From: mmcalees@sol.UVic.CA (Michael McAleese)
Subject: STORY: Dingbat and the Brooch (Part Four)
Followup-To: rec.games.frp.misc
Summary: See below
Keywords: Story, Dingbat
Organization: Those Dudes
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 1993 19:11:27 GMT


                      Dingbat the Monk and the Brooch
                             by "Those Dudes"

(Synopsis of Parts 1,2&3: Dingbat finds a jeweled brooch and is promptly
kidnapped by wererats.  The remainder of the party is confronted by
Ach'ptooe, the orc chieftain and his band of merry orcs.  They argue
philosophy and split up, the party eventually tracking Dingbats kidnappers
to the city of Vermouth.  The ensuing battle at a wine and cheese shop
leaves the wizard metabolically challenged [dead] but does herald the
return of Dingbat to the party.  There is little rejoicing, especially
since Dingbat returns sans brooch.  Dingbat explains that the brooch was
taken by the wererats to their secret temple beneath the city.  The party
[broke as usual] takes Sauramud to the temple and weasels a raise dead in
return for the heads of the wererat priests.  Dingbat sets the temple on
fire accidentally and the party skulks off to delve the sewers for the
wererat temple.)

Part Four

	With a grunt and a scatalogical curse Rodent heaved up the heavy
grating covering the dank, smelly hole in the alley.
	"Are you sure the wererat temple will be down in the sewers?" asked
Dingbat uncertainly.
	"Of course.  If not, there'll be entrances to their lair." said Rodent
confidently.
	"Duh, you sure?" asked the paladin, eyeing the dark hole.
	"Oh don't be such a wimp!" said Dingbat, perking up suddenly.  "Watch
me decend this hole using my incredible monkish powers!" Before anyone
could say anything, Dingbat hopped down the pit.  (A monk, you may recall,
can fall some thirty feet without taking damage.  Usually Dingbat could
too.) A few moments later came a "plonk" sound and a cackle of monkish
glee.  "Only twenty feet down!  C'mon guys!"
	"He's probably gonna be all smug about this for the next bunch of
rounds." groused Playdough hefting his mass over the edge of the manhole
and beginning to lower himself.
	"Whoa!" said Rodent hooking a finger in the chaste one's helm and
reefing him back.  "Hadn't you better wait until we lower a rope in there?"
	"Oh, okey dokey." chortled Playdough good naturedly.  "Lower away."
	"Uh, I thought you had the rope." said Rodent.  They both turned and
looked at Sauramud who merely shrugged.
	"Hey, I got stuck carrying the rations." he said.  The threesome
leaned over the hole and called down,
	"Yo Dingbat!  You wouldn't happen to have the rope would you?" There
was the sound of somebody twenty feet down digging through a backpack.
	"I've got it right here, why?" There was a pause.  "Oh..." There was
another pause as the threesome exchanged looks.  A rather plaintive voice
echoed up from the depths.  "Say, are you guys going to be coming down here
pretty soon with a couple of lights?  I think I hear things moving around."
	"Not without rope we're not!" said Rodent snidely.  "Why don't you
come back up?  Don't you have a 92% chance to climb that wall?" There was
the frantic scrabble of monkish toes and fingers clawing for purchase.
	"No good!  It's all slick and wet." whined the monk.  "Couldn't you
just lower me a torch or something while I wait?"
	"Well we could drop you one, hold on." The wizard hauled out his Zippo
and sparked up a torch which he tossed down the open drain.  There was a
'THWUCK' from below.
	"Agh!" screeched Dingbat.
	"Here, catch." said Sauramud as an afterthought.
	"Ooooh!  If I DO get out of here..."
	"Stuff it both of you!" said Rodent, asserting his imagined authority.
"I have dispatched the good paladin to the General Store with a note to get
fifty feet of rope."
	"Why can't we buy that in a thirty foot length?  Isn't that all we
need?"
	"Some guild arrangement I think." said Rodent absently.  "Remember the
time we needed two hundred feet for that tower and we had to tie all the
knots?  I still think we should ban Playdough from tying knots - we lost
ten feet when we had to cut him free." As he spoke the aforementioned
paladin returned still tearing the 'Acme Rope Co.' label off his newly
procured fifty foot coil of rope.
	"Duh, hows about if I just tie it to this drain pipe here?" offered
Playdough helpfully.  Rodent snatched the rope out of his hands as calmly
as he could muster.
	"That's okay.  I'm a ranger, it's my job." He looped the rope around
some convenient objects with a rangerical double-hitch, then turned to one
of the gathering townees.  "Watch you don't trip on that or it could get
ugly." The townee eyed the ranger up and down a bit and shrugged.
	"Sure Mac.  Nice rope you got there, would be a shame if somethin' wuz
to happen to it." Rodent blinked, then turned to the paladin.
	"Playdough, is this man evil?" The paladin squinted at the offending
townee and nodded.
	"Yup, he's evil alright." He jabbed a beefy finger at the townee and
growled, "I warn you, I gots a special dispensational from the temple what
