The Mysterious Midget and his Minions were gone, taken prisoner by the worm riders and swallowed up by the desert sands. But JigSaw was gone too. He had run away and his friends had given chase, but once he had reached this barren pile of rocks rising up from a sand dune he had disappeared. "Do you think those worm riders got him?" Sindy asked. Dabbler shook her head, "No, they showed up after Jig reached this patch of rock. If anything, the Mysterious Midget took him. Only thing is, if JigSaw was all he wanted, why would he stop to battle us once he got him? Maybe the Midget just wanted to make sure that we couldn't interfere with his plan to resurrect Sawyer. But I think its more likely that the Midget didn't get JigSaw at all. That he's still somewhere out here."
D.J. agreed and, although her mana reserves were almost depleted, used her powers to scan the desert for JigSaw's trail.
"THERE!" she said, pointing to the northwest. A sparkling line of footprints glowed in the sand. Dabbler attuned her own eyes and saw it too. "Follow us!" she said and began to run alongside the tracks. A blanket of mana along the sand guaranteed that no tremors would alert any nearby sandworms. And in very short order the trail led them to an eroded lump of rocky terrain dominated by a bent and crumbling naturally formed chimney.
But there the trail ended.
"What the hell?" Dabbler mumbled. "Where'd he go from here?"
Rincewind mumbled something too, something rather unkind. He was more than just a little annoyed with JigSaw and the situation he'd put them all in. But Dabbler wasn't in the mood for Rince's complaining, especially not after the wizard's beggardly attempt at joining up with the Mysterious Midget. "Do you have something to say, wizard?" Dabbler barked at him. Rincewind just dropped his head shamefully and didn't say a word. But Dabbler wasn't satisfied; she was angry with Rincewind and filled with anxiety over JigSaw's disappearing act. "Come on Rincewind, spit it out!" and then she shoved the wizard hard. He lost his balance and tipped backward and before anyone could make a move he fell down into the dark crevice yawning open behind him.
"Rincewind!" Dabbler shouted, suddenly full of regret. She knelt down at the edge of the crevice but could see nothing in the darkness of the deep hole. "Are you alright?!"
And then a voice echoed up from the hole, "Uh, I think you should come down here. There's something you aught to see."
Sindy pulled a rope out of her backpack and soon they had all climbed down into the hole. Rincewind waited for them at the bottom. "What is it Rincewind, what's down here?" D.J. asked. Rincewind pointed to the ground ahead of him. Set into the bed of the crevice was a metal hatch. "Woah," D.J. exclaimed, "JigSaw's aura is all over that hatch. This is where he went."
"We found him then!" Dabbler yippied, and then added a bit apologetically, "Uh, thanks Rincewind, we couldn't have done it without you."
"Don't thank me yet," Rincewind replied, but with a proud grin on his face. "Finding the hatch won't do us any good, unless we know how to open it."
Go back - Go to the parent episode.
Tue Jun 06 23:03:50 2006