How’s that for irony? Huh? Huh?
Quite ironic.
Dirk, not exactly sure of what he should be doing beyond lighting matches in something called “Deep Dudue,” came to a crossroads. Its signs read “Savoir Faire” to the left and “Scarborough Faire” to the right. Down the middle lay an unmarked road, which for some reason was the only road that went through a forest of dead trees and had a lightning storm overhead.
Dirk remembered that Pooshka had said that a weddings waited him is Scarborough. He also knew that going down the middle of a crossroads is what got him into this mess. So he knew that his only choice was…
[I am getting SICK AND TIRED of being Ninjaed today!]
The lightning flashed in the distance.
“Psst, hey buddy…” said a tiny rather high-pitched voice from very near to Dirk, but he was unable to place the source.
“Who said that?” inquired Dirk anxiously.
“Me, that’s who,” said the Voice. “Look on your right shoulder.”
Dirk then perceived a glowworm. A talking, sentient glowworm.
“Umm, who are you?” Dirk asked the glowworm.
“That’s not important,” he said, “but you can call me Neon. Listen, I have very important news about your lady friend up there. She’s not who you think-she’s not even who she thinks!”
“Ploothka! How is she?”
“She is doing fine, other than worrying herself sick about your carcass being lost down here.”
“Then who is she, then? I recall that her sister was odd…”
“I cannot tell you, I can only show you, and it has nothing to do with her sister, and I’m afraid that the answer isn’t simple in the showing, and will take quite a bit of time to do the entire thing justice. C’mon, let’s go farther down this path…”
[make that that the glowworm now will decide which way for them to go-you guys catch my drift…]
“Wait wait wait,” came a gravely voice from his other shoulder. It was gravely because it was the recently-named Yawai-Gesso, the sentient rock who was already there to help Dirk on his journey. “You’re not going to listen to this glowworm are you? I was here first and I already know where you should go.”
“This guy’s got rocks in his brain,” the glowworm retorted with a snort. “Who are you going to listen to, some stupid rock or a clever, educated glowworm who was obviously smart enough to avoid a hungry drooldragon?”
“Drooldragon?” Dirk repeated questioningly.
“Who you calling stupid, ya stupid worm?” the rock growled back. “I’ve been around a lot longer than you, I’ve got wisdom that comes with age. What have you got?”
“Oh not much, just a Bachelors of Science from BYU!” the worm shot back. “You know, the Byzantine Yoyodyne University? They don’t just take anyone off the street, y’know.”
“Oh a college boy, eh?” the rock snorted. “Well I’ve got street smarts. In fact, I was part of a cobblestone road for 30 years!”
“Oh yeah, you were a street, that’s impressive. If you like getting pooped on by horses!”
“That’s it!” Yawai-Gesso howled. “Lemme at 'um! I’ll squash you like a bug!”
“You want a piece of this, big man?” the worm howled back. “Let’s do this!”
“Let’s rumble!” the rock howled and fell off Dirk’s shoulder and onto the ground with a thump. The glowworm leaped down and hopped in front of his adversary, holding his front legs up and bouncing back and forth like some kind of Bioluminescent bare-knuckled fighter.
As the two argued over who would throw the first punch, daring each other to take a swing, Dirk took a few steps forward towards the three-pronged fork in the road, looking at his three choices.
As Dirk put his right foot forward, another distraction fell from the sky. It took the form of Dirk, sans the clothing.
The handsome stranger said, “Dirk I am you from the future. The GM punished me and sent me back (and this moment a loud yell from the rock/worm fight prevented Dirk from hearing the number) turns.”
Dirk of the present replied, “alright. But why are you naked? Is it because inorganic matter cannot travel through the time stream?”
The handsome (and sexy) stranger answered, “no, there was a mix up. It involved a deck of cards, seductive women, and several clothing bets, but I can’t tell you more than that. All I can say is that I’m supposed to take the rock and the worm (once more, their bickering blocked out the number) turns into the future, to a point where they will be more helpful.”
Dirk hurriedly asked, “wait wait! Can you at least tell which path to take?”
The handsome, sexy, (and fading) stranger shouted quickly, “Oh yeah! I just went…”
[Your job, next guy.]
Upon hearing the phrase, “I just went,” Dirk realized he had to go.
He figured the Rock and the pugilistic Glowworm were otherwise occupied, and so he slipped off the trail into the bushes. There, he pulled down his breeches and squatted to micturate.
Glancing around to be sure no one could see him peeing, Dirk noticed a deck of cards lying nearby.
GM: Sorry, you’ve posted a Critical Failure. The thread is dead.
Player: But don’t I get a saving throw?
GM: You players, all you do is talk and talk and say “The rules say I get a saving throw” and “I just want to say this.” Well you’re dead now, so shut up!
