From the article archive
World A Week: Associate
I woke from transition, and saw Cicero blinking his eyes in front of me.
He wore more than a dozen handguns of high caliber, and had been my smuggling Libertarian guide, until we confronted the being responsible for the Prime which had been his and after a bit, mine enemy.
This godling had invented socialism, and caused billions of deaths across at least five universes with it, and he thought the only problem with his doctrine was it was being misapplied. He needed another universe to experiment on.
Well I think I wanted to and maybe did break my rule against being rude to gods.
Anyways, I was in a new universe, and evidently I had an associate.
"Back when we faced that thing, I remember hoping if you got blasted out of there, that I would go with you. Since I'd be certain to be next." Cicero said, and I nodded. It sounded like an 'opportunistic association' which is not bad. The other type is an 'affection association' in which deep feelings for the other cause one to desire to leave a world if only to travel with the beloved.
Since, I and Cicero were decent buddies, but not that close, the first made sense.
"Let's find out where we are." I said as he tried his scriff sense for the first time. He began to chuckle.
"Too cool. I can sense you, my gear, and something over that way." He pointed to a hill covered by northern temperate zone oaks, and laden with autumn leaves.
If I judged right, in a few hours it would be dark, and I could check the stars. So far this looked like an Earth-like world.
I followed Cicero over the hill, and experimented with my psionic skills. I could Perfectly Remember things, and make a penny float in my hand, and summon a squirrel to eat a Cheerio(r)circle, but pyrokinesis slipped my mind.
At the bottom of the next valley, about seventy feet down, a Hummer mounted with a dual fifty caliber machine-gun turret on its roof waited.
Cicero laughed.
"All right. All my most important stuff was in it. I'd hoped the whole thing came."
So I rather incredulously asked him if the Hummer with the machine-guns were his, and he replied in the affirmative with the point that it was his Monday morning commute.
The Hummer was rather stoutly equiped with survival gear. It seemed Cicero liked to take a break from camping out on dangerous foreign dimensions, by going camping in his own reality in a terribly remote piece of the Rocky Mountains he rented.
Then he started to unpack, and check the weaponry. I'm all for weapons, but I started to gawk when he pulled out the anti-air missile, and I dropped my jaw when he proudly showed me his semi-automatic land mine dispenser with four hundred micro-mines.
"Um, isn't this a bit much? You were just going camping."
"Ever hear of the First Amendment? The Right of the People to Keep and Bear Arms Shall Not be Infringed Upon so that they may if need occasions, rise up and strike down a tyrant."
"In my world, that was the Second. The First was speech. And although that was the point of the Second, we did not make quite so firm a point about it."
"There's your problem. Government officials are like cockroaches. You gotta squish them, tar and feather, or even do like my granpop did and engage in a little rebellion to remind them occasionally to remind them who is the boss. And how are you going to remind them, if you don't have the weapons to do it?"
In a way, he made perfect sense, but looking at his untroubled face, I could not help thinking it was more complicated than that. I had to admit that a radical individualist like my friend here might adjust best to versing. There's a tale of a verser who is a samurai who found his life in his clan, and then he versed out. No clan, and utter loneliness.
We hopped into the Hummer, and he unhappily confessed that his robotics including the robomule of his did not seem to be working. A bit of jiggering under the hood, and we got the engine going.
For a verser, high-tech turn-on systems like computers are generally not a good idea for a lower tech device. You might find yourself in a world where the device works, but unable to turn it on because the ignition does not.
We drove down a creek, following the current, hoping to find a larger creek, and eventually civilization that way.
Instead what we found was a bridge of stone over our small vale, and a dozen archers pointing bows at us, at the command of two men behind them on horseback.
Something about them, their wiry strength, and beauty of form reminded me, and I cranked my eye muscles to turn my eyes into binoculars.
Pointed ears. Elves.
"They are elves." I told Cicero.
"How do they like hot lead? Or does it have to be cold-rolled steel?"
I looked surprised at my literal minded friends knowledge. He shrugged, explaining that a fellow had traded him a story for some food in another world. It had been a bad trade, full of magic and other unreal stuff.
