Newsgroups: alt.pub.dragons-inn
From: kring@efes.physik.uni-kl.de (Thomas Kettenring)
Subject: [RATS] Shopping
Message-ID: <1993Feb14.003610.8552@rhrk.uni-kl.de>
Date: Sun, 14 Feb 1993 00:36:10 GMT

  The gang of rat exterminators had succeded in exterminating a big pizza
when Higar stood up, stretched audibly, and spoke:
  "Ready, everybody?"
  In the same moment, Bakr said, "That's a good pizza they make here,"
and Firgun asked, "Do we have everything we need?"

  They stopped short for a second, then again three sentences came
simultaneously:
  Bakr to Higar: "OK, let's go"
  Firgun to Bakr: "I still think mushroom would have been better"
  Higar to Firgun: "We'll need mining lanterns"

  Again the three digested what the others had said, and responded:

  Firgun to Higar: "Where do we get them?"
  Higar to Bakr: "I liked it too"
  Bakr to Firgun: "Of course bell pepper would have been better"

  Now the pause was longer.  Everybody looked at Git, and Git said, "Me too."

  Higar swung his arms and took the initiative.  "I have one mining lantern,
but we'll need more than that."  Bakr lifted a finger, "I have some torches,
if that's what you mean..." - "No, that won't do.  We only want to kill the
rat, not blow up the sewers.  There is a fantastic hardware shop across the
Plaza, perhaps we can borrow one more lantern.  How much money do we have?"

  Bakr said, "I think I've got enough.  I recently helped killing a queen,
and her son gave us heaps of gold."  He dropped a few gold pieces on the table.
  "WHAT?  Then why do you want to go to the sewers?"
  The Scharidian mage shrugged his shoulders.  "Adventure.  Thrill.  Uh...
fun."
  Higar had the look of a sewer rat that has found a fat, grinning man in
bermudas and sunglasses crawling out of its favorite tube.
"Fine.  Then we two go to the hardware shop, and you two could get a canary
from that pet shop vis-a-vis."
  Firgun frowned.  "A canary?"
  "Canaries make great gas detectors."
  "And how many of those ghastly... whatever will the canary have to make
until we can go?"


  Soon after that two pairs of adventurers, in each case a tall one and a
small one, left the inn in different directions.  One pair entered Raketha
Dronular's Hardware Shoppe at the Plaza Of Glittering Steel.  Higar visibly
lit up when he saw all the tools and apparatuses.  Bakr looked around, but
had no idea how this shop could be viewed as "fantastic" by anybody.  It
contained nothing but uninteresting junk.
  Dronular, a muscular dwarf, greeted Higar heartily, and soon three mining
lanterns were purchased.

  Meanwhile...

  "You're out of canaries? What kind of a pet shop are you???", asked Firgun.
  "The only one in town. You're not the only group that's thinking of going
into the sewers, you know..."
  "Well.. what about finches..."
  "Out."
  "Robins?"
  "Sold the last one a minute ago."
  "Turtledoves?"
  "Some guy came in two months ago and bought both of them, and he even
bought all the calling birds, most of the female geese, seven swans and the
last three French Hens. We threw in a partridge free of charge. He asked for
cows but we don't deal in cattle."
  "Chickadees?"
  "Ah-ah."
  "African Swallows?"
  "Sold out of those yesterday."
  "Parakeets?"
  "Out."
  "Red-breasted Forest woodchucks?"
  "Stock comes in next week."
  "WELL, *WHAT* do you have?," asked Git.

  "Firgun?"
  "Yes, Barker?"
  "Are you sure that it was a good idea to buy that?"
  "Well, they're out of every other dang bird in the world. What choice do we
have?"
  "But, a *DUCK*???" The black headed drake watched the adventurers with
melancholic eyes, even as it tried to grasp onto Git's shoulders with
webbed feet.
  "It'll just have to do," said the gnome, sighing.
  "Rat-catching isn't all it's quacked up to be..."

--
Text written by
  kring@efes.physik.uni-kl.de AKA Bakr
  c164-ez@po.berkeley.edu AKA Higar

Input and corrections by:
  scott@athena.mit.edu AKA Firgun
  d.morgan@bradford.ac.uk AKA Git