Roleplaying thoughts
I'm not a very good roleplayer. I'm in awe of people who can channel their character who hours on end, having long conversations entirely in character, or even thinking in character. While I can channel characters easily enough when writing a story, it just doesn't work in a roleplaying situation. I can't act, I can't sustain speaking in character, and I get easily distracted into out of character digressions or puns. Fortunately, the groups I've roleplayed with have a similar style, so I enjoy our sessions immensely.
However, I think I'd enjoy them even more if I put more thought into character creation. Even though I can't do immersive roleplaying, I can at least give myself an interesting, rounded character to play with. Several of the ones I've played recently are merely a name and a collection of skills. In several cases, the actual character creation has been done by the GM, which can make it harder to get a handle on the character, but that's no excuse; Bacchus, for example, manages to come up with immensely detailed character concepts, even if the actual rolling up of the character is then done by someone else to fit his outline. With Traveller, another problem comes from the fact that there is so much backstory to this universe that I always get daunted and run away whimpering, so my character exists in a vacuum, but this is not an excuse I can use with A Game of Thrones.
For five days of last week's eight day gaming session, I played a character - Lady "Bubbles" Chatterley - that was created for me as a joke. Some years ago, on a long, booze-fuelled evening during a roleplaying weekend, we all rolled up joke characters for each other, trying to create a character totally against each person's preferred type. The following year, we all played those joke characters for a little while during the week, and I chose to play her again for most of this week. She turned out to be great fun to play. Her skills - which included driving tracked vehicles, bribery, brawling and an insane level of handgun skill - suggested a interesting past life for a noble woman in her 50s, and I had far more fun with her than I've had with many other characters. In contrast, the character I played at the beginning and end of this week was basically "chap with engineering 6" and little more.
And so I resolve in future to be more creative when it comes to characters. My first exposure to RPGs came on the computer, with games like Baldur's Gate. I saw my character more as the hero of a fantasy novel than as a character for me to play, so normally went for handsome heroic men. This has carried over into roleplaying as a whole, in that I always play human males. Next time I create a character, though, I will definitely consider playing someone from interesting alien race, or a quirky character with an interesting background.
I will also try to write something from the point of view of each character that I play. Bacchus played with us for the first weekend via Skype, but missed the rest of the week, so I started writing up a brief in-character diary of what he was missing, so he wouldn't be too confused if he managed to join in again at the end of the week. I'd only intended to do one day, hoping that another character would cover the second day, but I really enjoyed it, so carried on. I'm a person who thinks through writing, so the fact that I was sitting down each morning and writing an account made a huge difference.
So here, for the sake of completeness, is said diary, though I doubt it will be of any interest to anyone who wasn't there.
(This doesn't include the first two days of our roleplaying week, when I was playing my other character, trapped on a plague-ridden ship.)
After a long journey on the Maori Spirit, with some at least halfway decent company, I suddenly find myself confined on a small ship with a flower for a pilot and a hiver for a travelling companion. It seems like a good time to return to the diary I last kept oh so many years ago. Leafing back through the pages, I see that when I last wrote I was engaged in… Actually, it is perhaps better to burn those pages, and the ones before them, and the ones before them. Start again with a clean page. There.
So here I am on a small ship called The Rainbow, heading off to a planet that sounds like a large cat coughing up a hairball. Our self-styled Commodore and a flock of Marines have headed over to a wrecked cargo ship, where they have apparently found evidence of hideous slaughter, and have received news that a large Thotloth fleet is headed for the furball planet. We have therefore been dispatched the carry the warning.
Ah. Mr Ungud wishes to play some more Bridge. I will return to this journal after we reach our desination.
The Journal of Lady Bubbles Chatterley
After a rather tiresome journey spent engaged in unsatisfying games of Bridge and sipping cocktails, we arrived at our somewhat uncouthly-named destination, armed with our warning about the coming Thotloth attack. Emerging from The Rainbow, we were greeting by a tediously officious bureaucrat who insisted that form-filling was far more important than saving the world from a hideous doom. My colleague, Ungud, attempted to reason with him. Since members of the Hive Federation are renowned for their skills of persuasion and influence, I can only assume that Mr Ungud intended all along for us to be dragged off to a noisome prison. Why, I am not entirely sure, since I can still see no way in which it advanced our cause, but the ways of our hiver friends are forever unfathomable. [1]
However, I have never been one to bow to the designs of others, and I am no stranger to the inside of a prison cell. I briefly considered the hairpin-in-the-stockings approach, dismissed the method that served me so well during the Affair of the Gilded Chamber-pot, and resorted to… Well, there are many who shy away from calling a spade a spade, but I have never been one of them. I resorted to good old-fashioned bribery, with a small amount of flattery thrown in; young prison guards, however unfortunate in appearance, can never resist some well-placed compliments. Swelling with pride and clutching one of the many fake diamonds I carry for just such eventualities, our guard rushed off to find his superior, and thus so easily was I free.
Mr Ungud did not comment on this overthrow of his unfathomable design, but deigned to be led from the cell with us. Our liberator, the manager of the star port, was a very tiresome man, who reminded me somewhat of our self-styled Commodore, that Bethran fellow. [2] "I told you so!" he whined at everyone who would listen, and a great many who would have preferred not to. Apparently he had predicted the impending Thotloth attack many days ago, but the governor had refused to listen. I almost found myself wishing that I had played along with Mr Ungud's design and stayed languishing in the cell; men of this type are quite insufferable when given any opportunity to consider themselves vindicated.
Anyway, our tiresome liberator took us to meet the governor, whose office looked depressingly identical to our prison cell, interior design being yet another thing that the Tchopth need to work upon. We arrived in the middle of a drama involving a bank loan, but beyond making a mental note of where the money is in this backwater, I opted not to get involved.
Fate thought otherwise, however. With our warning delivered and our task fulfilled, we left the governor's cell-like office, only to encounter the sound of primitive gunfire. Two of the participants in the bank-related drama raced past us into the heart of the battle, wailing in a way that indicated some personal involvement. Moving forward, I saw that an enormous machine called an ore crawler was under attack by some human-sized creatures shrouded in robes. Since our officious form-filling friend had assumed me to be something rather uncouthly called a "Dune Raider", I concluded that these might be Dune Raiders a-raiding, but this did not appear to be a good moment for first contact.
Bullets were flying hither and thither, but physical danger adds to the spice of life; indeed, my third husband first popped the question in the middle of a fire fight. I was alone by this point, Mr Ungud having suddenly remembered an unfathomable design he had to work on round the corner. Of our two friends from the governor's cell, one, an older male, was down, and the other - probably his daughter, since a trophy wife or professional escort would have possessed better taste in headwear - was pathetic and hysterical. I have no patience with hysterical women, so slapped her about a bit until she let me save her father's life.
At this point, the ore crawler exploded, and the Raiders disappeared. Since local law enforcement was being ineffective, I took it upon myself to examine the wreckage, where I discovered the body of one of the Raiders. I raised its mask, expecting to find a human face looking back at me, but it was a Chopth, cunningly disguised to look human!
The pathetic little girl now told us her story. Apparently the family mining business was in dire straits, very probably because a dastardly rival had been sabotaging their machinery. The boss of said dastardly company had been present in the governor's cell, and I can confirm that he did indeed look very dastardly, dastardlyness being a quality that transcends species barriers and stamps itself indelibly on the face, "Commodore" Bethran being a case in point.
(By the way, it is quite worrying how often I think of Bethran. Throughout the events I have just recounted, I kept hearing his voice in my head, asking questions and commenting on what was happening, even though he wasn't there. I can only assume that I have become so used to the incessant sound of his droning self-importance that my imagination supplies it even when I am blessedly far away from him.)
Anyway, since we clearly need to meet these Dune Raider fellows who live in the desert, I gave a vague sort of assurance that we will help the struggling company find the rich ores it needs to pay off its bank loan and that we will uncover the truth about the putative sabotage. It sounds like a challenge, but life is so dull without challenges. And if it all goes hideously wrong…? Well, that Bethran fellow will no doubt take over as soon as he arrives and will claim that the whole thing was his idea, so the blame will be his if it all goes wrong. I didn't get where I am today without knowing how to recognise a win: win situation.
When all that was sorted out, Mr Ungud made contact with the goodly-sized Sergol fleet that was in orbit around the system, and talked to a fellow with a an impressive title. (Why is it, I wonder, that all the men with the most impressive titles are either ugly, impoverished or purple worms? Chats - the late Baron Chatterley - was a case in point.) I believe he received a strong indication that they would help fight off the Thotloth fleet, should it arrive. A very large ship was also in orbit, but we could discover nothing more about it other than that it belonged to a people called Elou.
Meanwhile, I repaired to the bar, where I soon persuaded the manager of the benefits of joining the Bar Bubbles family. [3] Not long after that deal had been completed, that curious "Binjam" fellow arrived, so I set him the task of supervising the bar's refit. Oh, and "Commodore" Bethran arrived, too. He proceeded to demand a status update, talk through all my answers, and generally behave like the poorly socialised man-child that he is. He also had some fanciful tale about grubs called George [4], group baths, and extreme heroism in the face of grilled mushrooms, which is clearly either a calculated pack of lies or the product of too many nights spent with the fruits of Commander McSporran's engine-room still. Knowing Bethran, it's probably both.
