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No

1 (3.6%)

It was fun for a long time but towards the end it just started to drag

6 (21.4%)

I wish I could have joined in.

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Total Members Voted: 28

[OREOSOME]

Just edited my part of the character sheet.

[WillowLuman]

You should add something about how we held you idle for 2 days.

You must tell me what college this is.

Google moving bookshelves + Saint Louis

[WillowLuman]

[In which I introduce a meta excuse for NOT retconning, while filling in a plothole]
HugoLuman scratched the last line into the rock. He wasn't sure if the name's owner wanted it to be known by anyone else, so he had spent these several hours carving it into a place where he was sure no one would ever see it, except him. Nevertheless, it was carved, and even if only HugoLuman looked at it, it was still something to stand in memory of Zanzetkuken.

He reflected on his history with the strange man. Though the nature of his true name suggested one side, HugoLuman had never and still could not decide whether the man had been, like the rest, abducted from what they tentatively called the Real World. Or the Old World. It depended on one's point of view. Certainly, Zanzetkuken had tried to help them, and seemingly came to their aid entirely unexpectedly, suggesting some knowledge of their plight. Whether he knew of cosmic boardgame and was trying to intervene, or was simply another pawn but wound up in the wrong place at the start, it was difficult to tell. Zanzetkuken certainly had strange motives, leading at times for him to act counter to the well-being of the rest of them, and possibly also to those people he led, even seemingly against logic on a few occasions, but HugoLuman always tried to see the best in people. With all his eccentricities and considerable power, a combination causing perhaps not unjustified fear in many of them, Zanzetkuken still was generally and honestly helpful in the end. Zanzetkuken's motives for turning him into a giant reptile were obviously well-meaning: just trying to help out a poor, disembodied person.

What the events of the little war did show was that their enemy would tolerate no interference, and could sabotage meddling outside parties to a small degree. Thinking of the whole thing was making HugoLuman feel rather fuzzy and distracted. He hadn't slept in so long...

Something snapped him from his mental eulogy. Time. An evil ZTG from an alternate timeline, which left said timeline to go to an entirely separate universe than the one it branched off from. How could such an aberration happen? Of course, when you started moving between universes, you got weird meta-causalities that threaded through them, strings of events shared by both. It was kind of like cross-contamination from working with uncooked fowl. But this was how things went, when you got into all this time-travel and dimensional cris-crossing: it got into you, you learned how to see things. He had been becoming a living barometer, or thermometer, or just a sort of o-meter. Magic, Psionics, and time. It wasn't the strange, intrinsic sense that he had (apparently bodily) for the supernatural, it was his working knowledge.

Or, truthfully, he could see it because he personally had been the one to throw a wrench in the mechanics of this universe. It hadn't fully recovered from his first major experiment; time was still wrong. It must have been going at different rates in different places, passing as the span of a normal day for him and the others who went to Thari's, while back at the fort, digging, building, trade, and research and development into various forumite projects occurred as if several months had passed. It had probably been going on at different rates for each of them, at the most damaged state. Now it had grown more even, going up and down like a wave, until the difference now was probably only a couple seconds.

Still, HugoLuman wondered. How much of time could their opponent see?

[Zanzetkuken The Great]

Thanks for that Hugo.  Good read.

[wierd]

Weird grumbled incoherently at himself.

Why was it that the simplest little errands for the simplest little things turned nasty, sour and complicated at the drop of a hat? Why couldn't he just knock on the door, say "Hi! Can I get some rubbed sagebrush and fennel seeds from you guys? I'm gonna make sausage, and I'll let you have some if you like--" and get a "Oh sure, here you go! Let us know how it turns out!"? Why was it always things like killer rats and interviews from hell, and avalanches of personal vendettas, accusations, arguments and near fist-fights? He JUST wanted to go back to the fort, and make some delicious food, and see some people smile at him for a change.

Well. At least he scored the dry spices and seed for his own herb garden. There was at least a silver lining.  For whatever strange reason though, he couldn't quite shake off the omnipresent sensation of baleful eyes staring out at him from the shaded underbrush of the forest edge on the sides of the footpath leading back toward the fortress, as if some hateful and resentful malice had focused its attention on him where previously it had ignored him completely...

