld, this philosophical query takes on a scientific dimension as some of the more educated and idle residents use their leisure time to wonder in the still hours of the evening that surround bustling cocktail parties: if Great A'Tuin, the World Turtle who carries the Disc through Space, were to cry which direction would those tears fall? Some suggest the tears would fall down as tears generally do, following the natural courses on the face (if turtles, indeed, have natural courses for tears), but others roundly dismiss this hypothesis, observing (in the tones of people who have had entirely more education than is good for them) that the act of falling down only pertains to systems bound by laws of gravity and, thus, in the vacuum of space, the tears must "fall" (if that is the term you must use, misleading though it is) towards the highest center of mass. Would this, then, be the Great Turtle herself or perhaps the nearest of the four World Elephants atop her shell? Or would it be the Discworld, slowly spinning atop the four Elephants? Sometimes these very enthusiastic speakers begin drawing diagrams by which point the curiosity of their audience has long since dissipated, often in direct correspondence to the amount of wine left in the bottles at the dinner party. So far, the only solution reliably found to make these intellectuals shut up is the desperate act of suggesting charades.^1 Thus all advances toward contemplating one of the greatest natural disasters facing the Disc and its residents are routinely silenced.

It was a dark and stormy day. The wind blew off the mountains, driving the rain in slanting curtains too thick to see more than a few inches in front of one's face. No living creature stirred far in the forests: they did what every screaming intuition told them to do and cowered down as if they too remembered myths of rising water and a flood that covered the world. In many ways, they were more intelligent than humans like that.

The humans themselves were moving around in the village, checking roofs and bracing windows, overseen personally by the king who was walking around attempting to read instructions from the sodden pages of some book to peasants who knew perfectly well what they were doing but listened politely anyway. He was the king, after all, and it was always nice to make kings feel important.

Granny Weatherwax's mind ceased roaming and returned to her body. Slowly, carefully, she sat up, bones creaking with more pain than she would have dared show if she thought someone were watching. As she stood (slowly, carefully) to her feet, assuming her full hatless height, she placed the card she had been holding on the small table beside her bed, face down. In the privacy of her own mind, she pondered how long she had until the sign's proud statement ceased to be true. Out loud, to the empty room of her small cottage, she declared in a strong voice:

"I ate'nt dead."

There, she thought and she put on the kettle.

While she waited for the tea, she stepped outside, her black hat now firmly in place, stood on the solid ground of her mountains in the Ramtops, and watched the rain fall. Down below, she could practically hear the prayers of the Lancre people rising up towards the heavens, asking for mercy from whichever deity happened to be listening.

Granny did not hold with "loving gods." "Loving gods," as far as she was concerned, would pat you on the back and smile nicely as they held your head underwater and waited for the bubbles to stop. You never knew where you were with "loving gods," but Vengeful Gods, on the other hand, were always clear. There were laws, often written in literal stone and when you broke those laws, you knew what was coming: fire and some kind of stone for whatever reason. You always knew what foot you were on with Vengeful Gods.

Granny Weatherwax always knew exactly what foot she was on: both of them, directly under her, and shod in iron-rimmed boots. She didn't understand people who took the time to wonder. And, precisely because she always knew where her feet were, she could feel what others could not. Beneath her feet, the ground trembled, hardly perceptible to those looking up at the rain. But Granny felt it.

In the rain, on the trembling ground, Granny steamed as the water fell on her black cloak and pointed hat, and she thought.

At the Unseen University in Ankh-Morpork, the wizards were whimpering. Many of them had even decided to follow the safety instructions A.E. Pessimal recently required to be posted throughout the University in case of accident, a task the Health and Safety Officer, Professor Rincewind, took to heart with his usual enthusiasm. As a result, the regulations read as follows:

In case of fire – Run
In case of flooding – Run
In case of tourist – Run
In case tourist has a man-eating trunk on legs – Run faster
In case you are being chased by samurai, ninjas, aborigines, drop-bears, power-hungry wizards, ancient barbarians, Death, or Fate – Run without stopping, ever
In case of an inter-dimensional rift in the time-space continuum unleashing untold demons from a hitherto unimagined dungeon dimension – crawl under a desk, put your hands over your eyes, and swear continually because running away will only prolong the business^2

This last instruction was currently being taken to heart by many of the UU wizards, including members of the faculty, although they were mainly hiding under tables in the great hall with several plates in front of them. It was a conviction felt by many that it was only a matter of time before an inter-dimensional portal opened and, for the present, they may as well eat to comfort themselves in the face of imminent destruction.

Exactly what form this destruction would take remained unclear, but the wizards had learned from their various tinkerings with the fabric of reality to recognize when reality was snapping back like a very large elastic band with teeth, only nothing like that at all. Besides, the spontaneous transformation of students into students which could only generously be called "solid states of matter" was a definite indication of shifting thaumic energies. And that incessant humming whining through the air was enough to drive any person mad, although that turned out to be coming from the Bursar.

Only Archchancellor Mustrum Ridcully remained above the mass hysteria with his generally calm demeanor.

"Bursar! Will you stop that damned humming!" He shouted, lifting the small and happily smiling wizard from where he was cheerfully quivering in a corner. "Have! you! seen! Mister! Stibbons?" He shouted directly into the Bursar's ear in the way of people who think shouting a lot and heavily emphasizing their words will help deaf people understand them. In the case of the Bursar, this proved even less effective because although it was assumed his ears worked fine, no one (possibly even the Bursar himself) was quite sure what he was listening to.

He beamed at the Archchancellor. "Isn't this a fun merry-go-round? Like the impy ones when I was a kipper. Look! All the funny little fishes twirl so pretty." The Bursar grinned at whatever Dried Frog Pill induced dream was currently swimming over him.^3

Ridcully dropped the crazed wizard unceremoniously. "Useless," he huffed, stomping away. "Stibbons! Gods damn the man. Only vaguely useful bugger in the lot and he's the only one impossible to find. Stibbons!"

"Over here, Archchancellor!" Ponder Stibbons waved a pale arm from around the next corner. "I was just checking up on the Library, you see. The books are going, er, well, they aren't behaving, or, um, perhaps I should say, they are behaving, if you see what I mean, Archchancellor?" Ridcully strode ahead, forcing Stibbons to nearly jog in order to keep up.

"What? Aren't they sitting on the shelves?"

"Well, as a matter of fact, sir, no, they aren't."

"So they're on the floor, are they? Damned bad place for them to be in this weather."

"No, not exactly there either, Archchancellor. They're more, sort of, flying, sir."

"Flying, Mr. Stibbons?"

"Yes, sir."

"In a magical Library?"

"Yes, sir."

"Seems perfectly logical place for them to be, then, doesn't it? Good thing we've got chains on them, eh?"

"Well, most of them, sir. A few books are just, er, winging around the library."

"Oh? And which books are those?"

"Well, it's hard to say, sir: they won't exactly hold still long enough to read, but I think I saw one about the color magic is."

"Ah," said Ridcully, nodding wisely. "Octarine, of course."

"Yes, well, there might have been another about witches, you know, wyrd sisters, some say, sir?"

"All sisters are weird, Stibbons. Comes of being women, man!"

"Er, yes, sir. Anyways, there were several others as well, all just kind of flyingaround the Library but the strangest thing was the Librarian didn't seem to know where they were from."

"Really?"

"No, sir."

"You asked him this?"

"Well, not exactly, sir. It was hard to ask him much of anything as he was swinging between the shelves trying to grab books out of the air. At one point, he was hanging upside-down tom the ceiling, trying to catch one particularly sneaky volume. I did ask him what the books were doing off the shelves."

"And what did he say?"

"He said 'Eek!' sir."

Ridcully nodded in understanding. The Librarian might be an orangutan, but he was a wizard first. "Poor old chap. And did he have a theory as to how these interlopers made their way into our Library?"

"He did, sir. He seemed to think they got in through L-Space, a phenomenon peculiar to Libraries, that, because of the build up of magical confluences surrounding the books and the transient nature of knowledge itself, means there's a sort of spillover from one Library to another making it possible for books or sometimes people to traverse the gaps between space and sometimes realities. I have often wanted to research this effect in more detail, if the University would see its way toward–"

"Yes, now really is not the time, Mr. Stibbons."

"Ah, yes, sir. Er, where are we going, Archchancellor?"

"To speak with your thinking engine, Mr. Stibbons. See if it knows what the bloody hell is going on here."

In her house in Lancre, Nanny Ogg, witch, was weathering the storm the only way she knew how: with many drinks and allowing herself to be carried away in a rhapsody of song.

After several choruses of "The Hedgehog Can Never Be Buggered At All" and a few lines of "A Wizard's Staff has a Knob on the End," Nanny began to feel warmly weary, in that happy alcohol induced state where everything wrong with the world seems to have finally given up and allowed itself to click neatly into place with all the good. And there was a lot of good, from Nanny's perspective. Everything she had ever wanted and loved was stretched neatly out around her, in a relatively small area of country with fifteen children, more grandchildren than she could count (which wasn't, actually, that high to begin with), the graves of three husbands, and several sufficiently cowed daughters-in-law to tidy up the house whenever she fancied.

