Allan Quatermain’s New Hair Color?

Later...

Sigin

“What the bloody Hell?!” I hear Allan shout from the other room.

I rush in, ready for fire, flood, or famine. Given all the difficulties we’d had up to this point to just GET to the Doctor’s honeymoon here in Xanth in the first place, I should not say I’d expect complete and utter disaster to greet my eyes.

. . .

But what I find instead is Allan still staring at the mirror hanging on the wall. He’d gone in here to quietly take the Youth Elixir (water from the Xanth’s Fountain of Youth), if only to get away from the STILL whining Mr. Griffin (the prat).

That man still feels we are holding out from him youth and vigor, even THOUGH Humphrey, the “Good Magician”, the Xanthian mercenary information broker . . . .uh . . . .sorry, still sore about what’s gone sour between us over this mess. When Humphrey said that his tests determined the only person that the Elixir would work for was Allan.

. . .

Oh, please stop looking at me like that with that question. Of COURSE we asked (and Humphrey well OWES me after the grief he made me and my friends go through with those barriers he put in our way, prophecy and request from Trilling Blackfeather or no) and got access to Humphrey’s private stash. Of COURSE we offered it to Allan, who’s (let us be honest) in the twilight years of his life and power.

Besides, it was worth it seeing Mina’s eyes light up at the thought of what Allan would look like with youth and vigor again. She is VERY smitten with him, even if she doesn’t know that yet. She covered it well, but it seemed to take her by surprise.

Ah, what fools these mortals be. A line I wrote for Puck in that one play of mine which seems to fit so well sometimes for people in general (which I include myself, really).

. . .

Allan, seeing that IF he was to run with us and having adventures amongst the stars and such readily agreed to it. Hey, he’s no fool . . .and he does love adventure, of course!

Had not read the novel, but know enough of him to guess that.

While the elves and the Doctor take Hyde, Nemo, and the still grousing Mr. Griffin off to another room (Humphrey’s left us to our own device whilst he consults his precious Book of Answers or some such. . .man’s really getting on my nerves right now) I had agreed to escort Allan to his room before taking his “medicine” (Youth Elixir as well as a Healing Potion . . .to take care of lingering injuries and scars). I was there just in case of some kind of unforeseen side effects, but honestly we didn’t expect anything (and the Good Magician had laughed at the precaution).

Considering the rather nervous glances that some of the League still gave Trilling Blackfeather even after he proved to be . . . friendly (much less intelligent), we'd thought it best that he go with Chiana whilst she give the cure I'd concocted myself to Chi. I would have loved to stay with my love and wife, Chiana, while the potion was being delivered . . . but duty calls.

. . .

Do think that my friendship with him (the Good Magicain) is OVER. Yeah, time to vacate Xanth as soon as possible (if I can sway the Doctor, being that it's HIS TARDIS, you know). Well, as for Humphrey (and Xanth in general) I guess that my suspicion that this version of the literary Xanth was a somewhat darker version of it, what with . . .

Nevermind. ‘Tis done. Didn’t really want to come here in the first place (misplaced friendship or no), but that’s a secret. Only reason the Doctor and Inquirer are interested in Xanth is that it has qualities that would allow an otherwise platonic union to have a chance at offspring. Not in the near future, but some day . . .

Well, enough of that.

Inquirer had taken Mina aside, carrying secretly her own supply of Xanthian Healing elixir (why waste magic we might need in the upcoming War of the Worlds if we have a ready means of magical healing?). She was going to make sure that Mina at least had a chance to get certain things of her own to heal . . . If the potion was strong enough (not a given, considering the powers of that ancient vampire who had marked Mina), then Mina could stop hiding her neck (and move on).

That is . . .if Mina wanted it AND it worked. If not, I’ll tackle the problem with my lab . . . And pray. Even I might not be able to fix it.

Dracula is . . . .a legendary vampire, you know, not for trivial things!

Right now, that is not my (and Allan’s) problem . . .

