Subject: D&D Cartoon On-LIne Fan Club Newsletter #6, Part 5 Ye Olde D&D ELSEWORLDS Fan Fiction Corner! Here?s Part 3 of Maureen O?Brien?s faboo D&D group-meets-the-X-Files story! Read on for more of ?Players?! Contains a couple PG-13 words, more information about pathologists than you ever wanted to know, and reprints huge hunks of Stan Rogers' "The Mary Ellen Carter" without permission. (Yup, it's time for a D&D song story!) Enjoy! Part Three -- Weapons Proficiency "There's no game here." -- Langly, "Unusual Suspects", The X-Files. "Personally, I'd like to have a talk with Dungeonmaster over his choice of accessories for our friendly neighborhood Feds. If I were in charge...." Bobby rolled his eyes. "You were, Eric." "And *you* didn't even bring us a lousy T-shirt," Diana teased. "Fine. Mock me if you want; I'm big enough to take it. But we have two experienced professionals join our group, people who've been trained to face the kind of psychos who get their pictures on the post office wall. And what do they get? A magic ukulele and a knife. Me, I was hoping for distance weapons, or something with some real power!" "I dunno, guys," Sheila said thoughtfully. "Dungeonmaster's never given us anything we didn't end up needing. And most of our weapons can do things we didn't know about at first." "Well, these better. Because so far as I can tell, they don't do a thing. "I know what the lute does. It does nothing." Presto sighed. "It has to do something, Agent Mulder." "Don't call me by my title. Why? Why does it have to?" "Because it's a magic weapon, Mr. Mulder." "So it's defective! And don't call me Mister. It makes me look around for my father. Since he's dead that's somewhat disconcerting. Just call me Mulder." Presto sighed again, not sure whether the FBI agent was joking. "Fine. Mulder. Just because your lute hasn't done anything magical *yet* doesn't mean it never will. It just means it doesn't make fire, or bring rain, or make a magic shield, or play by itself, or...." "I know the catalog." Mulder sighed. "So far, the only magical thing this lute's done is stay in tune longer than any guitar I've ever had. Though I have to admit, an instrument that sounds this good doesn't need magic." One hand roamed the frets while the other strummed. That hand was killing him, but the chords he'd drilled into it so long ago were coming back. "Catalog? Hmmm.... That's it! I'll ask my hat to give us a book on what magic your lute's got!" "Can you do that?" Presto's excitement started to fade. "Um. Sometimes. If I get the twiddle right. Or if I'm lucky." "If you want to find out the truth, you have to go down some pretty improbable paths. Try it. If you fail, we're not any worse off than before." "That's what you think," Presto said darkly. "But okay. I'll try." He took off his hat, gulped nervously, and began to make passes over it. "Hey, magic hat, This world is a zoo. So give me a book On what this lute can do!" Mulder sighed. T.S. Eliot he was not. Presto held his breath, reached in the hat and drew out -- a book. "It worked! Hey, it really worked!" Presto flipped the book open excitedly and started to read. Or tried to. "Oh, no. There's nothing in here but sheet music." Mulder walked over, took the book, and opened it wide. He looked puzzled for a moment, then shook his head, amused. "It's all things this lute can do. Wanna hear 'Louie Louie'?" "Maybe it doesn't do anything magical unless there's danger," Hank said calmly, looking back and down at her. While coming back from weapons practice, he'd seen a buck and brought it down -- with a normal arrow from a spare normal bow. That meant fresh meat for dinner instead of iron rations. Scully looked at the buck and felt her old ambivalence toward hunting. On the one hand, she had sworn back when she killed a snake as a kid that she would never take an innocent life. On the other hand, she had never had any problem with cooking meat, cleaning fish, or making the game her dad and brothers brought home disappear down her throat. Or blowing some bad guy away to defend Mulder or herself, if need be. "Combat is not when I want to be practicing," Scully said grimly. "At least this sword's got a nice sharp edge...almost as good as my breadknife back at work." The pole was digging into her shoulder. Thank goodness they were back at camp. "Why does an FBI agent need a breadknife at work?" he asked, curious. He made a mental note: remember to get out some bread for sopping up the venison juice. "If this is a good place to put the deer, I'll show you." "Good enough. Preparing game's a messy job, and Uni doesn't like the smell. So we usually do it out on the edge of camp." "Fine." Scully didn't even bother to unbind the deer's legs from the pole. "Breadknife is the pathology slang for a 12 to 18 inch surgical knife we use for autopsies. Very sharp. Some people get very attached to their breadknives: carry them with them at all times, never let anyone else use or touch them. One of my instructors was buried with his breadknife, in fact." "Do I want to know what you use it for?" She looked at the