In the heart of the fair nation of Fudgpakistan, economic turmoil gripped the land. Jobs were scarce, resources scarcer, and happiness, some say, once in abundant supply as it slid off of rainbows like the last white droplets of juice from a sausage, was the most rarest rarity of all.

The people were disgruntled, no longer happy, no longer productive, no longer packing fudge to be shipped off so firmly with authority to neighboring countries. The issue weighed heavily upon the shoulders of King Bloodsage, who called forth his twin advisors, Ja'Deth the Squirrelly and Mightion the Largely Ambivalent.

"A crisis of epic proportions grips this land, gentlemen," Bloodsage declared as he strode before the window from which he overlooked his once-proud kingdom. "The people are woeful since there is no gold to finance their dreams and happiness. Our policy of paying people in gumdrops has become increasingly ineffective." He turned a glare upon his advisors. "And yet, for all this woe surrounding us, all my useless administration seems incapable of doing anything but staring at me, eyes agog and jaws agape."

"Apologies, your majesty," Ja'Deth offered meekly. "Truly, the economic disparities weigh heavily upon us all, but may I suggest that you might yet see progress from your staff if you did not insist on conducting these meetings whilst nude."

With a roar, Bloodsage, in all his pantsless glory, leapt from his throne to press his sweating body against the face of his insolent advisor.

"I NEED ANSWERS, NOT ADVICE!" he shrieked, jiggling with barely-contained fury. "So great are the kingdom's woes that I am forced to discard my stately robes and fineries to appeal to the common man."

"We understand, great king," Mightion offered, straining to look away, yet unable to do so. "And far be it from us to point out that you have a myriad of other clothes to choose from and have actually conducted affairs of state in the buff since coronation, but-"

"Get to the point!" Bloodsage demanded, leveling his scepter at his underling menacingly.

"It becomes increasingly clear that the people are dissatisfied with our current reasons for the economic shortage," Mightion continued, "if they continue to remain disgruntled, they may yet probe our budget and discover that the money meant to be used to pave their roads was spent on pig's fat."

"Absurd!" Bloodsage proclaimed.

"Quite so, m'lord," Ja'Deth nodded sagely. "However as we may feel, the people do not quite find your greased-up midnight sonatas as entrancing as we had expected. A duty to take up with the ministry of culture another time, I am certain. In the interim..."

"...what we require is something to take the minds of the people from the economic crises," Mightion continued, "an external threat in no way traceable to you. Perhaps a monster of some sort."

"Yes," Bloodsage muttered, sliding into his throne and stroking his chin furiously, "a real monster..."

At that same instant, far removed from Bloodsage's Castle, far removed from any civilization at all, a creature within the depths of a murky mire stirred from his long nap.

Emerging from a cave reeking of patchouli, tomato soup cans and odor eaters, the great monstrosity known as Maradon vomited onto the world. Clad in naught but his furry loincloth to hide his sagging, sallow skin that clung so lovingly to his ribs, he scratched himself righteously and declared to the various creatures sharing his swampy home...

"I feel like an adventure today!"

At that moment, he spied something large, rotund and hideous sliding across the swamp floor. He leaned down to regard it carefully: its slimy shell, disgustingly scaly face and moplike head of hair.

"Good morning!" Maradon bid the creature. "Are you my animal companion?"

"Your what?" the thing asked from below.

"You know, my animal companion! A cute and cuddly little appeal to children's emotions, a shallow way to garner pity and comedic relief which is sure to follow in your sassy demeanor."

"I don't really do sassy," the creature grunted, rubbing his flippers together. "In fact, I'm actually quite repugnant and anti-social. You interrupted me as I was pooping on your lawn." He extended a tiny appendage. "I'm Sean the Surly Sea Turtle. I hate children, too."

"Sean the Surly Sea Turtle," Maradon said, nodding. "Could you, perhaps, be Sean the Saucy Sea Turtle? Maybe Sean the Somber Sea Turtle? Something more pleasant?"

"I could be Sean the Sex Offender Turtle, maybe. Speaking of which, if we're going on an adventure, I can't come within fifty feet of a daycare center."

"Woah, brah, that's rough!"

