Chapter Seventeen
Nutscracker
Would that be the one at the centre of the separator labyrinth?
UGLI 666
Do not waste your final moments in blasphemy!
Sartrik
What the hell's going on out there? Stop it!
IsoldA
Romeo! Goodbye, you bastard!
Ariadne
My door's getting hot. Are yours?
Nutscracker
I'm stifling. Something . . .
Monstradamus
It's him.
Theseus
MINOTAURUS!
Monstradamus: Ah?
IsoldA: Ah?
Nutscracker: Ah?
Organizm(-: Ah?
Theseus: Ah?
Ariadne: Ah?
UGLI 666: Ah?
Romeo-y-Cohiba: Ah?
TheZeus
Fuck U
Monstradamus: MOOOOOO!
IsoldA: MOOOOOO!
Nutscracker: MOOOOOO!
Organizm )-: MOOOOOO!
Theseus: MOOOOOO!
Ariadne: MOOOOOO!
UGLI 666: MOOOOOO!
Romeo-y-Cohiba: MOOOOOO!
Organizm(-:
Ladies and gents, I don't get it - what was that?
Nutscracker
I think it's getting cooler. And the noise has stopped.
IsoldA
What, don't you understand? It's Theseus!
Romeo-y-Cohiba
Theseus! How we've longed for you to come!
Monstradamus
Theseus. At last. Where are you? What do you see around you?
UGLI 666
Hmmm.
Organizm(-:
Theseus, answer!
Nutscracker
Stop it. It's pointless.
UGLI 666
He's given us the slip.
Monstradamus
Has he really gone?
Nutscracker
Yes.
IsoldA
But of course . . .
UGLI 666
There is no more Minotaur.
Ariadne
Hang on, papa.
Monstradamus: My son!
IsoldA: My son!
Nutscracker: My son!
Organizm(-: My son!
Sartrik: My son(-:
:-(((((
Organizm(-:
Why don't we look for him? Maybe he still believes?
Monstradamus
In what?
Organizm(-:
Well, in the whole pile of xxx. That he has a body. And it's in a room.
Ariadne
He never did believe in that.
Romeo-y-Cohiba
You could say he saved us. He could have just killed us all once he'd seen us.
Nutscracker
No he couldn't. Then he'd never have got the helmet off. He isn't kind, he just knew.
Ariadne
What I've heard is that if anyone knows then it's precisely because he is kind.
Nutscracker
And what I've heard is that if anyone's kind then it's precisely because he knows.
Organizm(-:
What difference does it make to us? How did we give ourselves away?
UGLI 666
We get distracted. Make too much fuss. Talk off the point, all this stuff about Versailles and Mona Lisa.
IsoldA
Ugly, you don't mind us living here, do you?
UGLI 666
This time it was Ariadne who blurted everything out. That's why he gave us the slip.
Monstradamus
What do you suggest?
UGLI 666
Not to tell him anything.
Nutscracker
That's going too far. Then how will he find out he's wearing a helmet? We can't put something that doesn't exist on his head just like that. We have to explain. And it's best to start from childhood. Not so he understands everything, though, just enough for him to do it all to himself. Ariadne's our best guide round the labyrinth. She's very skilful at it.
UGLI 666
Nutcracker, you're talking about what she ought to do. I'm talking about what she's already done. And anyway, I beg your pardon, but what has skill got to do with it? The labyrinth is any route the Helmholz has been led along.
Monstradamus
That's right, any route. But it seems like a very long time since anyone walked round your route, Ugly.
Sartrik
What . . . What route is that?
Monstradamus
Back with us again, hero? Ladies and gents, a joke. Imagine Sartrik wakes up with a massive hangover. He can't remember anything about the previous day. There's a pool of blood beside him. He's surrounded by a labyrinth. But there's no Minotaur anywhere. Sartrik raises his eyes to the ceiling and whispers in horror: 'I killed him . . . Killed him and ate him . . . '
IsoldA
What's funny about that? That's exactly how it happened.
UGLI 666
Your joke's older than the labyrinth, Monstradamus. Let's discuss the serious situation we're in. Some day Ariadne will be the death of us.
IsoldA
Stop stirring things up, Ugly. It's not Ariadne's fault at all. Sartrik blurted it all out in a drunken stupor.
Sartrik
You always blame everything on Sartrik.
IsoldA
You should be xxx to xxx. Why did you butt in? What for? Lousy drunk.
Monstradamus
But how did he actually find out the Name?
UGLI 666
Ariadne gave away the whole thing to him in so many words.
Nutscracker
Then why hasn't he dissolved the lot of us if he knows the Name?
Monstradamus
He has. It just seems to us in here that he's dissolved himself.
UGLI 666
Ariadne, maybe you can explain what made you like him more than us?
Ariadne
Oh, go to hell. You can lead him round the labyrinth instead of me.
UGLI 666
I'll come back to you about this. I'll show you up for what you are.
Romeo-y-Cohiba
I don't understand - who's responsible? Ariadne or Sartrik?
UGLI 666
Ariadne's to blame. She was beside Theseus in the MINOTAUR and they got too cosy.
Ariadne
You be careful who you go yapping at. Or you'll wind up lost forever in that cathedral of yours, get it? You're here on my thread. And there isn't any other.
UGLI 666
Did you all hear that? Did you hear it? Papa, have you thought where we'll all end up when she goes running off to that snake?
Nutscracker
Don't be such a Cassandra.
Organizm(-:
What are we going to do here now?
Monstradamus
What are we going to do? Carry on with the discourse.
Nutscracker
I know that. But in what capacity?
Monstradamus
You've only got the capacity for doing one thing, Nutcracker. Staring into that screen, like Pavlov's bitch gazing into Tarkovsky's mirror.