Mister Monday: Chapters Twenty-Three and Twenty-Four

[teres]

Chapters Twenty-One and Twenty-Two | Table of Contents | Chapter Twenty-Five

Kerlois: A good day, everyone, and welcome back to Mister Monday! Last time, Arthur and Suzy arrived at Monday’s Antechamber, they were busted by Noon (again), Dusk allowed them to escape, and they began the descent to Monday’s Dayroom.

We open on Arthur going down the spiderwire. This is “easier than it look[s]”, Arthur says. He can slide his feet forward, the wire feels “rock solid” and, as long as he does not look down, his balance is fine. As soon as he looks down, though, he begins to “shake and quiver”, and that then turns into “a general wavering” that threatens to make him fall over. It passes when he looks up again. I presume this has to do with the spiderwire being invisible.

Suzy then steps up behind him. She has no trouble with it and does not need to use her arms for balance because her wings help with that. Soon she is right behind Arthur and he is quite conscious of how slowly he goes. After he has gone some “twenty yards” the Will asks if it is the time to mention that “the spiderwire is impermanent”. No, the time for that would have been when they went to step on. That might have given them more time to traverse it. Still, now is the second-best time for it.

Arthur goes faster and asks what the Will means. They say that the spiderwire will disappear in a few minutes. That is a problem, then, and a smart decision of whoever made the wire. Arthur tries to “run”. He finds not being to lift his feet is “very odd” and, though he does go faster, he also gets trouble keeping his balance. When he is about halfway down, the Will again tells him to go faster. …It might have helped to tell him to go as fast as he can the first time? By now Arthur is in the “clouds of cooling steam”. It is not as hot as Arthur feared, and he compares it to steam from a shower.

The Will tells Arthur to go much faster. Arthur tries to, but he has considerably difficulty keeping his balance and he realises that he “expend[s] as much energy” trying to keep upright as he does going forward. (Maybe the Key could have a solution to this? That is something the Will could quite possibly help with.) The Will tells Arthur to go even faster (how, then?) because the spiderwire is unravelling. I guess it is magically held on course? Just then, Arthur spots the island, which is “about two hundred yards away”. The water is only some “ten or twenty yards” below him, and at this height, the steam is much hotter and the glow of the lava brighter. Then the crater must be quite a bit bigger than I thought it was; I thought that the spiderwire was much steeper, after all. As it is, I see it would slope somewhere between 3 and 6 degrees.

Either way, Arthur is reminded of Suzy talking about how you can be killed in the House, which “fire, if it’s hot enough” is one of. He thinks that “[s]uperheated water” falls into this category, too. Hmmm, Arthur does have the Key to protect him, so he might be protected… but I do not know if it could adequately protect him from the lava. I also do not think that water falls in that category, since it cannot become quite as hot as fire, so it would likely not outright kill. Given that fliers will be hit by bursts of steam… Suzy should truly hope she reaches the island.

Arthur cuts his thoughts off and focuses his energies on sprinting, but it barely works because he cannot lift his feet. We get a countdown from fifty yards (which I really like!), and then Arthur says they are “going to make it”. He finally steps off and throws himself on the lawn around the villa. Yay! This whole sequence is written quite well, too.

Arthur looks around and “nearly [has] a heart attack”. Not only has Suzy fallen back, she is also hanging upside down! That is indeed a problem. Arthur jumps up and tries to climb onto the spiderwire. As he puts his foot on it, he slides off and nearly falls in the water, though. The Will says it is one-way, and Arthur should leave Suzy and go on. Arthur tells them off and says Suzy is his friend. The Will says that “[e]ven friends must be sacrificed for the goal”, which Arthur does not listen to.

Good to see how the Will really feels, then! With such an ally, Monday would not have to do much to see Arthur defeated! Further, Suzy is quite necessary for their plans. Arthur and the Will will be occupied with Monday, and if Suzy cannot distract him or just help out, everything needs to work according to plan or they will fail. She is also just capable of more than the Will. They simply cannot afford to abandon Suzy!

Arthur pulls out the Key, tells Suzy to hurry and asks the Will how long it will be before the wire unravels. The Will says it is already withdrawing from the ledge while looking out over the lake, and at the current rate, Suzy will fall into the water “in ten seconds”. Just enough time to act, then. Arthur immediately puts the Key to the spiderwire and tells it not to unravel. The Key grows a bit brighter, but Arthur naturally cannot see any difference.

