It had me snicker several times. Loved it!

Me too! I loved Ra'jirra's cynical observations of the people and events around him.

Now what did happen in Bravil?

Hilarious as ever!

farting from feather potions.
Ewww! So the secret of feather potions are that they fill you with helium, making you lighter than air!

After a nasty incident involving mistaking a mountain lion for a deer,
Important safety tip, you can pet the deer, but not the lions!

This is hilarious - I just wonder if you really called Hamlof a thermos or if the auto-censor got you on that one! ROFL !!!! Oh, and definately MORE! MORE!!!!!

This is hilarious and I actually think the auto censor might make it funnier!

OK folks, here it is...
5. In which Our Hero gets his Recommendation from the Bravillians


My experiences in Bravil led me later on to pass the Safe, Cautious And Responsible Experimentation (SCARE) Act. Henantier's still a bit toey about it, but I need to explain why.

First off, Bravil is as bad as that stuck-up Ottus bint who writes all those guide books says. It's damp, dull, depressing. Mind you, so's the count. So I spend a night at Silverhome On the Water and front up at the Guild later that morning. Just one problem. Nobody either knows who to talk to, or wants to talk about, recommendations.

Also, while I was upstairs looking for the guildmaster, I found a disturbing note threatening an unnamed Argonian woman, probably Kud-Ei. The wording stank of necromancer.

In Skingrad, Erthor had been doing something that landed him under siege by zombies, and also exiled to a cave. Now here in Bravil was a death threat from necromancers. What the bloody hell was going on?

As it turns out, Kud-Ei was the only Argonian as well as the headwoman of the hall, but she had a problem: Henantier. He was the sort who was so in love with being the guy to wow the world that he'd do dumb things at home without any supervision.

Some (all right, most) of the faculty here at the Arcane University still give me arseholes about it, but I'm working on setting up a specialised research facility out in the eastern wopwops where the Henantiers of the parish can kill themselves without taking out an entire town. And they'll have to log everything they do. There's several reasons for that. First, a supervised mage is more likely to survive. Second, if they don't, all isn't lost, we'll have their notes and learn from their mistakes. Finally, I reckon the Legion's battlemages need a decent training ground. Also they can be roped in if the experiments get loose.

Now Henantier was a daring mage of the old school and a prize idiot anywhere and the silly bugger had tried to turn his dreams into a sort of proving ground. When Kud-Ei showed me to his house, I could smell not only the fact that he'd crapped himself, but also fear. Turns out the silly sod had been trapped in his dreams for three days.

Kud-Ei gave me a copy of the amulet he'd cooked up, and I popped it on and hit the hay and what happened next I don't want to let on. Let's just say Henantier had lost some of his marbles and was too addled to find them himself. So I had to go get them.

Dreams are important. There's a mage I knew who tried to sleep without dreams, and last anyone's seen of him he was entering Sheogorath's realm through that gate by Bravil, crying out for his dreams to come back. Again, the silly sod didn't have an assistant to knock him unconscious after going too far.

Wandering around in a distorted dream that isn't yours – just don't. Unless you have permissions.

Anyway, I wasn't exactly smelling like a rose when he and I awoke either. Things were awkward for him, and why not? All gone up in his face and he needed to change and wash. So did I.

So away went Kud-Ei and I back to the guildhall, and I was still a bit muzzy and wondering why passers-by were giving me strange looks. In we go and the members give me strange looks and since most of 'em are women there's giggling too.

"Are you all right?" asks Ayalie and her chin.

"I think so," says I, "why?"

"Well," says she, "you seem to be wounded, and... um..."

So I look down and yep, I've got some nice scrapes from where dream minotaurs hacked at me, I can cope with that. But I can see this because I'm now stark bollock naked!

Well, I went and shot out the door and round the back where I'd dropped my gear off, found my shielding robe, but too late. Ever since then, when I leave the Bravil guildhall, somebody female whistles lewdly.

Every single time.

But anyway, Kud-Ei had another problem, a mage called Ardaline. Apparently she was being pestered by a local Dunmer swain who I'll call Drongo, to save him embarrassment. And now Ardaline had lost her mage's staff, which are pretty important more as symbols of office than anything else, but usually have a useful enchantment on 'em. Kud-Ei wanted me to pump Drongo for any information he had.

