Bimbos of the Death Sun

by Sharyn McCrumb

  “Hmm. Sector two is garbled. Try another pair,” said Jay Omega.

  Joel hit another key, and soon a new scrap of text materialized on the display monitor.

  Tratyn Runewind strained at the ropes which bound him to the stakes in the floor of the mead hall.

  When he had agreed to let Ole Redbeard’s men tie him down spread-eagled on his stomach, he had naturally expected a romantic evening to follow, but the playful nibble at his left buttock was not foreplay from a burly oarsman, but an enterprising rat who liked his meat fresh. Runewind felt little cold noses at his ears and toes …

  Joel Schumann sank back in his chair. “What is this stuff? I’ve read the Tratyn Runewind books, and they’re definitely not like this!”

  “Is this what you’re looking for?” asked Jay Omega.

  Louis Warren nodded. “Yes, it’s fairly mild compared to some of the alternate last chapters I’ve seen.”

  Jay shook his head. “I don’t get it.”

  “Appin Dungannon hated Tratyn Runewind?’ asked Joel.

  “Bingo!” said Louis, “But he had to keep writing the novels, because they were so popular. So to vent his frustration he would write two last chapters to every one of his books.

  “You should have seen some of the others,” grunted the editor. “Tratyn Runewind having a bout with dysentery during a battle, and getting stabbed by a twelve-year-old boy; Runewind being castrated by a Druid priestess who greatly resembled Mrs. Dungannon. I never knew what to expect. He’d send it in along with the manuscript, just before the last chapter, and I’d always take it out before I sent it to press. But that’s one piece of Dungannon trivia that nobody knew; people might get upset to know how much he hated the series.”

  Joel Schumann nodded. “The fantasy people would freak if they read this, all right.”

  Jay Omega gave a start. He looked at Joel and then back at the screen. “When do you suppose this was written?”

  “Judging from the times on the existing directory entries, I’d say sometime Friday night. The real last chapter was written Saturday morning. Why?”

  “Oh, nothing …” He stared at the green letters on the monitor, lost in thought. It seemed to make sense. He wondered if that was an ominous sign that he had been around the fen too long.

  He was still gazing at the monitor. He had an idea. “Let’s see how much more of this there is,” he said to Joel.

  At one-thirty in the morning, Marion was sprawled across the bed in a pile of maps and D&D manuals, fast asleep. Jay Omega smiled down at her, thinking that she looked like a vulnerable little girl when she slept. She wouldn’t thank him for that observation! Despite the fact that she was a complete rabbit about math and at the mercy of almost any mechanical device, she liked to think that there were no intellectual differences between them. She seemed to think that his inability to quote Auden and the fact that Thomas Hardy put him to sleep evened the score. She didn’t seem to realize that the intelligence he admired in her had nothing to do with literature. He liked the fact that she really listened when he explained something technical, and that she kept asking questions until his explanations made sense to her; he admired her versatility—they had lunch almost every day and never ran out of things to talk about, without resorting to shop talk or campus gossip; and he was a little afraid of her perceptiveness: she knew things about him that he’d never dream of telling her.

  He wondered if she would guess what he was up to now. He wasn’t quite sure himself, or at least he didn’t really want to discuss it. It was just the glimmering of an idea, and he felt it would be better kept to himself—just in case he was wrong. How hard could it be to run a dungeon? Maybe he could manage without her. Jay Omega picked up the game scenario and studied it for a few minutes, but he decided that it was too important for him to bluff his way through it.

  “Wake up,” he said, gently shaking the bed, “You have to teach me how to run a dungeon, and I have a few variations to put in.”

  Marion groaned. “Sorry. Your fairy godmother is on down time. Unless you want to do an R-rated version of Sleeping Beauty, in which case you have a chance of waking me up.”

  He shook the bed again. “Wake up, Mrs. Peel! The game’s afoot!”

  FOURTEEN

  Miles Perry was reflecting on how correct Einstein had been about time being relative. This con, for example, had managed to last for about twenty years within the space of one weekend. He found himself actually looking forward to the real world, in which he could manage the grocery produce section with relatively little turmoil, without having to worry about hotel damage fees, elves who lost their room keys, and famous dead people.

  He had spent a weary hour the night before with Lieutenant Ayhan, who had questioned the entire “Chip Livingstone Consortium” right after the banquet. They had all been fingerprinted, and all had assured him that they had no access to guns, but the lieutenant had pointed out that since his other suspects were computers and fictional characters, they were his best bet.

  When Ayhan had appeared in the hotel lobby early this morning, Miles had braced himself for another round, but the lieutenant was there, he said, responding to a phone call from Dr. Marion Farley. Miles Perry sat down and started to search the newspaper for a write-up on Dungannon.

  “You through with the book section, yet?” asked Diefenbaker, sinking down in the chair beside him.

  Miles Perry handed it over without a word.

  “Thanks,” said Dief. “I think I’m setting a new world record for lack of sleep. And I thought grad school was bad!”

