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[Shofet]

She must be sacraficed!!!! Science must be done on vampires.

I would like to request a dwarf, crime being one act of cannabilism.

Also I would like to propose an experiment on starving dwarves presented with fresh dwarven corpses.

[Deus Asmoth]

Wouldn't work. Corpses are inedible until butchered and dwarves don't understand the logic of hungry->here is a butcherable object->butcher for meat.

[Taupe]

Also I would like to propose an experiment on starving dwarves presented with fresh dwarven corpses.

Dwarven laws are sacred, and they prohibit the butchering of pets. Good luck feasting on your aunt.

[QuQuasar]

First things first: Shofet:



He is a speardwarf of The Bronze Tangles, and serves alongside Stakud (Eye Stabber), Deduk (Baron of Boltblade) and Udib (Spearmaster).

Now, back to your regularly scheduled interview with a vampire:


It appears Esme wishes to speak with Deduk Vieldsack (impersonating a Noble), Baron of Boltblade and Legendary speardwarf. None of us said anything to dissuade her of this, for obvious reasons.

Deduk, for his part did his best to make her comfortable.



Chains, raw meat and the company of an idiotic, impatient sociopath! Deduk certainly knows how to show a lady a good time. What more could a vampire of discriminating taste ask for?

In the end it was irrelevant. Her message was for all the criminals of Icehold, not just the Baron. Honeymoon wrote the conversation down: I'll provide a copy here:

Esme: "Ah, Baron. Such a... "nice"... place you've carved out for yourself he-"

Deduk: "That's bullshit and you know it, lady."

Esme: "Yes. Yes, I suppose I do, criminal. Very well, let's get to the point. I have an offer to make to every dwarf of this forsaken prison, but it requires the telling of a story first, so listen well. That goes for those eavesdropping as well."

"Ninety-two years ago, I confronted a man called "San Mushroomdip". At the time, he was law-giver of The Foggy Nation. He had been corrupted by power, and sought to extend his life by any means."



"I defeated him, and in exchange for his life, he confessed to occult dealings and agreed to formally pass his title on to me. I was hailed as a hero, and became the leader of a nation overnight."



"Seventeen years later my true identity was discovered. By that stage I had learned the art of influencing weak-willed minds and been joined by enough of my kin that hiding myself was no longer needed. A full take-over was easily accomplished with minimal bloodshed."



"The Foggy Nations belongs to a higher order of being now."

"I think things have worked out remarkably well for that nation, all things considered. They are ruled kindly and fairly by me and my kin. We have built schools, roads, hospitals. And all we ask in turn is obedience, and the occasional... harvest."



Deduk: "Yeah yeah, I get the idea. Sick vampire shit. Whadda ya want from us?"

Esme: "I was getting to that. Much later I discovered that Sans compulsion, his desire for immortality, had not sprung from nowhere. He had been contacted by a group of necromancers known as The Vises of Turquoise, who seek to spread their influence across the world."

"You probably know them by the name of their tower: Houroars. At the very least, you know them by the hordes of undead that occasionally plague your doorstop. Which brings me to my offer."

"I have no fondness for the The Vises of Turquoise. My immortality is a gift from the gods, an evolution from prey to predator. There could be nothing more natural. Necromancy, on the other hand, is foul. Tainted. The pitiful attempts of man, dwarf and elf to imitate perfection."

"So, should you wish it, I have no misgivings about occasionally sending some of my forces to harass them on your behalf. Pick off the weak and isolated among them. And we can bring you trade goods, as well. Weapons, cloth, trinkets, wood: whatever you wish. I've brought some with me right now, as a sign of good faith."



Deduk: "What's the catch?"

Esme: "Nothing a group of hardened psychopaths would miss. Just, once a year... a small tribute. Do you understand?"

Deduk: "Nope.."

Esme: "Something you have much of, but is still new? A tribute of little consequence but pure, untainted by the humours of age?"

Deduk: "What are you getting at?"

Esme: "Kids, you moron. Provide a place where we may drink the childrens blood once every year."

Deduk: "Speak plainly woman!"

