During the course of this parody, The Management also spoofs other works of fiction. We make no apology for this blatant use of satire. In fact, we wield it with glee.
Adventures in Fantasyland
Presented by The Management
- Calanteli, LuckyShadows & Llandaryn -
o - o ^ o - o
2. You Are Here
Fully robed and feeling like a complete berk, Daniel affected a casual stroll as he approached the town. This had the unfortunate effect of making him look like a tall, tent-covered wading bird, complete with stiff legs and bobbing head. His shoes threatened to trip him at every step, so he was forced to kick his legs high in front of him to clear the ground.
As if by magic, people appeared on the streets the instant he passed the large 'HERE' sign. Some hawked their wares from carts, others tried to scurry furtively in the shadows but were foiled because the sun was directly overhead, leaving no shadows to scurry in. Many of the people were first-time Tourers, like him. He could tell, because they wandered around with their heads buried inside their guide books, barely looking where they were going except when the stopped to gawp at something outlandishly simple, such as horses tethered to a rail outside the inn-cum-saloon and small dishevelled beggars who had managed to cultivate a plethora of interesting smells.
The first thing to do, he decided, was find out where he was. Then he could find out where he needed to go to finish the Tour, hopefully bypassing all the messy, bloody middle bits which were bound to be hard work and painful. He wasn't going to fool himself into believing he was a hero. He wasn't, which was why any character he created was small, sly, and with just enough wits to know when to run and save his skin.
There would be a Helpful Local somewhere, to guide him and offer him pearls of wisdom (or, more likely in this case, pearl-coloured iridescent small glass marbles of wisdom). He knew this from his own experience of being The Management in his own games. Always, in those cases, he was the DM. He didn't hold with all this newfangled GM nonsense, because DM had connotations, it conjured images of true fantasy roleplaying (miles upon miles of dark, dangerous dungeons) whereas GM was more ambiguous, almost the politically correct term dreamt up by somebody who thought implying that all roleplaying games had dungeons was a negative thing.
It was probably the fault of New Labour. Everything had become about political correctness since they'd started running the country again. His dad had complained about it time and time again. No company worth its weight in salt had a payroll department anymore. Instead, they had 'human resources', which put in Daniel's mind the image of employees standing in neat, pliable rows, being harvested by teams of chainsaw wielding executives. No longer did kitchens have cooks. They had been replaced by 'catering and hospitality operatives'. Fitness instructors were now 'personal health and wellbeing advisors' And woe betide anyone who got his dad started on what lollypop ladies were called these days.
Finding the Helpful Local was proving to be something of a challenge. There were plenty of people around, but they all refused to make eye contact with him. He tried marching firmly up to one man, but the fellow simply turned and hurried the other way. He waved to one woman who retreated to her house and slammed the door. It was, he decided, time for drastic action. He strolled casually (see also, stork-like lurching) past a lone man, and on the last minute lunged for his shirt, managing to grab a handful of dirty sleeve.
"ExcusemecanyoutellmewhereIam?" he asked quickly before the man could object.
"You're Here," said the man, trying to pull his sleeve out of Daniel's grip.
"But where is here?"
"Damn newbies. Check yer map," said the man, tugging his sleeve free and hurrying away down the dusty street. A cactus popped up out of the ground and watched the fleeing man.
His map? What did that mean? He didn't have a map. Or did he? With nothing better to do, he turned to his guide, which was thankfully arranged in alphabetical order, and looked down for the word MAP. Under the bolded heading, he found a brief entry. "It's at the front of this book." So, feeling like a complete idiot, he turned to the front of the book and was greeted by the sight of an apparently hand-drawn map that had a definite printed quality about it. The map showed a large continent with a ragged coastline, and several bays which made perfect natural harbours. There were several offshore islands located near the coast, which all had suitably ominous sounding names, like 'The Isles of Dhoom', 'Prickly Death Island' and one simply labelled 'Here Be Dragons'. A handful of towns and cities littered the map, strewn about as if somebody had simply picked them out of a bag and dropped them from a height. Many were located along the coast. Some could be found bordering forests, mountains and sprinkled across plains. And amongst the towns were symbols indicating ruins of castles, keeps, other towns and cities, ancient engineering projects, elven domiciles and wizard towers. Why there were so many ruins, or more importantly, what had made them into ruins, he didn't know, but he sincerely hoped he wouldn't have to visit any of them.
He scanned the map, and discovered where he was. In the north-western corner was the symbol for a town, and beside it were the words 'YOU ARE HERE'. So. Not Hereford after all, but quite literally, here. Not that it explained very much, but at least Here was better than Nowhere, which itself was a step up from one of the many Ominous Ruins he had seen on the map. It was just a shame he couldn't spend his whole Tour here, in Here. It seemed a nice little town, despite the paranoid townsfolk and the plague of small cacti.