Leaving planetary defence in the hands of the locals, we set off into the desert in a cramped ore crawler full of miners and marines - a situation that would have pleased me considerably in my younger days, and causes me a certain frisson of pleasure even now. A curious initiation ritual took place involving skimpy pink garments. [5] Some of our party churlishly refused to join in, but I participated willingly; I have had many happy nights as a result of enthusiastic immersion in native practices, and never turn one down. "Commodore" Bethran, needless to say, clung to the tattered shreds of his imagined dignity, and refused to join in, but Commander Cleaver… Mmm, have to say that I had never noticed quite how muscled Commander Cleaver's torso was before I saw him in that negligee.
And so the journey continues. We have fraternised with the crew, attempting to uncover traitors, but to no avail. We have visited sad little mining towns, and Commander Cleaver has run numerous drills, but no attack has materialised. And outside, the air grows hotter and the land grows more and more barren. I am beginning to regret accepting this mission. Maybe something interesting will happen tomorrow…
******
It has been many days since I was last able to record happenings in these pages. Most of my waking hours have been spent driving an ore crawler, of all things! When circumstances forced me to learn how to drive a tank, all those many years ago, little did I think that it would put me on a path that would lead to me sitting at the controls of such a mighty machine. It is quite thrilling to sit at the controls of such power - to feel it throbbing at the touch of my hand.
But perhaps I need to backtrack a little. After my last entry, we entered the Jackar company's claim and started prospecting. In order to make best possible use of time, it was necessary to split the party into watches. A simple task, one would have thought. A simple task indeed… but not for "Commodore" Bethran and Commander Cleaver, who has impressive muscles and… Who has impressive muscles. While I concentrated on learning how to drive the ore crawler, Bethran tried to work out how to divide ten people into two groups, and Cleaver tried to work out how to divide three squads into three.
Many hours later, Bethran and Cleaver came to some sort of settlement they were happy with, and the first autogyro shift was sent out to search for ore. When they were several hours out, Bethran suddenly had a brainwave of staggering genius: that this planet might actually have something quaint called "night", which might happen at a predictable time - very soon, in fact. Due to the belated nature of this realisation, we are now doomed for ever more to work to a calendar in which "hour one" happens half way through lunch time. Men!
Apart from that, it was a successful day's prospecting, with many deposits of ore uncovered. We settled down to mine the first deposit - a task that took almost two days. Towards the end of this operation, one of the pilots reported feeling a little under the weather.
It was quite amazing what effect this news had on my comrades. Within a few minutes, they had convinced themselves that the entire planet was doomed, doomed, I tell you, and that within a few days, it would become a wilderness ruled over by naught but mushrooms. Isolation units and quarantine was discussed, and there was much talk about searching for "Zippy". (Is Zippy some sort of missing pet, I wonder. From the way they were scurrying around madly, looking into cooking pots and liquor stashes, it must be a small animal, perhaps a furry mammal of some sort, maybe of the type called "a corgi.")
Personally, I thought they would be better off considering those common ailments called "The Morning After", and "I Don't Like My Job," but my colleagues preferred to panic the whole native crew with talk of plague ships and utter doom. Meanwhile, the hapless victim proceeded to turn an alarming shade of magenta, magenta being a colour that works better on an evening dress than on a Tchopth. This was enough to make me revise my earlier assessment, and made me suspect poison administered as part of the dastardly corporation's ongoing programme of sabotage.
Bethran had sent for a shuttle from the Maori Spirit, which duly arrived, piloted by a young fellow called Stuart. [6] Stuart is a young man gifted at nothing whatsoever except for whining, so it is clear why Bethran favours him. Stuart delivered some medical equipment that demonstrated that the ailing pilot was not, after all, infected with spores/insects/grubs/mushrooms/small quadupeds called Zippy/pink unicorns, then took the patient to the star port and delivered him to the hospital. By the time he returned, two more Tchopth had gone down with the same symptoms, and Stuart - moaning all the while - made a return visit to the hospital, where he discovered that the doctors had diagnosed poison.
Now, when we headed out into the desert, we were warned about a rare occurrence called a "Devil Blow" - a sandstorm of extreme magnitude and danger. "Don't worry too much," we were told, "since they happen but rarely." One struck that night - and oh, what a dreadful night it was! We found traces of the poison in all the other Tchopth, so Bethran decided it was a good idea to improvise a stomach pump with a vacuum cleaner, some heavy machinery, and a large dose of over-confidence. There is no need to write about what happened next. The memory of that night spent trapped in an unventilated space, as Tchopth were purged all around me, is one that will stay branded on my mind for ever more.
After the storm ended, Stuart took the rest of the crew back to the hospital, where we charged him to join up with that "Binjam" fellow and try to discover where the crew might have contracted the poison, since the fact that we are all unaffected tends to suggest that the poison was ingested before they boarded the ore crawler. (Binjam reported back a little later to say that they had all stayed at the same hostel, and that the owner of the hostel had recently had a large debt paid off by person or persons unknown.)
Without any of the crew left, I became the sole ore crawler driver. Ore is only mined when I am awake and working - a fact that Bethran has never ceased to complain about. I have never shied away from hard work, when hard work needs to be done, but if Bethran complains one more time about me requiring a few hour's sleep, he will discover that certain skills are possessed not merely by dastardly corporations…
And so the next few days proceeded. The next night, another rare, once-in-a-lifetime Devil Blow stuck, followed the next night by another, and then another, and then another. [7] We have found a large amount of spectactularly good ore, but we have also uncovered evidence of claim-jumping. Some of the ore had already been mined, leaving behind nothing but the quaintly-named "skreep." Also, Commander Cleaver departed in a vehicle full of young female Marines, and arrived back some hours later, flushed and dishevelled. Oh, and he also had some story about a sabotaged ore crawler lying abandoned in the desert.
The next day, Cleaver disappeared once again with the gals, and never came back. When hailed, he claimed that the vehicle had broken down, and he'd been forced to wriggle into a cave with a carefully-chosen gal. (He might not have said those words; I heard all this second-hand from Bethran, and accuracy of reporting, like so many other things, is not his strong point.)
Abandoning our mining, we set off to rescue Cleaver and the gals, only to find yet another of those incredibly rare Devil Blows approaching. When we arrived, Cleaver and his sergeant were deep in discussion about meting out discipline to naughty mechanics, but Cleaver tore his attention away long enough to report that he had found a cave with evidence of habitation. When the storm had passed, we approached the cave in case the Dune Raiders had taken refuge in it. Recognising this as a possible First Contact situation with a people who could well be territorial and aggressive, I worked hard to persuade Cleaver and Bethran to be placatory and cautious in their approach, rather than war-like...
And it worked. As the latest Devil Blow approaches, we find ourselves in a cave with a group of Dune Raiders.
And they are human.
******
When our squadron embarked on this mission, Mr Archimedes Flux insisted on holding a series of lectures for all senior staff, entitled "Why I know everything about First Contact situations, and you fools know nothing," or words to that effect. It was riddled with unnecessarily long words - I have always suspected that a man who uses polysyllabic words is, shall we say, monosyllabic in a certain other department - and long quotes from Famous Sophontologists I Have Known. He waved enormous ancient tomes, expounded on theory, and took palpable delight in drawing graphs.
It is, perhaps, a good thing that Flux was not here today, to see all his cherished theory collapse in the face of strong drink and mindless violence.
The Dune Raiders introduced themselves in primitive, manly language, calling themselves Onyar. (This is a phonetic representation of the name, since these Onyar do not convey the impression of a literate people.) My first impression of them was not favourable, since they claimed they were "those who were left behind," and "those who chose not to go." My first husband was like that, forever refusing to go to dinner parties and jail breaks, then moaning because he was left behind. However, a moment later they went up in my estimation when they dismissed Bethran utterly, and focused instead on Commander Cleaver as the alpha male.
Cleaver responded with the requisite warrior grunting and bottom sniffing, and it appeared to be the beginnings of a beautiful friendship, until attention turned to Lieutenant Ass. (I do wonder if anyone has had the heart to tell him that he has accepted a nickname that implies both a beast of burden and a shapely posterior.) "He is my second," grunted Cleaver. "Me has second too," barked Cleaver's new best friend. "My second is my g'ho. My g'ho and your g'ho will wrestle."
Said wrestling match is apparently ritualised and oh so important. The explanation had just about reached its third word, when Lt. Ass put into practice that old, familiar ending of so many Ithklur anecdotes: "and then I hit him."
Things looked warlike and grunty for a while, but Cleaver managed to convince the Dune Raiders that almost bashing someone's arm off is a normal, polite greeting where we come from. (He sounded most convincing when he said it. I found myself briefly unable to take my eyes off him, and ready to do anything he suggested. That feeling passed, but something of an echo remains...) The two g'hos proceeded to wrestle, although I am afraid that our lieutenant was sadly ineffective. I have lost few of the skills I acquired during those heady days I spent as a mud wrestler, and should consider offering to pass them on to those who require them. Perhaps I could train Commander Cleaver in the grapples and holds, so he could cascade the training down to his men.