So I found him in Silverhome, used a scroll Kud-Ei gave me (smart girl) and nearly clocked the stupid bugger. He'd stolen the staff all right. But he'd flogged it to his mate Dopey in the Imperial City!

Now I'm a law-abiding fellow and didn't want to try out the popular idea of recruitment for the Dark Brotherhood, so I thanked him kindly for the advice and got the hell out of town. I stomped around Bravil County for a day or two doing alchemy and other stuff to cool off. Once I was halfway sane, I went back to the big smoke and located Dopey's residence, after trotting around the district three times.

If only he'd put up a sign or something eh? Residence of Dopey the Dumner, Stolen Staffs a Specialty, Enquire Within.


It cost me a scroll, several septims of sweet-talking and another couple hundred to get the damn thing back to Kud-Ei and Ardaline. By this time I was fed up and stomped on down to Leyawiin.

Ah, that's why Ra'jirra gets a whistle every time he goes to Bravil! Better him than me, I say!

If he looks anything like a Cathay-Raht, I'd be whistling, too! Go ask mALX if you're not sure.

Another fun installment, where Ra'jirra tries out the nudist lifestyle and finds it not to his liking.

Some (all right, most) of the faculty here at the Arcane University still give me arseholes about it, but I'm working on setting up a specialised research facility out in the eastern wopwops where the Henantiers of the parish can kill themselves without taking out an entire town. And they'll have to log everything they do. There's several reasons for that. First, a supervised mage is more likely to survive. Second, if they don't, all isn't lost, we'll have their notes and learn from their mistakes. Finally, I reckon the Legion's battlemages need a decent training ground. Also they can be roped in if the experiments get loose.
Sounds like a great idea. How about privatizing it? You could call the company running it The Umbrella Corporation...

SPEW! ROFL !!!! You had me choking laughing with this!

Good work.

Now that is just plain hilarious! Good job, Cardboard!

Brilliant Cardboard! Next please!

This is awesome. Can't wait for more!

6. Dirty Deeds in Leyawiin

Apparently some people think Leyawiin's nastier than Bravil, and having made my way down there I can understand. The western road was chocka with bandits – but the alternative is to cross the Imperial bridge near Pell's Gate and brave whatever's on the eastern bank.

Anyway, jaguars. Nasty bits of work, and I'm a cat person.

But I survived and entered Leyawiin on Tirdas 11 Heartfire, felling that bit more smarter, wiser, even tougher. I was also muttering to myself about getting a better shield spell or finding one for invisibility or chameleon I could actually use. Affording it would also be nice.

After spending the night at Five Claws Lodge I fronted up at the guild and was directed to Dagail, the master of mysticism in the Guild. I didn't know that at the time and fronted up to a scholarly Bosmer with a distressed expression, poring over A Life of Uriel Septim as though her life depended on it.

“You seek wisdom from me, child?” she asks, “Ah, no. You seek words. Words are... difficult. They come and go. The... the voices, though. So loud they are, they... they drown out of... of words... words.”

And there I am watching this bird's hands waving away and thinking, what in Oblivion? It was like she was struggling to string her thoughts together.

“Without my amulet, my stone to... to lock the voices... voices away, the words will never come... come and stay.” She took a breath, scrunched up her eyes, then, “Would you lift your hands to help another, to help me find the words?” came out in a rush.

Well, I have a think, and realise that she's in a bad way and asking for help. “All right,” says I, “What must I do?”

Her mouth flaps a bit, and she finally manages to get out, “You speak, yet I cannot hear. You... you listen, yet I cannot... speak. When the voices... voices grow quiet, then shall our... time... time be at hand.” And her face scrunches up like she's trying to think with Sheogorath singing in her ear. Then she brightens up a bit but there's still this desperate look in her eyes. “Agata has heard the voices, though I speak for them all. It is to her you must now go.”

I asked around and found Agata in the kitchen off the main entrance getting some breakfast and talking to a wierd-looking guy with the most extraordinary and disagreeable eyebrows I'd ever seen this side of Caffrey. He had just one that went from one side of his face to the other.

Anyway after He of the Eyebrows finished his chat and wandered off, I sat down next to Agata and introduced myself as an associate.

“Good to meet you Associate,” she said around a mouthful of bread, “I'm Agata, your local enchanter. Looking for a recommendation?”

“Um, yeah,” says I, “but I've spoken to Dagail and... well...” How the hell do you tell a senior Guild member that their head's losing it?

