Dinner Conversation

Dateline: 2nd Low, The Pivot. The place: The Fox's Den in the berg of Scintillating. Ten and his new employer, "Box," sit down to eat some dinner. Over a mouthful of bread, "Box" asks, "Why are you not a Guvner, Ten?"

"Permission to speak freely Sir?"

"Granted."

Ten takes a sip of wine (he has displayed quite a fondness for the alcoholic beverage in the few days "Box" has known him). Putting the glass down, he picks up the knife and begins cutting into his steak.

"Because, I am a member of the Doomguard."

"Box" chokes on his bread.

Basically, Ten got seperated from his unit at some point, and found himself on a cube in Acheron, trapped on a battlefield in the midst of an army of orc petitioners fighting their eternal battle against the goblin petitioners. Thru blind luck and happenstance, he managed to save the life of an orc high-up during the battle, and then went on to help the orcs rout the goblins that day . In gratitude, Ten was adopted into the tribe, and began his career as the general's advisor. His real aptitude with startegy, planning, and tactics made him a valuable asset.

Eventually, Ten grew bored with helping the orcs win victory after victory. So he switched sides to see if he could help the underdog goblins regain some of the ground they had lost. As soon as he had restored the status quo to as it was when he arrived, he turned stag on the goblins and made his way to the realm of Lei Kung, the Duke of Thunder, to escape from the enraged orc and goblin hordes.

The Mercykillers tried to get him to join them, so he humored them, knowing however that he really didn't care much for justice. Deep down he knew what he wanted. He wanted to fight. He had spent plenty of time sitting in the tent on the hill, sipping a chardonay and smoking a cigar with the other field marshals, watching the armies clash on the distant plain below. Now, he wanted to get into the shit. he wanted to take down a man at a hundred yards with a big-ass crossbow. He wanted to feel the steel of a sword bite into flesh and bone. He wanted to hear the cries of the wounded and dying laying at his feet, not being carried to him on the wind from the battlefield below.

So, he got the Red Death to train him with weapons. During his time with the Death, he heard about the Sinkers. "Now there's a faction for me," thought Ten. "People who want to travel the multiverse, seeking the good fight. Waging war in an infinite number of conditions, on an infinite number of battlefield terrains, with an infinite number of adversaries."

So when the Mercykillers sent him thru a portal to Sigil to take the oath of membership and join, he changed his mind before he became a Mercykiller. Ten headed for the Armory, and joined them instead. Unfortunately, his initial experiences with the Sinkers weren't pleasant; many of them seemed to be ruled by simple bloodlust. They had no admiration for the art of war like Ten did. They wanted to spread discord and entropy in an artless, random, ignorant fashion.

He joined anyways, but decided not to play much part in the faction. He probably won't ever rise above namer rank.

Passing up duty at the Armory, Ten knew the life of mercenary was all that was left for him. Luckily, he stumbled across a flyer, written in Modron, about a repatriation program run by a lawyer named Box in the Clerk's Ward.

The rest is history.

Ten puts down his fork and knife, the steak gone. He looks up at Box. Box finally swallows his bread.

"Sir! I hope this doesn't affect your opinion of me, SIR! I have tried to prove myself these last few days. I am completely loyal to you, SIR!"

"And just be glad, sir," he adds with a strange glint in his eye, "that I'm not a Hardhead!"

Box stares at Ten for 3 minutes and thirty three seconds. No emotion. He puts down his dinner utensils, reaches down to his Modron box on the floor, gets his quill, his ink, and his paper, and begins writing. "Permission to consume my portion granted. I shall refuel via alternate means."