  “Who cornered you this time? You didn’t go to the Chip Livingstone Memorial Service, did you?”

  “No,” said Dief. “I’d have felt like a murderer. They didn’t invite me anyway. But I hear that Bernard Buchanan is trying to figure out which one of us praised his writing.”

  “The one with the most sadistic sense of humor,” grunted Miles.

  “I thought it was you!” said Dief.

  “I thought it was you!” echoed Miles innocently. “So, where were you ’til all hours?”

  “In a Far Brandonian council meeting. I can’t figure out why Richard Faber wasn’t there. He’s been moaning about armies on his southern border all weekend.”

  “I think he has something else on his southern border at the moment,” said Miles.

  Dief grinned. “I’ve been waiting for Lieutenant Ayhan to start looking for C.D. Novibazaar. People certainly talk enough about him.”

  “Ah, yes, your player character in the game. Yes, that’s all Ayhan needs, another imaginary suspect.” He folded the paper and stood up. “Good morning, Dr. Omega!”

  Jay Omega managed a groan that resembled the syllables of “good morning.” He looked as if he had forgotten to shave. “I usually get more rest than this,” he mumbled.

  Miles Perry looked anxious. “You’ll be ready for the D&D game at ten, won’t you?”

  Jay Omega nodded. “Yes. That’s what I came to talk to you about. Is Lieutenant Ayhan here yet?”

  “He’s around somewhere, asking questions. Why?”

  “Just ask him to look me up, will you? I’ll be in the high-tech room.”

  He wandered off in the direction of the dining room, and Miles Perry went back to his newspaper. When he had any energy to spare, he would wonder what that exchange had been about.

  The prospect of a celebrity Dungeon Master had lured a cross-section of con participants to the high-tech room for the exhibition D&D adventure. The computers and tech equipment had been shoved to the back to make room for the circle of participants, and onlookers were crammed into available space. A few lucky ones had latched onto wooden chairs. Of the twelve chosen to demonstrate their skill for the audience, only one had dropped out after the substitution of Omega for Dungannon as DM. Miss Megan (Beef) Wellington had withdrawn from the game, deciding that an acquaintance with the author of (shudder) Bimbos of the Death Sun would do nothing to help her chances of publishing her fa
ntasy novel, the 560-page Chronicles of Karamecia. Three others had either overslept or left the con early, leaving eight remaining adventurers to play the game.

  Most of the players had come in some sort of costume. Richard Faber had borrowed a cloak from his beloved Brenda in honor of the occasion. She had come to cheer him on from the spectators’ gallery. Diefenbaker, who was a born experimenter given very few chances outside Fandom, had borrowed a feathered elf cap from Saffron; and Clifford Morgan was in full Tratyn Runewind regalia, complete with cape and broadsword. Bill Fox had on a tunic and shortsword, and the jock from the costume competition was back in his Conan costume. Bernard Buchanan wore a T-shirt stretched to the bursting point, and a button that said: “KISS ME, I’M ELVISH.”

  “Should I wear some kind of get-up?” Jay had asked Marion.

  “The cap and gown you always wear to graduation comes to mind,” said Marion dryly. “No, seriously, I don’t think it’s necessary. The DM is basically God, and God wears anything He wants.—He looks particularly nice in jeans and a sweatshirt,” she added smiling.

  A few minutes before ten, Marion, back in her Mrs. Peel jumpsuit, appeared carrying a stack of weapons charts and other data necessary for conducting the adventure. “God could use a computer for this,” grumbled the Dungeon Master.

  “Don’t panic,” said Marion. “As long as you’re plausible no one will complain. If they do, turn them into a pillar of salt.”

  Jay Omega glanced again at the scenario, and out at the rows of spectators, seated on the floor between computer displays. Lieutenant Ayhan was not among them. He glanced at his watch: ten o’clock. Let the games begin.

  “You realize,” he said to Clifford Morgan, “that you can’t play Tratyn Runewind. He’s an NPC. You’ll be assigned somebody else.”

  Morgan nodded impatiently. His white hair was held in place by a leather thong tied around his head, and he wore a rope belt around his tunic of homespun wool. As he eased himself to the floor in front of the Dungeon Master, he took care not to sit on his blue velvet tunic, which had been brushed spotless, and was not the sort of garment one usually wore to loll about on a tile floor. While the other players looked like partiers anticipating a good time, Morgan managed a look of intense dedication, suggesting a soldier awaiting battle orders.

  “Okay,” said Jay Omega. “Everybody, listen up!” He turned back to Marion. “I don’t have to say forsooth or anything, do I?”

  “No!” whispered Marion. “But try not to talk like Bear Bryant, either.”

  “Who is she?” asked one of the younger elves.

  “I’m the Oracle of Delphi,” Marion replied. “He consults me on close calls.”

  “But the DM is omnipotent,” said the elf.

  “Don’t hassle an oracle, kid. You could end up as souvlaki.”

  Lieutenant Ayhan appeared in the doorway. “Somebody here wanted to see me?”

  Jay Omega motioned for him to come over. “I asked you to sit in on this, because I think something interesting may develop.”