The Will immediately complains that this was foolish, because this might just alert Monday. You should have said that before Arthur came here, and since you did not, you have no ground to complain about Arthur being foolish. Arthur tells them off yet again, and then asks if the spiderwire will stay. (Nix says he is “contradicting himself”, but he really is not..)

The Will answers “mulishly” after a bit (and by this point I would like to kick them into the lake) that the process has slowed. The spiderwire was “made with the Greater Key” and is governed by how it was made then, but it has slowed. Good!

(I have also thought about what the spiderwire was supposed to do, and I think it is meant as an escape route. If the Dayroom was threatened, whoever needs to be evacuated could step on the spiderwire, go up to the ledge, go through the weirdway, then shake off pursuers in the crowds of the Antechamber, and finally take an elevator elsewhere. It would also be a nice way to surreptitiously get people into the Dayroom, for example for secret meetings (and that would be somewhat necessary, given there are ninety thousand people around the Dayroom).

This also explains why the spiderwire unravels (to prevent people from following and to remove evidence) and why it is one-way (presumably to keep it clear). It is also hidden quite well, because of how it is transparent and because it is mostly hidden by the steam clouds. Overall, it is set up quite smart, and I like it!

Oh, and that is presumably why Dusk knew about it; he would be told because he might need to use it.)

So, Arthur stands back and “wave[s] frantically” at Suzy. She flaps her wings furiously and is nearly upright again. He shouts at her to go faster, and she does, “her wings beating up a storm”. She comes closer and now Arthur can see “the tension and fear” on her face. He grips the Key so tightly he nearly cuts himself again. Suzy comes even closer…

Twenty feet from shore, the wire breaks beneath her feet. Suzy screams and flies for shore “with all her might”. Just then, a bubble forms beneath her and Arthur remembers the blasts of steam meant to target fliers. The bubble expands as Suzy flies, and Arthur holds his breath. Three seconds have passed, and Suzy is almost on shore. Then he remembers the Key he is holding and points it at the bubble… and it bursts, “sending a great jet of steam straight up like a geyser”.

Arthur staggers back, thinking that he was too slow and Suzy has “been blown to pieces”… and just then, she “crashe[s] into him” and they roll across the lawn. Phew! That was a quite tense scene and it was written quite well, too! As they untangle and get up, Suzy says it was close, and she feels her “shoulders ‘ave been pulled up to [her] ears”. Arthur asks her what she was doing, and yells this. Suzy says she was tired of staying behind Arthur, so she thought she could “run along upside down”, but her wings did not work properly that way.

Arthur tells her to forget about it, and apologises for yelling at her. He looks at the villa. The windows are shuttered, but there is an “unassuming back door of unfinished wood”. I guess that is some kind of secret exit or emergency exit, then. Arthur guesses they should enter there. The Will agrees, and says that the inside might be confusing, as Monday has changed the interior to “steam rooms and bathing pools” and it is much larger than the outside is. (That would not be confusing to Arthur, since you have not told him what it looks like yet.) Obviously, Arthur should then find Monday and get the Hour Key from him. They end with “I… ahem… we shall assist as best we can”. Oh, good to see you bother to acknowledge Suzy. (I almost wish they had made their earlier remark in Suzy’s presence…)

Arthur wants to do it, so he reviews the needed incantations and procedures, then goes for the door. “Ten paces” from it, he stops. Before the door there is a “dry moat”, of about six feet deep and wide. In and of itself it is not much of an obstacle, Arthur says, but it is “knee-deep in writhing, undulating, coiling, hissing snakes”. These are also not ordinary snakes; rather, they are “patterned in yellow and red flames that flow[] from their flat heads to their pointy tails, and their eyes [are] shiny and blue, as bright as sapphires”. They sound quite cool (and obviously made)!