Yes, she sighed, collapsing heavily into her armchair and putting her feet up. Life can't get much better than this. Her tomcat, Greebo, with a scarred face and ragged ears only Nanny could love, hopped up into her lap and, purring loudly to let her know he was there (as if the smell wasn't warning enough), began prodding and poking her ample lap with his sharp claws. He turned around several times before finally deigning to settle himself and curl up for a nap. Nanny decided this was an excellent idea and, after taking one more swig from her flask, closed her eyes.

Abruptly, she became aware of a distant tapping, as of someone sharply rapping, rapping at her door.

For a moment, the maiden of her youth briefly hoped some handsome man were at that moment standing in the rain and knocking at her door, carried away in an ecstasy of passion. It had happened once or twice before, although not in a long while. As she reflected on those previous episodes further, she realized her present age would probably require moving the action inside, preferably into a comfortable bed, which would rather detract from the spontaneous excitement of those encounters.

"Who is it?" She cooed.

"Me," snapped a voice from the storm, perfectly in sync with a flash of lightning. Briefly, the shadow of a tall pointed hat perched atop a lean face with an angular nose floated across Nanny's floor. In the roar of thunder that followed, Nanny rose, spilling an affronted Greebo to the carpet, and picked up her broom. With a slight sigh of regret, she walked to the door. The nap would have to wait.

She opened wide the door and smiled broadly.

"Good evenin', Esme!" She said.

Susan Sto Helit sat up in bed. This, in itself, was not strange. Sitting up in bed was a daily occurrence: generally, it was the first thing she did in the morning. It was, in many ways, the most normal thing about her, one of the few things that kept her human and prevented her from drifting off into the abyss of Them. Some mornings, she had to concentrate in order to make sure she sat up, put her feet on the floor, and walked before finding herself in the kitchen, but she always managed it and feared the day when she would confuse the order.

But this time, it was not morning. Beside her, in the deeps of night, Lobsang Ludd stirred, her sudden movement disrupting the waves of his sleep. As he rose to consciousness, his hand reached out to her and his fingertips, gently brushing her arm, were warm, solid, and, above all, real.

Outside, the rain came down. The earth shook and she felt the change as keenly as if she were on a rocking ship.

"Oh, no." She said aloud. "Not again."

"Damn the man!" Vimes exclaimed loudly as he strode quickly up the steps of the Palace. "Doesn't he know we have work to do?"

"Yes, sir," said Captain Carrot cheerfully beside him. "I think that's why he called us in."

Vimes looked at Carrot sharply, once again searching for some hint that Carrot's comment should be taken as reproach against the Patrician, but, as always, the large man's simple, honest expression betrayed nothing. He sighed.

"The whole damn city is about to be underwater and he has us come running in to satisfy his whims. Damn him! Damn him, damn him!"

One of the clerks they passed gave Vimes the pointed look of a man used to giving bad news from above carefully lowered spectacles, but Vimes did not have time to stop and tell the man just what he thought of him either as he and Carrot approached the Oblong Office. Carrot knocked, and the two watchmen entered the room as the Patrician's clerk, Drumknott, swung the door open. They stepped into the center of the room, snapped off salutes, and stood to attention, Vimes deliberately fixing his eyes exactly three inches above the Patrician's head.

Lord Vetinari stared intently at a piece of paper in front of him for a few moments longer, sighed expressively, set it down, scribbled a signature on the bottom, and then looked up, almost, but not quite, as if he were surprised to find the Commander of the Ankh Morpork City Watch and one of its captains standing in front of him. Carefully, he folded his hands in front of his beak-like nose and stared over his desk at the two officers.

"Ah, gentlemen. I trust I find you in good temper?"

Vimes remained silent. Beside him, Carrot cheerfully replied:

"Yes, sir!"

"Oh good. Now then, Commander Vimes, how are your men weathering this storm?"

"Men and women, sir. All working hard to keep the city dry."

"I see. And the good citizens of our fair city? How are they managing?"

"Most of them the same way they always have, sir: content to walk through whatever muck the River Ankh bring 'em."

"I see. And what about the water getting into homes, Vimes? What are you doing about that?"

"Some of the lads with Constable Dorfl and Sergeant Detritus are trolling and goleming an array of pumps to direct water out of the city sir. I've also sent Captain Angua to personally oversee evacuations in the Shades while Sergeant Colon prepares Pseudopolis Yard to take in refugees. Lady Sybil is also throwing open the doors of Scoone Avenue for all the unfortunate, downtrodden souls of the city... sir."

"Impressive, Vimes. Now, what are you doing about the rain?"

"Sir?" Vimes actually blinked, his normally wooden face cracking in surprise.

"The rain, Vimes. It is coming from somewhere and I wish it stop before the River Ankh rises over our heads."

"No particularly great concern there, sir. We could just stand on it as it comes up." He hesitated as he thought about was in the River. "Not that I would want to."

"Indeed, Commander. Nevertheless, I would rather keep my city as above water as possible and therefore I have a mission for the Duke of Ankh to fulfill in this time of crisis."

"Sir, the place of the Commander of the Watch is with the City during times of–"

"But the place of the Duke of Ankh is wherever I, as the Patrician of the City, see fit to send him, is it not? In any event, this mission will not require you to leave the city limits." He paused deliberately. "At least, I do not think it will."

"Ah," said Captain Carrot. "And I suppose this mission involves those two women, sir?"

"What?" For the first time, Vimes looked around, his eyes lighting on two elderly witches (you could tell from the pointy hats and black clothes) standing in a shadowy corner. Except… there were no corners in the Oblong Office. That was, after all, the entire point of the name, and yet there was no other word to describe the triangle of space that folded around the women. It was as if they needed a place to be inconspicuous and the universe, rather sheepishly, obliged.

Damn magic, Vimes vehemently thought as the corner dissolved back into curved wall. One of the witches, a squat, round one with red cheeks, winked at him.

"You are to escort these two ladies to the Unseen University," said the Patrician, "and, once there, do what you can to discover the source of this very inconvenient weather."

"You don't need me for that," Vimes objected. "You have other ways of communicating with the University."

"Unfortunately, it appears the wizards are not answering their clacks. I have attempted to send other… messengers, but they have either not come back or returned in forms one would hesitate to call 'human.' I trust, however, that the wizards would think twice before attempting to transfigure or otherwise alter the semblance of the famous Duke of Ankh."

"In my experience, wizards rarely think once," Vimes scowled, "but why should I escort these two…" (he hesitated as he once again looked at the black cloaks and pointed hats) "ladies?"

"I am not certain at this point if the wizards are themselves transfiguring my messengers or if it is the result of some occult accident. Either way, your presence as Commander of the City Watch would help ease tensions considerably and make sure that any arguments are handled peaceably without risk to anyone's safety."

The tall witch snorted. "Their safety, you mean."

Amazed, Vimes watched the Patrician's normally implacable expression freeze as if consciously trying not to wince.

"That may be, Madam Weatherwax–"

"Mistress!" Granny snapped. "I wasn't born to be a madam, no one can ever say I was."

"Indeed, they could not." Even the Great Nef, an arid desert renowned for its negative rainfall, envied the dryness of the Patrician's voice. "Nevertheless, the presence of the Commander of the City Watch will ensure peaceful cooperation on both sides."

Vimes, rather stunned but also thoroughly enjoying this turn of conversation, inquired: "So you two are witches, yes?"

"That we are, boyo," winked the round witch. Her face resembled an apple with teeth stuck in. "Whatever gave us away?"

"And you came to the city to see the wizards?"

Granny sniffed.

"That's right," said Nanny Ogg.

"And yet you came to see the Patrician first?"

"Well, no, not exactly–"

"Gytha Ogg, we agreed I should do the talking!"

"Sorry, Esme."

"You mean to say," continued Vimes, "that you tried to get in to see the wizards? And they turned you away?"

"Nothing of the sort," said Granny. "They just wasn't home is all. No one turns away a witch."

"That's true, that is," cooed Nanny, "no one ever turned me away, that's sure."

"Gytha!"

"Yes, Esme." Despite Nanny Ogg's sufficiently quelled tone, she still winked at Vimes in a way that made him incredibly grateful to be married.

Vetinari cleared his throat. "If we could return to the matter at hand. Commander, I require you to escort these two… ladies. You will find my coach already waiting outside. Captain, I trust you will take charge of the Watch while Commander Vimes is occupied." He raised an eyebrow.

"Yes, sir! I shall faithfully do my duty to the city to the best of my ability," Carrot said as if reciting, which he probably was, Vimes reflected. Carrot had memorized many patriotic nonsense books, no other person would have even thought to look at, like they were scripture.

"Excellent, captain. You are dismissed."

Carrot saluted, turned on his heel, and strode out of the office. The Patrician turned to Vimes as if surprised to still find him there.

