Gideon_v_Caligula/twofatal.md

Gideon started swearing again.

"Fuck!"

The blood in on her forehead was starting to drip along her eyebrow, tickling
as is grew ready to flow along the bridge of her nose and right into her eye.
She tried to use her right arm, without dropping her enormous sword, to wipe
the it off of her forehead before it dripped into her eyes. But the shredded
sleeves of her cultist robes were already soaked through and the gesture only
smeared sanguineous sludge over her nose and mouth.

"Fuck. FUCK!" Gideon swore. In frustration she started to use the back of her
other, less slimy hand,  to do the job, forgetting about the razor sharp
obsidian knuckle knives strapped to her left wrist. She stopped herself only a
pubic-hair's breadth away from gouging the last pair of functioning eyeballs out
of her skull. She still needed those.

"Did I say fuck yet? Because seriously, fuck this ... Oh FUCK NO!"

Moving her left hand had made her lose her grip on the princess's body. It
slipped out from under her arm and fell back further into the pit, dislodging
other precariously piled corpses and threatening to start a charnel avalanche
which would bury Gideon in fresh human remains.

"OMG Gideon what are you doing!? You let it go!  I swear on our eternal rotting
goddess, if you don't bring my body back in one piece I'll personally feed your
fingers to the ommigrindr. I'm not bluffing!"

The dead princess was bluffing, but calling her bluff would be nearly as
painful as the actual omnigrindr, so Gideon said nothing. Instead, she craned
her neck to keep her still-functioning eyeballs glued to the desiccated royal
corpse as it continued to slide deeper into the pit, closer to the aperture.
Aiming from memory, she then swung her great sword backwards, tossing it up and
out of the pit. With normal luck it should land in something soft, (hopefully a
priest), and stay put. With Gideon's luck it would definitely spin in three
perfect circles before plunging straight back down through her skull. At least
that would shut the princess up.

"OMG Gideon, what are you doing? That was your sword!" the once and former
princess pronounced helpfully. "Why did you do that!?"

"It's okay your highness. I'm sure you'll buy me a new one as soon as we bring
you back, right?"

"OMG Gideon what are you thinking? I can't... we can't afford... there is
absolutely no... Oh.  Ha ha. Ha."

Death, (or undeath as it might be), must have improved the princess's powers of
perception because it was typically the next day before she detected sarcasm,
if ever. 

"OMG Gideon what are you doing!?  Ahh! Ahh look it's going to fall in.  Get it!
Why aren't you looking!? Save it! Save me!"

No matter how many times she had haunted Gideon, the princess couldn't seem, or
couldn't be bothered more like, to understand the basics of parasitic
possession.  She never accepted that she could only ever see exactly what
Gideon was seeing with her own, adequately functioning, eyeballs no more no
less. Right now what Gideon was seeing was this:  the precious  corpse was
starting to come unwound, its linen strips unravelling as it slipped and rolled
over fresher, more fetid, human remains on its way toward the aperture at the
bottom of the huge conical pit that Gideon and descended into on a rescue
mission for the terminally damned. The aperture was a narrow choke point
exactly like the throat of and hourglass. But instead of sand measuring
minutes, the gently used, previously owned, second hand flesh-houses of humans
measured eternity as they periodically tumbled into a stinking scarab-infested
cavern below. 

The bodies came from all over. Most were offered by devout descendants of their
lately devout ancestors. The Emperor Undying sent a regular shipment of
'retired' slaves from the arena or the mines. The army contributed a regular,
though surprisingly modest---all things considered, share. But not all deceased
homo-sapiens were appropriate offerings to the pit.  For example the mummified
corpse of the unholy princess of misery was a completely inappropriate
offering---as the princess herself had been quick to point out.  The
bureaucratic error that had led to the present scenario was one of such gravity
that mere death (even if preceded by unspeakable torture) would not have been
sufficient punishment. However justice is blind, stupid and utterly
corruptible; the very office that originated this unforgivable sin had managed
to arrange things so that it became entirely Gideon's problem. The ghastly
princess herself seemed to lose all interest incriminating the actual guilty
party upon realizing she had obtained the opportunity to nag and torment
Gideon, albeit briefly if the swordswoman was not successful. 

Gideon blinked. Sand scratched the inside of her eyelids. She wished devoutly
that the princess could feel that too. Holding her breath and moving slowly she
gingerly bent her knees and reached down to take hold of the end of the
princess's linen wrappings which extended like a long fuse toward the regal
stiff which was still unravelling slowly. 

Gideon swore again. 

"You fucking better have something on under those bandages, your highness. If I
have to see your sun-dried titties or your fossilized fanny I'll rip each of my
eyes out and throw them in the pit after you."

"OMG Gideon what are you talking about!  I'm ravishing and you know it. You
should be so lucky."

This was not the first time the princess revealed that despite seeing through
Gideon's completely operational eyeballs, her vision was gravely flawed.

Gideon, still holding her breath, gently tugged at the cloth, the body
started to roll faster.  She gave a tremendous, pull hoping to snap the regal
corpus back up towards her like a yo-yo.  The force of the did flick the little
morsel of dried princess meat into the air for a second before it tumbled
directly through the aperture.

The incorporeal princess screamed like a Saturday morning sacrifice victim from
out of the depths of Gideon's skull.  Gideon hadn't thought her head had such
impressive acoustics but the spirit of the princess of misery's miserable
shriek was reverberating through her brain like a amphitheatre.  The linen wrap
end in her hand was momentarily slack as the body tumbled into the void but
then it grew taught with a sickening crack. Surely, the princesses body would
have crumbled into dust at that shock.  But no, the conscientious embalmers of
yesteryear must have done a good job of converting the petulant bitch's remains
into some sturdy taxidermy because it held. The same clever embalmer, bless her
heart, must also have had the stunning foresight to tie the shroud tightly
around something, probably the imperial neck bone, as insurance against exactly
today's eventuality.

Gideon held firmly to the thin linen ribbon and could feel the body begin to
swing at the other end.  It was terrifically light at least. It hadn't caused
her to lose her footing only a few yards away from the opening. Slipping now
would mean falling, with the corpse, into a vast cavern.  With any luck, she'd
break her neck. With Gideon's luck she'd actually break her legs and stay
conscious as the scarabs ate out her functional eyeballs, tongue, and tonsils
before using her warm body to incubate scarab eggs. Eventually they'd get
around to eating the princess's chewy hide but no doubt they would save if for
last so Gideon would have some shrill complaining company during her last
miserable days of life.  Though, come to think of it, the princessly
poltergeist was strangely quiet right now. Gideon decided not to think about
what that might mean and dutifully started winding her catch back in.

Angling for the dead like this had to be done slowly; to avoid slipping; for
reasons that are now plainly established. So Gideon had time to think. That was
unfortunate.