Anyway, the Onyar appeared pleased when their champion defeated ours, and friendship seemed assured, until a message came from our crawler, saying that it was under attack by two enemy crawlers. Abandoning his new friends, our mission, and a delicate First Contact situation, Cleaver raced out of the cave mid-sentence, and proceeded to hare across the desert in search of a piece of the action. (One word for a man who tries to cover three miles in three minutes on sand while wearing armour is "optimistic." There are other words, too.)
Ignoring the possible carnage happening not far away, the Dune Raiders took us to play with their f'fadden - three-legged beasts of burden. Ass was now best friends with the man whose arm he had almost broken, thus demonstrating that the illogicality of males transcends species barriers. His friend offered him a f'fadden to ride, which Ass mastered after only one minor fall. At this point, Bethran predictably stepped forward, unable to tolerate anyone else receiving praise for something that he could possibly (in his dreams) do just as well.
Earlier, I recorded how the stench of the Tchopth-purging would stay with me forever. The stench of Bethran after his tumble into a steaming pile of f'fadden excrement will stay with me, too, but as foul-smelling memories go, this counts as one of the very best.
Recognising that this was a masculine culture, I had kept myself in the background until now, but I stepped forward at this point, avoiding Bethran's semi-conscious, bruised and stinking form, and attempted to mount the most docile of the creatures. Having achieved a lumbering walk without mishap, I opted to dismount without attempting the gallop that had been Bethran's downfall. This proved to be wise. I am now the proud owner of a f'fadden called Bulo. It is dull, solid, dependable and three-legged, and reminds me strongly of my dear departed Chats. Our kind hosts even offered me a servant to lead my mount: the stinking, battered creature who clearly possessed the lowest status of those present. I accepted graciously, for one should always accept the offerings of your hosts, even when they disgust you. The stinking, battered creature rebelled, and staggered off muttering.
The dust storm was approaching by now, so we retired to the cave, reassured by the news sent by Cleaver: that the hostiles were defeated and prisoners obtained. With hours of storm ahead of us, we settled down to story-telling. When invited to tell a story, Ass started with the line, "Three Ithklur walked into a bar.". "What is bar?" asked the Dune Raiders, so I explained, lubricating the stiffness of my explanation with a flask of good brandy. I deemed it a little too early to mention the Bar Bubbles franchise, but I did plant a few seeds, suggesting that their watering holes might need a little… decoration. The brandy was a great hit - not surprising, when you consider the vile nature of their own form of strong drink - and these primitive people found the word "bar" exceedingly amusing, and bleated it in amused chorus for the duration of the storm.
More than stories were told during the storm. The leader told us about his people, saying they had stayed behind while the crystals did their work. Like so many men before him, he claimed that his tribe was right and the others were wrong, the others having wandered off elsewhere. Before he passed out from excess of brandy, I asked him about the symbol with the circles, and he said that he had seen it once as a child, in a secret, sacred place. He grew quite cagey at this point, but intimated that the elder would know more. He also suggested that the elder was looking for a wife. This could be interesting. Elders, after all, are fond of hoarding secrets, but I know from experience that even the most secretive of men can grow chatty when lying sated on a scented pillow. I wonder what the Onyar think about divorce…
Anyway, at length the dust storm passed, and Commander Cleaver hailed us from the crawler. The Chtiaki had been in touch, he said, to report that the Maori Spirit had retreated to distant orbit, because what we feared has come to pass: the Thotloth fleet has arrived in the system.
******
Many weeks have passed since I last put pen to paper, since the lurching gait of a f'fadden does not lend itself to legible journalling while in the saddle. True, we stop to rest every night, but my bronzed native guide has taken to eyeing anything I take from my pack with avid hunger, as if he suspects that it is soaked in brandy. He tried to suck alcohol from my pen, and when I tried to teach him canasta, he licked the ace of spades.
He is asleep now, however, and the flashes in the sky leave me unable to settle. Are friends dying up there? How many grains of sand can fill the universe? The desert makes thoughts strange. Sometimes, often, I imagine that I can hear distant, sweeping music as I reach the top of a dune, and linger there for a while, poised against the hovering sun. Other times, I look at the proud, bronzed native beside me, and… But he is snoring now, his mouth open, drooling into the flank of his f'fadden. Even bronzed warriors are but men beneath the skin. He is sleeping, and that means that I can write this without him trying to eat the pages. Onwards, then, Bubbles. On.
Weeks ago, that morning when the war began, we emerged from the cave with our new friends, intending to return to the ore crawler to resupply. No sooner had we arrived, than Whiny Stuart arrived in his shuttle, and disgorged my old acquaintance, the Tchopth governor. Exhibiting the characteristic fluster behaviour of the Tchopth, he told us that the Thotloth were invading and the sky was falling down. I pointed out quite politely that he had thrown us into prison for sugesting that very same thing, but he waved that away with that standard excuse that all bad leaders (and Bethran) have used throughout history: bad advisors. Grovelling on the invertebrate equivalent of bended knees, he beseeched our aid. Similar gleams ignited in the eyes of Cleaver and Bethran at this point, Cleaver's eyes glinting with the thrill of approaching battle, and Bethran's eyes glinting with the dream of unlikely victory.
Leaving the ore crawlers in the desert for the Jericorp company to deal with, we headed off in our different diections - Cleaver, Bethran and the Marines to fight a war, and Lieutenant Ass and I to rally the natives. We rode first to meet Salcho Thonyar, leader of the Gissnu tribe, our current friends. He was a seedy-looking fat man sadly in need of a makeover; in a world in which shampoo is unknown, long hair should definitely be avoided. Even more tellingly, his five wives were dispirited and sad-looking and past their prime. (When encountering a leader, always look at the wives, that's what I say.) Since my subtle enquiries into local divorce law brought up images of sharp knives and hideous drama, I deflected Salcho Thonyar's predictable proposition, and concentrated on rousing him instead for war.
It was a simple enough task. Unsurprisingly, the Onyar have no desire to see their entire world destroyed, and willingly agreed to join their swords with ours. When I politely pointed out that their swords, manly and mighty as they may be, would be no match for modern weaponry, they willingly agreed to be equipped with modern guns and trained in their use. I reported this to Commander Cleaver, who sent down a troop of Marines to carry out the training, commanded by a nice young fellow called Tarquin.
The night that followed was somewhat unpleasant, and involved fending off the unwelcome advances of a smelly chieftain. I have done the necessary with many men in my time, but in this case, I deemed that the price was not worth the reward. It was with some considerable relief that I left the next morning, heading off to find the other tribes of the Onyar and recruit them to join our army.
Upon our departure, Salcho Thonyar gave Ass a token with his symbol on it, and told us to tell the other tribes that he was calling Agruas - a gathering of all the tribes at The Place of the 17 Pillars, a place whose capital letters were audible. Conveniently, this capitalised place also appears to be associated with the symbol with the circles, which a passing elder tells me is called "the Yursur," the sign of the ancestors who came briefly from another world before popping off again.
We rode through the desert, Ass and I, with our two bronzed guides. Local wildlife was encountered, and stories were exchanged. Above us, flashes in the sky showed that the space battle was proceeding, but the desert does strange things to one's mind, and makes such things seem almost important. Sitting on my lumbering f'fadden, I could almost lose myself in the contemplation of the horizon or my tender, bruised posterior. Commander Cleaver checked in occasionally, but his reports used so many military code words that I remain in doubt whether he was reporting victories, or telling me about a particularly fine fish supper.
At length we reached the territory of the Otkar Apuay tribe. According to the Gissnu - no pacifists themselves - the Otkar Apuay are a warlike, pugnacious tribe, ruled over by a tyrant. Their outriders surprised us near a lake, but water and brandy smoothed over any unpleasantness. Blndfolding us, they took us to their leader, Brolov, who was sitting cross-legged on the floor in a way that was clearly meant to convey that he was far too manly for cushions. His eyes were too close-set, too, and I have never trusted a man with close-set eyes; it implies that he is so mean and suspicious that he doesn't even trust his eyes to behave unless he keeps a close watch on them.
By now, we were getting good at this, and proferred water, brandy, flattery and powerful guns in quick succession. He Who Spurns Cushions made a show of reluctance at first, but was persuaded to join our army when Ass pointed out that otherwise the Gissnu would have all the fun. Really, chieftains of warlike tribes, like commodores of large fleets, are no different from small children in a playground when it comes to managing them. The big guns we dangled over their heads, using them like the promise of an ice cream. If they were good, we told them, and mustered peacefully at the Place of the 17 Pillars without massacring any other tribes en route, we would given them big guns and train them in their use. They might even get a gold star.
Ass and I split up at this point, so we could cover more ground. I went north, heading for the pole. En route, I received another fish-riddled communication from Commander Cleaver, which I initially thought meant that he had developed an allergy to seafood, but which turned out to mean that the Thotloth had landed, wiped out a local tribe - religious fundamentalists with a water fetish, apparently - and occupied the Place of the 17 Pillars. Fortunately, I had foreseen such an eventuality, and had left communication devices with both chieftains, so it was a simple affair to propose a change of plan: mustering near the western lake for a combined assault.