"I am sorry, Commander. Did you require anything else?"

"No, sir."

"Do not let me detain you then," said Vetinari, looking back down at the papers on his desk.

"Oh, we shan't do that," said Granny, emphatically. "Woul'n't want to inte'fere where we're not needed." She sniffed and pulled her cloak tight about her.

Vetinari's shoulders stiffened. Slowly, he looked back up. "I am sorry, Mad… Mistress Weatherwax. Can I help you further?"

"No," said Granny. "I do believe that's all we needs from you." And she stalked out of the Oblong Office like a tower on legs, Vimes' eyes following her, fascinated, until she was out of sight.

Nanny Ogg sighed behind him. "That's Esme," she said. "Always needs the last word."

Vimes turned back to look at Vetinari then quickly exited, Nanny Ogg following him closely, moving quickly on her plump legs. Even Drumknott followed them out, sedately, but quickly, closing the doors behind them.

Left alone inside the Oblong Office, the Patrician picked up that day's newspaper and turned to the crossword.

"Ah," he said, carefully looking over the clues. "A mistake already. Good."

And his pen slashed down.

Inside the carriage, Vimes sat opposite the two witches and looked them over with the eyes of a policeman.

Gytha Ogg did not require much scrutiny. Her entire appearance was like a one-page book left open under a magnifying glass with footnotes pointing to an entire library packed with scandalous marriages, assignations, dalliances, and one-time encounters. She opened a bag of nuts and entertained herself with cracking them while humming off-key. Vimes had the distinct impression he did not want to know the words.

The other one, Esme Weatherwax, was harder to read in some ways. Whereas Nanny Ogg's eyes were always moving, cheerfully meandering about, glancing over everything, but not apparently taking much notice, Granny always stared straight ahead and saw everything. The very way she held her lean frame made her look like she were forged of steel, but her eyes, on the other hand, were a piercing blue eyes as cold as the heights of the mountain.

And yet, for Vimes, looking at her was almost like looking in a mirror. Here was a woman who did what was right not because it was easy, but because it was hard. Like him, she knew the way to really hurt people, lots of people, but would never let herself do it because it was too easy, because that was how you became something that wasn't exactly human anymore and was even worse than a beast. That was how you became a monster. Instead, you learned when to hurt in order to keep other people safe.

He also knew that she wasn't the sort to fight fair, that she did what was necessary to win because losing wasn't an option. If she'd been at Treacle Mine Road that day, she would have suggested putting the grandmothers on top of the barricade to shout down at the attacking soldiers, just as he'd done. It wasn't really right or fair, but you couldn't argue with the results. Soldiers who put down their arms because their grandmother rebuked them was far better than fighting a messy battle.

Her eyes turned slightly, just enough to meet his own, and they stared at one another, each one reflecting on the other, and Vimes realized there was a key difference as well. Even sitting next to Nanny Ogg, her best friend in all the world, she was alone. He remembered being alone like that, so alone he didn't even realize it. He wore the night like a cloak and rambled the streets expecting to die there and never thought about the cold heart curled up inside his chest. Of course, the drink had helped him whenever his heart did let out a faint whimper, but he knew that would never do for her. She let nothing touch or influence her mind. She allowed herself to feel everything.

He took out the silver cigar case Sybil had given him and flipped it open.

"Don't mind if I smoke, do you?" He asked, lighting a cigar.

"No, not at all!" Beamed Nanny. She produced a pipe from somewhere in the folds of her clothes and eagerly began smoking away.

Granny glared at Nanny, then at Vimes. "Things'll kill you, I've always said so."

"Oh, no they won't," grinned Nanny behind her pipe. "A little smoke is good for the lungs."

"Look at you, Gytha Ogg," exclaimed Granny. "Whole world underwater and you acts like you're on vacation."

"I am, Esme! I ain't home, am I? Stands to reason I'm on vacation, then."

"So," said Vimes, exhaling smoke, "off to see the wizards, are we?"

"Oh yes," said Nanny expansively. "Big mission, we have."

"And this is about stopping the rain, is it?"

"That's right."

"And how do you propose to do that?"

"Well–"

"We won't knows 'til we gets there, young man," Granny cut in. "I knows there's someit bad 'bout this weather, I can feels it in my bones. And we have this same storm way off in Lancre. It's everywhere we saws as we flew 'ere and I don't like it. But marks my words: where there's trouble, wizards'll knows what done it."

Vimes felt where there had once been a scar over his eye. "That's one point we can agree on," he said, "often because they caused it, right?"

Granny smiled unpleasantly. "Whatever they done, witches'll put it right."

At the entrance to Unseen University, the gates were (quite visibly) closed. Granny stared at them and pursed her lips tightly in a way Nanny Ogg had learned to recognize. Nanny took a step back. Vimes, stomped up behind the witches, water sloshing over and through his boots, looked up at the gates, and scowled.

"What ya reckon? They still not home?" He asked Granny.

"Possibly," she said. "Or possibly they needs learnin' in how to open doors for poor old ladies."

This said, she strode up to the gates, her black cloak like living shadow following slightly behind, then, raising her hands, she shouted to the very heights of the Tower of Art:

"Open up in there, you bleedin', stuffy buggers!"

The echo of her powerfully shrill voice carried and reverberated from seemingly every part of the University, for a moment drowning out even the sound of the rain. The gates, however, remained resolutely closed.

Nanny Ogg shook her head. "Now, Esme, that's just what you done the last time."

"No it ain't," said Granny. "I used different words this time."

"Lot o' good that did," Nanny coughed.

"I'm sorry, did you speak, Gytha Ogg? Seems I couldn't hear you on account of that terrible cough you have there."

"Sorry Esme, but look, doors still shut and what good did yer shoutin' do?"

"It made me feel better," Granny said bitterly, rain streaming from the brim of her hat.

Vimes stepped forward, earnestly wishing it were dry enough to smoke, and walked over to the towering gates.

"Don't you bother," said Granny. "Seems the wizards would rather doom the world than open their doors to a witch."

Nanny grinned. "Yeah, thems plenty proud is wizards. I've always said wizards would get in trouble being as they's so proud. Rather see the end of the world than risk letting someone else open a pair of doors, they would."

Granny ignored this comment while Vimes inspected a little alcove beside the gates.

"Tell me," he called back to them. "In the country, how do you ask people to let you in?"

Granny stiffened. "We don't ask, Sir Commander of the Watch," she spat each syllable of his title with a venom Vimes heartily approved. "We're witches. People lets us in."

"Ah," said Vimes, "I thought as much." Lazily, he leaned against the wall just to the side of the gates and stared up at the sky. He'd never seen rain like this before. He had to admit, whatever was happening, it did not look good.

Granny clenched her hands into fists, but said nothing. Nanny Ogg, however, was less afraid to ask questions, particularly questions that were deeply personal and could make young men blush a spectrum of colors. Therefore, she did not find it all difficult to inquire:

"Well, how do you city folk ask to be let in, then?"

"Like this," said Vimes, and he pulled on a rope just beside him. From within the University, the reverberations of tiny bells could be heard tinkling up and down the halls. Shortly, a short, slight man appeared in red robes and hat, dashing through the rain with the gait of one to whom locomotion did not come easily, particularly in rapid sprints through ankle-high water. He stopped panting on the other side of the gates and pushed his glasses higher up on his nose.

"He– hello," he stuttered between breaths. "I'm–" (he gasped) "Ponder Stibbons, Head of–" (he wheezed) "Inadvisably Applied Magic and–" he finally regained enough breath to properly look at Granny. "Er, don't I know you?"

Back in the carriage, Vimes watched the witches follow the wizard into the University.

They don't need me, he thought. Wherever they go next, they don't need some old copper whose only use is knowing how to ring a doorbell.

He stared up at the sky as the carriage pulled away, the wheels spraying water in every direction, more like a boat than a cart. Lightning flashed in the clouds and Vimes wondered what had made the gods angry this time.

Well, it's not like there aren't plenty of choices: rape, murder, injustice, social inequalities, or, according to some daft people looking for something to complain about, social equalities. Hell, I'm surprised they haven't drowned us before now.

He lit another cigar and blew smoke around the coach, absently twirling the cigar case in one hand. Somehow, it cheered him to smoke inside the Patrician's personal carriage. It made the end of the world seem a little less dire. But that still didn't change where he wanted to be.

For a moment, he contemplated leaning out the window and shouting to the driver to head for Scoone Avenue. He imagined himself running inside, scooping up young Sam from where he would be playing in the nursery and holding him, just holding him, and possibly reciting "Where's My Cow?" over and over and over to get them through the dark. Perhaps, he, Sybil, and young Sam would all be together when the water rose over their heads.

Yes, he thought, that would be the way to go.

He looked at the silver cigar case and the monogram from Sybil. With the other hand, he took out his badge and stared at it: a small, hardly-adorned piece of metal, scraped and bruised and stained with his blood and the blood of many other coppers before him. Vimes sighed, threw the butt of his cigar out the window, snapped open the case, pocketed his badge, and lit another.