“Did she ask you for help?” Agata pushed her plate to one side and looked at me square on. I just nodded.

“Well, get this straight. She's not crazy, okay? She has visions, for lack of a better term. While they used to be helpful at times, they have lately become problematic. There was an amulet, a family heirloom, that she wore to suppress, and sometimes focus, the visions. She's lost the amulet, and so has lost control.” And then she sighs a bit.

I'm still floundering, but I manage to say, “Look, what do you mean by visions? The only experiences I've had with folks who saw--”

And I stop because she's picked up a knife and is looking daggers at me.

“She. Is. Not. Crazy.” Very, very cold. Then she pulls herself together and carefully spreads some jam on a piece of bread. “At times, they served her well. She gained something of a reputation in the guild, and was highly valued by the Council. As she aged, the visions became less coherent. Rather than cast her aside, the Council gave her a position here. Some resent her, and wish she'd disappear. I do not. I am proud to help her with her daily tasks.”

“How do we help her then?” I ask.

She looks a bit surprised at the “we”. “Find her amulet, I guess, I'm not really sure what she wants. Hells, I'm not even sure what the amulet looks like.”

So up I get and go to talk to Dagail. “You seek more from me, child? It is as I have seen,” says she. Before I can even explain that I'd been speaking to Agata her eyes go strange and she doesn't so much say as recite:

“I know what you would ask. You would bring light to that which is in darkness, bring silence to the voices so loud. I know where you must go. Blood ran blue, and dragons flew high. Under broken towers and broken bodies it now lies, waiting to be found. What was my sire's must be mine, if you would have the words you seek. You must go and find his stone.”

I'm a bit shaken at this, and I just sit there beside Dagail, who doesn't seem to notice I'm there. Eventually my brain started working again and several things slotted into place. “Dragons flew high” sounded like a reference to an Imperial fort, probably a ruin if what I'd seen of Fort Redman was any indication. Was there a Fort Blueblood too?

I went looking for Agata and heard her squaring off with Mister Eyebrows in the library. “All I'm saying is that she should have retired years ago,” says he.

“Shut it, Kalthar!” snaps she, “I won't hear that kind of talk, and out of courtesy to you I'll pretend you never said that. Again. I take care of what little administrative work there is because Dagail isn't interested. I do it because it has to be done, and no one else wants to do it.”

“More like she can't do it, the way she is!” And he goes all wheedling like. “Honestly, with your talents and experience you should be head of the hall, not Dagail.”

At this point I decide to prevent something violent happening and deliberately make some noise pushing the door open. Both spin around and look at me, both sort of relieved at the interruption.

“Well,” says Agata, “Um, we'll discuss this some other time, Kalthar.” And I'm thinking that further discussion might involve explosions at twenty paces if Agata's expression has anything to do with it.

“Sorry,” says I, “I was looking for mistress Agata, I had some questions about enchanted arms?” And I put on a dumb expression.

So Kalthar excuses himself and takes off like Molag Bal's after him and I'm alone with Agata.

“All right,” says I quietly closing the library door, “What's this stone Dagail wants me to find in Fort Blueblood?”

Agata sits down at the table furthest away from the door. And sort of sags. “All right, yes, her seer's stone is missing. It's the one thing that has kept her visions at bay, and without it, they're nearly crippling. She can't function. We haven't yet spoken to the others, for fear they would be less than accepting of her situation. Perhaps it is time, though.”

“That guy, Kalthar,” says I, “He already suspects doesn't he?”

Agata just stiffens and her face goes hard. “Oh, he does all right. I don't think he really knows one way or the other, but I don't trust him. He stayed on and changed his ways when Archmage Traven banned necromancy, but damnit, he...”

And then she gets this expression like she's put two and two together. “You have a map?”

I do, so she marks a spot east of town on it. “What's left of Blueblood is around here. We paid one of the local loafers to go that way and pick up some ingredients a week ago, and he said he saw bandits hanging around. So,” and she gives the map back, “head on over there as soon as you can and bring Dagail's father's amulet back.”

Well, I don't hang about. I'm out of the guildhall sharpish, and then over to the nearest armory, a place called The Dividing Line. Tun-Zeeus has a nice spiel he likes to open ceremonies with, and until then he had a nice silver mace. I think I still have it.

All the trip out, I felt like I was being followed, but I couldn't see anyone. And it wasn't the sense of being followed by an enemy, either. Because of that I nearly got skewered by an archer patrolling outside the entrance into the fort's bowels.