After passing the pole, I met another tribe, the Okloi, who, to be frank, do not look as if they will contribute much to our fighting strength except for enthusiasm and limp wrists, but who agreed to join it even so. Renowned f'fadden-breeders, the Okloi gave me a new mount, called Breddu, and I set off at renewed speed into the desert, lumbering south in search of yet another tribe to add to our army. Lieutenant Ass reports similar success in the east. With four tribes added to our collection and one wiped out, there remain three still to contact. If all goes to plan, all tribes will muster by the western lake at the appointed time, where they will be trained in modern warfare and unleashed on the enemy.
Equipping warring tribes with high-powered weaponry… What could possibly go wrong with that? It is good work that Ass and I have done. Perhaps Cleaver has done good work, too, but I can't wade through the fish in order to find out.
******
Since last I put pen to paper, days have continued in a similar vein. My bronzed guide and I continued south, where we made contact with yet another tribe of the Onyar. This bunch, the Dalag a'suk, or something to that effect, favoured beards. So there I stood, surrounded by beards of varying virility, flattering their hairiness for all I was worth, but this time, it all fell on deaf ears. The bearded leader dismissed me in an imperiously bristly fashion, saying that he would not join our army, full stop.
However, no sooner had I left his presence, than a young woman accosted me. She explained that she was an exiled princess from the tribe Lieutenant Ass was wrestling his way through in the eastern desert. Her father had come close to uniting all the tribes, but when he had died leaving but a daughter, the unification had collapsed. Even in her own tribe, a usurper had risen up and deposed her, casting her out into the desert, where she had wandered for a while until the bearded ones had taken her in. Said usurper has a name that translates as "He Who Wrestles," which seems to me to be an exceedingly silly name, given that the entire lot of them are addicted to wrestling and do it at every opportunity. Sadly, they do not wrestle naked. Having tried both kinds in my time, I believe firmly that naked wrestling in a better test of skill than wrestling with clothes on, but perhaps these warriors are reluctant to expose their muscled flesh to the burning sun. It is such a shame, but I suppose it is a good thing to consider health and safety.
Anyway, she struck me as a sensible young lady, this exiled princess, although we almost got off to a bad start when she asked me if I had the ears of the Tchopth governor. After so many weeks surrounded by people who barely let an hour go by without asking if I have any more "bran-dee," I have to admit that my initial reaction was to reach for my pack, but I stopped myself just in time. (It was not an entirely foolish reaction, of course; many primitive people like to wear various enemy body parts as jewellery, after all. I have never understood that urge. Diamonds sparkle so much more, and smell so much less.)
Discussions proceeded more smoothly after that. The princess wishes to unite the tribes and lead them into the modern world, negotiating with the Tchopth over land rights and mineral ownership. She agreed to come with me and learn our ways. Additionally, she is hopeful that the Bearded Ones will be won over to our cause, since she is loved by a very influential war leader, who will work on the bearded chief in our absence. Behind every successful man, etcetera etcetera.
We set off, then, and headed west. The princess claimed to be a modern girl, open to modern ideas, so I spent much of the journey leading her to the realisation that a few branches of Bar Bubbles, placed at beautiful oases near the Tchopth mining areas, would be of extreme benefit to the Onyar. I also urged her to do something with her hair.
Eventually we encountered the Bursthuro tribe, who are a tribe of shining common sense and wisdom, in that they are ruled by women. We were taken before their ruling committee, which presented no challenge to me; I have not got to where I am today without knowing how to win over flower show committees, ladies' charitable institutes, female crime syndicates and the like. (Bond over stories of Useless Men We Have Known; it works every time.) The ladies were very taken by the exiled princess, and agreed not only to back her cause, but to send their warriors to join our army.
(Note to self: when this war is over, I need to return to this tribe and advise them on make-up and deportment. Every member of the ruling council has embraced the old cliché that powerful older women must be twisted crones who cackle all the time. They need to be taught that old can be sexy, and that wise and powerful can be sexier still. They could be femmes fatales; instead, they have let themselves become stereotyped as wizened crones.)
Heading east again with our escort of bronzed warriors, we met Ass, who had a mighty army of our own. We united our forces, and went to the agreed rendezvous point, where all the other tribes had already gathered, along with that nice Tarquin fellow and his troop. At this point, Commander Dex reported that the Thotloth were still at the Place of the 17 Pillars, but since their supplies had been cut off, they were out of ammunition. The original plan had been to remain at the rendezvous point for a good long while, while the Onyar were trained in modern warfare, but they opted to set off immediately. (The sound of 7000 bronzed warriors all shouting, "We ride!" is a thrilling one at first, but gets tiresome after ten days. I am not sure if my hearing will ever recover.)
It was a mighty charge, and I'm sure it will go down forever in the annals of the Onyar; indeed, wandering through the camps afterwards, I repeatedly heard Onyar bards attempting to find a rhyme for "Thotloth," and, I blush to report, for "Bubbles." The Thotloth were swept from the face of the earth, and the Place of the 17 Pillars was regained, with few casualties, although Salcho Thonyar, the fat and greasy chieftain who still wants to marry me, suffered in injury in a place that makes marriage even less of an option than it was before.
After the victory, the Agruas took place in the Place of the 17 Pillars. It was a sacred meeting, and a solemn one, but with 7000 f'fadden parked outside the circle of pillars, it was also a smelly one. The poems and stories will not mention that, but the smell will remain my chief memory of this most portentous meeting. There is an Onyar family whose sole task is to dust the stones and keep them clean, and a son of theirs, young Cayn [8], made some inroads into the steaming piles of f'fadden excrement, but it was not enough. It was nowhere near enough.
Inside the stones, the meeting of the chiefs continued. It did not start well, with much bickering over spoils, and many a childish "I was more heroic than you!" "No, I was more heroic than you!" The princess revealed herself, but only a few tribes openly declared for her. It all seemed doomed to failure, until I had the idea of inviting the Tchopth governor to attend, so the princess's plans of a future settlement with the Tchopth could become more than just a wishful dream. The plan worked. Although the tribes remain fractured, each with their own leader, all tribes have now agreed to recognise the princess as their spokesman when it comes to dealings with the Tchopth. Tchopth miners will have to pay compensation to the Onyar when they invade their territory, and in return the Onyar will refrain from killing them.
With this settlement reached, the Onyar departed, leaving behind all the detritus that a camp of 7000 men and animals always leaves. We remained, since it was clear to us that the Place of the 17 Pillars was far more important even than the Onyar thought. Analysing the site from above, Commander Cleaver had seen signs of underground chambers, and he ordered a dig. Having just roused 7000 warriors to a state of rampaging bloodlust with the report of strangers poking around the site, I strongly advised stealth and secrecy, so the dig took place under a sheet.
A hole was dug; an underground chamber was found. Cleaver and Ass bickered a while on who could see in the dark better, and were then lowered into the hole together. And now… Oh, now they report news. There's a large spaceship within, and its door is open! I must stop now, and find out more.
******
I find that I have lost any enthusiasm about writing this journal. I feel so betrayed, so… so violated. Suffice it to say that Cleaver and Ass discovered a buried spaceship, and said spaceship set them off on a course of discoveries that led to the revelation that…
Oh, I can't bring myself to care about the details. The Onyar are robots - that is all that matters to me; that is the message that I hear in my head, repeated endlessly over and over and over again. Those mighty warriors, proud and simple, are in fact an immortal people who were human once, many thousands of years ago, but let themselves become more machine than man. They never truly die. The story is that they dwindled over the years and that the passage of long millennia has caused them to forget what they once were, but repeatedly coming back to life every time you get hacked in pieces in tribal warfare… Isn't that the sort of thing that you remember? Surviving for nearly 300,000 years… Isn't that something unlikely to slip the mind? Isn't that the sort of thing that you mention to a woman before proposing to her?
I lived with these people for many months. I travelled with them. I was named as one of their own, entrusted with their secrets. I gently guided them in the ways of the modern world. I offered tips on hairdressing and make-up, and I meant those sincerely, offering them to innocent, honest representatives of a simple race. I watched their muscled warriors wrestle. I watched my bronzed guide drool into the flank of his f'fadden, and, naïve betrayed fool that I was, I remarked loftily on the common humanity of men.
And all along they were biological robots. I…
No, I cannot write any more, not here, not now. Perhaps one day, perhaps soon, but now… No.
******
Notes:
1. bunn rolled a 2 on her influence roll, but Bubbles doesn't know about dice.
2. Bethran is good at form-filling and annoying people. How he ended up commodore of a large fleet, I have no idea. I was fully intending to have Bubbles treat him with respect, but he was spectacularly rude to her during their first in-game interaction, so this was not to be.
3. The Bar Bubbles chain was founded 3 years ago, when our characters ended up in the middle of a bar brawl, after which Bubbles bought the bar.
4. For the two days previously, my other character and his colleagues had been stuck on a plague ship infected with spores. Flesh-eating grubs and mushroom-like creatures were later stages of the life cycle of this infection. There seemed to be two strains of the spores, one which multiplied fast, and one which multiplied slowly. These were dubbed Zippy and George. You see what I mean about our group not being particularly immersive about these things. We also have scout ships called Rod, Jane and Freddie.
5. This bizarre hazing ritual came from the fact that we ran out of male Tchopth miniatures, and had to use one in a pink bikini.