For a while he wandered, lonely as a cloud, not wanting to really progress any further than he already had, but not wanting to stand still in case somebody from The Management noticed he wasn't having fun or being placed in mortal peril and decided to intervene. Nevertheless, he found himself drawn inexorably forward by some unseen force, and he wasn't the only one. Many of the first-time Tourers were making their way down the dusty main road, seemingly unaware that they were all travelling in the same direction, like a flock of birds who knew that south was somewhere in the opposite direction of north, but weren't really sure, exactly, what south looked like, and were a little too embarrassed to ask the birds around them. Briefly, he wondered if somebody in the town had a large first-time Tourer magnet which they were using to draw all these people onwards... then he dismissed the idea as crazy and too modern. Maybe on the Sci-fi Tour, there would be magnets, but not Here, not on the Fantasy Tour, unless the magnets were simply a component in a much larger spell. Something for summoning demons, say.
At last he knew why he was being pulled forwards. His eyes lay upon a market in the middle of town, and it was quite a noisy affair. There were stalls, booths, tents and tables, all advertising different goods and services. Men and women cried their wares; "Freshly baked bread, milord, freshly baked bread, guaranteed weevil-free!", "Fresh vegetables for you, my good sir? You look like a man who needs fresh vegetables!", "Horses for sale! Fine horses for sale for fifty gold! Slightly less fine for twenty five! Nags for ten and not a copper less!", "Exotic pets! Your exotic pets sold here! Spiders for Animal Companions! Cats for Familiars! The fearsome battle-hedgehog, good for throwing, rolling or releasing on your foes!"
Daniel opened his pouch of money and looked inside. All he had was thirty gold, which immediately ruled out buying a fine horse, and probably a slightly less fine horse, unless he wanted to spend the rest of the Tour starving and without a change of clothes. Then again... it wasn't as if he even knew how to ride. That sort of skill was given to paladins and scouts, with wizards getting more esoteric abilities, such as being able to decipher runes (with enough training) and spot magic being performed (he hoped) and maybe even espouse lore (well, probably not). But at the very least, he knew he couldn't ride, so whether he got a fine horse or a nag didn't matter very much. At least a nag was most likely to be docile.
Just then, another stall caught his eye. It was large, possibly the largest one in the market, and the sign proclaimed it 'Honest Alwin's Magical and Adventuring Consortium', and a smaller sign beneath it said "SALE NOW ON" in large capital letters. Honest Alwin, it turned out when Daniel stepped forward, was a large, dark-skinned man wearing a turban, and doing brisk business with almost every Tourist in the town. Money and goods exchanged hands almost too quickly for Daniel to see, always with a jaunty "Thank you for shopping at Honest Alwin's Magical and Adventuring Consortium for your magical and adventuring needs, please come again!"
"Excuse me," said Daniel, shouting over the din, "are you Honest Alwin?"
"Me?" the large man chuckled. "Bless the twelve gods, no! I'm Unscrupulous Uddin. Honest Alwin is my cousin. He runs the consortium from the capital, Lalaleth. A great man, Alwin, though a little too honest at times. His tongue used to get him in trouble all the time, before somebody who took exception to it cut it out. Now he has to use a helper monkey to speak. Far better to be Unscrupulous and speaking, I say."
"Um... yes, I have to agree with you there. Listen, mister Uddin, I'm supposed to buy supplies..."
"Ah, a first-time Tourer, yes?" said the man with a wide smile that showed off teeth so white they might have been transplanted from Tom Cruise's mouth. "All the first-timers end up here, eventually. Let me guess... novice wizard? I have just the thing for you!"
Uddin bent down behind his table and began rooting around for something. Daniel took the opportunity to study the rest of the stall, and its contents. Had it been a stall on an Earth market, it would have been what his mother called 'bric-a-brac', Aunt Bertha called 'curios' and his father called 'absolute garbage'. The tables held a mishmash of rings, talismans, amulets, necklaces, brooches, shawls, shoes, cloaks, cooking pots, cutlery, blankets, bedrolls, bags, bows, crossbows, arrows, bolts, swords, axes, staves, morningstars, flails, daggers, throwing stars, halberds and even a stuffed alligator (or crocodile - he knew there was a way to tell the difference, but he had no idea what it was).
"Here you go, my fine young friend," said Udding, reappearing with a heavy bag which he dumped into Daniel's arms. "Standard adventuring kit number three."
"What do you get inside it?" he asked dubiously.
"Just have a look at the label, good sir!"
Daniel turned the heavy bag in his arms until he came to a small label underneath it, which he read aloud.