Mindful of the likelihood of being held up by gibbering, mindless and potty-mouthed abominations of the night if he didn't get back soon, he hastened his footsteps; that it helped get some distance between whatever hateful presence was radiating its rage at him unseen from the roadside and that jackass askak in the tower was simply gravy.

He just wanted to get home, such as it was, and try his best to relax and unwind...

Slowly but surely, as if waking from one reality into stark hues of another, the dusty blue pinnacle of stone receded behind him, and the lights of the sentry fires and torches glazed the mud trampled lawn of the weary little fortress that passed for home as it rose up in front of him while the sun glimmered tired and red on the horizon.

Something was different tonight in the swaggers and almost cheery bearded faces he saw going in. Descending the bricked and plastered-up downward stair, he knew at once and immediately why. The now nearly forgotten reek of ubiquitous alcohol wafting out the angel's share into the enclosed halls of the fortress from opened kegs and drunken breath clung thick. Eric must have cleared into the kitchens and food stocks earlier that day while he was out. That was good.

Heaving a wearied sigh, he wound his way passed the harlequinned patchwork of red brick repairs on cracked and chipped grey stone that comprised the walls, ceilings and floors, and for the first time in a long time, reflected on how being down here right now was the fruit of just about everyone's labor.  He and Rikod had baked the bricks, Eric and his masons and architects repaired the walls, and armies of haulers pulled debris out and raw materials in for days to get this place patched up. It was good to smell alcohol and hear raucous belly laughing again.

Parking the heavy grass-straw basket of hard-won spices at the food stocks nearest the kitchens, the sounds of a wild party coming from the only half-repaired dining hall echoed down the corridors. A weary but genuine smile touched his face at the thought. Gently, he creaked open the banged up and slightly offbalance door to the kitchens...

He should have expected it, but it was still a disapointment.

Large slabs of rock had fallen in from the cieling, smashing 2 of the 3 great stone hearths of the kitchens.. now singular kitchen.. he supposed.. and had sent wooden bowls, mugs, measuring cups and other assorted kitchen appliances all over the nearly decimated workcenter.

He'd suffered worse, and he couldn't fault eric for leaving it in favor of getting more vital parts of the fortress dug out first. On the bright side, at least one of the hearths was still theoretically servicable.

Digging through the rubble, he scored a rustic looking old broom, and commenced getting what was left of the kitchens clean enough to cook in. If he could sleep in his own bed tonight, he'd make eric a real breakfast in the morning-- his choice.

For the time being, he was hungry, had spices, a kitchen to cook in, food to cook, and a surely receptive audience of party-goers he felt sure would be pleased to get *anything* beside week old dry fish to eat with their beer and ale.

The cleanup, such as it was, wasn't exactly what his mother would have considered proper, given the need to remove several very large boulders, some smashed stone countertops, and other assorted post-apochalypse detritus all neatly swept up into the far corner near the ruined hearths on the far side of the kitchens, but what survived of the place quickly had the appearance of a properly kept kitchen, with shiny cleaned stone countertops, neatly packed cabinets, racked pots and pans, and (after a thurough examination of the flu) the beginnings of a cheery cooking fire lit in its belly.

Smiling broadly to himself, and admiring the handiwork he had made, he stretched his arms over his head, then retreated back out through the slightly crooked doorway back into the hall to take inventory of the stockpiles.

The booze side was clearly obvious; several lids from sealed wooden barrels had been popped off, and the reeking of a melange of various liquors, hard and soft alike, mingled in the cool fortress air. Feeling sneaky, he scooped a tall stone flagon he had rescued from the floor of the kitchens deep in a barrel that smelled delightfully like river spirits. A good stiff one like that is JUST what he needed right now, and would help him think while sorting and inventorying.