Esme: "Oh my god, why am I talking to you? Bookkeeper woman! Yes you, eavesdropping at the door and writing down everything we say! Take my offer to whoever is actually in charge!"


At which point, Honeymoon brought the offer to myself.

A fascinating opportunity, I must say! A chance to study the effects of rapid blood loss and the presumed analgesic effect of vampire saliva, observe the physical symptoms of vampiric immortality, and converse with an ageless creature? How could I pass that up?

I instruct Honeymoon to inform Esme that the overseer of Icehold will accept her kind offer, and will begin construction of a 'feeding room' of sorts, where the children will be stored. Future visits by Esme, or any of her kin, will be met with the respect and hospitality they deserve.

[Taupe]

You have to admit, this makes for a very convincing noble impersonator tho.

Oh, and that was a pretty solid way of weaving this into the story. I laughed at the end.

[QuQuasar]

Esme's caravan presents a perfect opportunity to offload some of the immense pile of yeti-bone detritus that has been accumulating in this place. I don't know, the fools have the perfect opportunity to excuse themselves from work entirely and instead they use it to craft toys and knick-knacks. I must admire their work ethic even whilst questioning their sanity.

I order every able-bodied moronic cretin in Icehold to haul stuff to the trade depot. Naturally, I then have to explain that this means all of them.



Except Limul Lashroses (parking in handicapped spaces). He can be excused by virtue of being paralyzed from the waist down. I am not a cruel man.

Speaking of which, I've thought of a new experiment! Construction of the necessary infrastructure will begin as soon as Esme's people leave.


Why is this trap not working? You've been in there for the past month, you pathetic excuse for a horrifying enormous shelled intestinal parasite!



Knock down the support and trap yourself already!


Thob Omareg created a shoe, and is excitedly telling everyone about it. I am not certain why nobody has put him out of our misery yet.




One little polar bear and these empty-headed simpletons lose their minds! Damn thing hasn't even touched anyone yet and already Udil Floorskinned the miner (double homicide) has fallen into the moat and, true to his name, grazed the skin off of his arm. Shofet Tradeday (cannabalism) has run out into the middle of the blizzard, in the nude I might add, and split open his hand...




... and Udil Bluntedmachine the mayor (election fraud) appears to have discovered a latent talent for melodrama.



YOU'RE NOT DYING, IT'S JUST VOMIT! GET OVER IT!

Argh, this task is driving me to empirically verifiable insanity (I check every day). Why can't these idiots just leave me to my experiments?

[QuQuasar]

Out of character

I imagine that last sequence with Udil the mayor playing out something like this:


Udil steps outside, squinting in the bright light. For a moment, all is calm. Then, Udil falls to his knees, raising his hands and face dramatically, and proclaims:

"I WAS NAUSEATED BY THE SUN! THERE IS NO HOPE!"

Udil then emits a massive geyser of high-pressure projectile vomit and collapses on his back, flopping around like a dead fish, vomiting all the while.

[Taupe]

Yes. When we inevitably create a new thread for this fortress, the melodrama quote is definitely going to the front page.

Also, you... probably want to add an i somewhere in Cannabal.

[Shofet]

I realized I misspelled it. My apologies. Is my hand still attached?

[De]

My working theory is that there was some sort movement that the King interpreted as politically dangerous and he had a bunch of people sent away to Icehold because he was worried that executing them would lend fervor to any dissent he faced. He focused on family with children, reasoning they would serve as political hostages. The large number of births are because it's a glacier, it's cold and boring there, and there's no birth control available. It all makes perfect sense really.

Edit: Frozen wasteland, exiled criminals, a population mostly made up of minors, undead, monsters and a deal with vampires: this is an ideal setting for a moderately well selling dystopian YA novel.

Further thoughts: If you do decide to make a new thread (here's looking at you Taupe), may I suggest changing the parameters. Pop cap: 30, Strict cap: 100, children ratio: 100/100. Let's embrace the YA dystopia thing.

[QuQuasar]

Stakud the Eye Stabber stabbed the polar bear in the eyes.