Agata's informant was wrong. Bandits don't usually swan about in heavy armour. These were marauders. To this day, I still don't know how I managed to stay alive long enough to reach the chamber entrance to the crypt where Dagail's father lay.

I certainly wasn't expecting Kalthar to yell, “Hey, j-just stop right there, all right?” behind me.

“Where the hells were you?” I snapped back, “A man could've used the help earlier on.” Now also note that I'd basically bashed, stuck and spelled my way through what must have been a dozen foes, almost dying in the process. So I was not in a good mood.


Kalthat stepped back a bit, but his shoulders were set. “I need that amulet. Right now.”

“Why?” I didn't really care, but a villain talking is a villain not hurting me.

“I took the other one, and that should've been enough. I shouldn't have to go through all this, just to get rid of her!” And he starts raising his voice and waving his arms. “It's not even as if I was going to keep it forever. I was going to give it back to her, once I'd gotten what I wanted. That's not so wrong, is it?” Would you believe he tried to look at me with puppy-dog eyes underneath those eyebrows?


I just look at him, tightening my grip on my good old mace. “What you wanted?”

“Once she helped me advance out of that place, and stepped down, then she could have it back! Why did you have to get in the way?” I swear I heard something go ping inside his head and he started screaming.

“Why are you trying to ruin everything!?” and off we went!

To be blunt, it wasn't all that uneven a fight. Kalthar was good with that little silver dagger of his, and I also had his skeleton whacking on me as well. But nevertheless Kalthar fell. So much for his plans to get out from under Dagail.

There isn't much to say about what happened afterwards. Dagail's return to reality was as easy as putting on the amulet, and last I saw of her she was sitting down at her desk writing my recommendation. News spread fast, and it was agreed all round that you can't trust necromancers of any sort except dead ones.

Then I saw a house for sale and things went strange.

ROFL!! Hilarious!!!!

OMG Boxee!

My thoughts exactly! I had just finished writing that quest in my own fan fic, and I have to say that I did mention those - that - those fuzzy caterpillars on his face, but not quite in such a funny and hilarious manner as you did! I laughed so hard at this I got dizzy! Ugh!

BTW, it's weird.

Lovely job writing one of the strangest dialogues in the entire game.

Keep writing!

Thanks HEC! As I said, I had to dig in the CS a bit and, frankly, Kalthar's unibrow is the most noticeable thing about him. Also observe his earlier reference to "Ayalie and her chin" -- the Mage's Guild seems to be a magnet for the facially interesting!

Dagail's stutter is actually modelled on something I find myself doing when I'm really stressed out and overloaded, that word duplication when I'm trying to think and can't.

And obviously the convo he has with Agata is a little contrived, but he strikes me as a sleazebag anyway, and besides, I wanted them to be more like people than finite state machines.

Also, in retrospect, this quest is when Ra'jirra begins to twig that things in the Guild aren't as rosy as he thought. Once the recommendation quests are done, I may kick off the main quest until Martin's safely in Cloud Ruler Temple, then leave him there. I haven't decided yet. ATM I'm grunting through Bruma and have Cheydinhal to go. Then we'll see...

Unibrow..... whoehahahahahah.... Awesome cardboard!

The Unibrow! He is one of those guys that the moment you first lay eyes on him, you know he is evil. Too bad its not so simple in the real world...

I liked how you portrayed Dagail! Good job of showing her scatter-brainness. I always wonder why no one at her own guildhouse can be bothered to get off their rear to help her. But that is the case with all the MG recommendation quests. I guess it is just because that would leave the player with nothing to do. In any case I think you did a good job of making it feel believable from the conversation that Ra'jirra has with Agata.

And I stop because she's picked up a knife and is looking daggers at me.
This was fantastic!


nits:
but the alternative is to cross the Imperial bridge near Pell's Gate and brave whatever's on the eastern bank.
I think you meant cross the bridge near Fort Alessia?


felling that bit more smarter, wiser, even tougher.
You probably meant "feeling a"?

@SubRosa: All I can remember is that close by Pell's Gate is a stone bridge that spans the river from west to east and marks the southern bonds of Lake Rumare.

Currently I'm trying to fire the MQ up so I can get Martin safely squared away, but Indigo's scripts don't seem to be functioning properly. Then I'll get on with Ra'Jirra's rationale.