Spring:
I've just arrived at the fortress of the eternal somethings. What's with all these midgets running around? Well, they seem to do what I tell them. (They're very literal-minded too, it seems. I must be more careful about telling them I could eat a horse...)
OK, so we've got a got a giant hallway with a bunch of cages hanging overhead. I've told the midgets it's not really safe, and all they said was "that's the point." This may be a bad sign.
Oh, a half-dead dog in the main corridor. Wonderful. Why is everyone looking at it with what can only be described as anticipation?
I told the midgets to do something about all the animals running around, and I have to say, they got right on it. A few days later, it got a lot easier to move around. I'm suprised they didn't put the animals up on the surface before! On an unrelated note, they are bugging me to tell them where to set up a new food stockpile...
I took a tour of the caverns below the fortress. Apparently there's a large lake down there, and a number of forest-like biomes entirely made of fungi. Obviously we need to do something about this. It's unhygienic. Luckily I have a plan.
There was such a smell in the fortress today. One of the midgets told me that some food had spoiled. I told them to feed it to the animals, and he gave me a funny look. I'm really starting to get worried.
Apparently there's a great deal of bone in the stocks. I'm not sure where it's from. Probably... um... from traders. I'll- What was that noise? It sounded like some kind of four-legged, bloated, web-spinning snow beast. With antennae.
My ears are disappointingly accurate.
The midgets seem unimpressed by the creature. They seem to know what to do...
Oh, well, that was impressive. Snow is apparently a bad structural material for life forms. It was killed by the native... people of the caves. Um. Bird-people. It's a good thing my plans are already in process.
I just got called in for a meeting with from someone calling herself a "Baroness". What is this, the middle ages? Anyway, she says we can't export something. Short swords. Apparently it wasn't a joke.
One of the short guys come running by. He said he made a wooden cup called "Beardedgulfs". I guess it was aptly named. Actually, come to think of it, it's got some pretty nice crescent moon pictures on it.
More midgets showed up. Like, dozens. I told them to all grab picks and start digging.
There is a lever near the surface, so I told a dwarf to find out what it does. He stopped by a litle while later and told me that it doesn't appear to do anything. How odd. I was tinkering with the lever, I heard a call from one of the soldier-midgets- apparently some other horrible creature from below has made it's way here. It's called Snanspex, and is a stegosaurus without skin. Apparently it has a trunk, slaveringlyness, and it breaths poison gas. If I could figure out how to send the troops over to investigate, I would, but they just stare blankly at me unless I fill in the right forms and get the right signatures. Hopefully the local bird-people will cut it in half like they did the other one.
Turns out Sanspex only wanted to hang out by the lava pump anyway. Oh well, live and let live, I always say.
Oh dear. Actually, Snabsten or whatever is currently working on dismantling a significant fraction of the lava machines we've been using.
There, I think I got all the paperwork filed away properly. The Mountains of aces, the bronze wires, and a gang of angsty midgets calling themselves the Generals of Mining should now have new assignments to kill Snansplex.
Arg, blast it all. They all told me that they can't follow that order. They won't tell me WHY they can't follow it. And now it's killing babies! Luckilly, we have a surplus of babies, or this would be a tragedy. OK, I ordered them not to kill the monster, but instead to just stand next to it and do whatever they like. I think the troops will accept this.
The mayor started a party just now. I asked him- was it to celebrate the mounds of corpses, the clouds of stench, the near-mutiny, or the fact that a beast from satan's own bad acid trip was roaming the caverns. He said "Yes."
Let's see, at last count, that's a baby, a doctor, and a fishcleaner it's eaten. And a whole squad of midgets just trying to dance past it to grab stuff from the dead guys. I don't even know. I told them to just ignore the stuff.
YAY! They killed the monster!
Some skinny, really laid-back star trek fans showed up. At least, I think they where. They had "spock" ears on, anyway, but when I asked them if they where into new series or old, they just looked at me funny. Maybe they're ironic ears. They wanted to sell us some cloth and plants... and a couple of animals, too. Oh, and timber. Oh, I get it! Plants, animals, and lumber? Gotta be Canadians. Hm... Well, since I know that all Canadians are members of PETA, it only makes sense that I should avoid selling them animal-based products. Luckily these midgets have been busy carving rocks into cups and stuff, we should be able to make some money.
I tried some of the local booze finally. I woke up several months later to find it was midsummer. We've had a busy spring.
Should be going faster now. Just a really low frame rate is giving me problems.