Chapter 3 – Micky’s Day (In Which Micky Talks to Odd People)

“Good morning, Archchancellor!” Micky called on his way back from breakfast.

“Good morning,” Ridcully replied absently, rooting around in his hat.

“Good morning, Dean,” Micky called to the Dean.

“Good morning young…student wizard,” the Dean replied, wondering why the students always said hello to him. All it did was pressure him to remember names, which he never could.

Micky chuckled to himself and continued on towards the Library. On the way, he ran into the Bursar. “Good morning, Bursar,” he said politely.

“Melon and kumquat, my good man!” the Bursar replied. He had nearly been on the calm seas of sanity the day before, but this morning seemed to have dawned on a storm somewhere in his brain.

“Really? Peanuts and cheese,” Micky said, deciding that trying to have a conversation would be interesting.

“Crackers. Orange and white,” the Bursar said after a moment’s thought.

“Purple,” Micky added.

“Melon and kumquat,” the Bursar insisted, seeming to want to emphasize that point.

“What about apples, peaches, bananas, and pears?” Micky asked, not missing a beat. The Bursar seemed stumped by this and walked off, muttering to himself. Micky laughed.

“Someone hasn’t had their dried frog pills today,” he commented, heading for the Library. He had always liked the Library, despite its habit of suddenly being on a different plane. There was something about the way the magic crackled through the air. The books occasionally shifting or ruffling a page didn’t bother Micky in the least; in fact, he thought, it gave the room some personality. That and there weren’t a whole lot of people in there at any one time. Even if there were, the Library could make itself seem empty.

Micky pushed open one of the Library’s big, heavy doors and slipped inside. His reason for this particular visit to the home of all books magical was a mission of concealment. Basically, he was hiding from the Lecturer in Recent Runes, who he was supposed to be meeting with in ten minutes. Like it was his fault that he’d written one stupid rune backwards? It’s not like it blew up more than a couple windows and the Lecturer’s hat. The Lecturer hadn’t been amused, however, and held Micky’s hysterical laughter following the explosion in complete contempt. Knowing how angry the Lecturer could get, Micky thought it better to just lay low, instead of getting the riot act read to him. Chances were that the Lecturer in Recent Runes would forget about the meeting, go off for a quiet smoke, and be calm by afternoon.

“Ook!” The exclamation met Micky as soon as the Library door closed behind him.

“No, I’m not carrying anything ignited,” Micky replied.

“Oook!” the Librarian nodded, then knuckled off down a row of particularly rowdy books that were trying to break their chains to fly around the room. Micky followed him, looking for a book that he knew was in the row somewhere, or at least it had been the last time he checked.

“Let’s see…mustard, muskrat, geez, where is it…ah! Here it is: Magic for the Musically Irreparable,” Micky pulled the thick volume off the shelf and riffled through the index until he found the entry for drums, “Oh good, it’s only a couple chapters. I’ll have those songs licked by tonight!”

“Oook?” the Librarian questioned.

“Oh, gig with the band,” Micky replied absently.

“Ook ook?”

“Tonight, actually, in Sator Square.”

“Ook.”

“I know it’s a merchant place, but there are always a lot of people there.”

“Ook. Oook?”

“The name of the band? Oh,” Micky lowered the book and regarded the Librarian carefully for a moment. What harm could it do? Micky shrugged and told the Librarian the band’s name. The Librarian raised his eyebrows as much as an orangutan can.

“Oook! Ook, eek!” he complained, shaking a finger.

“No, with two E’s,” Micky explained hurriedly. The last thing he needed was to get clobbered by a 300-pound ape.

The Librarian scratched something in the dust on the floor and pointed to it. “Ook?”

Micky bent down to have a look. “Sort of,” he affirmed, “But more like this.” He rearranged the letters the Librarian had drawn so that they looked somewhat like a guitar. The Librarian clapped.

“Hey, you should come,” Micky said suddenly, “It starts at eight, and it’s not that far to go.”

“Ook!” the Librarian nodded.

“All right, then I’ll expect you. Can I take this book with me?”

“Ook! Oook, ook!”

“Okay, okay, I’ll be careful with it. It’ll be back before dark, I promise,” Micky laughed, leaving the Library with the book tucked under his arm.

What a day, already. Sleeping late, long breakfast, no classes, and his drums. Micky couldn’t think of anything better, except possibly the day that he had been promoted to the fourth level. Of course, it didn’t take much to make him happy. A quiet place to practice, a few new spells, and his friends were often enough.