deer. It really ought to be a scalpel for this step, or at least a hunting knife. "Slicing organs, mostly. Like slicing bread. Hence the name." Still, the sword was sharp enough. "But it has other uses. The primary virtue of a breadknife is that it produces nice clean cuts." She bent to her work. With one long skillful slice, she split the deer all the way down its middle. Then she began to gut the deer. Hank looked down at her, as impressed by her matter-of-factness as by her skills. "I don't think you need me to train you." "Wow, Dana! That was the best venison ever!" Presto leaned back and rubbed his stomach. "I'd ask for thirds, but I'm stuffed." Dana smiled at the compliment. Presto needed to put some meat on that gangly frame -- no pun intended. "Thank my mother. It's her recipe." Mulder looked up. "So where in DC does she get those pink things?" "So I made a few substitutions, G-Man. Are you suggesting that my cooking had something lacking?" "Would I have had fourths if there were?" "There they go again," Diana whispered to Sheila. "Am I imagining things, or do our two FBI agents...." "Like each other?" Sheila blushed a little. "I don't think it's your imagination. I mean, look at the way they look at each other all the time, and the way Mulder brightened up as soon as he saw Dana come into camp...." She sighed a little dreamily. "Sorta like you and Hank?" Diana teased. "We do not!" "Oh yes you do. It's really getting obvious. Especially with Hank." Sheila's face changed in a second. "Do you really think so?" "I really do." Diana sighed a little as she watched Sheila smile a little smile. "I wonder if I'll ever meet someone like that. I mean, someone who knows I'm a girl, but isn't intimidated by me being smart and liking a fight." "Well, they come from the future. Maybe in ten years or so, all the guys back home will have evolved into Mulders." Sheila and Diana considered the notion. Then they looked at each other and simultaneously said, "Naaah!" "You know, though," Sheila said seriously, "we've been pretty lucky about that. I mean, Eric and Presto and Hank don't treat us like we're some kind of frail flowers." "They'd better not," Diana said darkly. "But you're right. And Bobby's knows better -- probably thanks to his big sister!" "Dungeonmaster sure doesn't treat us any different. But people in the Realm seem to be as mixed up about that stuff as people back home." She paused, then spoke against her will. "Speaking of which, do you think we might really get home this time?" "I don't know if I even want to think about it!" Diana answered. "We've gotten *this* close so many times...but we've never made it. Not to stay." "Yeah, but we never had new people along before." "What about the Lost Children, Sheila? And the pilot? And...." "I know, I know. But what if?" "I don't know." Mulder strummed a chord, and they looked up. "Since Scully took care of the cooking tonight, I thought I'd sing for my supper," he explained to the girls' startled gaze. "You can keep talking. Think of me as Muzak." "Are you kidding?" Eric demanded. "People pay good money to hear a Bard. It's not like we can flip a switch and hear music any time we want." "He's right," said Presto. "Believe me, I've tried." Mulder shrugged, said "It's your ears," and continued to strum. What to play, what to play.... A warm feeling spread up his fingers. And then he knew. Most of the songs he knew were classic rock. This was a song Scully's sister Melissa had liked, and played in the hospital once while Scully was in a coma. With his eidetic memory, he had learned the words instantly and often replayed the song in his head. He checked the chords in the music book Presto'd produced from his hat, told them, "This is by a guy named Stan Rogers about something that really happened," and began. "It started last October, in a pouring driving rain. The skipper, he'd been drinkin' and the mate, he felt no pain." The kids looked at each other, not knowing what to think of these words from their old world. Scully recognized the song as her dead sister's, and her face betrayed old grief. Mulder continued stubbornly. This was the right song. They'd see. "Too close to Three Mile Rock, and she was dealt a mortal blow And the _Mary Ellen Carter_ settled low. There was just us five aboard her when she fin'lly went awash. We worked like hell to save her and didn't count the cost. And the groan she gave as she went down, it caused us to proclaim That the _Mary Ellen Carter_ would rise again." He sang them how the owners wrote her off. He sang them a stubborn scheme to raise the old ship from the bottom of the ocean. And then he sang the chorus. "Rise again Rise again! That her name not be lost from the knowledge of men." "Sam," Scully thought, and suddenly realized why Mulder liked Melissa's favorite folksong. His own sister Samantha, missing since 1973, had been written off by everyone but him. "So the ones who love her best, Who were with her till the end, Will make the _Mary Ellen Carter_ rise again." Mulder strummed a second and caught his breath. The kids were really getting into the song. Good. "All spring now we've been with her on a barge lent by some friends. 