Both monster and sea turtle looked up to see the pot-bellied, shaggy, ring-tailed creature looking down at them from the branches above. Scratching himself indecently and looking through red-rimmed eyes, the primate-like creature cracked a smile.

"Sup mang," he offered, "I'm Liam the Layabout Lemur, ready to join you on this adventure. I'm real excited to be a part of this, in fact, so much so that I'm prepared to offer whatever I have to this madcap zany story."

"Fantastic!" Maradon proclaimed. "What do you offer?"

"A half-eaten bag of Doritos and a jar of spaghetti sauce."

Before Maradon could reply, another creature came hopping out of the foliage. For all intents and purposes, it appeared to be a tiny toad-like creature wearing a straw hat atop its head. Maradon smiled brightly at this new friend.

"Well, if it isn't another animal companion! What's your name, friend?"

"Black," the frog offered simply. "The bullfrog."

"Black the Bumbling Bullfrog?"

"What?"

"It's the theme of this adventure, silly! All my animal companions have cute little alliteratory names! So what are you, anyway? Black the Bashful Bullfrog? Black the Bamboozling Bullfrog?" He tapped his chin thoughtfully. "Oh, since you wear a hat, you must be Black the Boorish Bullfrog!"

"Oh, this?" Black pulled his hat down to reveal it to be a hood through which cold and calculating black eyes stared through. "This is my hood. I'm Black the Bigoted Bullfrog."

"..."

"I hate minorities."

"..."

"Why are you yellow? I don't like yellow people."

"I'm not people!" Maradon protested. "I'm a monster! And I've summoned you all to join me in an epic journey in which I think the moral is that you can love anyone or save the environment or something like that."

"Word," Liam said, nodding. "So where are we going, chief?"

Maradon tapped his chin thoughtfully...

Where should Maradon and his friends go?

1: They should save a princess!
2: They should go looking for treasure!
3: They should slay a dragon!

P.S. If you're a regular member who hasn't posted much, please feel free to. I may be running out of characters to use.

quote:

---

Katrinity impressed everyone with:
All three! Slay a princess, save a dragon, loot the royal coffers!

---

This.

(Gotta stay in character, but I also say D. All of the above.)

quote:

---

Katrinity attempted to be funny by writing:
All three! Slay a princess, save a dragon, loot the royal coffers!

---

Kat knows how it's done!

..And I have to talk to my P.O. if we leave the state

quote:

---

Asha'man spewed forth this undeniable truth:
Loot the princess.

---

Yeah, I'm sure she has some fine booty.

"We'll go search for treasure!" Maradon declared, thrusting a clawed finger to the sky as though he was the first monster to ever have that idea.

"With treasure," Liam piped up cheerfully, "I can finally buy a sweater to last me through the cold, swampy nights!"

"With treasure," Sean offered, "I can finally wash away the stain of my previous conviction."

"Treasure can wipe off quite a bit," Black said, nodding sagely. Slowly, every inch of slimy skin creaking, he turned and narrowed his eyes at where an audience might sit had they stumbled upon such a scene, and uttered: "Except Zionist influence."

"And with treasure, I can finally enable my dream of a tiny house where all peoples and creatures, humans and monsters alike, can live in harmony." Maradon clasped his hands together and sighed wistfully to the sky. "Perhaps then, finally, I'll be understood and welcomed to birthday parties."

"And if there's anything left over," Sean said with a broad smile, "you can buy a new tampon."

"...yeah, that too."

"You know, for your menstruation."

"...right."

"...because you're a girl."

"...I got that."

"...and you weep great crimson rivers out of your-"

"So, anyway," Liam interjected, "we should probably get to the ol' two-step watoosi, friends, if we're ever going to find the treasure that will make our dreams come true!"

And so, with their hearts filled with dreams and trousers brimming with excitement, the merry band set off to seek their fortune, unaware of the doom that was being penned in a script of diabolicism against a parchment of unkindness with the quill of woe mere days away...

...meanwhile, in his castle, the naked king Bloodsage wrung his hands and stroked his scepter in concern of the latest complications toward his plot.

"I trust the monster has been found," Bloodsage murmured to his advisors.

"As you specified, your highness," Mightion replied with a nod. "We have made the public well-aware of this recent threat. As predicted, the people quickly forgot about the economic crisis and focused on the impending threat of this horrible monster."