Player: I think you may have confused this thread with the Monty Python Non-Sequitur thread. It’s hard to miss, just up the list a way. It’s on page 52 or somesuch with over 2000 posts!
GM: Oh, right, sorry.
Wait wait…so its over? Can the GM do that?
D20 = 20
Dirk is still squatpissing in the bushes near a deck of cards.
“Well, hello there,” purred a seductive voice just out Dirk’s view. “We don’t usually get such handsome strangers around here.”
Dirk tried to scramble to his feet quickly (once he heard the voice, he got stage fright and couldn’t pee anyway) but he mostly stumbled awkwardly. He finally got to his feet and looked up to see possibly the most beautiful woman he has ever laid eyes upon.
“Er Hi,” stammered Dirk. “I didn’t realize someone was nearby.”
“I can see that,” she seductively replied, eying the hero up and down. Dirk felt she was mentally undressing him, but then realized that his pants were down around his ankles and that she was looking at his underbreeches, which were decorated with cute cartoon bunnies.
“Er, it’s washday,” he blushed and quickly hoisted up his trousers.
“I see you have a deck of cards with you,” murmured alluringly. “Care for a game of chance?”
“Er well you see, I don’t think they’re actually mine,” Dirk shrugged sheepishly.
Dirk suddenly found himself sitting in the grass face to face with the beautiful stranger. She was shuffling the cards and started dealing them out entrancingly.
“Ever play…” she paused and her words floated down into Dirk’s ears like warm, delicate pollen blown into his ears by a warm, westerly wind. “Two handed euchre?”
A few hands later and Dirk was down to only his bunny underbreeches while his bewitchingly beautiful opponent was still fully clothed, her raven hair cascaded over her shoulders and onto her long cloak.
“This is the worst game of strip euchre I’ve ever played,” Dirk bemoaned.
“One more hand and I will have all your clothes,” the beautiful woman smirked. “Those ridiculous bunny shorts are all but mine.”
“They were a gift,” Dirk insisted. He could not stop staring at this woman who sat before him. She was absolutely stunning, to be sure, but she also almost looked familiar to him.
She made short work of this last hand and soon demanded that he hand over his shorts. Dirk glumly complied and was surprised to see that she began to strip off her clothes as well, which appeared to be only her long cloak.
“Uh, I’ve got a girlfriend,” Dirk stammered. Maybe he could cheat on her just this once. He’s in an enchanted forest all by himself, who’s going to know?
“I’m not going to sleep with you,” the alluring-but-almost-recognizable woman replied. “I just want your clothes.”
With her cloak stripped off, she hoisted the bunny-printed bloomers up. They weren’t quite the right size for her, but then they seemed to fit just right in some sort of magical way. This was followed by his breeches and the rest of his clothes, which also immediately fit as soon as they were pulled onto her body. The woman’s body shifted and altered until the almost-familiar face became very familiar. Dirk was looking at his own face!
“That’s better,” the newly transformed Dirk sighed.
“But how—?” Dirk stared in wonder.
Dirk kicked the cloak over to Dirk. “This is a +2 Cloak of Gender Realignment. If you put this on, you will turn into a female version of yourself.”
“Yeah but–”
“This is the Phoenix Gate,” Dirk tossed a small shield over to Dirk. “It’s a magical artifact that will send you back in time. You need to go back in time, warn yourself not to take the wrong path, put on the cloak, and then beat yourself in the card game, then give yourself the cloak and the Phoenix Gate and then continue on your journey – Which is what I’m about to do now.”
“This doesn’t make a lot of sense.”
“Nope.”
“Uh OK,” Dirk managed to reply. “One question, when you – er – I, am a woman, do you find the male me attractive?”
“Of course,” Dirk replied. “I could barely keep my hands off you. Female me thinks male me is the most gorgeous creature EVAH!”
“Yeah, I bet we’d have really cute kids,” Dirk nodded wistfully. “But it would just be too complicated.”
“Yeah, you’re right,” Dirk agreed with a sigh. “It’s like the opposite of a mixed marriage, but it just wouldn’t work.”
Naked Dirk scooped up the cloak and the artifact and was immediately engulfed in its magical energies. He could immediately feel the power drawing him back in time.
“One more question!” He called out from the vortex.
“Yeah?”
“Which path should I take?”
“Well that’s simple,” Clothed Dirk said. “You have to–”
And in a flash, Naked Dirk was gone, leaving Clothed Dirk alone in the enchanted forest, standing in front of the split in the path.
“Now, which way did I tell me to go?” Dirk said as he scratched the side of his head.
Dirk stood at the fork humming, trying to remember back to a time when the best path was obviously provided.
A few hours of fierce internal debate that nearly fractured his psyche later, he heard someone calling “Dirk! DIRK!” behind him. Eventually, the mysterious voice came into the clearing. It was revealed to be Ploothka.