says I gets ta kill you and guys like you." The townee blanched a bit and
moved along.  The others gathered cheered as Playdough preened.
	"When you're quite finished..." said Sauramud, hanging on the rope and
beginning to lower himself.
	"Just one more autograph." muttered the paladin, then he followed the
others down into the hole.  When they arrived at the bottom they found
Dingbat slightly muddy and singed, but none the worse for wear.
	"I think I found which way we have to go!" he said excitedly, prancing
from foot to foot and pointing down the corridor.
	"What makes you say that?" asked Rodent suspiciously.
	"That sign on the wall!" said Dingbat, indicating an arrow carved into
the wall with the childish script "WerERat Templ DIs way.  Servis TimEs
inna MidDle of dA NiTe (bUt onLy onna FULL moOn).  PasTR J.  RATTY"
     "I say, a clue!" declared Sauramud.
	"Best not take it too literally." warned Rodent sagely.  "Could be a
trap." The party nodded agreement and prompty marched off in the direction
of the arrow.
	The sewers were dank passages, low and dripping with noxious
substances.  The flickering light of the torches illuminated the many side
corridors they passed which led to twisty little passages, little twisty
passages, twisty little grottos and a grotty little twisto - him they
detoured around as he seemed to be doing something unpleasant to himself
with a fork.  Eventually Rodent spotted a door at the end of one of the
side passages.  They took that as a good sign and turned down that way.
With nary a pause to think when they reached the door Playdough lowered his
shoulder and smashed it from its hinges.  Beyond lay a square room.
	"Hey!  A ten by ten room." beamed Rodent.  "I think we've found the
dungeon proper here!"
	"Thank god!" said Sauramud who had been frantically charcoaling out
the squiggly corridors on a piece of parchment (and found to his
consternation that many of the corridors seemed to overlap each other in
places).  "Now where did I put my graph paper?"
	"Duh, I gots a question for you Rodent." said Playdough thoughtfully
as they cautiously entered the room.  "Who builds these dungeons and why?
Howscome they's always all abandoned and only full of monsters?"
	"Well some appear to be temples." said Rodent philosophically.  "Who
knows why people do the things they do for gods...  other gods I mean." he
added hastily as he felt a tug on his alignment.  "False gods."
	"Others are built by wizards for defense, experimentation and storage
of monsters they aren't quite ready to unleash....  the usual." said
Sauramud.
	"And there are some that are built with no good reason and no visible
means of support." said Dingbat majestically.  "They're the fun ones.  Lots
of monsters!  Baff!  Pow!  I wonder which one this is?" Just then a chute
opened in the wall and out poured fifteen giant rats.
	"Methinks it's the latter." said Sauramud, quickly dropping to his
accustomed position at the back of the party.  "This should slow them." He
waved a hand and the lot of them fell asleep, much to the wizard's
amazement.
	"Hm, nice work." mused Rodent.  He stepped over and began braining the
comatose rodents with the business end of his sword.  He was joined
enthusiastically by Playdough and Dingbat, who were much accustomed to
dispatching slept opponents.  Sauramud pulled out his pocked dungeon guide,
perusing it amidst the sound of spintering ratty craniums.
	"Now, statistically speaking, behind this next door we should find..."
	"Goblins!" bellowed Rodent with delight as he reefed open the next
door.
	"Damn!" cursed the wizard.  "It was supposed to be kobolds.  Hey guys,
we could be in for a tough one here!"
	"Die, you environmentally unfriendly nasties" cried Rodent as he
buzzsawed through their ranks on rangerical frenzy mode.  "This will teach
you to douse your campfires before retiring for the night!  Don't litter!
Recycle!  Give a <thwack> hoot, don't pollute!"
	"Duh, Rodent's gone 'ranger' again." said Playdough ducking some of
Rodent's wilder swings.
	"Ranger madness." said Sauramud darkly.  He dodged a flying goblin
arm.  "Those six attacks really push his adrenalin level to the toxic
point.  Thank Le Thick that he lacks testosterone or the results might be
unpleasant."
	"They're not unpleasant now?" asked Dingbat angrily as Rodent finished
off the last goblin.  "I didn't even get to unleash my monkish wrath on
them before nature-boy had them filleted." Rodent was standing in the
center of the 30'x30' room panting and puffing, holding his dripping sword
in one hand and a goblin head in the other.
	"<Puff> Only you can prevent forest fires...  <Pant> Ban leg-hold
traps..." Slowly he came back to a semblance of normality (normal for
Rodent, anyway), snapping fully aware again when he noticed Playdough
beginning to rifle the corpses for treasure.
	"Fifteen silver?" spat the paladin, tossing it down with disgust.
"What a rip-off!"
	"But not atypical of goblins we have encountered in the past."
interjected Rodent, now fully recovered.  "I suggest a quick wash and rinse