I am a man of the city and if the world doesn't end, there needs to be a city ready and waiting for young Sam. Ankh-Morpork isn't going to sink into the river while Samuel Vimes is on the Watch.

Nevertheless, his thumb traced Sybil's engraving all the way back to Pseudopolis Yard.

"So," said Granny darkly, "you mean to say, you have a machine what thinks for you?"

"Yes," said Ponder excitedly, completely oblivious to Granny's tone. "Well, nearly. You see, I don't think it's quite accurate to call what Hex does 'thinking,' exactly. At least, not in the way we think of thinking because Hex can only take what information people give him–I mean, it–and then, sort of, filter that information and come up with results at the other end which are based on the initial input but generated far faster and more precisely than any human brain can hope to manage!"

"And you say it's run by ants?" Asked Nanny Ogg. "Gosh, but ain't that exciting!"

"Well, yes, he–it– does have an anthill inside, among other things. It also wanted a ram skull for some reason and–and a mouse on a little wheel so we kind of attached them to it, I mean him, I mean–"

"Her?" Offered Nanny, helpfully.

"Er, yes, I mean, no! I mean–" Ponder pondered. His exposure to members of the opposite sex had been very limited over the years and the thought that Hex could have a preferred gender was a new one, but then, so was this idea that Hex might be more than a mere it. Hex's demands had been growing more insistent of late and more and more often came the request for dirty magazines and other booklets with pictures of naked ladies which the wizards rather guiltily and resentfully added to the machine. Unfortunately, it was proving hard to determine whether this helped Hex or not. Frequently, the addition of the sultry pictures would cause Hex to go into spasms, the quill rapidly scratching away +++ Error Error +++ Cookies Cookies +++ Redo From Start +++, messages which made no sense at all to the baffled wizards, but often required them to hold the mouse wheel still and make the ants stop running about as much. However, when they did remove the offending pornography, Hex somehow seemed sadder, more disconsolate, even sulky. Ironically, it was as if Hex was naked without the nude women. Ponder briefly wondered if Hex were trying to discover his (or her?) sexuality and then quickly dismissed the thought as being just too frightening. He would be damned if a machine achieved sexual fulfillment before he did.

"No," he said, trying to sound more definite than he felt, "I don't think Hex is a she."

Granny sniffed. "Ain't right this letting things think for you. T'ain't… natural."

"Oh, I dunno," Nanny mused. "I mean, ain't we always been makin' others think for us?"

"Not me," said Granny defiantly.

"Yeah, well, that's what I mean," continued Nanny. "Like, your head is so far up there, thinkin' 'bout the Big Things and all, I don't have to bother. I can just sit in my cozy house and curl up in a chair with Greebo and leave all that big thinkin' to you. And in turn, I do some of the other witchin' your too busy thinkin' to take a mind to, like helpin' some of the girls with their young men."

"This is different," Granny huffed. "Ain't right, things thinkin' for people. People thinkin' for people, stands to reason you gots to have them or things'd fall apart. But once you gets things thinkin' for people, well, that's when people starts fallin' apart."

"What if there's no people like you to do the thinkin' for 'em?" Asked Nanny.

Only Nanny noticed the slight hesitation in her friend's response: the way her shoulders had to shift to stand just a little bit taller, as if even that small effort cost something deep inside the witch.

"Not likely," Granny said. "I'll have tolds 'em who to listen to. And especially," she cast a dark look at Ponder (who didn't appear to notice) "what not to listen to."

Ridcully was having a hard day. It wasn't easy being Archchancellor of a magical university, but he liked to think he'd managed to eliminate all but the most crucial elements of effort from the position. For one thing, he no longer had to worry about other wizards trying to bump him off, and not having to worry about your fellow faculty sneaking up behind you left a great deal of empty space in the schedule. He'd even managed to delegate a great deal of the work in making sure reality stayed where it should be to young Stibbons who enthusiastically took up the task because he didn't know any better and thought reality was likely to slip all by itself. To this purpose, Stibbons performed constant tests to push the limits of time and space and find out exactly what would happen if reality really did collapse. Perhaps, this was not "advisable," per se, but "inadvisable" was part of the young wizard's job description and Ridcully would rather have young wizards probe the fabric of reality to make sure it was still there than listen to them blather on about "how can we know anything about reality to begin with?" and "maybe nothing is real anyway and we're all a figment of someone's imagination." Ridcully did not bother with such quandaries: what was the point? He knew who he was and where he was and how often he had dinner and that all seemed all right so life went on and the world kept turning.

But now there was this blasted rain and books flying in from some other reality and Stibbons' thinking engine was malfunctioning again (although Ridcully quite enjoyed looking at the woodcuts stacked around the machine: reminded him of his younger days, they did), and then Stibbons went running off to answer the damned doorbell, and now, on top of everything else, Death's granddaughter had walked through the wall in a black cloak with the hood up and just about scared him half-way to, well, her grandfather.

"Bloody hell, Susan!" He said, clutching his heart. "You can't just go sneaking up on wizards like that! I could have hit you with a fireball! Or something worse!" He added menacingly.

"Yes, I'm sure you could," said Susan in the voice she generally reserved for troublesome toddlers. "Now, what is going on?"

"Haven't the foggiest–" Ridcully began, but paused as he heard the familiar voice of Stibbons approaching from the hall. "Although he might be able to figure something out, clever man that he is," he said, turning to point at the door. He stopped short. It wasn't Stibbons leading the way into the room, but someone Ridcully had almost given up hope of ever seeing again. She entered just as tall, lean, and powerful as he remembered. She wasn't exactly beautiful, but his heart went to her just as it always had, like a custard curdling in the sun reaches for the sky.

"Esmerelda Weatherwax," he breathed. "What on the Disc are you doing here?"

"Mustrum," Granny said curtly, nodding sharply to him, then turning her eyes on Susan. "Ah, I see you're here then."

Susan blinked. "I'm sorry, have we–"

"Officially, no," Granny said. "But I know who you are. Anyone that's anyone as claims to work in the occult knows who you are."

Nanny entered the room behind Granny, gave Ridcully an eager wink and wave, then looked to Susan.

"Oh?" She said. "Who's she then?"

"Death's granddaughter," stated Susan.

"Really?" Nanny's eyes went wide. "Never figured him for the family sort. Didn't really think he had the right kind of bone for–"

"Gytha!"

"Sorry, Esme, but I do have a certain, what's called, 'in-sat-able cure-yos-ty,' I have, and if Death's got a granddaughter, stands to reason he had to stand to, as it were."

Granny gritted her teeth. "Don't you remember the girl Death adopted all those years ago?"

"What? Well, now you come to that, I think I do recall some talk or such thing. Was she that one what married Death's apprentice?"

"Yes," Susan said quickly, "and then they had me and some things, like Death, run deeper than genetics, so can we please just get on now?"

"Er, yes please," said Stibbons from somewhere behind Nanny Ogg who hadn't moved from blocking the doorway. Apologetically, she stepped aside and Stibbons carefully maneuvered his way through the too-small room, which was mostly filled by Hex already, to stand by the Archchancellor.

"Right," he said. "I grabbed a shoe while I was out so now we should be able to get this working again."

"What's that?" Asked Susan, leaning forward.

"Oh! Um," Ponder quickly tried to cover the magazines surrounding the machine, but Nanny was too quick for him.

"Ooh!" She said, flipping through the pages. "I didn't know they still had these!" She sighed. "I really was quite a looker in my day, see Esme!" She brandished the small book in Granny's direction who very deliberately stared at the ceiling and hummed. Loudly.

Susan rolled her eyes. "I meant: what was that about a shoe, Mister Stibbons?"

"Er, sometimes when Hex does… this," he pointed to the scrawled parchment and the hourglass hanging from a spring beside it slowly turning itself over and over. "It, uh, asks us to reboot, but, er, I couldn't find a boot so I…" He bent down under the main body of the machine, pulled out an old boot, and replaced it with the shoe he had found.

Immediately, the hourglass withdrew, the parchment spun to a fresh sheet and there was a loud whirring noise from somewhere in the machine, soon followed by a rising booOONG. A rotten apple core dropped down on a string, revolved in front of the parchment for a few moments, and then withdrew.

"Ooh, what was that?" Asked Nanny. Granny sniffed and tapped her boot on the floor.

"Er, um," Ponder had really been hoping no one would ask that. "Well, it's an Empire apple that slowly spins, or an oscillating Empire, so, er, we decided to call it: the O.S. Emp." This announcement was greeted with a resounding silence from all assembled. "Er, and we add a number to the end to indicate how many apples have rotted away." According to the inter-dimensional laws of comedy, Ponder thought he could hear crickets chirping. "Because it makes it easier to say," he added lamely, hoping that would help clarify and knowing it would not.

"Anyway," said Susan. "What do we do now?"