"'Standard adventuring kit number three, for wizards, mages and sorcerers of any level and of good or neutral alignment. Kit contains; One itchy woollen blanket (keep away from naked flames), one canteen (cold liquids only [not included]), one wizard's staff (20% yew, 80% pine, incl. fully automated lighting system), one woollen cloak (olive-green, with silver-plated neck clasp and hidden inner pockets), one set of saddlebags (good for horses of size 14hh - 17hh), one bag of rations (10 flatbread, 5 apples, 5 pears, 1 roast chicken, 25 instant stew mix), one bag of magical components (various herbs and spices, set of runes, deck of tarot cards, small crystal ball [quartz], mysterious magical sextant [travel-size], pestle and mortar), one ring of vomit resistance and one book of magical cantrips (pocket-size).' A ring of vomit resistance?"
"You'd be surprised how many people wish they had a ring of vomit resistance. Why do you think we put it in there to begin with?"
"About the cloak... can't I have a coat instead? Then I won't have to hold it closed all the time?"
"Sorry, my young friend, but only standard adventuring kit number eight gets the coat."
"And that is..?"
"Standard adventuring kit number eight, for wizards, mages and sorcerers of any level and of evil alignment.'
"Why do evil wizards get coats, but not good or neutral wizards? That seems a little unfair."
"Tell me about it. But I don't make the rules, I just follow them as unscrupulously as possible," said Uddin with a shrug. "If you don't like it, you'll have to take it up with The Management, but I doubt they'll change anything."
"I don't need to take it up with The Management. I'm an evil wizard, you see." Uddin subjected him to a sustained, sceptical look. "No, really. I sacrifice innocents to fuel my dark magic. I throw puppies down wells and strand kittens up trees. I regularly conjure demons and devils, and raise the undead whenever I get the chance. I steal sweets from babies too."
"Babies shouldn't have sweets. Rots their teeth, you know."
"Did I say steal sweets from babies? I meant... erm... first I give the sweets to the babies, to rot their teeth, then I take the sweets from them to make them cry!"
"That's one good thing and one bad thing, which cancel out to make you neutral. Pull your face all you like, but it's been proven that neutral characters have the lowest mortality rate and the highest life expectancy of any alignment. That's why there's so many neutral characters out there; the good and the evil spend far too much time trying to kill each other off, whilst the neutral characters sit back and wait for the danger to pass, before swooping in and claiming what's left. I myself am neutral; unscrupulously so!"
"And how much will this standard adventuring kit cost me?" he sighed, admitting defeat. Uddin's logic was sound enough, and he was willing to trade an uncomfortable cloak for a longer life expectancy.
"For you, my fine friend, fifteen gold."
"Fifteen gold? That only leaves me with ten!"
"Enough to buy a horse and saddle, yes? And you'll have enough left over from that to rent a room at the inn for the night. Caravans don't leave until morning, you know."
"Fantastic," he sighed. "I don't suppose you know where the caravans are going, do you?"
"They go everywhere, my friend. Some will cross the Tarry Sea by ship to trade with the Otherlanders, others will go east, braving the Lonely Forest to make deals with the elves, a few might even make it through the Dread Wastes, to where the barbarians and steppe-folk like, whilst some may head south and into the heart of the Capella Desert."
"Don't any deal in local trade? Say, to the coast and back?"
"Of course not!" he chuckled. "Only farmers deal in small-scale trade. Where would be the adventure in that?"
"I see," said Daniel miserably. He opened his Tour Guide to the front page and scanned the map. There were a lot of dangerous looking places. "Say, are you one of the desert nomad folks from the Capella Desert?" he asked.
"Me? Of course not. I came here from the Arabian Nights Tour. The only thing you could sell there, though, was magic carpets or camels. I swore I wouldn't grow up to become a camel trader, so I took a job here on the Fantasy Tour at the first chance I got."
"Oh."
"I like you, novice wizard," said Uddin, leaning over the stall to clap him affably on the shoulder. "I tell you what, you go and speak to the horse trader, Intrepid Ishmael. He's a cousin of mine twice removed. Tell him I sent you, and he'll give you a good deal on a horse."
"Actually, I was thinking of just walking on my own two feet, to be honest."
"You can't do that!" said Uddin, aghast. "Why, your ridiculous pointy wizard boots would surely get in your way at every step, and they don't exactly have thick soles, do they? Besides, what will you eat when you run out of provisions? You might be forced to resort to cannibalism if there's no horse to butcher!"
"Right. I'll go and get myself a horse then."