6. I suspect that a Stuart will feature in all future campaigns, rather like Cain the Dunny Man.
7. The repeated Devil Blows came from repeated rolls of 9. All the ore we found was of excellent quality due to repeated rolls of 6.
8. And here he is again: Cain the eternal dunny man.
However, I think I'd enjoy them even more if I put more thought into character creation. Even though I can't do immersive roleplaying, I can at least give myself an interesting, rounded character to play with. Several of the ones I've played recently are merely a name and a collection of skills. In several cases, the actual character creation has been done by the GM, which can make it harder to get a handle on the character, but that's no excuse; Bacchus, for example, manages to come up with immensely detailed character concepts, even if the actual rolling up of the character is then done by someone else to fit his outline. With Traveller, another problem comes from the fact that there is so much backstory to this universe that I always get daunted and run away whimpering, so my character exists in a vacuum, but this is not an excuse I can use with A Game of Thrones.
For five days of last week's eight day gaming session, I played a character - Lady "Bubbles" Chatterley - that was created for me as a joke. Some years ago, on a long, booze-fuelled evening during a roleplaying weekend, we all rolled up joke characters for each other, trying to create a character totally against each person's preferred type. The following year, we all played those joke characters for a little while during the week, and I chose to play her again for most of this week. She turned out to be great fun to play. Her skills - which included driving tracked vehicles, bribery, brawling and an insane level of handgun skill - suggested a interesting past life for a noble woman in her 50s, and I had far more fun with her than I've had with many other characters. In contrast, the character I played at the beginning and end of this week was basically "chap with engineering 6" and little more.
And so I resolve in future to be more creative when it comes to characters. My first exposure to RPGs came on the computer, with games like Baldur's Gate. I saw my character more as the hero of a fantasy novel than as a character for me to play, so normally went for handsome heroic men. This has carried over into roleplaying as a whole, in that I always play human males. Next time I create a character, though, I will definitely consider playing someone from interesting alien race, or a quirky character with an interesting background.
I will also try to write something from the point of view of each character that I play. Bacchus played with us for the first weekend via Skype, but missed the rest of the week, so I started writing up a brief in-character diary of what he was missing, so he wouldn't be too confused if he managed to join in again at the end of the week. I'd only intended to do one day, hoping that another character would cover the second day, but I really enjoyed it, so carried on. I'm a person who thinks through writing, so the fact that I was sitting down each morning and writing an account made a huge difference.
So here, for the sake of completeness, is said diary, though I doubt it will be of any interest to anyone who wasn't there.
(This doesn't include the first two days of our roleplaying week, when I was playing my other character, trapped on a plague-ridden ship.)
After a long journey on the Maori Spirit, with some at least halfway decent company, I suddenly find myself confined on a small ship with a flower for a pilot and a hiver for a travelling companion. It seems like a good time to return to the diary I last kept oh so many years ago. Leafing back through the pages, I see that when I last wrote I was engaged in… Actually, it is perhaps better to burn those pages, and the ones before them, and the ones before them. Start again with a clean page. There.
So here I am on a small ship called The Rainbow, heading off to a planet that sounds like a large cat coughing up a hairball. Our self-styled Commodore and a flock of Marines have headed over to a wrecked cargo ship, where they have apparently found evidence of hideous slaughter, and have received news that a large Thotloth fleet is headed for the furball planet. We have therefore been dispatched the carry the warning.
Ah. Mr Ungud wishes to play some more Bridge. I will return to this journal after we reach our desination.
The Journal of Lady Bubbles Chatterley
After a rather tiresome journey spent engaged in unsatisfying games of Bridge and sipping cocktails, we arrived at our somewhat uncouthly-named destination, armed with our warning about the coming Thotloth attack. Emerging from The Rainbow, we were greeting by a tediously officious bureaucrat who insisted that form-filling was far more important than saving the world from a hideous doom. My colleague, Ungud, attempted to reason with him. Since members of the Hive Federation are renowned for their skills of persuasion and influence, I can only assume that Mr Ungud intended all along for us to be dragged off to a noisome prison. Why, I am not entirely sure, since I can still see no way in which it advanced our cause, but the ways of our hiver friends are forever unfathomable. [1]
However, I have never been one to bow to the designs of others, and I am no stranger to the inside of a prison cell. I briefly considered the hairpin-in-the-stockings approach, dismissed the method that served me so well during the Affair of the Gilded Chamber-pot, and resorted to… Well, there are many who shy away from calling a spade a spade, but I have never been one of them. I resorted to good old-fashioned bribery, with a small amount of flattery thrown in; young prison guards, however unfortunate in appearance, can never resist some well-placed compliments. Swelling with pride and clutching one of the many fake diamonds I carry for just such eventualities, our guard rushed off to find his superior, and thus so easily was I free.
Mr Ungud did not comment on this overthrow of his unfathomable design, but deigned to be led from the cell with us. Our liberator, the manager of the star port, was a very tiresome man, who reminded me somewhat of our self-styled Commodore, that Bethran fellow. [2] "I told you so!" he whined at everyone who would listen, and a great many who would have preferred not to. Apparently he had predicted the impending Thotloth attack many days ago, but the governor had refused to listen. I almost found myself wishing that I had played along with Mr Ungud's design and stayed languishing in the cell; men of this type are quite insufferable when given any opportunity to consider themselves vindicated.
Anyway, our tiresome liberator took us to meet the governor, whose office looked depressingly identical to our prison cell, interior design being yet another thing that the Tchopth need to work upon. We arrived in the middle of a drama involving a bank loan, but beyond making a mental note of where the money is in this backwater, I opted not to get involved.
Fate thought otherwise, however. With our warning delivered and our task fulfilled, we left the governor's cell-like office, only to encounter the sound of primitive gunfire. Two of the participants in the bank-related drama raced past us into the heart of the battle, wailing in a way that indicated some personal involvement. Moving forward, I saw that an enormous machine called an ore crawler was under attack by some human-sized creatures shrouded in robes. Since our officious form-filling friend had assumed me to be something rather uncouthly called a "Dune Raider", I concluded that these might be Dune Raiders a-raiding, but this did not appear to be a good moment for first contact.
Bullets were flying hither and thither, but physical danger adds to the spice of life; indeed, my third husband first popped the question in the middle of a fire fight. I was alone by this point, Mr Ungud having suddenly remembered an unfathomable design he had to work on round the corner. Of our two friends from the governor's cell, one, an older male, was down, and the other - probably his daughter, since a trophy wife or professional escort would have possessed better taste in headwear - was pathetic and hysterical. I have no patience with hysterical women, so slapped her about a bit until she let me save her father's life.
At this point, the ore crawler exploded, and the Raiders disappeared. Since local law enforcement was being ineffective, I took it upon myself to examine the wreckage, where I discovered the body of one of the Raiders. I raised its mask, expecting to find a human face looking back at me, but it was a Chopth, cunningly disguised to look human!
The pathetic little girl now told us her story. Apparently the family mining business was in dire straits, very probably because a dastardly rival had been sabotaging their machinery. The boss of said dastardly company had been present in the governor's cell, and I can confirm that he did indeed look very dastardly, dastardlyness being a quality that transcends species barriers and stamps itself indelibly on the face, "Commodore" Bethran being a case in point.
(By the way, it is quite worrying how often I think of Bethran. Throughout the events I have just recounted, I kept hearing his voice in my head, asking questions and commenting on what was happening, even though he wasn't there. I can only assume that I have become so used to the incessant sound of his droning self-importance that my imagination supplies it even when I am blessedly far away from him.)
Anyway, since we clearly need to meet these Dune Raider fellows who live in the desert, I gave a vague sort of assurance that we will help the struggling company find the rich ores it needs to pay off its bank loan and that we will uncover the truth about the putative sabotage. It sounds like a challenge, but life is so dull without challenges. And if it all goes hideously wrong…? Well, that Bethran fellow will no doubt take over as soon as he arrives and will claim that the whole thing was his idea, so the blame will be his if it all goes wrong. I didn't get where I am today without knowing how to recognise a win: win situation.
When all that was sorted out, Mr Ungud made contact with the goodly-sized Sergol fleet that was in orbit around the system, and talked to a fellow with a an impressive title. (Why is it, I wonder, that all the men with the most impressive titles are either ugly, impoverished or purple worms? Chats - the late Baron Chatterley - was a case in point.) I believe he received a strong indication that they would help fight off the Thotloth fleet, should it arrive. A very large ship was also in orbit, but we could discover nothing more about it other than that it belonged to a people called Elou.
Meanwhile, I repaired to the bar, where I soon persuaded the manager of the benefits of joining the Bar Bubbles family. [3] Not long after that deal had been completed, that curious "Binjam" fellow arrived, so I set him the task of supervising the bar's refit. Oh, and "Commodore" Bethran arrived, too. He proceeded to demand a status update, talk through all my answers, and generally behave like the poorly socialised man-child that he is. He also had some fanciful tale about grubs called George [4], group baths, and extreme heroism in the face of grilled mushrooms, which is clearly either a calculated pack of lies or the product of too many nights spent with the fruits of Commander McSporran's engine-room still. Knowing Bethran, it's probably both.