The Will, in a panic, says these are “[b]ibliophages” and orders Arthur back. Arthur quickly does so, as the snakes try to climb up the walls of the ditch. To his relief, they cannot get out. Arthur asks what they are. The Will says they are Nithlings, and they “spit a poison that dissolves any writing or type into Nothing”. (That might be quite useful to permanently dispose of documents…) They then say that the bibliophages should not be here, and Monday has exceeded “the limits of… of anything”. Oh my, how shocking. This is the same person who has no trouble with having Noon cause an epidemic, so I would only expect this.

Arthur asks if they will spit if they do not have writing or type. The Will says no, but they are wholly made of type, and cannot cross. You are living in a jade frog, so you are certainly not entirely made of type, Will. Suzy says that is what Monday meant to happen, and asks what the plan will be. The Will rallies (not that I am sure why they were so shocked by the obvious trap) and says that it remains as they discussed, only Arthur must go without them (what a pity). First he needs to be sure he has no “writing or type” of any kind whatsoever on him, for if he even a single letter with him, the bibliophages will notice, they will spit, and All Will Be Lost.

Suzy adds that they will also be dead. Yes, that too, since I note that the Will (again) does not seem to care whether Suzy lives or dies. So, they go about removing their type. After some five minutes, they are done. Arthur needs to tear off labels from his clothing. Suzy has some “handwritten laundry letters”, but she just throws them out and has “three shirts, breeches, two pairs of stockings and her boots” on. Arthur has more difficulty, as each item of usual clothing has multiple labels and often text on it. He even needs to remove “the waistband [] of his underwear”, and he is glad he does not have tattoos and has not written on his hands. That would indeed be problematic.

The Will (who is now sitting on their discarded clothing) asks for a double-check, and notices something on Arthur’s wrist. Arthur realises that the “brand name” on his watch is type and so presumably removes it. The Will asks again, and they check their pockets. Then Arthur notes there are letters on the zip of his jeans (presumably “YKK”). This is also in the same paragraph as the Will speaking; sloppy, Nix.

So Arthur tries to break of the zipper, but then he sees there is writing on the inside, too. He realises that it will not work, and that he will need to get rid of all of his own clothing and “just wear the stuff from the Antechamber”. He then gets out of his clothing, puts on the shirt the Lieutenant Keeper gave him, which is long enough to be akin to a “nightshirt”, and then his coat. He does feel “pretty weird and exposed” like this, even though the coat is buttoned up, and he hopes to avoid “Marily Monroe-style gusts”.

The Will wishes them success, and ends with “Let the Will be done”. Arthur nods. Then… the Will “[stands] on his hind legs and bow[s]”. First, it should be “its”, not “his”. Second… how can the Will even do this when they are clearly physically a normal frog? Just have them salute Arthur or something! Suzy curtseys and Arthur nods again, then gives a salute.

Then he (finally!) goes ahead to the moat and stares at the bibliophages. He sees there are thousands of them, and they are all “at least four feet long”. As he watches them move around, he feels his mouth drying. He and Suzy will have to “literally wade” through them. (Sidenote: I get the feeling we are supposed to find the bibliophages ominous, too, but I just find them cool.)

He thinks he has not even asked if they bite as well as spit… and he does not have underwear on. That gives him a “faint, almost hysterical chuckle”, as he cannot believe his situation. He is supposed to be a hero, to go up against Monday, and here he is “without pants on, worrying about being bitten somewhere very unpleasant by Nithling snakes”. He thinks that surely no real hero would end up in something like this. Well, you chose this because it was the safest way in… and now it turns out to be more troublesome than expected, you go on either way. That seems like something a hero might do to me.

Arthur then says “No time like the present” and lowers himself into the moat. There the chapter ends. Over to Vermaanti, then!

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Vermaanti: So we open next chapter where we left off: Arthur and Suzy are about to enter the Dayroom! When he lowers himself into the bibliophages, he finds them “unpleasantly warm, almost hot”. That’s a sure sign they’re Nithlings, then. As he drops entirely into the ditch, they begin coiling around his legs. Their skin also feels like sandpaper, which makes it even worse. He tries not to think about it and goes to wade to the door.

The bibliophages wind around his waist and are “all around his legs and under his coat”. Some begin to hang off his arms, too, and one even “slither[s] up and around his neck”. Even when they’re wound tightly, they don’t constrict, and they haven’t bitten. Arthur is sure the Key will protect him if they try.

