Mortal Sin - Sin Book II

Chapter 11

I took a long breath, letting it out slowly. It seemed to be the first time I'd been able to do anything slowly since arriving on the beach. I couldn't say I'd 'appeared' on the beach, nor could I say I'd 'woken up' there. I was quite sure there hadn't been a fizz and a sparkle of fairy dust to pre-empt Scotty beaming me down. Also, I didn't notice one of Tolkien's Great Eagles flying away having dropped me off on its way to help out Gandalf and Bilbo.

Why didn't the Grey One use the massive birds for a personal taxi? They seemed more than willing to carry the band of heroes across Middle Earth when they were in danger. Wouldn't it have been nicer for them - less feather-singeing, for example - if they just picked them up just outside the Shire and flew them over to the Dwarven stronghold? They could light a fire, roast some marshmallows, maybe have a sing-along. There would have been no trolls turning to stone or having to divert to the Elven city of Rivendell. They could have arrived fresh as daisies and twice as pretty. Instead, they only called on them when they were hanging from a falling tree. I supposed that was the equivalent of pub kicking out time. You were stumbling about, not quite with it, and the ones who'd had too much to drink were getting rowdy and pushing their luck with the bouncers. You just needed to grab the nearest cab and get home.

At least you could stop by the kebab shop on the way. I don't know if there were any roast wild boar takeaways in Middle Earth.

I was in a bed, which I may have mentioned but it bears repeating. I wasn't about to be battered by a brute for knocking his cigarette out of his hand. I wasn't narrowly escaping arrest and I was no longer sprawled on a beach covered in entrails. Down feathers filled my covering now, which was much more pleasant. The memory foam mattress my lower body was sinking into was also a preferable sensation to sand and blood.

But, much like I walked through trees and found myself in the middle of a parade, I'd exited an alleyway (in someone else's clothes) and woken up in a bed.

Yes, that's three times. Three times, hopefully, would be the charm and the source of or reason for these strange occurrences would reveal itself in a sudden fanfare of fire, brimstone and hedgehog sandwiches - although, maybe not so much fire and just a trickle of brimstone would be better. The hedgehog sandwich can stay.

No, that's not a sweet little prickly rodent slapped between a couple of rounds of bread. Can you imagine what that would do going down? Thinking about it, though, it'd have built in toothpicks to clear your teeth of any remnant morsels on the way...

Anywho. Hedgehog sandwich. Yes to the two rounds of bread, no to the animal, yes to a packet of crisps (or potato chips if you're from across the pond - any pond!). Salt and vinegar if possible. My stomach was snarling like a rabid dog. I was hungry so, if the truth were to present itself, I'd appreciate some sustenance to be the cherry topping the revelation cake. Maybe a pork pie and a latte thrown in (not literally) for good measure.

Did this have any relevance to my situation? You're damned rootin'-tootin' it did. I didn't want to find out I was the offspring of Jeff Goldblum from The Fly and can teleport, though I might need to vomit on your food before eating (I prefer salt and black pepper, personally) and risk getting swatted. Similarly, I could have done without the discovery that I was Bruce Willis, time travelling to the point I worried I might be insane and no amount of monkeys could help me. If I was going to find out anything so bizarre to explain the weird things that were happening to me, I may as well be doing it without my tummy butting in all the time with requests for food.

I took in my surroundings with a sweeping gaze. The contents of the room were so non-descript, I would have failed miserably if I were on a television quiz show and had to show them my memory prowess - swiftly brushing over my memory absence. I looked around again. Nothing had leapt out at me the first time and a second viewing brought the same reaction. The room was, basically, boring.