Watch this, I thought, and flipped down his eye shield to find the mirror I sought. A peering at it, and mentally through it, and suddenly I slumped with my astral form standing on the bridge.
"What is the problem?"
"You trespass. Break our laws, and damage our sacred forrests with that vile machine."
I relayed this to Cicero who replied that he would pay a reasonable fine. That did not go over well.
They were in charge. They were representatives of the High King of the House of Isildur, and this was the Last Wizard, Radagast the Brown, and we were to surrender at once, or face elven justice.
Something about those names seemed familiar, but I slid it aside while I relayed the demand in a mumble to Cicero.
"Tell them this. They can have my guns, when they pry them out of my cold, dead fingers."
I phrased it more politely, but the elflord ordered the crew of bowmen to fire down upon the 'strange and monstrous creation of the treasonous fey.'
A jammed button, and metal plates dropped over windows, and a joystick popped out of the dashboard.
Ratttatatatatttaatatta!
A stream of fifty caliber bullets dented the rock wall of the bridge in a horizontal line right below the archers' feet. Watching them dive for cover crazily was quite amusing, I'll admit.
Elves can be a bit annoying with their 'God's gift to creation attitude.' that so many have.
"You dare!?!" Radagast said, and he raised his rod which sparkled with light that threw Cicero into a trance. I reached out with my telekinesis and stripped it out of his hand.
"So, know this human traitor, you have declared war on the High King and all his lesser kings, and upon the Elves of the Wood, and the Last Wizard. Such an alliance threw down Sauron, and even your foul machine will not save you, nor your unholy magics."
They turned and left the bridge rapidly. I had little doubt that though we had won this conflict, they would be back.
I relayed the data to Cicero. We had started a war with a continent full of good people. I think this was the Fourth Age of Middle-Earth.
He nodded.
"Kings?" He asked, and I nodded back.
"So where's this Gondor city thing?" He asked purposefully.
"Why?"
"Sounds like a bunch of statists. Hamiltonians. We go there, and we set the people free."
Oh, dear, war with a continent, and my only companion a madman.
Tadeusz
He wore more than a dozen handguns of high caliber, and had been my smuggling Libertarian guide, until we confronted the being responsible for the Prime which had been his and after a bit, mine enemy.
This godling had invented socialism, and caused billions of deaths across at least five universes with it, and he thought the only problem with his doctrine was it was being misapplied. He needed another universe to experiment on.
Well I think I wanted to and maybe did break my rule against being rude to gods.
Anyways, I was in a new universe, and evidently I had an associate.
"Back when we faced that thing, I remember hoping if you got blasted out of there, that I would go with you. Since I'd be certain to be next." Cicero said, and I nodded. It sounded like an 'opportunistic association' which is not bad. The other type is an 'affection association' in which deep feelings for the other cause one to desire to leave a world if only to travel with the beloved.
Since, I and Cicero were decent buddies, but not that close, the first made sense.
"Let's find out where we are." I said as he tried his scriff sense for the first time. He began to chuckle.
"Too cool. I can sense you, my gear, and something over that way." He pointed to a hill covered by northern temperate zone oaks, and laden with autumn leaves.
If I judged right, in a few hours it would be dark, and I could check the stars. So far this looked like an Earth-like world.
I followed Cicero over the hill, and experimented with my psionic skills. I could Perfectly Remember things, and make a penny float in my hand, and summon a squirrel to eat a Cheerio(r)circle, but pyrokinesis slipped my mind.
At the bottom of the next valley, about seventy feet down, a Hummer mounted with a dual fifty caliber machine-gun turret on its roof waited.
Cicero laughed.
"All right. All my most important stuff was in it. I'd hoped the whole thing came."
So I rather incredulously asked him if the Hummer with the machine-guns were his, and he replied in the affirmative with the point that it was his Monday morning commute.
The Hummer was rather stoutly equiped with survival gear. It seemed Cicero liked to take a break from camping out on dangerous foreign dimensions, by going camping in his own reality in a terribly remote piece of the Rocky Mountains he rented.
Then he started to unpack, and check the weaponry. I'm all for weapons, but I started to gawk when he pulled out the anti-air missile, and I dropped my jaw when he proudly showed me his semi-automatic land mine dispenser with four hundred micro-mines.