By the time he’s halfway across, he’s wholly covered. The snakes are everywhere, “even around his head”, and there must be dozens around his legs. Their number makes it hard to walk and he stumbles some times, which allows even more snakes to get on.

Kerlois: This does sound like something I might enjoy. Being among so many snakes and having a relatively friendly interaction with them… I like it.

Vermaanti: Behind him, Suzy cries ‘Avert! Foul snakelings!’ which I find quite funny. Arthur doesn’t react, because a bibliophage might crawl in his mouth. He doesn’t turn to look either, because he’ll surely lose his balance and fall, and he doubts he’ll be able to get up because of how heavy the snakes are. So he concentrates on pushing ahead. Finally he reaches the door, which is set in the side of the trench, and is thus half buried in the snakes. Arthur tries the handle, but the door is locked. He shakes some bibliophages off and opens it with the Key.

The door actually opens, which tells me that Monday didn’t expect Arthur to come this far, and lets out “a blast of heat and the very unpleasant smell of rotten eggs”. Not the smell I’d associate with steam pools, but alright. The bibliophages that sat against the door don’t fall in, but keep in the outline of the ditch, Arthur sees. It wouldn’t do to have them wandering all over the place, after all.

Arthur, holding his nose against the smell, steps out of the snake pit and into the Dayroom. As he does, the bibliophages still on him fall off “like leaves from a tree suddenly struck by a high wind”.

Kerlois: We then get a paragraph of Arthur noting (and sounding quite surprised) that the interior of the villa does not look like the outside at all. Never mind that the Will just told him that.

Vermaanti: So we get a description. Arthur’s standing on a “platform of old black-brown cast iron”, which he likens to “an island in a sea of steam”. (Monday didn’t bother to protect it against rust, then?) The floor has an “open diamond weave”, and through it, Arthur can see “boiling mud” some fifteen metres below. The mud is dark yellow and “bubble[s] and pop[s] like burning porridge”, which sends the steam up.

A very narrow one-person bridge leads further in. This one is also made of iron and “the monogram MM” is cast into it every few metres. Arthur can’t see where it leads because of how thick the steam is. I think I’d prefer water to mud, but you do you.

Suzy then speaks (because she apparently just entered) saying that she remembers this as the “stink of the match factory”. That would mean that she originally lived somewhere in the 19^th century, and I can’t find a plague epidemic in London in that time… so I think Nix messed this up. She says he father said it was “the stench of the”—and then Arthur says it’s sulfur dioxide and cuts her off. That’s quite rude of him, really.

Kerlois: Arthur further explains that it comes from the hot mud, and it is like in “Yellowstone National Park”. There will probably also be geysers, he thinks. I do think Suzy understands quite little of this, given where she comes from and given that Arthur does not bother to explain further. Also… I guess Monday is heating this complex with the heat from the volcano, then? The lava we saw should provide enough heat for it, at least.

Vermaanti: Just then, a geyser indeed erupts, spewing hot mud everywhere. Suzy puts her wings over her head for protection, and Arthur finds the Key cools the mud that hits him. That’s good to see! Arthur tells Suzy to come and starts along the walkway. After some twenty metres, he notices that Suzy is still at the platform, staring into the steam clouds. He goes back to her. She says there is something in the clouds and draws her knife. Arthur looks up just as “a shadowy figure” dips out of the clouds. It’s not Mister Monday, but someone dressed in pink, “with yellow wings that shed feathers as he hover[s] above them”. It’s… Pravuil!

Kerlois: I do wonder how he managed to get into here… Maybe he flew ahead of them and went in before Arthur and Suzy? That would explain why he is right here, at least.

Vermaanti: So Pravuil immediately shoots a “crossbow bolt” that shoots straight for Arthur. Without conscious effort, the Key hits the bolt and cuts it in two; the halves fly harmlessly past Arthur. That was close! Pravuil says it’s nothing personal and simply “a commercial priority”. Now he must “sound the alarm” (so presumably alert Monday to Arthur’s presence). He begins to wish Arthur farewell, but then cries out.

Kerlois: It turns out that the clouds had parted for a moment and Suzy took that chance to throw her knife at Pravuil! It hits his left foot and sticks there. Pravuil drops his bow and tries to pull the knife out, “wings labouring”.