Leaving planetary defence in the hands of the locals, we set off into the desert in a cramped ore crawler full of miners and marines - a situation that would have pleased me considerably in my younger days, and causes me a certain frisson of pleasure even now. A curious initiation ritual took place involving skimpy pink garments. [5] Some of our party churlishly refused to join in, but I participated willingly; I have had many happy nights as a result of enthusiastic immersion in native practices, and never turn one down. "Commodore" Bethran, needless to say, clung to the tattered shreds of his imagined dignity, and refused to join in, but Commander Cleaver… Mmm, have to say that I had never noticed quite how muscled Commander Cleaver's torso was before I saw him in that negligee.
And so the journey continues. We have fraternised with the crew, attempting to uncover traitors, but to no avail. We have visited sad little mining towns, and Commander Cleaver has run numerous drills, but no attack has materialised. And outside, the air grows hotter and the land grows more and more barren. I am beginning to regret accepting this mission. Maybe something interesting will happen tomorrow…
******
It has been many days since I was last able to record happenings in these pages. Most of my waking hours have been spent driving an ore crawler, of all things! When circumstances forced me to learn how to drive a tank, all those many years ago, little did I think that it would put me on a path that would lead to me sitting at the controls of such a mighty machine. It is quite thrilling to sit at the controls of such power - to feel it throbbing at the touch of my hand.
But perhaps I need to backtrack a little. After my last entry, we entered the Jackar company's claim and started prospecting. In order to make best possible use of time, it was necessary to split the party into watches. A simple task, one would have thought. A simple task indeed… but not for "Commodore" Bethran and Commander Cleaver, who has impressive muscles and… Who has impressive muscles. While I concentrated on learning how to drive the ore crawler, Bethran tried to work out how to divide ten people into two groups, and Cleaver tried to work out how to divide three squads into three.
Many hours later, Bethran and Cleaver came to some sort of settlement they were happy with, and the first autogyro shift was sent out to search for ore. When they were several hours out, Bethran suddenly had a brainwave of staggering genius: that this planet might actually have something quaint called "night", which might happen at a predictable time - very soon, in fact. Due to the belated nature of this realisation, we are now doomed for ever more to work to a calendar in which "hour one" happens half way through lunch time. Men!
Apart from that, it was a successful day's prospecting, with many deposits of ore uncovered. We settled down to mine the first deposit - a task that took almost two days. Towards the end of this operation, one of the pilots reported feeling a little under the weather.
It was quite amazing what effect this news had on my comrades. Within a few minutes, they had convinced themselves that the entire planet was doomed, doomed, I tell you, and that within a few days, it would become a wilderness ruled over by naught but mushrooms. Isolation units and quarantine was discussed, and there was much talk about searching for "Zippy". (Is Zippy some sort of missing pet, I wonder. From the way they were scurrying around madly, looking into cooking pots and liquor stashes, it must be a small animal, perhaps a furry mammal of some sort, maybe of the type called "a corgi.")
Personally, I thought they would be better off considering those common ailments called "The Morning After", and "I Don't Like My Job," but my colleagues preferred to panic the whole native crew with talk of plague ships and utter doom. Meanwhile, the hapless victim proceeded to turn an alarming shade of magenta, magenta being a colour that works better on an evening dress than on a Tchopth. This was enough to make me revise my earlier assessment, and made me suspect poison administered as part of the dastardly corporation's ongoing programme of sabotage.
Bethran had sent for a shuttle from the Maori Spirit, which duly arrived, piloted by a young fellow called Stuart. [6] Stuart is a young man gifted at nothing whatsoever except for whining, so it is clear why Bethran favours him. Stuart delivered some medical equipment that demonstrated that the ailing pilot was not, after all, infected with spores/insects/grubs/mushrooms/small quadupeds called Zippy/pink unicorns, then took the patient to the star port and delivered him to the hospital. By the time he returned, two more Tchopth had gone down with the same symptoms, and Stuart - moaning all the while - made a return visit to the hospital, where he discovered that the doctors had diagnosed poison.
Now, when we headed out into the desert, we were warned about a rare occurrence called a "Devil Blow" - a sandstorm of extreme magnitude and danger. "Don't worry too much," we were told, "since they happen but rarely." One struck that night - and oh, what a dreadful night it was! We found traces of the poison in all the other Tchopth, so Bethran decided it was a good idea to improvise a stomach pump with a vacuum cleaner, some heavy machinery, and a large dose of over-confidence. There is no need to write about what happened next. The memory of that night spent trapped in an unventilated space, as Tchopth were purged all around me, is one that will stay branded on my mind for ever more.
After the storm ended, Stuart took the rest of the crew back to the hospital, where we charged him to join up with that "Binjam" fellow and try to discover where the crew might have contracted the poison, since the fact that we are all unaffected tends to suggest that the poison was ingested before they boarded the ore crawler. (Binjam reported back a little later to say that they had all stayed at the same hostel, and that the owner of the hostel had recently had a large debt paid off by person or persons unknown.)
Without any of the crew left, I became the sole ore crawler driver. Ore is only mined when I am awake and working - a fact that Bethran has never ceased to complain about. I have never shied away from hard work, when hard work needs to be done, but if Bethran complains one more time about me requiring a few hour's sleep, he will discover that certain skills are possessed not merely by dastardly corporations…
And so the next few days proceeded. The next night, another rare, once-in-a-lifetime Devil Blow stuck, followed the next night by another, and then another, and then another. [7] We have found a large amount of spectactularly good ore, but we have also uncovered evidence of claim-jumping. Some of the ore had already been mined, leaving behind nothing but the quaintly-named "skreep." Also, Commander Cleaver departed in a vehicle full of young female Marines, and arrived back some hours later, flushed and dishevelled. Oh, and he also had some story about a sabotaged ore crawler lying abandoned in the desert.
The next day, Cleaver disappeared once again with the gals, and never came back. When hailed, he claimed that the vehicle had broken down, and he'd been forced to wriggle into a cave with a carefully-chosen gal. (He might not have said those words; I heard all this second-hand from Bethran, and accuracy of reporting, like so many other things, is not his strong point.)
Abandoning our mining, we set off to rescue Cleaver and the gals, only to find yet another of those incredibly rare Devil Blows approaching. When we arrived, Cleaver and his sergeant were deep in discussion about meting out discipline to naughty mechanics, but Cleaver tore his attention away long enough to report that he had found a cave with evidence of habitation. When the storm had passed, we approached the cave in case the Dune Raiders had taken refuge in it. Recognising this as a possible First Contact situation with a people who could well be territorial and aggressive, I worked hard to persuade Cleaver and Bethran to be placatory and cautious in their approach, rather than war-like...
And it worked. As the latest Devil Blow approaches, we find ourselves in a cave with a group of Dune Raiders.
And they are human.
******
When our squadron embarked on this mission, Mr Archimedes Flux insisted on holding a series of lectures for all senior staff, entitled "Why I know everything about First Contact situations, and you fools know nothing," or words to that effect. It was riddled with unnecessarily long words - I have always suspected that a man who uses polysyllabic words is, shall we say, monosyllabic in a certain other department - and long quotes from Famous Sophontologists I Have Known. He waved enormous ancient tomes, expounded on theory, and took palpable delight in drawing graphs.
It is, perhaps, a good thing that Flux was not here today, to see all his cherished theory collapse in the face of strong drink and mindless violence.
The Dune Raiders introduced themselves in primitive, manly language, calling themselves Onyar. (This is a phonetic representation of the name, since these Onyar do not convey the impression of a literate people.) My first impression of them was not favourable, since they claimed they were "those who were left behind," and "those who chose not to go." My first husband was like that, forever refusing to go to dinner parties and jail breaks, then moaning because he was left behind. However, a moment later they went up in my estimation when they dismissed Bethran utterly, and focused instead on Commander Cleaver as the alpha male.
Cleaver responded with the requisite warrior grunting and bottom sniffing, and it appeared to be the beginnings of a beautiful friendship, until attention turned to Lieutenant Ass. (I do wonder if anyone has had the heart to tell him that he has accepted a nickname that implies both a beast of burden and a shapely posterior.) "He is my second," grunted Cleaver. "Me has second too," barked Cleaver's new best friend. "My second is my g'ho. My g'ho and your g'ho will wrestle."
Said wrestling match is apparently ritualised and oh so important. The explanation had just about reached its third word, when Lt. Ass put into practice that old, familiar ending of so many Ithklur anecdotes: "and then I hit him."
Things looked warlike and grunty for a while, but Cleaver managed to convince the Dune Raiders that almost bashing someone's arm off is a normal, polite greeting where we come from. (He sounded most convincing when he said it. I found myself briefly unable to take my eyes off him, and ready to do anything he suggested. That feeling passed, but something of an echo remains...) The two g'hos proceeded to wrestle, although I am afraid that our lieutenant was sadly ineffective. I have lost few of the skills I acquired during those heady days I spent as a mud wrestler, and should consider offering to pass them on to those who require them. Perhaps I could train Commander Cleaver in the grapples and holds, so he could cascade the training down to his men.
Anyway, the Onyar appeared pleased when their champion defeated ours, and friendship seemed assured, until a message came from our crawler, saying that it was under attack by two enemy crawlers. Abandoning his new friends, our mission, and a delicate First Contact situation, Cleaver raced out of the cave mid-sentence, and proceeded to hare across the desert in search of a piece of the action. (One word for a man who tries to cover three miles in three minutes on sand while wearing armour is "optimistic." There are other words, too.)