Quite a few barrels full of eggs had met an unsavory fate in the upheval, and several fat barrels as well; the smell of spoilage only just barey overpowered by the stiff alcoholic fragrance from the opened booze kegs. Shifting barrels this way and that, peeking inside dry goods, and sniffing at the wax sealed ones, the highly disorganized and byzantine shuffle of barrels and pots came into rank and file.

50 barrels of various preserved meats of indeterminate quantity had survived (most likely potted kitten) , as had 30 barrels of assorted packed plant and fruit products, 5 barrels of milled goods, a grotesque number of fat and tallow barrels, 10 barrels of eggs, which he would have to more thuroughly inspect for breakage later, appeared unharmed-- and nearly 100 barrels of miscelaneous alcoholic brews in various stages of consumption.

Smashed barrels were moved to the far side, empty barrels to the other, and filled barrels in neat orderly rows.

The gloominess from earlier was neary gone now. With a subtle whistle, he moved a select few of  some of the barrels into the kitchen.

Everything set, ready, and in its place.. he cracked his knuckles, and started cooking.

[WillowLuman]

Why was it that the simplest little errands for the simplest little things turned nasty, sour and complicated at the drop of a hat?

Sounds like a Bethesda game.

[wierd]

[Yes... yes it does... but at least when you do a crazy quest in a bethesda game, the consequences aren't so pernicious and lingering. Weird is gonna suffer various rodent based hysterics in the coming months...]

[Oliolli]

Oliolli whirled the sword around as he walked the corridors, or what little had been excavated. While he did want to see the ruins again, he didn't want to disturb Eric with something like that. It could wait, and what he had seen probably wouldn't come back. He moved as close to the entrance to the ruins as the rubble allowed him to. As he stopped and set down his hammer, he kept whirling the sword, and was spooked by the feeling that a man wearing a fedora and a leather jacket and carrying a bullwhip would soon shoot him. He quickly turned to look down the path he had come, but it was empty. Taking a deep breath, he stopped playing with the sword, grabbed his hammer and started making his way to where the food stockpiles would be.

[wierd]

It was a guilty passion, and one which had always made people wonder about his sexuality, but weird LOVED cooking. Well, at least every once in awhile. Doing it every day as a job would ruin the joy.

The fire in the hearth had leveled down to a delightful bed of glowing red coals, as cat-kabobs sizzled, several whole chickens rubbed with hard-won spices from the elven tower glazed beautifully on the high spit, and 3 dutch ovens (2 from the other ruined kitchen compliments) hung over the low one.

Bloated tubers au gratin, with crumbled bacon bubbled to perfection in one, prickleberry pie baked on a trivet in the second, and the third was a warm loving home for a fresh shortcake round.

He wished he had more variety in the veggies he could offer, but then again, dwarves seemed to prefer meat products and sweet things.. and this *was* a party. He had recalled the dissatisfaction some had subtly expressed over the beeftips and mushrooms he had made last time, including poor hugo's gastric reactions... and had tactfully avoided making any mushroom themed victuals this time.  He had sampled some of the tubers au gratin himself, being unsure of the substitability for potatoes.. but with the bacon, it was close enough.

Right then, he was whipping some heavy cream with dwarven sugar to top off the shortcake when it was ready for the world, when he heard the clatter of a sword hitting the floor outside the kitchen, followed by muffled cursing. It was hard to concieve of what sorts of "party revelries" dwarves would partake in... but given the nature of this place, just about anything was possible.

He set the whisk and mixing bowl down, and peeked out through the crack in the door...

[Reudh]

[arg Wierd you are making me drool]

[wierd]

[True story, when I go visit friends, they make me cook for them.]

[WillowLuman]

"Aren't you happy here, happyface?" echoed the sourceless voice through the metal streets. "We can play any song I remember, and I remember all of them! Here's one to run away to! Or from, depending on your point of view." The laugh reverberated as a lively yet haunting Korobienki picked up. On cue, marching picked up from the inlets to the deserted street where MrHappyFace hid, so he fled.

[wierd]

[Ok, I am gonna wrap up a few plot hooks I have been weaving, since nobody seems to want to play. ]

Weird shook his head and returned back to the chipped stoneware mixing bowl. It was just Ollioli, wandering around aimlessly outside in the fortress gloom. Maybe Oli had issues with attending parties too?