Somewhat of an anticlimax, really.


Well, these foolish injuries do at least give me a chance to practice my medical skills. In the absense of a chief medical dwarf (I seem to recall something about a helmet snake?) I have appointed myself to the position. I am, of course, extremely qualified for this.



The wounds of Udil the miner merit attention, him being a dwarf of some skill with a pickaxe and thus moderately more useful than the rest of the morons around here. 'Black Pat' Conventpost (domestic homicide) insisted she be allowed to perform most of the work. It's almost like she doesn't trust my abilities as a doctor!

The wounds of Shofet, however, she was happy enough to leave to me after diagnosis. Let's see... large rip on palm of hand, wrist bent in odd direction, ... easily enough dealt with.


First we clean the wound. Sadly I don't have any gnomeblight or forgotton beast blood (yet!), but I think there's some rock salt lying about...


Shofet has an impressively loud scream. With the right equipment, we may be able to use him as some sort of long-distance communication relay.

Next, sutchering. I have the thread, I have the needle, now all I need to do is...


Well, I think I did a pretty good job of that. Only missed three times!

Next, setting the bone...


Okay, that's done! The wrist made a wonderful "cracking" sound when I bent it back into place. That's got to be healthy, right?

And the screaming lets me the know the patient is still alive.

Now all we neet to do is dress and immobilise the wound...


Well, I think I may have used a little too much plaster (I'm fairly certain he's supposed to be able to walk without dragging his hand on the ground), but otherwise a perfect operation! The patient will live, and the reduction in quality of life does not exceed the bounds of tolerance for Icehold.




In other news, Esme's people have left, taking a small fraction of the yeti bone mound with them. I've ordered Zaneg Trumpetwhispered (murder, conspiricy to commit murder) to cut tree's and make bins in order to expedite this process in the future.

Esme however, has not left. She also appears to have chained the Baron to the wall for some reason. I can hardly blame her, but this is not my idea of diplomatic behavior. Indeed, were she not a woman of such high class, I would almost call this... rude.



(Out of character: how did that even happen? The baron hasn't broken any laws (at least, nothing that shows up in the Justice menu), and it's not possible to assign dwarves to chains manually. Or unassign them, for that matter. I'm going to deconstruct the chain to get him out and prevent Esme from going nuts.)


Ah. Our dear baron has been unchained, and has brought Esme to his room to finalise the agreement.



I forsee wonderful things in the future for Icehold and The Foggy Nations. And by "wonderful things", I of course mean feeding children to monsters in exchange for a strategic advantage and an unrivalled opportunity for testing.

I'm sure this will go most excelle-



What.



WHAT.




ONUL. ONUL BATTLEGLAZES (MURDER, VIGILANTISM), DO YOU KNOW WHAT YOU'VE DONE?

"Yes. I've stopped you from feeding children to vampires, you goddamn madman."

NO! YOU HAVE STYMIED SCIENCE! YOU HAVE SET BACK THE MARCH OF PROGRESS! YOU HAVE STOPPED US FROM FEEDING CHILDREN TO VAMPIRES wait that's what you said.

CURSE YOU!! CURSE YOU ONUL BATTLEGLAZES!!! MAY MAGGOTS FEAST UPON YOUR EYEBALLS FOR ALL ETERNITY!!!!!

"Also, he wasn't even a real baron. He was just a planter."



AAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGHHHH!!!!!

[QuQuasar]

Out of character

Well.

That could not possibly have gone more awesome.

At first I was absolutely pissed. I didn't plan any of that, it ruined my chance to build a vampire feeding room and get in good with the vampire clans, and it seemed like an anticlimactic end to the reign of Baron-Impersonator Deduk Veiledsack.

And then I realized exactly what had happened...


The baron and vampire lady entered his engraved quarters. She look maintained her haughty demeanor, while he kept a wary eye on her for any sign of trying to drink his blood. Just before the door closed behind them, a shadow slipped in.

"Can we finally get to this, "noble" dwarf?" asked Esme with a sneer. She was obviously anxious to conclude the meeting and leave Icehold, at least until next year. "There is much to discuss."