Micky’s history as a wizard was pretty strange. He wasn’t the conventional “eighth son of an eighth son”; in fact, there weren’t even eight people in his immediate family. If you asked him to tell you when he first arrived at the University, Micky would probably reply with something vague like, “Oh, when I was a kid”. His mother barely remembered where Micky got his wizardly powers. But sometimes, in the depths of the night, Micky would have vague dreams about a tall, red-clad wizard with a moon on his hat and a long, wooden staff that shone with an unseen light. He supposed that was where everything had started, though he couldn’t really be sure why. All he knew was that he could do magic and, despite their past of fighting for positions and attempting to bump one another off, being a wizard made Micky happy.

When he reached his room, Micky tossed his pointy hat on the floor and sprawled on the bed with the music book opened in front of him. The drums had been another odd addition to his life. He had never really thought about performing any kind of music, except the conventional hairbrush-in-front-of-the-mirror variety. Then suddenly, one night after sneaking out for a drink, he’d run into some people practicing guitars in the basement of the Mended Drum. Those people turned out to be Mike and Peter, who were trying to avoid the prying ears of the public until they got a few songs down. That, and when they practiced at home they usually got threatened by the neighbors. Micky had complemented their music, and suddenly Mike was offering him a position in the band that they were trying to put together. Micky remembered the conversation well.

“Me? Join a band?” he had said.

“Sure. We’re looking for singers and a drummer,” Mike replied.

“Ah, well, I don’t really do either…” Micky admitted.

“You could learn. It’s not hard,” Peter had put in.

“Yeah, and by the looks of it, you’re a wizard,” Mike added, “That’s bound to help.”

“Well I…” Micky paused, then came to a decision, “All right then, when do we start?”

“We practice down here whenever we can,” Mike explained, “Sometimes together, sometimes not. We’ve only got a few songs so far, but if you meet me here at, say, midnight tomorrow, I’ll show you the music.”

And that had been that. Micky and Mike had met in the basement of the Drum at midnight the next night, and Micky had returned to his room in the University with some sketchy drum lines for Mike and Peter’s songs. Everything had progressed from there, and the band had accumulated more songs, plus recruited Davy. Micky would be the first to admit that he still wasn’t a wonderful drummer, but he tried and he certainly enjoyed himself.

Returning to the book after his brief flashback, Micky studied the spells that made instruments play by themselves. That might be of help, especially if he wanted to see exactly how to correct the mistakes he knew he was making, plus identify any others he might have been missing. The problem was that the spells were only one or two syllables away from other similar ones that could cause some very different results. Micky wanted to play the drums, not blow them up or turn them into lemon custard. Still, he tried the spells, taking care to read each word extremely carefully before trying to say it aloud. Finally, the drumsticks floated into the air, and Micky read on. With luck, he’d have them banging out the end part of “Star Collector” in no time.

About twenty minutes later, Micky was watching his drums intently as the sticks went up and down, playing nearly the entire gig through by themselves. Micky was impressed, and bit overwhelmed. There was a lot to correct by seven-thirty that night. If worse came to worse, he could use a disguise spell that made it so nobody noticed any mistakes, but he was pretty stubborn about learning his part as best he could.

After watching the drums for a few more minutes, Micky went down to lunch. On the way back to his room, he paused on one of the landings for a quick smoke. Then, with a sigh, he returned to his room, sat down at the drums, and began to practice.

ER, EXCUSE ME…

Micky started and turned around slowly, the feeling of time slowing jangling his nerves. Standing several feet behind him was a tall, skeletal, black-clad figure, holding a scythe and a violin.

“What are you doing here?” Micky demanded, “I can’t be dying yet.”

ACTUALLY, I WAS WONDERING IF YOU COULD HELP ME.

“Help you?”

ER, YES. Death held up the violin and Micky saw that two strings were broken, DO THERE HAPPEN TO BE ANY SPELLS IN THAT BOOK FOR VIOLINS?

“I, ah…” Micky was at a loss for words. Here was Death asking him to help with a sorry-looking old violin. Who knew that Death played the violin? From the looks of it he just battered the poor thing, but Micky figured he should at least look in the book. Being in the immediate presence of Death made him uneasy, and who could blame him?

IT’S ONLY THAT, I’VE GOT THIS VIOLIN, AND I CAN’T SEEM TO PLAY IT, Death explained, almost apologetically. Micky just nodded and flipped through the index.

“Violins, right here,” he said suddenly, almost to himself. He didn’t turn around, but he could feel Death looking over his shoulder. He found the chapter and scanned it. “Well, there’s a section on stringing it by magic, and something about lulling people to sleep, and something else about romance…I don’t think any of that will help.”

ARE YOU SURE?

Micky shrugged. “There doesn’t seem to be anything here that tells you how to play or how to make it play itself, which is actually rather odd. Nothing about personifications playing instruments, either.”

Death attempted to look disappointed. NOTHING AT ALL?

“Nope,” Micky snapped the book shut with newfound confidence.

