Un Lun Dun

67. Weapon of Choice

“This is ridiculous.” Deeba could tell from the book’s voice that if it could walk, it would be refusing to. It would be digging in its heels. Unluckily for it, it was tucked under her arm, and she was walking rapidly. “I said this is ridiculous.”

“I heard you,” Deeba said.

“So? Are you going to stop?”

“Nope.”

Hemi, Curdle, and the utterlings ran after the arguing duo. Deeba was turning decisively but randomly down side roads as shadows lengthened in the UnSun.

“Look,” said the book frantically. “You can’t pick and choose bits from a prophecy. That’s not how they work.”

“Let’s be honest,” Deeba said. “We all know you have no idea how prophecies work.”

Hemi winced and sucked in his breath, shook his hand in an ouch motion.

“In fact,” Deeba went on, “it looks a lot like prophecies don’t work.”

“The whole point is you need each of those things to get the next one, until we get to the UnGun,” the book said.

“Even if we had time to try that, you don’t know,” Deeba said. “You’re the one that keeps saying what’s in you’s wrong. You want to do it your way to make some of it work again. But if we know it’s the UnGun we really need to deal with you-know-what, we’re going straight to it, instead of messing around with in-between bits. Unless,” she added with sudden interest, “there’s any more telephones on the way?”

“N-no, there’s not,” the book said. “But in any case—”

“We are not walking through each of your chapters, book! So. Give me directions, or…or I’m just going to keep wandering in circles until the Smog finds us.”

Deeba and the book sulked at each other.

“I vote you give her directions,” Hemi said.

“Alright,” the book said at last, as they turned yet another corner pointlessly. They passed a tumbledown piano, one of UnLondon’s random pieces of street furniture. The book sounded beaten down and miserable. “I’ll tell you what’s written.

“It’s going to be harder to get the UnGun than the key. Even if we had the crown of the black-or-white king. To get the UnGun we have to get past something truly terrifying, one of the most deeply feared creatures in UnLondon—”

“Get on with it,” Deeba snapped.

“Alright. It’s protected by the Black Window.”

Hemi gasped. Deeba stopped.

“The Black Window?” Hemi said in a hushed voice. Then he said to her more normally, “Are you laughing?”

“Sorry,” said Deeba. She tried to stop. “Black Window!” She sniggered again, making Curdle turn excited circles. The utterlings watched her, bewildered.

“I do not see what’s so funny,” the book said.

“It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter,” Deeba said. “Tell me about this Black Window. What do we have to do?”

“This is no joke, Deeb,” Hemi said. “The Black Window’s nasty UnKin. Someone must’ve really wanted to protect the UnGun if they put it there.”

“That’s why we’re supposed to work up to it,” the book grumbled. “In stages…”

“Yeah yeah,” Deeba said. “Who must’ve really wanted to?”

“Well,” said Hemi hesitantly. “Whoever…wrote the prophecies, I suppose.”

“That makes sense,” said Deeba. “Sadists. Tell me what it is.”

“The Black Window lives in Webminster Abbey,” the book said.

“Oh you didn’t say that,” said Deeba, and laughed more.

“I wish you’d treat this information with the awe it deserves,” said the book plaintively.

“Webminster, though!” Deeba said, but her laughter died at Hemi’s face.

“It is serious,” he said. “You wouldn’t catch me going near there normally.”

“The window doesn’t just kill you,” the book said. “It takes you right out of the world. No body left, no clothes, no trace. Swallows up whatever comes close. It’s the perfect predator.”

“I thought that was a shark,” Deeba said.

“Alright, the shark’s the perfect predator. The Black Window is the pluperfect predator.”

Deeba still wanted to tease them, but there was a fear in Hemi’s and the book’s voices that made her uneasy.

“So how do I get to Webminster Abbey?” Deeba said.

Deeba’s heart sank when she looked at the map. There were miles to go. Some of the areas they would have to cross were inhabited, some were empty— and now some were smogmires.

“It’ll take ages,” Deeba said. “Oh no. Can’t we…I dunno, take a train or something?” Hemi stared at her as if she were mad. “There’s going to be more and more people coming after us, every minute.”

She was proved right much sooner than she had expected.

For an hour or so the rather dejected little group followed the route they had mapped, as briskly as their exhausted limbs would let them. They did nothing to attract attention to themselves, and apart from their clothes being a little more dirty than most people’s, there wasn’t much noticeable about them. In the streets of UnLondon, a group of a girl, a half-ghost, a talking book, a piece of rubbish, and two living words was unusual, but not very.

That was why, when Deeba first heard a motor approaching, she didn’t think it was anything to do with her.

It got slowly louder and louder, until suddenly Deeba heard a voice call her name. She turned and looked up in dismay. Descending towards them, through a brief flock of scurrying laundry, was Rosa and Conductor Jones’s bus, the Scrollscrawl Sigil clear on the front.

Murgatroyd was leaning from the platform, shouting, “Deeba Resham, stop! We need to talk!”