"Sure," said Deduk, gruff and rude as always. "The overseer tells me we have 26 children in the lower parts of the fortr-"

A shadow rose up behind him as he talked, and a flurry of fists came from nowhere. With a crack, the fourth strike reshaped the Barons skull and he collapsed, revealing a young woman covered in blood and encased from head to toe in the shiniest steel. With a flash of cyan she drew an adamantine sword, and pointed it at the vampire.

"Get out."

Her voice wasn't overly loud, but the sheer rage infusing those two words made it more threatening than anything she could have yelled.

Esme raised herself to her full height, bearing her teeth, haughty and terrible.

"You would threaten me, dwarf? Me? Do you know who and what you're dealing with?"

"Yes, I do. I don't care. You will not harm a single child here. Get out, and never come back."

"Or what? You'll kill me? By yourself?"

The adamantine sword stuck out in a flash, leaving a sparkling trail in the air, and the head of Ngon Swampnature, a Glacier Titan engraved in microcline on the wall mere centimeters from Esme's head, collapsed, cleanly decapitated. To her credit, the vampire didn't flinch. The anger left her face, and she bowed to the swordsdwarf with a smile.

"Very well, child. You've made your point. I shall take my leave, for now."

She swept towards the door, but stopped and smiled, revealing a row of sharp, pointed teeth. "But we'll meet again next year. One way or another."

And then the room was empty but for the young vigilante. In silence, she bent down over the body of the Baron and respectfully closed his eyes, blinking away tears. The poor, foolish dwarf had sealed his fate when he failed to oppose the overseers plans, but nonetheless... he hadn't deserved this fate.

Someone else deserved this fate.

She would wait, for now. It did not bode well to kill an overseer during their term, and perhaps the madman would yet repent, see what he had become, and attempt to redeem himself.

But if he did not, come his resignation on the last day of obsidian... one way or another, the world would be less one monster.

The young woman would ensure it.


Ladies and gentlemen, the children of Icehold have found their protector.

Onul Battleglazes, Vigilante Girl.

[De]

Called it.

Is Icehold on 40.24? I've never had any of my dwarves grieve and I've been blaming the version. I've even been playing a freshly downloaded totally vanilla version murdering migrants children trying to get somebody to grieve for a damn death.

[QuQuasar]

After yesterdays events, I was forced to recalibrate my methodology for checking sanity levels as it was returning a number of false positives.

Thankfully, once revised, the methodology once again confirms that I am sane.


It is time to finally capture Kor The Deep Holes. That ribbon worm has remained uncaged, and thus unstudyable, for far too long. I have a section of the cavern roof carved out.



... and collapsed...



... and we wait with baited breath for the dust to clear, to reveal...



.... Kor, you bastard.

HOW THE BLOODY HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO CAPTURE YOU NOW?


Oh great, Kor brought a friend to help taunt me.



I'll get you one day, you monsters. I'll find some way to administer your poisons to children in a controlled environment! Just you wait and see.


To improve my mood, I took an examination of the experiments under construction.

Experiment 5 - Under construction, require 1 raising bridge, 2 levers.



Experiment 6 - Under construction, require 5 floor grates, 1 raising bridge.



Urgh. Construction is taking far too long. Not good enough! I require some testing now. I shall have to think of an experiment with minimal infrastructure requirements. Hmm...

Eureka! Somebody put a door in front of that spike well, I have an idea.

Experiment 7 - Under construction, requires 1 door.




AARGH! More distractions! A giant cave spider attacked Zaneg while he was working on more bins and cages.



The fool woodcutter fled into the depths of the Caverns, and the spider disregarded him, instead approaching the far stronger smells of prey emanating from the staircase. If only we had infrastructure in place to capture it!

Sadly, lacking any cage traps, that all there will be to study is a corpse. I shall have to remember to set some traps in the upper caverns for the future.

Sadly, the presence of this creature in the fortress is a potential risk to my own health and safety. Also some other people's, probably. I told the thuggish simpletons to kill it.



