A story I made up for Fraser.

There came an awesome hammering on the heavy oaken door… “Awake, awake, it is I, Pako the Watcher; I know you are in there awake, awake. Gorgon the Magnificent rolled over on his mat on the cold stone floor and opened one bleary bloodshot eye. “Go away” he croaked from a gravelly throat”. “I’m extremely busy and can’t be bothered by oafs such as you.” This was a lie; Gorgon had once again been caught up in the late night antics of Carson John and Quincy the Meat cutter and was attempting to regain his strength through sleep. Unfortunately Pako the Watcher knew well his friend’s deceptive ways and with one mighty crash burst the door open scattering the boots and clothes that Gorgon had left as a trail to his pallet on the cold floor.

“Oho and aha” cried Pako, “Is this the way you greet your friend and comrade in arms?” He attempted to maneuver around the door which had wedged itself on some chain mail that Gorgon had worn to the Royal Joust one week before.“ I’ll show you the way I greet a friend ,” roared Gorgon and began to search diligently amongst the clutter on the floor looking for his sword which he intended to cut off the part of Pako’s body that offended him the most, namely his head. “Oho and aha” said Pako the Watcher, “What a sorry state you have descended to. Where is the magnificent warrior that fought by my side in the Battle of Turning Events? Where is that fearless fighter who turned aside the A-Team and led them to ruin during the war of Residual Positions?”

“Humph” mumbled Gorgon as he moved toward a glint of steel under a pile of clothes which only turned out to be his much battered battle helmet.

“And more importantly, where is the undaunted commander who led us in the year long fight against the Nasty Little People?” “And where,” he went on, “Are the trophies from that horrendous endeavour, eh, where?”

With this last question Gorgon the Magnificent seemed to loose all his steam. He slumped back on his pallet on the cold stone floor and meekly pointed towards the vaulted ceiling. Pako looked up and gasped when he realized what he was looking at. With a voice that turned to cold rolled steel he said “So this is all we see that remains of that great battle. You have their tiny flying machines displayed, but where are their tiny ground transport systems and navy vessels? I also don’t see the tiny stuffed bodies that Dillon the Diligent worked on so long and hard upon. I can tell you that your life won’t be worth a Plug Nickel when the rest of Glenlivet’s Perfect Five Hundred hear about this.

As Pako’s rage grew it seemed that Gorgon’s being shrank smaller and smaller giving the impression that it like to join the tiny stuffed bodies of the Nasty Little People if only he could find their ranks.

“Who lives like this?” roared Pako, “Who lives without table or chairs? Who lives amongst clothes and weapons scattered on the cold floor? Who lives in a pile of bedding lacking legs? Have you adopted the deadly Doctrine of Downess as your philosophy?”

“I’ve tried,” Gorgon whined (this, the same Gorgon the Magnificent who, by his very presence on the battlefield, could drive enemies away crazed with fear) “I have spoken to her Royal Highness Gojo the Gorgeous who told me to see the house keeper Ikea the Organizer who told me he was busy with Princess Haisla’s needs and that I could visit the Great Void without my spacesuit as far as he was concerned. I confess, dear Pako, that such is my mood these days that I suffered this insult quietly and humbly. I do not know myself these days. I should have searched for his heart with my sword but I couldn’t be bothered to even search for my sword. Oh, woe is me!” and with that he slumped lower on his pallet on the cold, cold floor.

“Drastic measures are called for.” Said Pako to himself. Before Gorgon knew what was happening he was pulled out of his space, hustled across and intervening sward into an awesome castle and into the presence of the God-woman Charon the All-seeing.

Both friends bowed from the waist until Charon deigned to notice their presence. She dismissed Pako with a wave of her regal flipper and turned to face Gorgon the-not-so Magnificent.

“Rumours have come to me,” the terrible wisdom of Millennia swirled behind her eyes, “that you are contemplating a journey to the Terrible State of Sloth. And upon reaching that awful country that you plan on becoming a doorknob like the rest of the inhabitants. I will not have it!” (Such was her anger that one of her ears blew off) “You have been one of our nations most valiant warriors and you shall again if I have my way and I will.”

“You will no longer join Carson John and Quincy the Meat Cutter in their evening antics. You shall stay away from the Streets of the Blue Hill lest you find yourself in night court without a pot to piss in.”

“Most important you will stop sipping from the Spirits of Procrastination and drink this instead.” With that she handed him a small bottle and turned her back on him.

Frightened witless, Gorgon took a drink as ordered before he noticed the title on the label, “The Cold Light of Dawn.”

Of a sudden he began to straighten up. His eyes cleared of their redness and his dusty mind began to shake itself clear.

He wandered out of the castle and began plans. “I shall go to the army of salvation located on the twelfth Perpendicular of the main Quadrant and choose table and chairs befitting my status. (his chest began to swell as in the old days) perhaps they will have legs for my bed.” He chortled to himself “I shall visit Chad the Constructor who is currently building one million cubicles for the False Islanders and gets some shelves from him to suitably display the trophies of the Nasty Little People and then…” his heart bubbled with the possibilities.

The Beginning