of our armour and then continuing onwards."
	"We don't have the time." said Sauramud, gingerly stepping through the
mounds of goblin bits on his way to the far door.  "C'mon."
	"What do you mean?" snapped the ranger, assuming a haughty pose.
"We're under no time limit."
	"Duh, I ain't waiting around fer you neither." said Playdough.  "Youse
killed all the monsters in here, and I'm bored."
	"And there's probably just gobs of treasure waiting for us in the next
room!" piped in Dingbat.  He bounded on ahead with typical monkish
enthusiasm.  "Why I'll bet there's just a pair of the ledgendary 'Monkish
Boots of Kicking' just waiting me in there!  I can almost hear them calling
me."
	"Stuff and nonsense." said Rodent sourly.  "There's no such magic
item!  Nobody would make such a silly item, ask the wizard."
	"Well actually..." said Sauramud thoughtfully, "I was reading just the
other day about a scarab that some sicko wizard invented that eats ones
heart out if worn.  And then there's always the 'Necklace of
Strangulation', 'Cloak of Acid', 'Codpiece of Incurable Jockitch'..."
	"Okay, we get the point." snarled Rodent as he and the paladin both
unconciously reached to scratch with the mention of the last item.
Dingbat, meanwhile, was at the door on the far end of the room attempting
to jimmy the lock with his minimal thief skills.  The growing pile of bent
and broken lock picks on the ground at his feet attested to his mounting
frustration.
	"This must be a magical lock!" he cursed, tossing down his last bobby
pin (having long run out of slim-jims and credit cards).  "This MUST lead
into the goblin treasure room!"
	"Actually the sign above it says 'Temple Entrance'." said Rodent.
	"And the little lable over the doorknob says 'PULL' not 'PUSH'." said
Sauramud, pulling it open.  Dingbat jumped up and down in annoyance.
     "Nice going wiz!  You probably just set off every trap in the world!"
	"You mean like that bell what's ringing way down deep there in the
corridor?" asked Playdough, pointing into the dark corridor revealed behind
the door.
	"Exactly!" said Dingbat, turning around and smacking the wizard's
pointy hat off.  As the latter turned to retrieve it with a curse the monk
applied his size 9 monkish Gucci boots to Sauramud's ample posterior.
	"Ooof!  <thwup> Why you...!" The wizard bounced back to his feet and
began to chant and gesticulate.  Dingbat watched for a few seconds and
counted slowly to himself.  As the spell reached a crescendo the monk
excecuted one of his patented manouvers and performed a lightning quick
monkish gaunch pull on a startled Sauramud.
	<F L O O M P H F> went the spell, leaving the stunned wizard blinking
out of a blackened face.  He wiped his face with one hand and shouted,
	"You IDIOT!  Don't you realize what you've done?  I had to sleep EIGHT
HOURS to get that spell!  And now it's GONE!  Forever!"
	"Forever?" said Playdough, scratching his noggin.
	"Well, for today anyway." amended the wizard hastily, "Which just
MIGHT be forever if we all get KILLED because I don't have that spell when
I need it!"
	"But you were going to cast it on me anyway so it couldn't have been
too important." said Dingbat smugly.
	"How do you know it wasn't a protective spell?  Like _Shield_, or
_Find Familiar_ or _Burn The Monk's Groin Hairs Off_?" Dingbat, meanwhile,
was pondering his last statement with growing consternation.
	"Well when I said 'not important enough' what I really meant was..."
	Rodent looked at Playdough.
	Playdough looked at Rodent.
	"Just because it isn't important to you doesn't negate the fact that
by interrupting my spell you could have spelled DOOM for the entire party!
Don't you realize we could have been BLOWN to BITS?"
	"Ah, you can't even blow your nose without looking in that stupid book
of yours for reference anyway." said Dingbat with a withering sneer.
Sauramud muttered something darkly about the monk trying to block _this_
one as he fished a nasty looking wand out of his pockets and flipped up the
crosshairs on the end of it.  About this time the sound of a door taking
leave of its hinges echoed back to them from the other end of the hall and
they both turned to notice that the fighters had wandered off without them.
	"Oh no!  They're going to get all the treasure and experience!  Follow
them!" cried Dingbat, leaping down the hall after the others.  Sauramud
followed after he had repocketed his wand and retreived his backpack.
     Meanwhile, in the room at the other end of the darkened hall, Rodent
and Playdough were just wiping the ichor off their swords from the pair of
dead hobgoblins when Dingbat leapt through into the room and assumed
monkish combat pose #14-b with a deafening,
	"Hyah!"

End of Part Four
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
-- 
*     mmcalees@csr.uvic.ca (Michael McAleese) : I speak only for me...       *
  "Man can believe the impossible, but never the improbable." - Oscar Wilde
  (For snooping governments: heroin, cocaine, FBI, CSIS, CIA, albatross...)


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