"Good, good," Bloodsage said, stiffening with pride at his idea's success.

"However..."

"WHAT?!" Bloodsage roared, slipping out of his throne and sliding across the floor, coming to rest just under the skirt of Ja'Deth's robes.

"Complications have arisen, my lord," Ja'Deth replied, hesitant, as though keenly aware of his king's displeasure. "The townspeople have scrapped together what little money they had and used it to hire mercenaries with which to combat this threat, citing the inadequacies of your army."

"Ridiculous!" Bloodsage snorted, causing his advisor's robes to billow. "I inspected the troops personally!" He paused. "...speaking of..."

"We are well-aware, sire," Ja'Deth continued, "and have thus convinced the townspeople to entrust the control of the mercenaries to our assignment at the promise of a full refund and reward once the threat has been dealt with."

"Very well," the king grumbled, "tell me their specialties...and also tell me how you managed to get a tattoo in such an odd place. What is that, a dolphin?"

"The first mercenary," Mightion interrupted with a grunt, "is a young, but talented wizard, fresh from Pigfart's Academy."

"A Pigfarter! Here in my own city!"

"Yes, sire," Mightion said with a nod. "When asked what his specialty was...well...uh..."

"Out with it!"

"He conjured up an image of a man of the East gasping," Mightion continued. "That was his sole reply until pushed...at which point, he cast a spell and, uh, turned both of my genitals into turkeys."

At this, Bloodsage peered out from under the robes of Ja'Deth and raised an eyebrow.

"Switch!"

After some shuffling, Bloodsage was agasp at the sight.

"He's brilliant! Send him to the roads, so that he may conjure his spectacles for all to see!"

"The next mercenary," Ja'Deth interjected, "is a rather...fruity fellow. Blond of hair, very little speaking, but he wears a very fancy green hat and carries a lot of weapons with him. Rather androgynous, if you ask me..."

Bloodsage leered out.

"...but clearly masculine."

"I see," the king contemplated, "then send him to the forest so that he may guard our path."

"The final mercenary," Mightion offered, "...well, he was...shall we say...the most 'exotic' of them all."

"Details?"

"Seven feet tall, m'lord, clad all in black armor and wielding a red sword. He breathed heavily, exceedingly so, sire, and had bizarre mental abilities, such as the power to throw things through the air as well as choke people with but a thought."

"Hm," Bloodsage grunted, only mildly impressed.

"What made him stand out," Ja'Deth continued, "was the fact that he used said power to strip half your army naked, slather chocolate sauce on them and then sodomize them with lightning."

"I like his style!" Bloodsage cackled. "Send him to the graveyard! I suspect he'll have a good time there guarding corpses from the incursions of our new threat!"

As if by chance, at that same moment, our brave companions stumbled across a triple fork in the road. Maradon paused and scratched his chin contemplatively.

"Now, which way to go," he muttered.

"The road is best," Sean the Surly Sea Tortoise offered. "I used to drive a team of cattle down there. Lots of caravans to pillage."

"That would only further perpetuate the stereotype of monsters being hungry for treasure and violence," Maradon said. "We're here to mend bridges."

"Maybe we can find someone mend your hymen."

"The forest, brah," Liam said, nodding. "Lots of places to hide treasure. Lots of plants around, too." His eyes rolled back into his head as a grin split his lemur face. "Probably smoke some dank nugz."

"What did you say?"

"I said we'll probably get some rank hugs."

"Good point!"

"Go to the graveyard," Black offered. "We can loot the ancient tombs of Fudgpakistan's kings, as well as drop off some bodies I've conveniently acquired."

"When did you have time to get those?" Maradon asked, puzzled.

"Probably about the time you were changing your maxipad," Sean grunted.

"That would have been a good opportunity," Maradon replied, scratching his chin. He quietly surveyed the fork, looking down each path, as if he hoped to see what threats lay beyond...

Which way should our jolly friends go?

1: They should go to the road!
2: The forest! The forest!
3: Think of Black's needs! Send them to the graveyard!

If he's not too busy watching reruns of Law & Order, that is.

Greenlit fucked around with this message on 08-03-2007 at 04:20 PM.