Vermaanti: I guess he didn’t see Suzy draw her knife precisely because he’s hiding in the clouds. Before Pravuil can do anything else, Suzy launches herself at him, calling out to Arthur to go on. She spins in circles around his head, “kicking and scratching”. Pravuil forgets the knife and hits back. As they fight, they fly higher and disappear into the clouds. It really is necessary, I think. After all, if Pravuil manages to alert Monday to Arthur’s presence before Arthur can get the Hour Hand, they will never succeed. Arthur can’t exactly keep Pravuil occupied, either, since he needs to look for Monday. I doubt he could do much with the Key, since Pravuil’s hidden in the clouds, and Suzy can actually fly and fight him there. So I’ll take it, but I wish I’d see more of Suzy in this chapter.

Kerlois: Notably, if the Will had left Suzy behind, Arthur would certainly have failed now.

Vermaanti: Arthur cranes his head and stands on his toes to look, the Key held ready. But he can only see clouds of steam and “a single pearly-white feather” that spirals down. Arthur catches it and he sees it’s stained with blood. “Red blood, not the blue blood of a Denizen”.

Kerlois: According to Superior Saturday, her blood is “neither the blue of a Denizen nor entirely the red of a human, but something in between”, so this moment falls apart a bit. (Given that there is more thought put to blood colour there, and because Suzy is clearly immortal I think it makes sense there would be more changes to her.)

Vermaanti: So Arthur stares at it and then lets it fall. Suzy is gone, he says, but “her sacrifice [will] not be in vain”. Even if she loses the battle, or has already lost, she has gained him “precious time”, and he won’t waste it.

Despite him saying that Suzy might not have died, this scene still feels like she did, and that bothers me. This feather with blood on it doesn’t even mean she’s severely wounded; she might just have cut herself on the knife, for instance, and given that she’s fighting with Pravuil, the blood would end up everywhere. And yes, Pravuil will be a hard enemy for her (not least because he’s probably a Dawn), but she doesn’t have to constantly physically fight him; she can also draw him away. Finally, she hasn’t lived for hundred of years and learned nothing. Have some trust in her!

Kerlois: To be fair, it would be more difficult, since she has no sure way to know when Arthur has the Hour Hand… Still, though, this is not a definite “sacrifice”, and it bothers me, too.

Vermaanti: So Arthur “[holds] back his fear” and runs along the bridge, into the “swirling steam, the geysers and the raining mud”. He runs faster than he’s ever done. His footsteps ring in the iron, until he silences them with the Key. (So now he’s getting quite adept at using the Key!) The bridge goes on for very long, much further than he expected. Every hundred metres there is a platform, but aside from that, everything looks the same. He hears more geysers than he sees, and the mud falls so often it’s “like rain” and it coats him completely. The Key keeps it from hurting him, but he needs to slow down from time to time to clear his face.

I guess this complex must be a few square kilometres in internal size, at least, and it’s almost completely deserted. Arthur’s lucky that there only seems to be a single way to proceed from the back door, or he’d never have found Monday. Well, as he runs, Arthur goes through the Will’s instructions again and again. He also has an “undercurrent” in his head which tells him that the plan is unlikely to work and that he needs to be prepared for anything.

Finally, the bridge widens and inclines down. Arthur sneaks up, holding the Key ready. Ahead, there’s another platform. It’s low and broad and is “only a foot or two above the mud”. Arthur can see someone standing “next to a table”. He crouches and creeps closer, wondering if it’s Monday, “awake and waiting for him”. Then… the figure turns and his “heart seem[s] to stop in his chest”. Arthur begins to speak the incantation, but stops when he sees who it is.

It turns out to be Sneezer (who we haven’t seen since the first chapter)! He looks nearly the same as he did on the oval, only he’s now bound to the table (made of iron, too) by his left wrist. The chain is very long. On top of the table, there’s a “methylated spirit burner” and some drink, including two bottles of “cognac or whisky” and a decanter of water.

That’s quite luxurious for someone who’s held prisoner here, but, since Sneezer is the only one who can operate Seven Dials, Monday probably can’t afford to treat him too harshly. At the moment, Sneezer’s mumbling to himself and fiddling with his gloves. Then he turns around, and Arthur sees his “coat and shirt” have been cut into strips. Beneath it, on the “jaundiced-looking skin”, are “ugly red weals”. Given that Denizens heal fast, Arthur knows this can’t have been cause by any ordinary whip.