"Well, um, I should say Hex has just about warmed up and is ready to take questions, so, er, what do we want to ask it?"

There was a contemplative pause, which Ridcully felt the need to fill.

"How about we start with what the ruddy hell is going on around here?" He shouted.

The quill quickly dipped in a pot of ink and began quickly writing across the page. The answer came back: +++ The End +++.

"Well," said Susan, "that's awfully terminal."

"I think," said Ponder, "that we should try asking more specific questions, probably using what the lads and I have taken to calling 'key words,' if you will, so something like this." He leaned over Hex, cleared his throat, and said with very careful articulation:

"Open quotation cause of rain close quotation AND open quotation end of world question mark close quotation." He stepped away and smiled proudly at the others, pushing his glasses a little higher on his nose.

"Good man," said Ridcully patting him on the back in what he probably imagined was a reassuring way but nearly knocked off Ponder's glasses. "It's alright to look foolish, you know. Glad you finally learned that."

Ponder's shoulders slumped. "Er, yes, Archchancellor."

The quill finished moving. Everyone bent forward.

+++ The Turtle Is Crying +++, it read. +++ APOCALYPSE: PROBABLE +++.

"There, you see?" Said Ponder. "Far more helpful results."

"And what," said Granny grimly, "would you say ought be done, thinking thing?"

The quill scribbled and stopped.

++++ Make the Turtle Stop Crying +++.

Granny leaned forward until her nose was almost touching the parchment and read the words very carefully, her mouth shaping each one as her eyes scanned the page. She hummed to herself. She took one finger, carefully inserted it into her ear, and swiveled it as she thought. There was an audible squelching noise. Everyone looked at her and didn't say a word until she stood up straight again.

"Right," she said. "Someone's got to takes me over the Rim."

"Oh, no," said a voice from the doorway. Everyone turned to see a gangly man with a face more wilted than a flower in winter framed in the entrance. On his head, he wore a red hat, the pointed tip flopping over to one side and the brim lovingly inscribed: "wizzard."

"Oh no," Rincewind said again, backing away. "Not again. I've already done that. Twice. You aren't going to get me this time, oh no, not this time. I've done my time, OK? I'm out of it! I like staying here and eating potatoes with no more damn silly adventures!" He backed up a few more steps then turned and ran down the corridor. "You aren't going to catch me this time!" echoed down the narrow passage, almost drowned out by the sound of his sandals slapping the stone floor. Then there was silence.

"Right then," said Granny. "I needs someone to fly me over the Rim. That's no trip for any broomstick."

"I can take you," said Susan. "Binky's used to carrying more than one person on occasion."

"Right," said Granny. She turned to Nanny. "You goes ahead and fly home, Gytha, and takes my broom with you."

"Alright, Esme, but are you sure?" Nanny looked carefully into her friend's eyes, but even to her the pale blue fires in them were veiled.

Then Granny did an unusual thing: the corners of her mouth turned up ever so slightly as she stared ahead into something only she could see over Nanny's shoulder. For once, she almost looked happy.

"Yes, Gytha. I'm very sure."

Nanny nodded and walked out the door.

Granny turned to Susan.

"Let's go then," she said. "No point wastin' time."

Susan reached out a hand, Granny took it, and the two walked out through the wall, leaving Ridcully and Ponder alone in the too-small room which suddenly felt very empty.

At that moment, the apple fell from its string and smashed on the floor.

Ponder sighed.

"There goes number ten," he said.

In the flooded streets of Ankh-Morpork, two coppers splashed the route they had trod for what qualifies as forever to a city which had changed around them but left them very much the same. The century of the Fruit Bat had set and the Night Watch which had cowered in the face of shadows had evolved into a City Watch which sent the shadows running (although the inclusion of trolls and dwarfs [not to mention a werewolf and a vampire] probably had a great deal to do with this), but Sergeant Fred Colon and Corporal Nobby Nobbs continued to walk like the bell ringers they once were. Like fossils surrounded by a multiplex of advancing civilization, they soldiered on, marked by time, but not defined by it.

"You know what I reckon, Sarge?" Inquired Nobby as he excavated his ear.

"What's that, young Nobby?"

"I reckon there's, y'know, two types o' people in the world, right? Those that do the bad stuff and those what catch 'em."

Colon considered this, looking down at the warty individual who had to carry a certificate in order to prove he was human. "An interesting point ya have there, corporal. And just which one do you think you fall in?"

Nobby looked up at Fred and grinned, revealing all the dirt between his teeth, as his helmet (which had never fit properly and was incurably afflicted with rust) fell lopsided across his ear. "Dunno, Sarge. Guess it depends on the day."

"Or even the time of day, maybe?"

"Yeah! Like, if I sees someone commit a crime, right–"

"Without a proper license, that is," Fred nodded sagely.

"Yeah, right, 'course ya gotta have that, but, if I see someone, like, kick a poor bugger in the unmentionables and take his stuff and take off running, then I'm gonna chase 'im, right?"

"Well, possibly, Nobby, possibly. Depends on who else is around, I guess. I mean, if Captain Carrot or Captain Angua or Commander Vimes are there, then they tend to do a lot of the running and someone's got to stay at the back and make sure no one gets in from behind while they're charging at the front, right?"

"Ah, yeah, Sarge, stands to reason somebody's gotta do that."

"And I'm not quite as young or fit as I used to be so I'm not much good for the chasing and you're..." Colon hesitated slightly as he tried to find some adjective to describe Nobby, "an individual of age what is difficult to determine with not overly long legs so, by process of logical deduction, we can conclude we should bring up the back."

"Right you are there, Sarge."

"Thank you, young Nobby."

The two continued wading through the street.

"Sarge?"

"Yes, Nobby?"

"Do you ever wonder what it's all about?"

"Gosh, Nobby, what ever makes you ask a chap a question like that?"

"I dunno, I guess it's all this rain, Sarge, like cats and dogs as my gran used to say."

"Yes, funny expression that, I always used to think. I mean, it's not like you often see cats or dogs come fallin' from the sky on a regular basis, leastways not 'round here. Do you think there's a place where it really does rain cats and dogs, Nobby?"

"I dunno, Sarge. I guess there must be, else why would people say there was?^4 Unless they was just tryin' to think of somethin' more interestin' to say than 'it's rainin' out like really wet stuff fallin' out the sky on my head.'"

"An excellent point, Nobby, that is, true philosopher you are."

"No, Sarge, don't make nearly enough things blow up for that.^5"

"I meant, corporal, that you think about the larger things in life and what's name."

"Ah, yeah, that's me, Sarge! Y'know me, always askin' questions. Speakin' which, Sarge, you still haven't said what you think it's all about."

Colon stared ahead of him. Up ahead, loomed the Tower of Art and the Unseen University.

"I dunno, Nobby, I mean, there's folk like wizards say it's all 'bout somethin' Big, right, like planets and stuff we don't see through city lights."

"Ah, yeah, I heard a them," Nobby nodded wisely, "like funny round worlds that just kinda spin without all the water fallin' off and stuff. Don't make much sense, if you ask me, Fred."

"Nor me, Nobby, but that's just my point. There's folk like them that says it's all Big things we never see or small things we can't see, like tiny particulars and things what build in other things. Y'know, it seems the big, important people like the Patrician and wizards think everything runs towards the things we can't see and make my head hurt tryin' to understand."

"Yeah, you know what I find helps that, Sarge?"

"What's that, Nobby?"

"Not tryin'."

"Good point there, good point, and almost exactly where I was going because if you ask me, if you ask me, Nobby, me, Fred Colon, Sergeant of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch, what it's all about–"

His already expansive chest puffed out mightily and then suddenly deflated as a white horse appeared above them, galloping on the air from the Unseen University. On its back, rode a woman in a black cloak and hood pulled low over her face. At least, Colon hoped she was a woman. For one fleeting moment, he thought he saw bones beneath the hood where flesh should have been and two bright blue circles cooly staring into his soul. Behind the first woman, sat a thin crone, also dressed in black, her cloak billowing about her like a piece of the night, and the tall point of her hat stretching towards the sky. Colon and Nobby watched in awed silence as the horse and its riders soared over them and vanished into the rain.

"What's that you was sayin', Fred?" Nobby asked, still staring up.

"Wha? Oh, I– I– I dunno, Nobby." Colon too remained staring after the horse. "I suppose... it wasn't all that important."

The rain came down like a big, damp, wet thing falling on their upturned faces. The surrounding buildings stood silent, watching them.

"Hey, Sarge?" Said Nobby's voice amid the sound of the downpour.

"Yes, Nobby?"

"You wanna ring the bells, y'know, for ol' times, sake?"

Rain drummed on the roofs of Ankh-Morpork.

"Y'know, Nobby, I was thinkin' just that thing myself just now."

The clouds roiled and boiled and seethed up above. Lightning flashed and two voices rang through the air, supported by the clamor of brass bells peeling through the evening:

"Twelve o'clock and all's weeeellllll!"