He looked at the large pewter pitcher of seperated cream from which he had begun his current task, and reflected how it would be wasteful not to use it for.. something.

Then he got a crooked little smile on his face, and hunted down a saucepan and a stockpot. The motley assortment of cookware in the kitchens reflected the almost ADHD addled and whimsical nature of dwarven craftwork. The idea of making a matched set of.. just about anything.. seemed to be a curious and strange concept in their society. As such, the bright orange of the copper saucepan, and the dull hues of the iron stockpot didn't really stand out as much as you think the would. Not in this kitchen anyway.

Reaching a hand deftly into the egg barrel he had drug in earlier, he snagged up 2, cracked them into a measuring cup he had been using, then dashed them up with a bismuth bronze fork (itself completely unremarkable in being the only one of its kind in the kitchen), before whisking in some cream and some of the separated milk it had come from, and finally pouring the off-yellow mix into the waiting copper pan he had placed on the stone cooktop of the hearth.

It could scald in comfort up there, while the rest of the creme got attacked mercilessly with the whisk.

Its hard to say, perhaps it was just some natura predisposition to the work, or maybe the result of years of ingrained actions, or perhaps some strange eldritch power to "just know", but it was one of those things that had seemed to always be with him when it came to making delicious deserts. Without missing a beat, he sat the bowl and whisk down, stirred the scalding cream mix, donned an oven mitt, and removed the pie and shortbread from their hooks. A little inserted straw confirmed the instinctual ritualistic motion he had undergone; the cake was indeed just right, and moments later, was sliced down its width into two circles of fluffy white cake, and being stuffed with sliced strawberries dusted with sugar, and stiff peak whipped cream in a fun caricature of a frost covered mountain atop a silver serving plate.

In turn, the tubers au gratin came off, and was decanted into a ceramic serving crock and covered, and the prickleberry pie was laid to cool on the open stone counter the cool as the chickens were moved to the lower spit to complete being browned.

Dish to dish, food item to food item, it was amost a dance in the kitchen, moving from one to the next in unbroken succession.

Finally, his attention came back to the now lovely and fragrant scalded cream steaming exuberantly on the cooktop. His smile broadened widely, as he stirred in sugar until dissolved, and poured the lot, over 2 quarts in all into the tall iron stockpot, slipped on one of the stained and slightly tattered pigtal gloves, and let it have it.

A bright flash of bluewhite light, his own twist on X's freezing spell, substituting photonic emission for kinetic redirection as the new form the thermal entropy should assume, blared brilliantly into the room for half a second, leaving the previously piping hot mixture, now flash frozen to near cryogenic frostiness. Eager to sample the offwhite treasure inside, he fumbled for silverware spoon, and ran it over the top of the chilled block inside the pot. A silky smooth curl of home-made frozen custard griped the spoon, and shortly thereafter, passed the cook's seal of approval for good taste. Being a wizard certainly had advantages.

The cart he had parked in the kitchen after his last fit of culinary reaction had miraculously survived the tumult of earthquake, and in short order, became a food services truck fit for party catering. A white pigtail cloth laid over the top of the push cart, giving setting to a mountain of grilled cat-kabobs, the whole spit complete with chickens, the large crock of "potatoes", the pie, the custard, the cake, and one each of a barrel of rum and dwarven wine.

Cracking his knuckles, he kicked open the door, and stormed the party.

Shoving open the double doors into the repaired dining hall, the sight he beheld was....... confusing.

A small group of dwarves had assembled a make-shift musical outfit with a drum, a harp, a flute, and a lute.. and were busy misusing all four instruments in a way best described as "exotic", while 2 burly and heavily bearded brutes laughed and smiled while tossing a 3rd, beardless dwarf up into the air, and then catching them again, amid cheers, jeers, and laughter.

Nonchalantly, weird pushed in the food cart, snagged up a cat-kabob, and a slice of the prickleberry pie with a dollop of the frozen custard on top, and headed for the dining tables.