Ignoring the possible carnage happening not far away, the Dune Raiders took us to play with their f'fadden - three-legged beasts of burden. Ass was now best friends with the man whose arm he had almost broken, thus demonstrating that the illogicality of males transcends species barriers. His friend offered him a f'fadden to ride, which Ass mastered after only one minor fall. At this point, Bethran predictably stepped forward, unable to tolerate anyone else receiving praise for something that he could possibly (in his dreams) do just as well.
Earlier, I recorded how the stench of the Tchopth-purging would stay with me forever. The stench of Bethran after his tumble into a steaming pile of f'fadden excrement will stay with me, too, but as foul-smelling memories go, this counts as one of the very best.
Recognising that this was a masculine culture, I had kept myself in the background until now, but I stepped forward at this point, avoiding Bethran's semi-conscious, bruised and stinking form, and attempted to mount the most docile of the creatures. Having achieved a lumbering walk without mishap, I opted to dismount without attempting the gallop that had been Bethran's downfall. This proved to be wise. I am now the proud owner of a f'fadden called Bulo. It is dull, solid, dependable and three-legged, and reminds me strongly of my dear departed Chats. Our kind hosts even offered me a servant to lead my mount: the stinking, battered creature who clearly possessed the lowest status of those present. I accepted graciously, for one should always accept the offerings of your hosts, even when they disgust you. The stinking, battered creature rebelled, and staggered off muttering.
The dust storm was approaching by now, so we retired to the cave, reassured by the news sent by Cleaver: that the hostiles were defeated and prisoners obtained. With hours of storm ahead of us, we settled down to story-telling. When invited to tell a story, Ass started with the line, "Three Ithklur walked into a bar.". "What is bar?" asked the Dune Raiders, so I explained, lubricating the stiffness of my explanation with a flask of good brandy. I deemed it a little too early to mention the Bar Bubbles franchise, but I did plant a few seeds, suggesting that their watering holes might need a little… decoration. The brandy was a great hit - not surprising, when you consider the vile nature of their own form of strong drink - and these primitive people found the word "bar" exceedingly amusing, and bleated it in amused chorus for the duration of the storm.
More than stories were told during the storm. The leader told us about his people, saying they had stayed behind while the crystals did their work. Like so many men before him, he claimed that his tribe was right and the others were wrong, the others having wandered off elsewhere. Before he passed out from excess of brandy, I asked him about the symbol with the circles, and he said that he had seen it once as a child, in a secret, sacred place. He grew quite cagey at this point, but intimated that the elder would know more. He also suggested that the elder was looking for a wife. This could be interesting. Elders, after all, are fond of hoarding secrets, but I know from experience that even the most secretive of men can grow chatty when lying sated on a scented pillow. I wonder what the Onyar think about divorce…
Anyway, at length the dust storm passed, and Commander Cleaver hailed us from the crawler. The Chtiaki had been in touch, he said, to report that the Maori Spirit had retreated to distant orbit, because what we feared has come to pass: the Thotloth fleet has arrived in the system.
******
Many weeks have passed since I last put pen to paper, since the lurching gait of a f'fadden does not lend itself to legible journalling while in the saddle. True, we stop to rest every night, but my bronzed native guide has taken to eyeing anything I take from my pack with avid hunger, as if he suspects that it is soaked in brandy. He tried to suck alcohol from my pen, and when I tried to teach him canasta, he licked the ace of spades.
He is asleep now, however, and the flashes in the sky leave me unable to settle. Are friends dying up there? How many grains of sand can fill the universe? The desert makes thoughts strange. Sometimes, often, I imagine that I can hear distant, sweeping music as I reach the top of a dune, and linger there for a while, poised against the hovering sun. Other times, I look at the proud, bronzed native beside me, and… But he is snoring now, his mouth open, drooling into the flank of his f'fadden. Even bronzed warriors are but men beneath the skin. He is sleeping, and that means that I can write this without him trying to eat the pages. Onwards, then, Bubbles. On.
Weeks ago, that morning when the war began, we emerged from the cave with our new friends, intending to return to the ore crawler to resupply. No sooner had we arrived, than Whiny Stuart arrived in his shuttle, and disgorged my old acquaintance, the Tchopth governor. Exhibiting the characteristic fluster behaviour of the Tchopth, he told us that the Thotloth were invading and the sky was falling down. I pointed out quite politely that he had thrown us into prison for sugesting that very same thing, but he waved that away with that standard excuse that all bad leaders (and Bethran) have used throughout history: bad advisors. Grovelling on the invertebrate equivalent of bended knees, he beseeched our aid. Similar gleams ignited in the eyes of Cleaver and Bethran at this point, Cleaver's eyes glinting with the thrill of approaching battle, and Bethran's eyes glinting with the dream of unlikely victory.
Leaving the ore crawlers in the desert for the Jericorp company to deal with, we headed off in our different diections - Cleaver, Bethran and the Marines to fight a war, and Lieutenant Ass and I to rally the natives. We rode first to meet Salcho Thonyar, leader of the Gissnu tribe, our current friends. He was a seedy-looking fat man sadly in need of a makeover; in a world in which shampoo is unknown, long hair should definitely be avoided. Even more tellingly, his five wives were dispirited and sad-looking and past their prime. (When encountering a leader, always look at the wives, that's what I say.) Since my subtle enquiries into local divorce law brought up images of sharp knives and hideous drama, I deflected Salcho Thonyar's predictable proposition, and concentrated on rousing him instead for war.
It was a simple enough task. Unsurprisingly, the Onyar have no desire to see their entire world destroyed, and willingly agreed to join their swords with ours. When I politely pointed out that their swords, manly and mighty as they may be, would be no match for modern weaponry, they willingly agreed to be equipped with modern guns and trained in their use. I reported this to Commander Cleaver, who sent down a troop of Marines to carry out the training, commanded by a nice young fellow called Tarquin.
The night that followed was somewhat unpleasant, and involved fending off the unwelcome advances of a smelly chieftain. I have done the necessary with many men in my time, but in this case, I deemed that the price was not worth the reward. It was with some considerable relief that I left the next morning, heading off to find the other tribes of the Onyar and recruit them to join our army.
Upon our departure, Salcho Thonyar gave Ass a token with his symbol on it, and told us to tell the other tribes that he was calling Agruas - a gathering of all the tribes at The Place of the 17 Pillars, a place whose capital letters were audible. Conveniently, this capitalised place also appears to be associated with the symbol with the circles, which a passing elder tells me is called "the Yursur," the sign of the ancestors who came briefly from another world before popping off again.
We rode through the desert, Ass and I, with our two bronzed guides. Local wildlife was encountered, and stories were exchanged. Above us, flashes in the sky showed that the space battle was proceeding, but the desert does strange things to one's mind, and makes such things seem almost important. Sitting on my lumbering f'fadden, I could almost lose myself in the contemplation of the horizon or my tender, bruised posterior. Commander Cleaver checked in occasionally, but his reports used so many military code words that I remain in doubt whether he was reporting victories, or telling me about a particularly fine fish supper.
At length we reached the territory of the Otkar Apuay tribe. According to the Gissnu - no pacifists themselves - the Otkar Apuay are a warlike, pugnacious tribe, ruled over by a tyrant. Their outriders surprised us near a lake, but water and brandy smoothed over any unpleasantness. Blndfolding us, they took us to their leader, Brolov, who was sitting cross-legged on the floor in a way that was clearly meant to convey that he was far too manly for cushions. His eyes were too close-set, too, and I have never trusted a man with close-set eyes; it implies that he is so mean and suspicious that he doesn't even trust his eyes to behave unless he keeps a close watch on them.
By now, we were getting good at this, and proferred water, brandy, flattery and powerful guns in quick succession. He Who Spurns Cushions made a show of reluctance at first, but was persuaded to join our army when Ass pointed out that otherwise the Gissnu would have all the fun. Really, chieftains of warlike tribes, like commodores of large fleets, are no different from small children in a playground when it comes to managing them. The big guns we dangled over their heads, using them like the promise of an ice cream. If they were good, we told them, and mustered peacefully at the Place of the 17 Pillars without massacring any other tribes en route, we would given them big guns and train them in their use. They might even get a gold star.
Ass and I split up at this point, so we could cover more ground. I went north, heading for the pole. En route, I received another fish-riddled communication from Commander Cleaver, which I initially thought meant that he had developed an allergy to seafood, but which turned out to mean that the Thotloth had landed, wiped out a local tribe - religious fundamentalists with a water fetish, apparently - and occupied the Place of the 17 Pillars. Fortunately, I had foreseen such an eventuality, and had left communication devices with both chieftains, so it was a simple affair to propose a change of plan: mustering near the western lake for a combined assault.
After passing the pole, I met another tribe, the Okloi, who, to be frank, do not look as if they will contribute much to our fighting strength except for enthusiasm and limp wrists, but who agreed to join it even so. Renowned f'fadden-breeders, the Okloi gave me a new mount, called Breddu, and I set off at renewed speed into the desert, lumbering south in search of yet another tribe to add to our army. Lieutenant Ass reports similar success in the east. With four tribes added to our collection and one wiped out, there remain three still to contact. If all goes to plan, all tribes will muster by the western lake at the appointed time, where they will be trained in modern warfare and unleashed on the enemy.