Ploothka appeared to be furious, shouting directly into Dirk’s face “HAVE YOU SEEN MY FIANCE? [Right? It was fiance? Screw it, going with fiance]. He has the same general facial structure, eyes, ears, nose, mouth, hair, and clothes as you? Did he walk by here?”
For some reason Ploothka did not recognize Dirk, which suited him just fine. He had a feeling that she’d be mad at him again for disappearing. She also appeared to have acquired new armor somewhere along the line. Adopting a falsetto voice, Dirk replied, " I believe he headed back into the forest, around there," Dirk pointed vaguely at some other point int the clearing. I think he said something about ‘finding something valuable. The most valuable object he’d ever heard of.’"
“He must have been talking about me,” said the now surprisingly happy Ploothka. “He probably thought I’d be looking for the legendary +@ Hidden Staff of Finding Stuff, which is said to be able to locate anything, even the Library of Infinite Knowing Things. Supposedly, the Library even knows the future.”
Dirk, realizing that a Library of Infinite Smart People Thoughts would even know stuff like the location of a stolen stole, or its thief, suggested, “Why not adventure there? Surely it would have knowledge like the location of Drogo Thuckershi-I mean, your fiance.”
Lighting up, Ploothka replied, “Great idea. By the way, sir, what is your name?”
“That is unnecessary, classified information at this particular instant, but I was wondering if I might travel with you?” Ploothka conceded that four eyes can see better than two (even if the two possess a +21 HUD of Waypointing) and advised they start heading out.
As an afterthought, Dirk also considered finding out why Ploothka didn’t recognize him at the library, if he had time.
Dirk and Ploothka came to a fork in the road. Dirk picked it up; it was good quality sterling silver, so he put it in his pocket.
Dirk commented “wow, it took quite some strength to pull that fork out of that stone right there,” gesturing towards a cantaloupe sized rock that had had the fork stuck in it, which began glowing purpley, like not bright purpeley, but evil purpley, with blood red mixed in.
They continued traveling. Ploothka, of course, knew exactly which path to take. She always knew. Ploothka warned the stranger she was traveling with, that it would take a long time to find the Staff thing, and then it would take even longer to use it to find the Library. They would travel through many places, including the infamous caverns of Deep Dudue. The legend of the Staff says that a vital clue to finding it was hidden at the bottom of Lake Feesees at the heart of cavern.
“The only way to reach the bottom with a +(∞-1) Sack of Air, which can only be created by putting a Sack of Holding © inside a Sack of Holding ©, while it contains a Sack of Holding ©. However, they are quite rare and can only be created by a wizard. Maybe we’ll find one in a chest along the way.”
Dirk ignored the majority of the meticulously provided exposition above, instead taking out his sac [remember, the own that had glow worms from post 17-20? I assumed he still had it since no one used the /drop command] and ogling at the very shiny fork he had put inside.
“Oh WOW! You have one right there! Perfect! I’ll show you the process when we get there. For now we’ll just put stuff in it.”
“Hm-Hmm, excuse me, I think you should have a look at this.”—The voice had an earthy resonance, and overall seemed very gneiss.
Yawai-Gesso, in all his grapefruit-sized majesty, sat behind the adventurers looking somewhat sedimental.
“What is it, Yawai-Gesso?” Dirk asked.
Ploothka looked at Dirk, a little shocked. “You know the rock’s name?”
“Sure, I named him.” (#ed.—See Post #18)
“But the Oracle of Phynxter Ahnee told me that only Dirk could name the grapefuit-sized rock!!”
“Oh, right, well, Yes, I see how that could be… er, uh, well… What it was was kind of… um, ahh, chuckle This is going to make you laugh, because, uh, because of the… Or more a little sad… Right, right… Maybe even very sad… very, very, sad… You see, because of… ahh well, you know, it’s a kind of sad story that might make you laugh too… um, because, uh, right, well…”
Dirk went on like this for nearly five minutes not knowing that he had the +4 Fork of Double-Duplicity in his possession. Ploothka had crossed her arms and stood back on her right leg watching her new acquaintance do the verbal squirm.
“Sorry to interrupt your repartee, but I did have something rather pressing to discuss.”
The rock moved back down the path the way they had come. Before long they saw what Yawai-Gesso was concerned about.
Atop a glowing-purpley-like-not-bright-purpeley-but-evil-purpley-with-blood-red-mixed-in, cantaloupe-sized rock was the glowworm which was also glowing-purpley-like-not-bright-purpeley-but-evil-purpley-with-blood-red-mixed-in. The rock and the glowworm were ensconced in a glowing-purpley-like-not-bright-purpeley-but-evil-purpley-with-blood-red-mixed-in aura, and worse yet, the glowworm had grown D3 * 12 meters and was holding his front legs up and bouncing back and forth like some kind of Bioluminescent bare-knuckled fighter.