AH WELL, THANK YOU ANYWAY, Death said slowly, SORRY TO BOTHER YOU.

“Hey, no problem,” Micky brushed the comment off and stood up.

WHY WERE YOU BANGING ON THOSE…ERM…DRUMS?

Micky turned, regarding Death with curiosity. “I thought you were supposed to know that sort of stuff about people.”

WELL, NOT ALL OF IT, Death admitted, MY LIBRARY IS RATHER LARGE.

“I…see,” said Micky, who didn’t. He hadn’t had as many encounters with Death as some of the other wizards, and therefore didn’t know as much about the way Death worked. In fact, most people didn’t know nearly as much about Death as they thought they did, but that was somewhat understandable considering the fact that normal people didn’t usually see him until the moment after they died.

I UNDERSTAND WHY HUMANS PLAY MUSIC. IT MAKES SENSE. IT GIVES THEM A FEELING OF ACCOMPLISHMENT AND FUN. DO THE DRUMS GIVE YOU A FEELING OF ACCOMPLISHMENT AND FUN?

Micky stared for a moment, his mouth open, before being able to pull himself together. Death was…curious. He was genuinely interested in something about…life. Micky didn’t pretend to know why Death had chosen that particular moment to start asking questions, but he couldn’t see any harm in answering.

“Yeah,” he said finally, “They do. Although sometimes the songs turn out to be harder than I bargained for.”

I HAVE A FEELING THAT, EVEN IF I COULD PLAY, SONGS WOULD STILL ESCAPE ME, Death sighed.

“Hey, not everybody’s musical,” Micky said comfortingly, realizing he was trying to reassure a seven-foot skeleton who would someday arrive to separate his soul from his body, “And it’s awfully hard to find a large group of people who appreciate the music once you learn to play it, anyway. There was that time when people in the Klatchian’s Head were throwing axes at – well, you should know; you were there. I saw you show up.”

Death appeared to think for a moment. OH YES. THERE WERE FOUR OF YOU, WERE THERE NOT?

Micky nodded.

I SEEM TO REMEMBER THAT THE SHORT ONE THREW HIS INSTRUMENT BACKSTAGE SO THAT HE COULD “CHASE” IT AND HIDE, Death said, almost looking amused, THE REST OF YOU WEREN’T TOO HAPPY ABOUT THAT. He rummaged around in his cloak for a moment and pulled out an hourglass. SPEAKING OF, I HAD SEVERAL FALSE ALARMS TODAY WITH YOUR GUITARIST THERE…WHAT’S HIS NAME…MICHAEL?

“He didn’t get hurt, did he?” Micky asked, suddenly concerned. He knew that Mike’s job hadn’t been going well lately, and Mike hadn’t looked all that calm earlier that day when he’d rescued Micky’s tobacco. NOT BADLY, Death replied. He suddenly seemed to remember that he had duties beyond his violin, and looked somewhat preoccupied. Micky shook his head.

“Well, hopefully the gig will pass without incident tonight,” he said loudly.

HOPEFULLY, Death nodded, then disappeared. Rolling his eyes, Micky went back to the drums. He had to get some practicing in before dinner because, knowing wizards, dinner would last almost until the gig started. Micky really wasn’t into those multi-course meals and usually opted to sneak out later on for a sandwich and some sort of drink. He was one of the few people at the University who hadn’t started hauling around extra weight after his first few months of attendance. In most other respects, however, he was very wizard-like. For example, whenever someone mentioned the fact that wizards were supposed to be celibate, Micky instinctively stuck his hands behind his back and whistled along with about three-quarters of the University students and staff.

Dinner rolled around about an hour later. Micky wandered down, flexing his fingers and staring at the blisters that were starting to form on his palms. He hadn’t seen blisters like that since he’d failed a Dynamic Thaumography test his first year. Oh well, he was sure there was a spell somewhere that could fix it before the gig.

Most of the senior wizards were already in the hall, eating. Ridcully seemed to be arguing with the Dean and Ponder Stibbons at the same time, so Micky sat down a few chairs away just for entertainment’s sake.

“They say that band made the whole Disc go wacky,” the Dean was saying, “Sometimes I have dreams about a weird hairdo and Death wanting my coat…or something.”

“I still say you’re crazy, Dean,” Ridcully replied, helping himself to more wine, “I mean, Music With Rocks In? That’s far-fetched.”

“Nobody has ever been able to prove that those people even existed,” added Ponder.

“I still think it’s a good story,” the Dean said stubbornly.

“I like it,” the Bursar chimed in placidly, his chin resting on his hand as he stared at a point somewhere above Ridcully’s left ear.

“Is it time for your dried frog pills already, old chap?” Ridcully pulled a complicated-looking watch out of his hat and glanced at it. Micky took the opportunity to do a little advertising.