Cohen the Barbarian fought his way through the snow. He had come to Uberwald (was this Uberwald?) and then this damn snow set in which wasn't kind to his old bones. For that matter, it wasn't particularly pleasant to his nether regions either, protected as they were only by a slight loin cloth which the snow was beginning to reach in certain places. His beard was already trailing in the stuff.

Why had he come here? He wished he could remember. The cold was making it so hard to, wasname, stand? Think? Stink? It was so hard to–

Something howled away in the distance, the snow muffling the sound and sweeping it away so there was no telling the direction. Cohen's sword was already in his hand and his one good eye swept the white wasteland around him, keenly seeking his thingy, the what's-it to be stabbed.

It was so hard.

Is this the way a hero some-it? Cohen wondered, blearily. Alone. In the snow. Eaten by… thems?

Yellow eyes appeared out of the gloom, on every side. Cohen thought he remembered hearing "wolves don't attack people," but it was hard to recall. Anyway, he'd always been good about killing them first. Some of the skins barely covering him had once been wolves, at least, he thought they were. It was so hard... to remember. So cold.

Cohen grinned. His diamond teeth flashed in the bleak midwinter.

"Gotta die someday," he said. "So may as well die my way. Come on, ya bastards!"

The wolves closed in around him. Cohen raised his sword.

And he froze.

High above the world, Granny and Susan rode through the night on a horse named Binky. Death, Susan reflected, never was particularly good at naming things. He'd picked the name because it sounded nice and he thought it would be comforting to introduce newly dead humans to a horse with a nice name. He didn't realize that most humans, newly entering into a state of non-living, would feel much better about things if they encountered a six-foot skeleton with a horse named Grimnir or Valkyr or even Spike, something menacing like that. They spent all their lives thinking life was for the living and death was the adversary, which made it very confusing to reach the Other Side of the Veil and meet a white horse named Binky, particularly when the six-foot skeleton let you feed his horse sugar-cubes.

"Where's your Grandfather then?" Granny said from behind her.

"What?"

"I said, WHERE'S YOUR GRANDFATHER GOT TO?" Granny shouted over the wind.

"Why do you think he's gone?" Susan shouted back.

"Stands to reason," the witch said, leaning closer. "You're here: he ain't. From what I hears, you mostly shows up when he can't."

Susan frowned.

"I don't know," she said back. "I just had this feeling I had to do something. He's not exactly around, like he normally is, but he's not gone either. I can still feel things dying, but he's not putting in a personal appearance."

And that's what really worries me, she thought to herself. Grandfather always insists on being there for humans so he can make it easy for them. He even helps along small algae on the bottom of the ocean sometimes, just to make sure everything is working as it should. A Death who names his horse to help comfort people into the Next Stage doesn't just leave. So where has he got to?

Behind her, Granny sniffed.

"He just better show up for our appointment, is all," she said. "I don't like to be kept waiting."

"What's that?" Susan called back. "An appointment?"

"All witches knows when we'll meet Death," Granny scoffed. "You'd best remember that when you meets witches. Can make a witch awfully testy to think a visitor is comin' to collect early."

Silence fell between them.

"You don't seem very upset about it," said Susan. "I thought you'd be angrier."

Even though Granny sat behind her, she could fee the power of that stare on the back of her neck.

"I'm always angry, child," Granny said in a voice that sounded as old as the wind. "And don'ts you ever forgets that either."

Above them, the stars wheeled in an ageless dance, the stars that, for today, happened to be their neighbors as the Turtle swam through space. Below them, beneath the clouds, the rain continued to fall on cities and countries and people shouting to the heavens.

And a horse named Binky galloped towards the Rim.

Carrot Ironfoundersson, in full, gleaming armor, fought his way through water up to his waist down the streets of the Shades, streets most coppers would think twice about walking alone on any other night (and then would find a reason to stay at home). But he was not most coppers and knew the name of anyone likely to jump out of the shadows at him and also to ask about the would-be assailant's mother and, anyway, they were all huddled inside, either in the homes they refused to leave or in more luxurious accommodations provided by the Watch and Lady Sybil. But Angua had not returned and she did so hate to be out in the water. It was so hard to get properly dry and she couldn't shake the smell for weeks.

He plunged on, his eyes looking through the debris being swept past him for anything that looked like auburn fur or golden-blonde hair. He saw nothing but water and beaten-up chairs and a few meager possessions. And lots of human refuse of other kinds.

"You idiot," called a voice from up above. Carrot turned, looked up, and there, standing on one of the rooftops, was Angua.

Carrot smiled and waved. "Ah, Captain Angua, there you are!"

"Yes, now can you find some way to get out of that water?"

Carrot looked around. "I suppose I could go into that building–"

Angua shook her head. "No, the ladder on the ground floor has already been swept away."

"In that case, I do not think so," Carrot said cheerfully. The water was rising up his chest now and getting stronger.

She sighed. "Hold on and close your eyes."

Carrot did so. From above, came the sounds of many uncomfortable things happening as the human body was stretched and condensed in places it did not naturally want to be. There was the clatter of a breastplate and armor striking wood and then a splash beside him.

Carrot opened his eyes and looked at the beautiful, big wolf swimming beside him. He loosened the straps on the breastplate he had polished faithfully everyday for what seemed a lifetime and let the waters sweep it away. Then he started to swim beside Angua, reaching out to her whenever he faltered. Her canine strength helped keep them both afloat and steer them around the bigger pieces of debris they encountered. Once or twice, as the currents shifted at intersections, it looked like Angua would be carried away and Carrot grabbed her, standing up in the flow, and keeping her close to him. By the time they escaped the Shades and found themselves in a more sturdy part of the city, they were both exhausted. Eagerly, they entered the first solid building they found open and climbed upstairs. Angua shook herself, water droplets spraying everywhere, as Carrot collapsed on the nearest bed and stretched out his huge arms to cover the entire breadth of the small cot. Again, there was the sound of unnatural contortions as hair withdrew and legs turned to arms and then Angua's human voice said:

"I hope you haven't gotten all those sheets wet."

Carrot eased himself up to a sitting position and looked at her, a beautiful naked woman with long, blonde hair flowing down over her shoulders and soaking wet. He picked up one of the sheets that wasn't too damp and passed it to her. She wrapped it around herself and sat down on the bed beside him. She leaned her head against his shoulder. He leaned against her.

"What if this rain doesn't stop?" She asked.

"It will!" He said confidently. "Rain always does."

"Yeah, but, this," she waved her hand at the window: the clouds and curtains of falling water, the streets turned into rivers, "this isn't natural. This is something different. Besides, if it goes on much longer, the water will get to us up here and that'll be the end for us."

"Oh, I don't think it will make it that far," said Carrot certainly.

"But what if it does? What if this is how we die?"

Carrot turned and looked directly at her, his honest eyes staring through the woman and soothing the wolf.

"Well, we're together," he said, "and that counts for something."

He leaned in to kiss her and she melted into his arms. The sheet dropped to the floor.

Outside, the rain came down.

At the end of the world, the horse of Death leapt into the Void. On the safety of Binky's back, Susan and Granny plunged into the dark of space, falling down with the water streaming over the Rim, and beheld the World Turtle, the Great A'Tuin. They saw the Four Elephants, trumpeting in fear and quivering slightly as the shell rocked beneath them, and they saw the tears of the Turtle streaming up the currents of space to the greatest center of gravity: the rotating Disc itself.

"What now?" Asked Susan, at least, her mouth moved but no words formed. Silence surrounded them, a silence like the one of Death's world, deep and unbroken. It seemed to Susan, that if she strained, she could just barely hear, on the edge of Nothing, the sound of time being sliced away.

Granny wrapped her arms around Susan's waist and held tight. She took a deep breath, stabling herself on the magic surrounding them, and then reached out with her mind to that of the Great Turtle.

She felt a shock to the heart, a sharp pang of loss that tore through the immense being of Great A'Tuin and Granny felt as if she were floating on an endless ocean of grief, gazing around on infinite darkness. She sensed that grief was not a new emotion for the Wandering Mother who had watched many of her young swim off into the depths of space where lurked many perils like black holes and asteroids and far worse things she had only ever seen at a distance, but this sudden agony of deprivation was something new. And she wept.

Faint images drifted to Granny's mind, some of them she knew and recognized because they were things that had happened to her but seen through another's eyes. She saw three witches flying over mountains, endless mirrors, a swamp, a glass shoe shattering on stone steps. She saw swarms of bees, a beautiful and terrible woman, a wedding with a king and a bride in spiked armor, an old woman holding back a unicorn. But there were other stories too and people she did not know, although she had seen a few faces before. She saw that Commander Vimes from before lying in a gutter, saw him running along rooftops, saw a dragon descending towards him. She saw him marry, saw him fall in a shower of glass and lightning, saw him holding a tiny boy in trembling arms. She saw a young man, tall and strong, with a remarkably unremarkable sword and a woman beside him who was sometimes a wolf. She saw a man in a golden suit and a hat with wings, saw Susan climbing a white tower the color of teeth, saw the scared man from before running across the length of the Disc. And she saw Death. In everything she saw, she saw Death standing and watching with a permanent smile.