  Ayhan looked pained. “Even if it were my day off, I don’t think I could find the time for THIS.”

  “Trust me. It’s important.”

  “I don’t play kids’ games, and I definitely don’t sit on floors.”

  Marion patted the desk top beside her. “You can come and sit beside me. I’ll even explain the game to you.”

  Ayhan consulted his watch. “I’ll consider this a coffee break.” He hoisted himself up on the desk beside Marion.

  “I’ll have to whisper, so that we don’t disturb the game, Lieutenant. What do you want to know?”

  Ayhan studied the scene in front of him. “I see a bunch of kids sitting around on the floor wearing funny outfits and playing with dice. What’s to know?”

  “Plenty. It’s a role-playing game. All the action is imaginary.”

  “Where’s the board?”

  “There isn’t one. Jay has a script of the adventure, but it all takes place in the imagination.”

  Ayhan sighed. “Then what am I supposed to watch?”

  Marion smiled. “Get into the spirit of it, Lieutenant. If Jay does a good job of describing things, it can come to seem very real after a while.”

  “So who’s Dr. Omega supposed to be?”

  “He’s called the Dungeon Master. He’s like the stage manager in Our Town.”

  “Thanks for the clarification,” said Ayhan, stifling a yawn.

  Marion sighed.” How can I put it? He tells them where they are and what they see, and they tell him what their reactions are. For example, he could say: ‘You see a stone with a gold statue sitting on it.’ And then the players talk it over, and decide whether to leave the statue alone, in case it’s a trap, or to risk taking it.”

  “Okay. Suppose they decide to pick it up.”

  “Then they relay that information to the Dungeon Master. And he tells them what happens next, like: you have just triggered an earthquake, or an alarm goes off, or whatever.”

  “What are the dice for?”

  “There’s a whole bunch. Four-sided, six-sided, eight-sided, ten-sided, twelve-sided, twenty-sided … even one-hundred-sided nowadays, or you can just throw two D-10’s, which we in the know call a ‘percentile.’ Had enough?” she asked, noticing Ayhan’s mystified expression. “Relax. All you need to know is that a throw of the dice—whichever dice—determines the outcome of something that depends on chance. If a rope breaks and you fall, how badly did you get hurt? In real life, it will depend on whether you fell on your head or not, whether you hit a rock or soft ground, and all the other variables. In the game, the dice take care of all of life’s possibilities.”

  Lieutenant Ayhan digested this information. “So you sit on the floor and imagine an adventure, and you throw dice. —Does this sound boring to you?”

  “Yes,” smiled Marion. “Unless you are playing with very creative people, it can be stupefying. Young male players tend to invent adventures that are all combat, and those are especially monotonous. This one should be better than that.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I helped to write it.”

  “And why am I here?” asked Ayhan.

  “Command performance,” Marion replied. “The Dungeon Master insisted.” She had wondered about that herself, though.

  The adventurers were looking up at Jay Omega with eager faces. Several of them had produced pads and pencils so that they could make notes about the things he described for future reference. It was a good idea to draw a map, too, so that when the adventure was over, the party could find its way back.

  Jay Omega consulted his notes. “Okay, the adventure begins. —No, that’s not right.” He read the pencil notes in the margin. “We have to do something else first.” What did “gen. char.” and “leg” mean? His learning capacities did not function well at 2 A.M., which is when Marion had explained it all, and he had scribbled reminders to himself.

  He tried not to look at the row of earnest players in front of him. He was rattled enough. In the audience, somebody giggled. “Gen. char”—“Generate characters!” he cried, just as the silence was becoming ominous. “First, you have to generate your characters, and then I’m going to distribute legends to some of you.” Legend cards were sort of house rules; Omega held up the hand-printed note cards which bore extra information about the adventure and which would augment the more usual procedures. “After that, I will explain the adventure.”

  Marion didn’t wait for Ayhan to ask. “Generating characters. Each member of the expedition will have certain skills, like strength, dexterity, intelligence, and so on. They’re rolling the dice to see what their attributes are. Think of it as a gene pool.”

  “Suppose you get lousy marks in everything?”

  “Then you start over. Better than life, huh? — And your dice scores determine who you are. If you are high in intelligence, but low in strength, you might be an elf, for example. Someone high in dexterity might choose to become a th
ief.”

  Ayhan frowned. “Thief, huh? There wouldn’t be any murderers in this game, would there?”

  Marion hesitated. “That’s a rather philosophical question, Lieutenant. All the adventurers are soldiers of fortune, and as such, they might be forced to kill in self-defense, or in order to complete their mission, or—”

  “Okay! Okay!” Ayhan made the football time-out signal. “It’s bad enough I have to watch this without getting commercials in metaphysics.”

  More than twenty minutes later, the eight players had been transformed into elf fighters, clerics, human warriors, thieves, and the other usual components of a fantasy A-Team. They had used imaginary gold to buy imaginary weapons, and each knew his strength and other abilities, because they had been determined by a roll of the dice.