Interlude
Player: Wait, wait. A D3! What the hell is a D3?
GM: You roll a D6 and divide the result by two.
Player: Why not just roll a D6 and multiply by 6 instead of twelve.
GM: Better yet…
Interlude
…the glowworm had grown D6 * 24 meters tall and was drooling acid, breathing fire, farting CO2 (which can accumulate in the atmosphere contributing to global warming) and holding a +Φ Doom-Dagger in each of his four free legs.
Player: Hey, glowworms don’t have…
GM: Opening his Tome of Terrible Tortures Sorry, what were you saying.
Player: Uh, nothing, nothing.
NOTE: the Φ symbol on the Doom-Dagger is the symbol for Phi, the Golden-Ratio; a possibly divine number, and very spooky and mystical.
Player: refresh my memory: just what items does Dirk currently have?
GM: He has a fork of +4 Double Duplicity, the empty sack the glowworms were in, and his clothing. That’s all.
Player: Does his clothing include a hat?
GM: <sigh> "Yes, he has a hat. A small sort of Robin-Hood type hat suitable for an adventurer.
Player: “Ok; Dirk takes his hat and puts it on backwards”.
GM; “O…-kay. His hat is now on backwards”.
[(exposition/narrative/interlude) What would this be called?]
Player: Uh…GM? I’d like to invoke the power of changing-through-flashback power used in post #15 again. Can I get a roll?
GM: You know what? WHATEVER! Do whatever you want. Not even a roll. Go ahead and screw with time. The only condition is that Dirk has to play another game of strip euchre at some point, and it must be told from Ploothka’s point of view. Yeah, think again next time before asking for favors.
So. Skip back to when Dirk had been blown up by his parachute. We will say that this time, when the boiling water lifted up his parachute it also nearly blew off his hat, and that he grabbed it at the last second and put it back on in a disorderly fashion.
/[(exposition/narrative/interlude) Seriously, do you know what this is?]
Anyway, now that Dirk took this moment to finally adjust his hat (he was dumbstruck at the sight of himself when he was swapping genders) the dormant magic hidden inside it activated once more.
You see, it was secretly a +8 Cap of Incognito (manufactured by Chrome Inc.) that Dirk had accidentally mistaken for his own one night at a bar fight in a bath house (long story). If worn while someone is looking at you, they can only recognize you while the hat is in that same position. But, when supplemented by the +4 Fork of Double-Duplicity, it would continue to disguise you from anyone who you don’t want to find you, unless they say your name three times while looking you in the eye. [At this point, 0]
“Oh, wait, where did that guy go? I coulda’ sworn…” began the stil-unnamed glowworm, before Yawai-Gesso cut him off.
“No, no. He’s still here. He’s just hiding,” before going on to explain the intricacies of +3 Emergency Hats of Temporal Shifting. The worm was quickly bored to sleep.
Yawai-Gesso waddle-rolled up to the pair, “Mistress, Sir I will attend to this monstrosity, and make sure he is returned to normal. I can always find you again. One of future Dirk’s punishments [see post #26] is to lug me/us to all the points in this adventure where I/we are needed.” Being bonded to Dirk, of course he would always recognize, but for once his ±8 Helpful ability to talk was actually being helpful. There is always the -8 part of that enchantment though.
And so Yawai-Gesso stayed with the grotesque glowworm, and the adventurous duo carried on towards the Deep Dudue.
As they walked away, Dirk heard a loud ‘ka-Pwaannng’ (or was it a 'chi-Quaiiiieeenk?) and the voice of Yawai-Gesso explaining stonily that Daggers of any sort (including Doom-Daggers) were about as efficient as Scissors when it came to Rocks. Dirk wondered if the ‘ka-Pwaannng’ might have come from the Fork, so he opened his bag to look. At that moment a reverberating Doom-Dagger kuuLanked (or shwaHPlunked) into the bag.
Dirk stared at the object for almost a full blink before shrugging his shoulders, stowing the bag, adjusting his cartoon-bunny under breeches and moving on. (Do we still have the bunny under breetches?)
Looking over his shoulder, Dirk saw a storm gathering near the horizon. It was a dark and stormy storm.
Dirk thought he heard dark, ominous music.
“If that music were played a little louder and a little faster, it would really scare the piss out of me” Dirk thought out loud.
The music grew subtly louder and faster and darker and more ominous. Then it sped up again. It grew louder and darker and more ominous.
“Well, I can see where this is going.”
Dirk ran to catch up with Ploothka.
In the preceding, please make the following changes to the text.
Dirk stared at the object for almost a full blink before shrugging his shoulders, stowing the bag, [del]adjusting his cartoon-bunny under breeches[/del] ^noisily scratching himself^ and moving on.