And there was more, so much more, a sea of stories surrounding her, enfolding her, and through it all, there drifted a smiling man. He was not a man she could ever remember seeing, but she knew him, somehow, like a line of a song she could not remember hearing. He was elderly with white hair, but seemed young at the same time. He wore wonder like he wore black, and on his head, he wore a black hat. It did not have a point, which Granny slightly disapproved of, but it fit him like a part of his being. He smiled at her above his white beard and spectacles and winked cheerfully. And he was gone.

Granny felt the burden, the pain, the terrible loss, and she shared in it. It was a rule of Borrowing never to take control of the mind you rode and she followed it. She just let the World Turtle know that someone else was there who felt and understood and mourned with her. She shared in the grief and helped make it a little easier to carry. She shared the weight of the world.

Slowly, the Turtle's enormous heart quieted. The loss was still there, still hard to bear, but it no longer consumed her. The tears stopped flowing and she swam on.

Granny returned to her own mind and tapped Susan on the shoulder. She was so tired, more tired than she could ever remember before. She sagged against Susan's back as Binky turned and galloped back to the Disc. Stars swam about her, but she was not sure if they were real or not. She just held tight and felt the sting of tears upon her face.

In a castle in Uberwald, Cohen awoke from a dream filled with blood, screams, and rampant death. He sighed. It had been a very good dream.

He stretched his exhausted muscles and realized that he was lying under very soft blankets. That wasn't right. Blankets should be rough and scratchy. Kept the body strong, did scratchy. And these weren't his clothes. They were… what was the word for "not stinking of ancient barbarian who slaughtered everything from trolls to human and done it all wearing the same loincloth?" Lean? He sniffed them and nearly gagged.

"Smells like soap," he grumbled.

He flung the quilts away and slowly eased himself out of bed to the stone floor. Just at that moment, the door opened and a woman entered. She seemed slightly surprised to see Cohen out of bed, but she took it in stride.

"Ah, I see you are awake," she said. "Although I would suggest you stay in bed awhile longer. You nearly froze to death out there."

"Wha? Oh," Cohen remembered then. He had been wading through snow nearly over his waist and there had been wolves. "What happened to the damn creatures then, hm?" He asked.

The woman raised an eyebrow. "Is that what you think of werewolves?"

"Eh? Who said anything about– oh," Cohen paused.

"That's right," she said. "Now you just get back in bed and I'll bring you something hot to eat."

"Where's my clothes?" Barked Cohen.

"We burned them, of course," answered the woman. "We could smell them from the far side of Uberwald. You didn't smell much better either until we gave you a bath."

"Wha– what?" Cohen sputtered. Werewolves and baths? This couldn't be the world he knew.

"You sure I ain't dead?" He asked, somewhat hopefully.

"Quite sure," she said. "If you were, I wouldn't have had to bathe you."

"Never met a dog that liked a bath before," Cohen said.

She smiled at him, showing off some very sharp teeth. "We're more human than certain other werewolves you may have met," she said. "Now will you get back in bed or do I have to make you?"

Cohen sighed. It might not be the Afterlife, but there was an attractive woman offering to bring him food and drink so he was probably about halfway there. No doubt the days of endless fighting would come later. He sniffed himself again. Alright, so maybe he was only a third of the way to the Afterlife, but still, a beautiful woman and good food was an improvement on other things.

He looked around the room and saw his sword leaning against the wall in a corner. He shuffled over, picked it up, and then dragged it back to his bed. The woman watched with some amusement as he placed it down on top of the covers and crawled in beside it.

Cohen looked at her. "Well, what are you still doing here?" He said. "Ain't you gonna bring me soup?"

She left and Cohen sighed as he settled in beneath the covers, which, he had to admit weren't so bad on his aching back. He gripped the sword hilt beside him in one gnarled hand and grinned. He was, after all, still a barbarian.

In Ankh-Morpork, the rain ceased to fall. The streets remained rivers, but slowly began to recede as the trolls and golems of the Watch who had been working their pumps all day long finally had a chance to drain the City. The clouds began to disperse as a wind picked up from the Hub and a ray of early morning sunlight glittered down on the restless city.

Angua shifted as the sunlight struck her eyes and she groaned, rolling over and hoping to sleep just a little longer. All her muscles ached. Unconsciously, Carrot's enormous arms wrapped around her, keeping her close. She placed one of her hands on top of his and leaned back against his warm body.

This can't last, she thought. A man and a werewolf. Someday, I'll have to leave him. The thought stabbed at her heart like it always did. He's the king, she reminded herself. Everyone knows it even if we don't admit it. How can this story have a happy ending?

She turned her head to look at his face, the handsome, honest lines so beautiful in the light of morning. She settled back down and closed her eyes, breathing in the scent of a good man.

That's a problem for another day, she thought. Today, we love each other, and that's all that matters.

In Unseen University, the wizards crowded to the windows, cheered, and then started yelling to the servants to bring food for a celebratory feast.

She did it, thought Ridcully as he looked into the clear blue sky. But of course she did. She's Esmerelda Weatherwax.

"Stibbons!" He shouted.

Beside him, Ponder jumped. "Yes, Archchancellor?"

"Have you ever been in love?"

"Er, no, Archchancellor, I, I can't say I ever have."

"Ah, well no big surprise there," Ridcully went on, "but when you find her, Stibbons… or him, come to think of it, moving times and all that, you just make sure you hold on and don't let go. Otherwise you'll always wonder what could have been."

"I– I see, Archchancellor."

"Now then," said Ridcully, clapping his hands. "Mrs. Ogg was kind enough to give me a bottle of scumble. What do you say, Stibbons? Shall we drink together?"

"Er, alright, sir. What's in it, by the way?"

"Apples, man, apples!" Ridcully paused. "Well, mostly apples."

Lord Vetinari stood in front of the long window in the Oblong Office and stared out at his city as the sunlight streamed in, hands folded at his back. Behind him, a door opened and Leonard de Quirm entered holding a mound of papers.

"I have the designs you asked for here," said Leonard, swaying slightly as he stumbled to the desk.

"Ah, thank you, Leonard, but I think those are no longer necessary. The rain has stopped and the city is once again safe."

Leonard blinked. "Rain, you say? What rain?"

Susan steered Binky through the morning, Granny's slight weight bouncing behind her as the old witch snored. Susan didn't mind. She didn't know what the witch had done, but it seemed to have saved the world and that meant she could put up with any snore, no matter how many logs it sawed through. At least, she could put up with it as far as the Ramtops. She hoped.

The miles went by below, the Disc's slow sunlight spreading over the landscape like melted cheese. Steam crawled up towards the heavens in weary waves. There was life down there, Susan felt. Lots of people milling about, breathing, celebrating, mourning. There was also death, people and animals carried away in the floods or buried in mudflows or crushed by floating debris. She knew they were all there, the people doing human things, like reveling in the light of the sun.

Up ahead, the mountains appeared, their tops gleaming in welcome.

"Down there," said Granny and a long bony arm pointed to a clearing. "Put me down over there."

Binky descended through the shimmering fog and they landed in the front yard of a small cottage with a garden whose plants even Susan wouldn't want to approach without a weapon of some kind. Then, slowly, carefully, she helped the old witch down from the horse. Granny stood on the ground of her home somewhat shakily at first, but quickly recovered her feet and stood straight.

She gave a sharp nod to Susan.

"Thank you," she said curtly. "I'll tell your grandfather you was very helpful."

"Thank you," said Susan, suddenly not wanting Granny to go. "I could stay a little while, if you want."

"No," said Granny. "This next part I do myself. You'd best be gettin' on."

Susan nodded dumbly and climbed back on Binky.

"Take care," she said.

"And you."

Susan rose back into the air and steered for home. A few stray tears fell behind her.

Granny walked into her cottage and put on the kettle. She scrubbed the small table and set out two of her least chipped cups. She found a few biscuits in a jar Nanny had given her and put that on the table too. The kettle started to whistle and she turned to take it off the burner.

"Come in," she said. "Tea's nearly ready."

As she brought the kettle to the table, Death stepped over the threshold in answer to her invitation. He wiped his bony, bleached feet on the mat then sat in the nearest chair.

YOU WERE EXPECTING ME? He said in a voice like the creak of a coffin lid.

"Of course," said Granny. "All witches knows when they meet Death."

BUT I HAVE NOT COME TO TAKE YOU.

"I knows that, 'course I knows that." Granny poured the tea. "Think you could take me if I didn't wants to go?"

Death looked at her, the blue fires glowing from the dark of his sockets meeting her icy blue stare. NO, he said after a moment. I DO NOT SUPPOSE I COULD.

"That's right," she said sitting back in her chair and stirring in the cream and sugar. "I beat you once before, you know."

YES. I DO NOT FORGET.