"Um, isn't this a bit much? You were just going camping."
"Ever hear of the First Amendment? The Right of the People to Keep and Bear Arms Shall Not be Infringed Upon so that they may if need occasions, rise up and strike down a tyrant."
"In my world, that was the Second. The First was speech. And although that was the point of the Second, we did not make quite so firm a point about it."
"There's your problem. Government officials are like cockroaches. You gotta squish them, tar and feather, or even do like my granpop did and engage in a little rebellion to remind them occasionally to remind them who is the boss. And how are you going to remind them, if you don't have the weapons to do it?"
In a way, he made perfect sense, but looking at his untroubled face, I could not help thinking it was more complicated than that. I had to admit that a radical individualist like my friend here might adjust best to versing. There's a tale of a verser who is a samurai who found his life in his clan, and then he versed out. No clan, and utter loneliness.
We hopped into the Hummer, and he unhappily confessed that his robotics including the robomule of his did not seem to be working. A bit of jiggering under the hood, and we got the engine going.
For a verser, high-tech turn-on systems like computers are generally not a good idea for a lower tech device. You might find yourself in a world where the device works, but unable to turn it on because the ignition does not.
We drove down a creek, following the current, hoping to find a larger creek, and eventually civilization that way.
Instead what we found was a bridge of stone over our small vale, and a dozen archers pointing bows at us, at the command of two men behind them on horseback.
Something about them, their wiry strength, and beauty of form reminded me, and I cranked my eye muscles to turn my eyes into binoculars.
Pointed ears. Elves.
"They are elves." I told Cicero.
"How do they like hot lead? Or does it have to be cold-rolled steel?"
I looked surprised at my literal minded friends knowledge. He shrugged, explaining that a fellow had traded him a story for some food in another world. It had been a bad trade, full of magic and other unreal stuff.
Watch this, I thought, and flipped down his eye shield to find the mirror I sought. A peering at it, and mentally through it, and suddenly I slumped with my astral form standing on the bridge.
"What is the problem?"
"You trespass. Break our laws, and damage our sacred forrests with that vile machine."
I relayed this to Cicero who replied that he would pay a reasonable fine. That did not go over well.
They were in charge. They were representatives of the High King of the House of Isildur, and this was the Last Wizard, Radagast the Brown, and we were to surrender at once, or face elven justice.
Something about those names seemed familiar, but I slid it aside while I relayed the demand in a mumble to Cicero.
"Tell them this. They can have my guns, when they pry them out of my cold, dead fingers."
I phrased it more politely, but the elflord ordered the crew of bowmen to fire down upon the 'strange and monstrous creation of the treasonous fey.'
A jammed button, and metal plates dropped over windows, and a joystick popped out of the dashboard.
Ratttatatatatttaatatta!
A stream of fifty caliber bullets dented the rock wall of the bridge in a horizontal line right below the archers' feet. Watching them dive for cover crazily was quite amusing, I'll admit.
Elves can be a bit annoying with their 'God's gift to creation attitude.' that so many have.
"You dare!?!" Radagast said, and he raised his rod which sparkled with light that threw Cicero into a trance. I reached out with my telekinesis and stripped it out of his hand.
"So, know this human traitor, you have declared war on the High King and all his lesser kings, and upon the Elves of the Wood, and the Last Wizard. Such an alliance threw down Sauron, and even your foul machine will not save you, nor your unholy magics."
They turned and left the bridge rapidly. I had little doubt that though we had won this conflict, they would be back.
I relayed the data to Cicero. We had started a war with a continent full of good people. I think this was the Fourth Age of Middle-Earth.
He nodded.
"Kings?" He asked, and I nodded back.
"So where's this Gondor city thing?" He asked purposefully.
"Why?"
"Sounds like a bunch of statists. Hamiltonians. We go there, and we set the people free."
Oh, dear, war with a continent, and my only companion a madman.
Tadeusz
Recovered from the Gaming Outpost database backup. Original wording is preserved; damaged punctuation and presentation markup have been repaired. Historical links without a local match point to the Internet Archive.