It is funny how we’d gotten to this point. Gone off to Xanth to have a holiday of sorts (I mean Inquirer’s and the Doctor’s honeymoon, celebrated in their special ways). After all those side quests, we’d finally gotten here and enjoyed it (for the most part . . .didn’t care for those snotty Xanthian centaurs down at that enclave at ALL). Then we find out that Chi’s got an impending mental collapse coming her way if something isn’t done. We go to the nearest reasonable place to get an answer (time was ticking). We have to run a gauntlet, but we find that there was a means for a cure (and no bloody years worth of service). Trilling himself (with Artizza and Fertal in tow) tells us of a prophetic vision he’d had and gives us the means to get to the universe of “League of Extraordinary Gentemen”.

. . . .

Of course, we’d not known it was so special until we had gotten there and had a decidedly BAD encounter with the Invisible Man (of all things). At first we thought that perhaps HE was the means to our needs, but it turns out that that he was only a means to an end. We hooked up (with a bit of effort, let me tell you!) with the League. We were both after the same thing, in the end: Cavorite (that mystical material that H.G. Wells made up in that quant novel of his about Victorian men reaching the Moon quiet in advance of that Neil Armstrong chap). The League wanted it back from those who’d stolen it (fearing correctly it would be used for a war machine to destroy London). We wanted it (after it denatured as what Trilling’s vision said it would . . .and which it did) to create.

We joined forces after coming to an agreement with sharing (but nobody of our group trusted the League’s handler, Mr. Bond, any more than we could throw that “tub of lard” as Inquirer called him).

Due to an . . . .unfortunate attack of panic that Dr. Jekyll suffered (bring out Hyde who proceeded to rip and eat people left and right, for Heaven’s sake!) , I fear that I had to reveal my true draconic nature before the forces of those who’d stolen the Cavorite in the first place could lay us low while we’d been investigating at an opium den (of all places). Fortunately we managed a miracle and BAGGED the very leader of those who’d stolen the Cavorite (a Fu Manchu if I’m not mistaken) in the chaos after I’d flown us all out of there.

I’d nearly scared Allan to death with the instinctive wash of Dragon Fear I give off in that form, alas . . .

He’d survived and I’d thought nothing of it .. . Until now.

. . .

Heh, it’s . . . actually rather funny. On a whim whilst coming down here-- on my PDA, the place IS wirelessly hotlinked to the Net--I had tried to look it up but short of actually *reading* the original bookin question, I can't say I honestly know the answer to this question: “What is Allan's original hair color?” In the League’s reality it was white due to his age. My eyesight wasn’t GONE, thanks. But when he IS youthened, what’ll it be? Yes, when he IS actually youthened to something on par with Mina, that's something I'd like to know for some odd reason. Some kind of . . . Strange need. I don’t know why, exactly, but . . .or perhaps I should have guessed.

Not prone to prophetic vision myself. Not that kind of mage (thank Heaven). With the destruction of the slipgates back on Terra Prime such feelings and visions should have completely died out (what with those kinds of otherworldly visions being a side effect of those gateways to other realities), but they still persisted (all be it at a much lower level) . . . No, it is silly, but it is an "attention to detail" thing that would rather bother me if I got wrong.

No, I’d put it off as some kind of foolish whimsy I’d give into (THIS TIME). I had found the novel online, but I’d been left without much. See, while H Rider Haggard's books are long out of copyright, so the complete text of "King Solomon's Mine" ought to be available online (and was online), at places like: http://www. gutenberg .net/ index.shtml I didn’t get it right off the first few pages, alas. That literature version of the man before me didn’t go into those details.

. . .

I had been doing a quick read through (with a rather resigned Allan’s permission) of the novel and HAD found a possible clue (though he’d not known I’d been doing such a trivial thing like a hair color check of all things, heh).

I searched the text of "King Solomon's Mine", thanks to Project Gutenberg, and found this description: "We ate our simple meal by the light of the moon, pausing at times to thank Good for his wonderful shot; then we began to smoke and yarn, and a curious picture we must have made squatting there round the fire. I, with my short grizzled hair sticking up straight, and Sir Henry with his yellow locks, which were getting rather long, were rather a contrast, especially as I am thin, and short, and dark, weighing only nine stone and a half, and Sir Henry is tall, and broad, and fair, and weighs fifteen." Allan is the "I" here. There are 14 pounds in a stone.

Well, by some archaic definitions of “grizzled” I find that it meant something like a mixture of black and grey/white.

1. But whatever the case I rather doubt it was EVER this color: a metallic coppery reddish brown (almost a match for my scale coloring) . . . .

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