3 dives a day in a hardhat suit -- twice I got the bends...." He told them the rest: how the ship was fixed underwater, cables attached, and the ship raised from her watery grave, valuable again. And when he sang the chorus again, the kids sang along and Scully said the words quietly. Her eyes looked wet. Probably remembering her sister, thought Mulder. "For we couldn't leave her there, you see, to crumble and to scale," Mulder explained earnestly. "She'd saved our lives so many times, ridin' through the gale -- And the laughin' drunken rats left her to her sorry grave! They won't be laughin' in another day." Scully lifted her chin with stubbornness. Someday those lawless men back home would fall. No one would laugh at the X-Files then. Mulder saw the same stubbornness in every kid's face. Good. If you believe there's still a chance to get home, there is. "So when you think adversity has dealt the final blow, With smilin' bastards laughin' at you everywhere you go, Turn to and put out all your strength of heart and lungs and brain And like the _Mary Ellen Carter_, rise again." Together, they swept into the chorus like a conquering army. Then Mulder rewarded them with the second chorus. "Rise again Rise again! Though your heart, it be broke, and your life about to end. No matter what you've lost, Be it a home, a love, a friend -- Just like the _Mary Ellen Carter_, rise again!" He played out that chorus again, just for good measure, and they all sang it like their lives depended on it. And suddenly it wasn't Mulder and Scully and the Young Ones sitting around that fire. It was Us. Shadowdemon listened to the Bard's music and watched the humans' revel. Pestilent creatures! That Bard and Paladin, insisting that one could win out through sheer stubbornness -- what did they know about adversity? He scowled. A certain smiling bastard was calling him to report even now. ============================================================= CONTINUED IN PART 4: WILDERNESS ENCOUNTERS Author's note: Stan Rogers, the famous Canadian folksinger who wrote "The Mary Ellen Carter", died in an airplane crash at the Cincinnati airport - because after he got out, he went back into the wreck twice to save others. The second time, he never came out again. Heroes should sing heroes' songs. ============================================================= Maureen S. O'Brien mobrien@dnaco.net ****************************************************************************** ******** ODDS N? ENDS This is a new part of the newsletter I?ve concocted to put in miscellaneous D&D stuff that doesn?t quite fit into any of the other sections, but is still important nonetheless! So, whattya waiting for? Read on! Here?s a response I got for the Poll Question from Newsletter Issue #3 in late December. Remember -- the one that asked about Yoda vs. Dungeon Master, and Darth vs. Venger? Here?s Patrick Drazen?s take on it: ?Speaking of movie dialogue (as you did at the top of the newsletter), this survey reminds me of one of my favorite exchanges from "Stand By Me:" VERN: Who do you think is stronger, Superman or Mighty Mouse? TEDDY: That is so stupid. Mighty Mouse is a cartoon. Superman is a real guy. VERN: Yeah, but it would be some fight, wouldn't it? The similarities between DM and Yoda are pretty obvious; short, speaking in riddles, powerful but not using that power unless absolutely necessary, touching death scenes (or in Dungeon at the Heart of Dawn, near-death scene). I give Yoda the edge only because (a) Yoda coached Obi-Wan as well as Luke, giving the story a nice continuity, and (b) Yoda was nice enough to stay with Luke, and didn't vanish when the going got rough or weird or whatever. On the other hand, until the "rise, my son" reference in "Dragons' Graveyard" gets sorted out, we just know Venger as a magical megalomaniac bent on ruling the Realm, while Darth Vader, it turns out, was only following orders. No contest; Venger was definitely the more impressive villain.? Also, Liz (9631334@arran.sms.ed.ac.uk) wanted me to ask around about the following....have you guys seen this? ?Did any one else watched a tv show called 'Childrens Island'? It was probably a 8 part (I think) live action tv show about 11 children marooned on a desert island whilst being evacuated from England in World War 2 and the search by the president of the USA's grandson to find them (the grandson was played by a guy called J.D.Roth who I believe presents kids? game shows now). I am kind of assuming that everyone getting this letter is about 20ish years old so it is possible someone else out there saw it (it aired about 1985 over here in the UK but none of my friends ever watched it)? Let me know if you?ve seen this show! It sounds interesting (and hey, I?ve always liked JD Roth, so I know I wouldn?t mind seeing it. Have you seen him on the Animal Planet station? That guy NEVER ages! He will perpetually be 20 years old.) ****************************************************************************** ********