Equipping warring tribes with high-powered weaponry… What could possibly go wrong with that? It is good work that Ass and I have done. Perhaps Cleaver has done good work, too, but I can't wade through the fish in order to find out.
******
Since last I put pen to paper, days have continued in a similar vein. My bronzed guide and I continued south, where we made contact with yet another tribe of the Onyar. This bunch, the Dalag a'suk, or something to that effect, favoured beards. So there I stood, surrounded by beards of varying virility, flattering their hairiness for all I was worth, but this time, it all fell on deaf ears. The bearded leader dismissed me in an imperiously bristly fashion, saying that he would not join our army, full stop.
However, no sooner had I left his presence, than a young woman accosted me. She explained that she was an exiled princess from the tribe Lieutenant Ass was wrestling his way through in the eastern desert. Her father had come close to uniting all the tribes, but when he had died leaving but a daughter, the unification had collapsed. Even in her own tribe, a usurper had risen up and deposed her, casting her out into the desert, where she had wandered for a while until the bearded ones had taken her in. Said usurper has a name that translates as "He Who Wrestles," which seems to me to be an exceedingly silly name, given that the entire lot of them are addicted to wrestling and do it at every opportunity. Sadly, they do not wrestle naked. Having tried both kinds in my time, I believe firmly that naked wrestling in a better test of skill than wrestling with clothes on, but perhaps these warriors are reluctant to expose their muscled flesh to the burning sun. It is such a shame, but I suppose it is a good thing to consider health and safety.
Anyway, she struck me as a sensible young lady, this exiled princess, although we almost got off to a bad start when she asked me if I had the ears of the Tchopth governor. After so many weeks surrounded by people who barely let an hour go by without asking if I have any more "bran-dee," I have to admit that my initial reaction was to reach for my pack, but I stopped myself just in time. (It was not an entirely foolish reaction, of course; many primitive people like to wear various enemy body parts as jewellery, after all. I have never understood that urge. Diamonds sparkle so much more, and smell so much less.)
Discussions proceeded more smoothly after that. The princess wishes to unite the tribes and lead them into the modern world, negotiating with the Tchopth over land rights and mineral ownership. She agreed to come with me and learn our ways. Additionally, she is hopeful that the Bearded Ones will be won over to our cause, since she is loved by a very influential war leader, who will work on the bearded chief in our absence. Behind every successful man, etcetera etcetera.
We set off, then, and headed west. The princess claimed to be a modern girl, open to modern ideas, so I spent much of the journey leading her to the realisation that a few branches of Bar Bubbles, placed at beautiful oases near the Tchopth mining areas, would be of extreme benefit to the Onyar. I also urged her to do something with her hair.
Eventually we encountered the Bursthuro tribe, who are a tribe of shining common sense and wisdom, in that they are ruled by women. We were taken before their ruling committee, which presented no challenge to me; I have not got to where I am today without knowing how to win over flower show committees, ladies' charitable institutes, female crime syndicates and the like. (Bond over stories of Useless Men We Have Known; it works every time.) The ladies were very taken by the exiled princess, and agreed not only to back her cause, but to send their warriors to join our army.
(Note to self: when this war is over, I need to return to this tribe and advise them on make-up and deportment. Every member of the ruling council has embraced the old cliché that powerful older women must be twisted crones who cackle all the time. They need to be taught that old can be sexy, and that wise and powerful can be sexier still. They could be femmes fatales; instead, they have let themselves become stereotyped as wizened crones.)
Heading east again with our escort of bronzed warriors, we met Ass, who had a mighty army of our own. We united our forces, and went to the agreed rendezvous point, where all the other tribes had already gathered, along with that nice Tarquin fellow and his troop. At this point, Commander Dex reported that the Thotloth were still at the Place of the 17 Pillars, but since their supplies had been cut off, they were out of ammunition. The original plan had been to remain at the rendezvous point for a good long while, while the Onyar were trained in modern warfare, but they opted to set off immediately. (The sound of 7000 bronzed warriors all shouting, "We ride!" is a thrilling one at first, but gets tiresome after ten days. I am not sure if my hearing will ever recover.)
It was a mighty charge, and I'm sure it will go down forever in the annals of the Onyar; indeed, wandering through the camps afterwards, I repeatedly heard Onyar bards attempting to find a rhyme for "Thotloth," and, I blush to report, for "Bubbles." The Thotloth were swept from the face of the earth, and the Place of the 17 Pillars was regained, with few casualties, although Salcho Thonyar, the fat and greasy chieftain who still wants to marry me, suffered in injury in a place that makes marriage even less of an option than it was before.
After the victory, the Agruas took place in the Place of the 17 Pillars. It was a sacred meeting, and a solemn one, but with 7000 f'fadden parked outside the circle of pillars, it was also a smelly one. The poems and stories will not mention that, but the smell will remain my chief memory of this most portentous meeting. There is an Onyar family whose sole task is to dust the stones and keep them clean, and a son of theirs, young Cayn [8], made some inroads into the steaming piles of f'fadden excrement, but it was not enough. It was nowhere near enough.
Inside the stones, the meeting of the chiefs continued. It did not start well, with much bickering over spoils, and many a childish "I was more heroic than you!" "No, I was more heroic than you!" The princess revealed herself, but only a few tribes openly declared for her. It all seemed doomed to failure, until I had the idea of inviting the Tchopth governor to attend, so the princess's plans of a future settlement with the Tchopth could become more than just a wishful dream. The plan worked. Although the tribes remain fractured, each with their own leader, all tribes have now agreed to recognise the princess as their spokesman when it comes to dealings with the Tchopth. Tchopth miners will have to pay compensation to the Onyar when they invade their territory, and in return the Onyar will refrain from killing them.
With this settlement reached, the Onyar departed, leaving behind all the detritus that a camp of 7000 men and animals always leaves. We remained, since it was clear to us that the Place of the 17 Pillars was far more important even than the Onyar thought. Analysing the site from above, Commander Cleaver had seen signs of underground chambers, and he ordered a dig. Having just roused 7000 warriors to a state of rampaging bloodlust with the report of strangers poking around the site, I strongly advised stealth and secrecy, so the dig took place under a sheet.
A hole was dug; an underground chamber was found. Cleaver and Ass bickered a while on who could see in the dark better, and were then lowered into the hole together. And now… Oh, now they report news. There's a large spaceship within, and its door is open! I must stop now, and find out more.
******
I find that I have lost any enthusiasm about writing this journal. I feel so betrayed, so… so violated. Suffice it to say that Cleaver and Ass discovered a buried spaceship, and said spaceship set them off on a course of discoveries that led to the revelation that…
Oh, I can't bring myself to care about the details. The Onyar are robots - that is all that matters to me; that is the message that I hear in my head, repeated endlessly over and over and over again. Those mighty warriors, proud and simple, are in fact an immortal people who were human once, many thousands of years ago, but let themselves become more machine than man. They never truly die. The story is that they dwindled over the years and that the passage of long millennia has caused them to forget what they once were, but repeatedly coming back to life every time you get hacked in pieces in tribal warfare… Isn't that the sort of thing that you remember? Surviving for nearly 300,000 years… Isn't that something unlikely to slip the mind? Isn't that the sort of thing that you mention to a woman before proposing to her?
I lived with these people for many months. I travelled with them. I was named as one of their own, entrusted with their secrets. I gently guided them in the ways of the modern world. I offered tips on hairdressing and make-up, and I meant those sincerely, offering them to innocent, honest representatives of a simple race. I watched their muscled warriors wrestle. I watched my bronzed guide drool into the flank of his f'fadden, and, naïve betrayed fool that I was, I remarked loftily on the common humanity of men.
And all along they were biological robots. I…
No, I cannot write any more, not here, not now. Perhaps one day, perhaps soon, but now… No.
******
Notes:
1. bunn rolled a 2 on her influence roll, but Bubbles doesn't know about dice.
2. Bethran is good at form-filling and annoying people. How he ended up commodore of a large fleet, I have no idea. I was fully intending to have Bubbles treat him with respect, but he was spectacularly rude to her during their first in-game interaction, so this was not to be.
3. The Bar Bubbles chain was founded 3 years ago, when our characters ended up in the middle of a bar brawl, after which Bubbles bought the bar.
4. For the two days previously, my other character and his colleagues had been stuck on a plague ship infected with spores. Flesh-eating grubs and mushroom-like creatures were later stages of the life cycle of this infection. There seemed to be two strains of the spores, one which multiplied fast, and one which multiplied slowly. These were dubbed Zippy and George. You see what I mean about our group not being particularly immersive about these things. We also have scout ships called Rod, Jane and Freddie.
5. This bizarre hazing ritual came from the fact that we ran out of male Tchopth miniatures, and had to use one in a pink bikini.
6. I suspect that a Stuart will feature in all future campaigns, rather like Cain the Dunny Man.
7. The repeated Devil Blows came from repeated rolls of 9. All the ore we found was of excellent quality due to repeated rolls of 6.
8. And here he is again: Cain the eternal dunny man.