"No one forgets when I beats 'em," Granny declared. "I makes sure they knows it."

She took a sip of her tea. Death, rather uncertainly, raised the cup to his grinning mouth, then lowered it when Granny set down hers. Outside, birds chirped.

DO YOU KNOW WHY I AM HERE?

"That man," said Granny, "the one in the strange hat."

YES.

"He's dead."

YES.

"And you're sad, are you?"

I... I DO NOT KNOW. SADNESS IS AN EMOTION AND EMOTIONS ARE HUMAN THINGS. I DO NOT KNOW WHAT IT IS LIKE TO BE SAD, BUT I KNOW I DO NOT FEEL MYSELF. I THOUGHT I KNEW EMPTINESS. I HAVE TRAVELED THROUGH THE VERY DARKEST PLACES AND SEEN DEEPS THE HUMAN MIND CANNOT IMAGINE. I HAVE SPOKEN WITH THE AUDITORS WHO WOULD DESTROY EVERYTHING HUMAN IN ORDER TO HAVE ORDER AND I HAVE SPOKEN WITH POWERS EVEN HIGHER THAN THEM. AND NOW I FEEL EMPTY AS IF I LOST SOME PART OF MYSELF BEHIND WHERE I HAVE RIB BONES WHERE NOTHING HAS EVER BEEN. IS THAT SADNESS?

Those strange blue lights looked at Granny above the smiling mouth inside the black hood uncertainly. It seemed to Granny that she had never seen anyone more lost.

"That's pretty close to it, I should say, yes," Granny said.

AH. I SUPPOSE I AM GLAD TO HEAR IT. I DO NOT KNOW. EMOTIONS ARE NEW TO ME. HOW DO YOU FEEL?

"Me? I'm mad, that's what I am," said Granny, taking a careful sip and setting down the teacup.

WHY ARE YOU ANGRY, MISTRESS WEATHERWAX?

"I just learned I was imagined up by a man what's dead. That's rather different from the gods I normally meet."

AND DOES THAT FRIGHTEN YOU?

"No."

IT DOES NOT? HUMANS BELIEVE GODS MAKE THEM TO GIVE THEIR LIVES PURPOSE. I HAVE MET MANY PEOPLE WHO AT THEIR END ASK TO MEET THE MAN IN CHARGE AND ASK HIM "HOW HE GOT THEIR LIVES SO MESSED UP." THEY ARE NEVER HAPPY TO LEARN I DO NOT KNOW WHO IS IN CHARGE. THEY DO NOT KNOW WHAT TO BELIEVE OR WHY THEY EVER BELIEVED ANYTHING.

"Not me," said Granny. "Witches don't believe in gods. We meets enough of them as it is."

SO WHAT GIVES YOUR LIFE PURPOSE? HOW CAN YOU BE ANGRY TO LEARN A MAN "IMAGINED YOU UP?"

"I gives my life purpose," Granny sniffed. "Ain't no one else gets to say how I do my own things. My head is my head like it's always been and ain't no one mess with that." She sighed. "But a body does get tired of it all. You see things die lots bein' a witch, could almost say that's what it's all about: watch things die so you knows what can be saved. But the mores you watch, the mores it seems that everythin' leads to you. And for all I give, everythin' will end up gone." She bowed her head over her cup, then abruptly straightened up and looked Death dead in the face. "That's not to say there's no point, I ain't never said there ain't no point to it all. You just gets tired is all. And then you learn the man what made you up dies like the rest. It tires you."

AND WHAT ABOUT YOUR FREE WILL? DO YOU WORRY THAT EVERYTHING YOU ARE AND EVERYTHING YOU HAVE EVER DONE WAS MADE BY HIM?

Granny laughed slightly. "Ain't no one makes me do what I don't want, like I said. You can't any more than he could. I've been part of stories before and I knows how to break 'em when I wants."

Death looked at her with respect. THAT IS A POWERFUL CONVICTION, GRANNY ESMERELDA WEATHERWAX. WHAT COULD HUMANS DO IF THEY WERE ALL LIKE YOU?

Granny frowned. "Let's hope we never finds out."

A little while later, Granny escorted Death outside. Binky was there, already waiting for him. As he climbed into the saddle, Granny said:

"Susan was very helpful, you know. You've got a good girl there."

Death looked proud. SHE IS A VERY RESPONSIBLE, STRONG, AND INTELLIGENT YOUNG WOMAN, SUSAN IS. SHE IS HER MOTHER'S CHILD, YOU KNOW?

"Yes, I do know. Well, I shall be seeing you, I expect."

YES.

"But not too soon."

THAT ALL DEPENDS, said Death, ON HOW YOU LOOK AT IT.

Granny did not watch Binky fly off. Instead, she went inside, washed up, and put the cups away. She scrubbed the table again and then leaned on it for a brief moment, using both hands to keep her on her feet. She had been mostly sure this appointment was not the end, but there was always that little bit of doubt nagging away that could even get at Granny, sometimes. Even witches were never quite sure what the future looked like.

And she was still tired, still so tired after sharing the grief of the World Turtle.

She made her way to the bed, hung up her hat, and crawled in under the covers. She knew Nanny Ogg would be coming to check on her soon and hear the whole story so she picked up the card from beside her bed, just to make sure her friend wouldn't worry.

She fell asleep to the sound of the birds singing and the water evaporating away, rising to the sky, her hands tightly clasped around the little sign's proud declaration: I ATE'NT DEAD.

Sam Vimes walked into the family living room to find Sybil sitting in her favorite armchair while young Sam played on the floor with little soldiers. Sybil rose as he entered.

"Ah, Sam, good to see you home. The city is safe, I trust?"

Sam hugged her tightly. After a few moments, he let her go.

"Yes," he said. "I think it is. Safe as it ever is, anyway."

He walked over to where young Sam was playing and leaned down to tousle his son's hair. He knew it was a demeaning thing to do to a small boy, but there are some things fathers just have to do. Young Sam looked up at him, patting his hair back into a mess, and frowned.

"What that for?" He asked.

"Oh, nothing," said Vimes, looking at his son. Soon, the boy would grow up, he thought. Soon he would be the Duke of Ankh, and, perhaps, Commander of the City Watch, if he chose. Soon he would no longer enjoy reading books about poo. He had already mostly outgrown "Where's My Cow?" although he still laughed when Vimes did the voices. Soon he would be a man, but not, Vimes thought, too soon.

He sat down on the floor beside the boy and picked up one of the toy soldiers.

"Grr," he said in the menacing tone adults use with children when they want to sound silly. "I'm a bad man, fear me!"

Young Sam giggled and held up a different soldier.

"I arrest you!" He said. "For not eating your vegetables!" He giggled again.

Far out in space, the Great A'Tuin continued swimming into the dark. If there were a direction to her travels, only she knew, and perhaps even she did not know the destination. But she swam on tirelessly, just as she had always done, knowing no other way to move forward.

And the world kept turning.

1 Suggesting charades is well-known to be the ultimate despairing act of any party host. Even in the gas clouds of Trepakaraaaaa, there inevitably arrives a moment as the helium supplies run low where the host throws up zer air sacks and proposes the ritual act of undoing thousands of years of evolution, forgoing the hard-earned technology of useful speech for the absurd gesticulation of flagella used by their ancestors to hunt a'erbereeee.

2 It should probably be noted that Professor Rincewind added this last bit of advice in the hope that any demons crawling out of a dungeon dimension would much rather eat fat wizards hiding under tables than chase, say, a very scrawny man with hardly any magical ability at all in possession of a pointy hat. This may not exactly be kind, but Rincewind was always on the side of practicality when it came to matters of not being eaten.

3 Dried Frog Pills are a hallucinogen prescribed to troubled individuals, like the Bursar, in the hope that it will cause the poor crazy people to dream they are sane. It has been declared a resounding success by the companies who produce them because, at the very least, they have been found not to make the condition of the afflicted noticeably worse. This also means they don't have to include a long list of side-effects which, really, stands to everyone's benefit.

4 There is in fact no planet where it rains both cats and dogs. There are a few which precipitate felines at various points in the year, which are particularly dangerous months for people with cat allergies or anyone who happens to be out on the street when a ball of fur armed with sharp bits at five ends comes streaking out of the blue. There are even some planets which drop dogs like snow who curl up on the ground and look at their humans with adoring eyes. At any rate, that's what happens to the lucky ones that don't hit something very hard, or very big and very wet, and avoid splatting or splashing in very terminal ways.

5 The Alchemists' Guild recently changed its name in an attempt to avoid debts they owed for repeatedly blowing up their Guildhouse. This led to the new Philosophers' Guild being kicked out of their former residence and constantly moving from place to place as their quest to turn common metals into gold left a trail of destruction across the city. Oddly enough, most landlords remained willing to sell them property given even the faintest promise of unlimited wealth. At this rate, however, if the philosophers ever do discover how to turn base metals into gold, they'll run out of supply before they can pay off their debts on every place they've destroyed, some of which are still charging rent.