So Monday had Sneezer whipped for something he clearly did not choose to do, which is quite evil of him. I do like that Monday has kept Sneezer in the Dayroom close to him, presumably in case the Will would try inhabiting him again.

Arthur thinks about how to proceed. He needs to get past Sneezer without Sneezer alerting Monday. He doesn’t think Monday is far away. On the other side of the platform are steps to a lower bridge, which is at the level of the mud. Monday might well be yards away. So Arthur keeps watching as Sneezer fiddles with his gloves some more and then shifts the bottles around. He slowly creeps closer while Sneezer’s back is turned. When he is close enough, he can hear what Sneezer mumbles.

Kerlois: He says he was apparently “visiting for a card game” somewhere, and the Will (not yet in the jade frog) crawled up his nose. He also says he tried to give his best service, even though he never had the training for it. Between that, he rightly complains about how it is not his fault and he could not possibly have known about the Will. Then he cuts off abruptly.

Vermaanti: So he stops because Arthur puts the point of the Key against his throat and tells him to freeze. (That’s more violent than I would expect from Arthur.) He’s unprepared for what happens next: Sneezer freezes literally! Ice flows from the Key in a “softly crackling rush” and within a few seconds, it envelops his entire body in “shiny blue ice”. Sneezer is now frozen solid.

I don’t think we’ll ever see the Key behave like this again, so this is a bit out of place. I’m especially certain that the Keys need to have their wielder direct their attention to them in order for them to work, too… so this just feels too convenient.

Kerlois: Either way, Arthur pulls the Key back. He says that he did not expect it, but it is a “good result” (that it is). He wonders if the ice will last in the heat, so he touches Sneezer with the Key and tells him to freeze again. More ice flows from the Key, thickening the layer until there stands a “man-sized icicle”, so thick that Sneezer is just a dim shape. Since he presumably will not be hurt by it, this is a quite smart way to do it!

Vermaanti: Arthur checks the icicle. Some water is already sliding off it, but he’s sure it will hold for some hours, and hopefully he’ll need much less time than that. So he leaves the platform and very quietly goes down to the low bridge. It’s barely above the mud, and, in some places, the mud even flows over. Arthur has no problem walking through, though.

Kerlois: I suppose Monday deliberately put this here to deter intruders.

Vermaanti: The steam is very thick here, so Arthur goes even slower and waves the Key to drive the steam apart. He thinks that surely Monday has to be close. Omniscient narration then tells us he is. Thank you for that. The steam parts before Arthur and he sees that the bridge stops. Before him is a “pool of bubbling mud” with some posts sticking out of it. Between these posts is a “hammock of silver rope”, and in it lies… Mister Monday! He has made it! Now he only needs to get the Key off Monday and somehow manage to complete the rituals.

Arthur stops, his mouth dry. Monday seems to be asleep. He’s wearing “a thick white bathrobe” and has something on his eyes, which Arthur thinks might be bits of cucumber, like Emily uses, but he soon sees it’s “[g]old coins” instead. At least Monday’s asleep, like the Will said he’d be… Then it depends on how quickly he can react when Arthur acts.

Arthur goes to the edge of the bridge. He can see an “iron ladder” go down into the mud. Arthur looks at it, then back at Monday. He can see a “glint” in Monday’s right-hand pocket and wonders if it’s the Hour Hand. Given that Monday had the Hour Hand in his right sleeve when he first met Arthur, that seems quite likely!

Monday moves somewhat, and Arthur flinches. Then he calms himself, as it was only a small movement and Monday keeps breathing with “the steady motion of a sleeper”. (It was an effective jumpscare, though.) So Arthur recalls the instructions the Will gave him, and he points the Key at Monday.

Kerlois: Then he swallows twice and softly says, ‘Minute by minute, hour by hour, two hands as one, together the power!’ There the chapter ends!

Well, these chapters had some excellent tension, I would say, along with a nice obstacle course.

Vermaanti: Certainly. (Also, as a reminder, Suzy is still out there fighting Pravuil at this point.) You’ll see us the time after next, then!