OOM: To the labyrinth with Bossuet

[cook_the_rude]

At the top of a hill, there is a door, set into the hill-face.

The lake is shimmering in the distance, and the Scottish summer is in full effect.

But the door in the hillside might still be considered boding.

"Not making any Dante puns," Dr. Lecter declares, gesturing to the door invitingly.

Comments

[cook_the_rude]

Dr. Lecter vaults over the sliding hoard using his lance, reaches the door before Bossuet, and pushes it open. "Good use of a crown," he gasps, "worthy of a revolutionary of France!"

He is still holding his lance, ready to charge into the next world beside Bossuet.

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

Bossuet nods breathlessly, laughing. À bas les rois, yes? His heart is still pounding as he shoulders through the door, lance ready, and charges fearlessly at a

tree.

The door that shuts behind them is glass; above it a sign proclaims the entrance of a Quality Burger Restaurant. Beside them, after some startled gasps, a group of teenagers begins to clap ironically.

[cook_the_rude]

"A burger restaurant?" Dr. Lecter says, stopping beside the tree and looking around. "Across from a McDonalds??"

He holds on to his lance as if that was the most natural thing. He seems to even have picked up a sword from the hoard before slamming the door shut.

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

Bossuet stares dumbfounded at the tree, and at the traffic beyond it, and at the crowd of teens. That, at least, he knows how to respond to. He tips his hat and leers absurdly at one of the girls. "Why, Mesdemoiselles, my friend and I were just slaying a dragon. Naturally we are armed. Do you like the look of my lance? Very firm, a nice size, just the thing to satisfy damsels in distress. No?"

He starts to saunter off around the corner, looking as nonchalant as he possibly can.

[cook_the_rude]

Dr. Lecter follows, after giving a brief bow and a murmured apology to the young women. "We don't want them to call the police," he says. "We simply want the next door. Let me see - where are we?"

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

Bossuet pulls into a doorway. When Lecter catches up to him, the whites of his eyes are showing very wide; he looks considerably more spooked than he had in the dragon's lair. "Where are we? How should I know? Those--those are automobiles...?"

At least in his coat and hat he looks like he's on his way to or from some costumed event, even if the lance doesn't exactly match the 1830s theme.

[cook_the_rude]

"Paris," Dr. Lecter says. "My time, from the look of the cars. Near the Jardin du Louxembourg, I would say."

He looks around.

"Place Edmond Rostand -- named for the playwright who wrote 'Cyrano de Bergerac', but that was after your time."

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"The Luxembourg...?" The name Edmond Rostand means nothing to him and it's nearly impossible for Lesgle to see Paris in these wide streets filled with cars and buses. He stares at a clump of trees for several seconds, then closes his eyes. "Wait, I've read about this. A plan of modernization. New streets, new buildings, new sewers even. Very clean. Very hard to barricade."

When he opens his eyes, none of this particularly helps. If that's the Jardin du Luxembourg, this is...oh, hell, it could be any of a dozen places Lesgle used to know like the back of his hand. "When I came to Milliways before, it was through a café. If I had a map of the new streets, I could...guess at where that would be now."

[cook_the_rude]

"The Café Musain?" Dr. Lecter says. "It is near here, I think. There wasn't a McDonalds or a burger restaurant, of course, when my uncle showed me this place in the seventies...."

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"No, another place." Bossuet glances at him sharply, just a flicker of a look: why would Dr. Lecter think of the Musain? He's unlikely to have mentioned it himself, as the place where they held the secret illegal revolutionary meetings. Gavroche at the Bar, though, he's talkative enough....

Bossuet puts the thought aside. "It was another place. Ever so many cafés in Paris. --Good God, though, this could be about where the Musain stood."

[cook_the_rude]

"I think so," Dr. Lecter says. "Perhaps we should go inside and see if we get our next door there. If they let us in, bristling with medieval pole-arms."

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

Ah, yes, the pole-arms. Bossuet pulls his eyes away from one of the automobiles--it must be the omnibus of the future, from the way people got on and off--and scratches his beard. "We'll tell them we're on our way to a party, and absolutely not an émeute. The bourgeois will be immensely reassured."

[cook_the_rude]

"We shouldn't eat or drink anything in there," Dr. Lecter says, eyeing the establishment.

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"I wasn't planning on it." In fact, he's already feeling rather strange, beyond just the confusion of this very unfamiliar Paris: it's hard to keep his mind off the fact that he's really quite dead. "But by all means, let us find a door."

The Quality Burger Restaurant does not have any rules in place about swords and lances. But when they go in, they get a very strong eyeing from the employees. A manager will likely show up soon.

[cook_the_rude]

"Let's go to the back of this place and see if there is a door that looks like the labyrinth doors," Dr. Lecter says.

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

Bossuet's used to dirty looks from disapproving café owners. He strolls on through, smiling politely. But the back leads only to the kitchen--and he's not foolhardy enough to intrude there without a better plan than smile and nod--and to a very ordinary set of restrooms.

[cook_the_rude]

Much cleaner restrooms, though, than Bossuet might be used to in his own time.

"It looks like a dead end," Dr. Lecter declares, opening the door to the gentlemen's.

Some employees are eyeing the two of them with great alarm.

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

Yes, back in the good old days at the Musain one had a choice of relieving oneself in the back alley or...no, that was it, really.

"It does look like a dead end. I'm--" Oh, dear. Bossuet may be capable of embarrassment after all. "I'm willing to put my head into the ladies', er...the ladies' department...if you think we'd better for the sake of thoroughness. Or we could try something else."

Here comes a manager.

[cook_the_rude]

"Something else," Dr. Lecter says, turning rapidly.

He politely nods to the manager and marches towards the exit, spear, sword and all.

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"Do let's."

Bossuet nods equally politely. So sorry to disturb everyone at this delightful eatery, and they were just on their way out the door after all.

At least the gawking teenagers outside have moved off. He refrains from attacking the poor inoffensive tree anyway. "Well. Shall we try to find a map to match this Paris to my own? Perhaps our next attempt will require visiting a greengrocer's or a fishwife's stand. Or a milliner's; do they still have milliners?" Everyone seems rather short on hats, now that he thinks about it. It's a shame. Milliners' establishments always had such charming shopgirls.

[cook_the_rude]

"Only a very few, for high fashion, or the very, very old-fashioned," Dr. Lecter says. "A bookshop might be a good option; we can buy the map and then find other landmarks you remember."

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"A lovely notion, if either of us has any money. I'm sadly deficient there. --Or, wait, they've instituted public libraries now, haven't they?"

He looks remarkably hopeful at the thought. Public libraries! With books, for free, that anyone can wander off the street to read!

[cook_the_rude]

"They do," Dr. Lecter says. "We should not, however, try to take a map outside. A bookshop might be better, especially if my credit card works here."

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"Ah, credit. There was once a time when people cared to sell me things on credit. Such happy times."

A bookshop is a fine idea. Bossuet sets off down the street in search of one. But sooner or later (probably sooner) he's going to have to work out how to cross a street filled with cars.

[cook_the_rude]

"We can't stop the cars with our lances," Lecter remarks. "Theoretically, we should go and cross at those coloured lights; they signal who mustt stop and who can go."