[Bordermarch] A few memories from BAM

[Lathrop, Dave]

Greetings Bordermarch,

I will Not! believe that my new Youth Archery Champion, M'Lord Carlos the Ripper, who's endless attempts to snuff me out in the past with clever assassination techniques, had any part in the multiple assaults upon my personage during and after last weekend's BAM!

The first assassination attempt took place during Saturday's Hafla, neth the BFT.
The cold damp air had forced a small group of Bordermarcher's to huddle together near the BFT. A large robust member of our group was smitten with a treat offered freely to any who would partake; the treat seemed to be a small teardrop that tasted of mashed legume covered with a dark sweetness. He was relentless in his attempt to get me to taste one. I did finally give in and taste one of the treats, they were quite chewy and sweet ,but a slight bitterness was present, no doubt from being exposed to the cool damp night air. The after taste of the treats left one pleasantly refreshed, but also left one craving some jellied preserves.

Good cheer, good conversation, and those suspicious free treats had steered my attention from a shroud of utter darkness that was slowly enveloping my feet. I never saw nor heard  the assassin creep between my boots to drive an iron stake [ no doubt forged in the depths of hell by a blue dwarf] right in the path of my next step.
When a child's mournful cry suddenly compelled me to venture forth and offer compassion, my boot became ensnarled by the assassin's iron stake of wickedness! I fought the stake's grasp of death with a big man's strength and fortitude;  if not for my years of battling many same such traps, I would have surely failed in my escape.

The assassin had placed a secondary devil stake in close proximity to the primary stake-of-death as a back-up; he no-doubt knew of my nimble cat-like reflexes.
As usual, my good friends were petrified into inaction by the act of witnessing the great battle between good and evil unfolding before them. They saw a simple man, who's only true passion in life was to be a good husband and father, now struggling to overcome a malevolence spawned from generations of unclean things!

As I wrenched my boot clear of the first stake it immediately caught on the back-up stake planted by the assassin. I instantly began a bob-and-weave technique for balance control that I had picked up at last year's BAM, and threw in just a bit of the "Flailing Arm" kata to guarantee my upright vertical position remained relative to terra-cotta.

To the untrained eye my escape methodology might have been easily mistaken for someone tripping on a simple tent stake then spinning out of control just before crashing into the ground. The fact of the matter was I was trying to spin fast enough so my combined curse and warning would be heard by not only my unmoving friends, but by everyone in the immediate area of danger.

The end result of the first assassination attempt was I'm still alive and no one else became ensnared in the ensorcelled stakes, except for one pour soul who found himself sprawled out on the ground, not quite knowing what just happened.
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The second assassination attempt took place during site tear-down.
It seems that the assassin used a  "Simpleton-potion" on our little group of tear-down table-loaders to weaken our minds. The "Simpleton-potion" must have been mixed into all of our drinks hours prior to the table loading.

The loading of tables should resemble a well rehearsed choreographed dance, thereby making every movement by participants smooth, flawless, and anticipated, but unfortunately, the "Simpleton-potion", had our group of table-loading dancers looking like a family of inbred Appalachian Cloggers!

To load tables correctly and safely there is a tried and true protocol that should always be adhered to:

1)      The smartest table loader should be the first in line to handle the table, he will effortlessly slide the tables on the wet grass too the next table-loader.

2)      The next smartest table loader should be next in line to receive the table from the #1 smartest table-loader.....

3)      .....and on and on it goes until finally;

4)      The  least smartest of the all the table-loaders should be the one who has to lift the tables over his head and place them on the ever taller stack of tables in the back of the wagon.

Somehow I ended being the table-loader who lifted the tables onto the back of the wagon!
What was even more distressing was the fact that when I saw that Sir Simonn was the #1 table-loader I knew that something was terribly wrong! The "Simpleton-potion" forestalled any attempts by me to reverse the present situation!

Although I could not remove myself from the table-loading nightmare, I could still vocalize my displeasure to my comrades about being the one lifting all of very heavy tables way up high over my head.
The rest of the dance troupe had totally succumbed to the "Simpleton-potion's" mind numbing power; they had accepted their positions in the table-loading dance.

The assassin's "Simpleton-potion" was meant to lull any who ingested it into a stupor that would prohibit them from thinking clearly, thereby starving themselves to death because of not thinking about food with a clear mind!
Due to hunger, we were all on the verge of collapse when my loud vocalization about my disgruntled state of being miraculously rattled loose one of the supposedly folded and secured metal legs of the table that I was currently holding over my head!
While the leg was falling and gaining speed before it slammed into my nose, I did not see my life flash before my eyes! All I saw was Lord Adolf's pudgy hands shoot up to cover his opened pie-hole, and his eyes begin to fill with tears.

Blam! It felt as if my nose was squashed into my head. My eyes instantly watered-up with moisture, but I did not cry. My disgruntled vocalizations instantly became more profuse and colorful; I promptly dropped the table I was holding only to hear it crash onto the already stacked tables in the wagon.

Everyone stopped what they were doing for just an instant then proceeded to start the table-loading dance as if nothing happened. The pain of a crushed nose bone must have rendered impotent the assassin's potion that was moments earlier coursing through my veins, all the while making me stupid!

I watched as the others continued to load the tables into the wagon, my comrades seemed to be getting simpler and simpler.
With the tables finally loaded we headed to the shed to unload. With my mind restored to full balance, I placed myself in a strategic position in the chain of table-unloaders.
I knew I was the only table-unloader present with a brain no longer influenced by the assassin's "Simpleton-potion", unfortunately that didn't help me avoid my next bout with pain.
Once again Sir Simonn placed himself in the #1 table-unloader spot; none of the others gave his actions a second thought.
If I recall correctly it was Jeffery the Barbarian who now claimed position as the least smartest of the table-unloaders, followed by Lord Zane. I stood next in line so as to induce some intelligence into the line of stupid stretching from the wagon into the shed;
Lord Adolf was between me and Sir Simonn.
The first couple of tables went into the shed quite nicely, then things started to pile up outside the shed. Jeffery and Zane, who were in the shed, could not keep up with the mindless vigor of Sir Simonn and Lord Adolf sliding the tables to me to hand to the shed men.
I had three tables stacked and could stockpile no more, but that mattered not to Lord Adolf. When Sir Simonn handed him a table, Lord Adolf automatically slid it in the dirt to me, regardless of the fact that I told him to hold!
When I took my eyes off of Lord Adolf and Sir Simonn for just a second, they managed to get a table unloaded and sliding on edge with tremendous speed right at me. I deflected the table just in time and jumped out of harm's way. The table crashed into the neat stockpile of tables I had arranged for the shed guys thereby scattering the tables everywhere. I once again vocalized my disgruntled state of being and promptly left the line of table-unloaders to fend for themselves.
They stopped for an instant, looked at me with confusion, and then began the process of unloading tables all over again.
It wasn't long before Lord Adolf slid a table right smack dab into Lord Zane's nether regions, Lord Zane grunted, smiled and then said, "Thank you Lord Adolf."

The "Simpleton-potion" finally wore off the others, but not before Jeffery the Barbarian decided to see if his head was harder than the wagon's door frame; we discovered that his head is softer!

Sir Simonn now limps, my nose still hurts, Lord Zane smiles every time he sees Lord Adolf, Lord Adolf has stomach cramps from laughing so much, and Jeffery is determined to test his head on other things in the future.

This now sort of concludes my recall of the assassination attempts during BAM and the story of Bordermarch's table-loaders-unloaders.

HE Santiago