“I heard that the concert tonight in Sator Square is going to be better than any fairy story,” he said slyly, taking the wine bottle from Ridcully and upending it into his own glass. The other wizards stared at him as wine splashed the table.

“What?” Ridcully asked finally.

“The concert. Tonight. In Sator Square,” Micky repeated slowly, mopping up the spilled wine with his napkin and pushing it towards the Bursar. There was a concentrated silence like that of several people thinking the same thing but trying not to look at each other for fear that they were all thinking the same thing.

“Concert, eh?” Ridcully scratched his chin. The impact seemed to have gone right over his head, which was quite possible when you considered it, “Music?”

“Yes,” Micky said patiently. There were some things you just had to explain to Ridcully. Actually, most things.

“Instruments and suchlike?”

“That’s usually how you make music, Archchancellor,” Ponder put in.

“That’s just like you, Mister Stibbons,” Ridcully sniffed and rooted around in his hat, coming up with a pipe, “Always acting like the logical answer is the right one.”

Ponder looked a little taken aback, but it was clear from his expression that he didn’t want to get into any further arguments with Ridcully, so he kept his mouth shut. Micky, however, was determined. He didn’t run into Ridcully much, but he was keenly aware of the way the man thought.

“Yes, Archchancellor,” Micky said again, “Instruments, music, singing, the whole bit.”

“Well then, we might just have to supervise that,” the Dean said quickly. Micky grinned. There was no better time to advertise a concert to a group of people than after they had just heard the legend of the Band With Rocks In.

“I’d like to go,” said the Bursar with the same spacey, placid look.

“Top pocket, green tin, old chap,” Ridcully advised. Then he turned to the other wizards, waving his hands. “Rubbish, the lot of it!” he exclaimed, “Instruments and singing and music…what has it got to do with magic? This is a university, and I won’t have my wizards bumbling off to concerts at all hours of the night!”

“But Mustrum –” began the Chair of Indefinite Studies.

Ridcully cut him off. “No buts! No wizards are going to that concert, and that’s that.” He huffed and folded his arms across his chest, puffing angrily on his pipe.

The Bursar took this as an opportunity to pick up Micky’s wine-laden napkin and wring it out over the Archchancellor’s head. The other wizards exploded with laughter, and Micky had the thought that perhaps the old Bursar wasn’t quite as crazy as everyone supposed.

Micky sat at the window in his room about ten minutes later, rolling a cigarette. He’d left the Great Hall when Ridcully had started chasing the Dean with a loaf of Klatchian bread. Things always got a little strange when the senior wizards had been drinking too much, which was most of the time. Normally, Micky was up for that kind of thing and joined in more often than not, but tonight he felt that he needed a little time to himself before the gig. Something was bothering him, and he couldn’t quite figure out what it was. He was just going over the afternoon in his head when there was a knock on the door.

“Come in,” he called absently. The door opened slowly, admitting Ponder Stibbons. He was closely followed by the Dean, the Chair of Indefinite Studies, and the Bursar.

“Er, Micky right?” Ponder inquired nervously.

Micky nodded. “Yeah. What’s up?”

“Well, we were just wondering…” Ponder trailed off, looking everywhere but at Micky.

“Yeah, and you know how Mustrum was at dinner…” the Dean added.

“I want to go to the concert,” said the Bursar plainly.

“I know that,” Micky replied, “So come.”

Ponder stared. “You mean it?”

Micky shrugged. “Why not?”

“Will there be Music With Rocks In?” the Dean asked hopefully.

“Lots,” Micky told him, not really knowing what else to say. Compared to the legend, Micky figured that the band did music that was enough like Music With Rocks In that it would please the wizards.

The Dean grinned. “Well then, when does it start?”

“Eight o’clock,” Micky replied, pulling a watch out of a pocket in his robe, “And I’ve got to get going. See you there, I guess.”

The wizards nodded enthusiastically. Micky rolled his eyes and pushed his way between them and out of the room, carrying his drumsticks. Hopefully one of the other guys had been able to rent a good set from somewhere or at least nonchalantly “borrow” one, because he didn’t want to have to come back and try to levitate his set down to Sator Square. Not only was it a complicated spell, but it caused quite a backup on the stairway.

At the bottom of the tower, Micky stopped, looked down at his wizard’s robe, and shook his head.

“I can’t go to the gig like this,” he muttered, digging around in his pockets, then his hat, trying to find some money. His last performance outfit had been ruined when a drunken dwarf threw his dinner at the stage, and Micky had been so busy with learning his part that getting a new one had slipped his mind. He checked his watch again. Well, he had about forty-five minutes; that should be enough. Better take the back door out of the Library to avoid Ridcully.

With a grin, Micky set off, still not quite sure of what had been bothering him before the wizards had barged in.

continued