Neblime commenced the assault, putting an iron bolt into it's abdomen. This seemed to have some effect for a moment, before the creature was lost in a swarm of screaming dwarven murderers.



Aside from the unarmed Honeymoon, attempting to pass on the stairs, being caught up in the melee, the assault was going surprisingly well. No bites, not even any friendly stabbings, which is what you'd generally expect when a bunch of untrained murderers are swinging adamantine about. But then suddenly the creature shot out thick strands of webbing. Instantly the entire militia were entangled, and the fight abruptly ground to a halt.



I was briefly optimistic that the creature would kill Olon Battleglazes, the young woman whose behavior recently has most irritating. A heroic death against the spider would solve that unnecessary distraction. Unfortunately, the creature pulled away from the militia dwarves and instead started grabbing at Honeymoon with it's legs, wrapping our manager in a silk cocoon.

Standing at a safe distance and taking notes on the hunting behaviour of the spider, I briefly considered coming to the bookkeepers aid. She is quite an efficient minion, after all. However, any sort of risk to my person could potentially deprive all of dwarvenkind of a glorious scientific future. Oh well, I guess shall have to seek a replacement. Still, it's a shame.

But then a shape flew past me on the stairs. The spider saw it coming and lunged at it, but the dwarf ducked low and kicked upwards, timing his strike to co-incide with the creature's lunge and using it's inertia against it...



The giant cave spider flailed about, it's crushed abdomen leaking ichor, until it finally collapsed on it's back, legs curled above it. It twitched, jerked, and lied still.

After a moment, I recognised the dwarf. Udil Bluntedmachine (murder, conspiricy to commit murder). A charismatic, rebellious dwarf who has been gathering support and power amongst the dullards here. Many of the morons of Icehold see him as a sort of leader or representative. Todays deed will no doubt cement that status.



Perhaps best to stay on this one's good side, given his ability to persuade the commoners. I have allowed Udil to lay claim to the high quality room that was just recently evacuated by the late baron.


Udil came to me to complain about his new quarters. Apparently, the late baron hasn't evacuated it just yet.



I told him he should feel lucky to have a dwarven corpse in his bedroom. Does he not recognise the opportunity for the learning of anatomy this presents for an ignoramus such as himself? I've done my fair share of autopsies in my time, but I imagine someone such as he could not tell an appendix from a coccyx from a gallbladder. Go in there, find a sharp knife, and learn dear Udil!

No? Well, if he wants to squander such an opportunity, he can carry it out himself. Or convince someone else to. I'm certainly not going to aid him in a quest for ignorance.


Sigh.

I need to relax. That experiment had better be ready.



It is? Somebody actually did something promptly? Good heavens, that's new. Who?


Limul Lashroses, despite not having use of his legs, dragged a microcline door all the way to the site of the new experiment. An admirable dedication to the persuit of science!

I have declared him my faithful assistant in recognition of his brave efforts. I'm told it is the height of modern fashion for a scientific genius to have a hideously deformed assistant, is it not, Limul?

In fact, no. "Limul" will never do as a name for my most faithful minion! I think a name change is in order, in recognition of this dwarfs persistent excellence in spite of his physical disabilities, and of my deigning to give him a position of significant import to me personally!



I think Igor is a wonderful name, don't you, Igor?

"Um... yes... sir?"

Oh please, let's not rest on formalities like "sir". You're my faithful servant now! Call me master.

"Yes master."

And do you think you could lisp a little?

"What? Why?"

Just do it.

*sigh* "Yeth marthter."

Oh excellent! Yes! You and I are going to get along wonderfully. Shall we begin the experiment? I think we shall!


Experiment 7: Effect on Dwarven psyche of being trapped in a small space with multiple angry, maimed war dogs
Apparatus: Presumed execution device, sealed by door.
Test subject: Corpulent dwarven child, female, 10 years old. Self-identifies as "Monom Minedsummits". Daughter of Eral Soldcaves (serial killer, aka. "the Head Smasher") and As Cilobnonub (ex-ghost, deceased).



... to be continued...

[Ruhn]

OOC: These experiments are fun to read.