There was Rikod, sandwiched between Themor and Keshan, the two brewers from earlier, acting very drunk and boistrous.

"Weird lad!" He shouted amid laughs and chuckes from the pair he was sandwiched between. "I was just tellin the wee lasses 'ere about how a clayworker can't be bested when it comes to usin' iz 'ands!"

Suddenly, it clicked.

The beardless, but otherwise equally mannish looking dwarves... were female dwarves. A sudden rush of comprehension and rationalization came rushing into his mind as the factoid suddenly hit home, and how completely oblivious he had been about things this whole time. That sort of thing came all to easily for him, being estranged from the whole sexual affair to begin with, but the realization that Rikod was........wenching with... Keshan and themor... was enough perhaps to turn everything that seemed rational or reasonable on its ear for him, and he stood there goggle-eyed and dumbstruck.

"Don' jes' stand there! Git O'er here and sidown!" Barked Rikod amid a flutter of giggles from the brewer 'sisters'.

Hesitantly, and as if sitting down with vipers, he complied, sitting on the right side of Rikod and Themor, the bald one of the two girls.

"Careful lads! That ye don't drop 'er now!" Shouted Rikod at the two burly ones playing catch with the long braided, ad heavy set 'woman', inducing a roar of laughter from the party crowd, and a personal challenge to get out there and do better from one of the "entertainers", to which the ceramicist bellowed "Caint! Got me 'ands full a'ready!" Before hugging the two brewers with each arm, amid a roar of laughter.

"I wuz jest tell the lasses 'ere 'bout how handy ye were o're the last few days lad-- Keshan 'ere says she knew jes' who I wuz a talkin 'boot too! Seem's ye gettin a bit famous round 'ere!"

Wierd's face felt hot, and he was glad his beard had been growing unchecked since getting plunked down, or else his brilliant crimson cheeks would surely be sending signals strong enough to get picked up by extra-terrestrial life.

Themor turned and leaned his way, examining the prickleberry pie he had just sat down on the table, and looking at him coyly.

"I dinna know ye was so talented.." she said, a toothy smile creasing her wide, bald head. It was hard to explain, but something about her appearance reminded him Fester Addams, only less goulish. "This old mud slinger 'ere was sayin ye gots talent.. "

Rikod slightly elbowed the lady in playful disdain of the 'slight', and she elbowed him back more briskly, pushing him almost into Keshan's lap without missing a beat.

"Herbalist.. Ceramicist.. wizard, and.. Cook too?" She asked, motioning at the pie.

"Only occasionaly..." he croaked.

"Well, we can't let you get off on only working occasionally, unless the work is excellent, now can we?" She asked rhetorically, and snagged up the plate of pie, before digging in with her fork. The look of culinary delight the practically rippled over the musclebound woman was impossible not to notice.

"Is it really that good Them?" Asked Keshan, shoving Rikod's face practically into her chest as he made a double "thumbs up" gesture amid more laughter. Completely oblivious, she reached a hand over to get some of the pie, causing Themor to swoon almost into wierd's lap.

"Ge' Yur own!" She mumbled out of a pie-stuffed face, clearly ecstatic over the combination of the warm pie and the frozen custard.

Weird felt so embarased, he throught he would die.

"What else di' ye make ba' 'dere?" She asked, fluttering thick black eyelashes up at him, as he timidly nibbled on the cat-kabob.

"..strawberry shortcake, and.."

"Oh, sounds exotic!" Said Keshan, standing up abruptly, as the two sisters practically battled to get to the deserts on the food cart before the other, leaving just him and Rikod at the table.

"Looks like the lassies like you!" The bearded old pervert crooned.

Weird just ate his kabob with a mortified expression. Rikod roared in laughter in a way only a dwarf could, and slapped him on the back.

This is why he hated parties.

[wierd]

[Ok, the stage is set for epic lulz. If anyone wants to drive the party scene, go right ahead. Just remember that weird is asexual, and VERY uncomfortable right now.]

[Reudh]

[Tempted to bring in Othob, but he'd just piss half the party off with his antics.]