The horse market was on the outskirts of the main market, probably because horses were rather prone to trying to fertilise the ground quite a lot, and so much fertiliser not only smelt bad, but also attracted hordes of frenzied flies. Daniel was in no hurry to go there, however. He dragged his feet, making the most of his master's degree in procrastination, running his eyes over items for sale on other stalls, moving on when their owners looked as if they were going to try to sell him something. He was sidling between two stalls when his Wizard Sense started tingling, and he felt something plucking at his pockets. His normal instinct to flee from trouble fled itself, and he reached out with his arm, grabbing a handful of hair, and pulling its owner out from underneath a cloth-covered table. What was in his hand was a mop of greasy dark hair sitting atop the head of some small, runny-nosed goblin-looking creature wearing clothes too large for it. It squirmed in a feeble attempt to get free, and when it finally realised it was stuck in his grip, it wiped a dirty sleeve across its runny nose and said in an over-the-top Hollywood version of a Cockney accent; "Gotta pick a pocket or two, guv'na!"
"Are you a goblin?" he asked uncertainly.
"Me? Course not! Oi'm a street urchin, oi am!"
Before Daniel could ask any more questions, a man wearing a suit appeared out of thin air. One moment he wasn't there, and the next he was. There was no flash of light, no bang of magic, no ripple in the air to herald his coming. It was as if he had always been there, and had been suddenly revealed. The man took one look at the street urchin, pulled what Daniel had come to think of as a Wiimote from his pocket, aimed it at the urchin and pulled the trigger. The boy raised his hands and closed his eyes, and Daniel let go just as a jet of purple light enveloped the urchin, surrounding him before making him disappear.
"As you were, citizen," said the man, pocketing his Wiimote. "Move along, nothing to see here."
"So... um... which Tour did he come from?" Daniel asked. The man looked surprised.
"What makes you think he was from another Tour?"
"You... er... made that boy disappear just like the cactus."
"What cactus?"
"Don't you remember? I was standing by the registration tables when a cactus appeared. Then you showed up, zapped it with your... um... thing... and told me it had escaped from the Western Tour."
"Oh. That wasn't me. Must have been one of the others. The urchin was from the Dickensian Tour."
"Others? One of the other Managers?"
"Me? A Manager? Only in my dreams!" the man laughed. "No, no. We're not Managers. Better to simply think of us as... Auditors. We're employed by The Management to make sure everything is where it should be. Now that you mention it, number six did mention rounding up a stray cactus earlier. It must have been him you met."
"Number six? Don't you have names?"
"Of course not. Only creatures with souls can have names, and everybody knows Auditors don't have souls. We sell ours to The Management when we take employment. It sort of... binds us to their service for a specific period of time. I've still got three years left on my contract."
"And what did you do before you became an Auditor?"
"I worked for Pricewaterhouse Coopers. It was pretty much the same job, only without inter-dimensional travel. Hmm... I wonder..." said the man, giving him a thoughtful look. Daniel was incredibly tempted to give it back. "You said this is the second time something from another Tour has ended up near you?"
"Er... yes?"
"I suspect you are Nerev'At."
"What's that?"
"Sometimes, a person comes along who can influence the very fabric of the Tour existence. It's said that the threads of every Tour are woven around somebody who is Nerev'At, and that other people, and even objects, are pulled towards them. People like you... blur... the boundaries between Tours, sometimes making them weak enough for objects or people to pass through. We haven't had a Nerev'At for... oh, at least four years."
"But if things can come from other Tours to me, doesn't mean that I might accidentally slip into another Tour?"
"No, you're not contracted for it. But this could be very dangerous for you."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, think about it. Sometimes, when a Nerev'At needs something badly enough, they find it. You might be drowning at sea when out of the Disney Tour pops a friendly mermaid to rescue you. Or perhaps you're facing a powerful enemy wizard and in danger or being defeated when a Jedi Knight from the Sci-fi Tour shows up just in the nick of time to save you. But it won't necessarily be something beneficial that appears. The friendly mermaid could just as easily be a hungry shark, or maybe even a dark pirate ship from the Pirate Tour. And just between you and me, one of the kids from the Sci-fi tour has managed to get his hands on a Sun Crusher. I really don't fancy explaining to The Management how something like that ended up here."
"What's to be done about it?" he asked, panicking. He didn't know what a Sun Crusher was, but he could take a pretty good guess.
"Here, take this," said the Auditor. From his pocket he withdrew a small round stone inscribed with a rune, which he recognised as the Anglo-Saxon rune Nyd - Need. He didn't know how he knew it, but he knew. "That'll be your esoteric lore kicking in," said the man without being asked. "Took its time, if you ask me."
"What is this?" Daniel asked, taking the stone from the man's hand.
"A communicator. To use it, run your thumb over the rune, then speak into it. It will connect you to an Auditor who can come along and fix any problems. Only use it if something from another Tour ends up here, though. Use it for complaining or general chit-chat and I'll take it from you and leave you on your own. Then it's your own fault if a piano from the Comedy Tour drops on your head, or if you're accosted by a red-eyed hound from the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Tour."
"I won't abuse it, I swear!" he said, hastily dropping the stone into his money-pouch before the Auditor could take it.
"Good, good." There was a beeping sound, and the man lifted up his sleeve to look at an elaborate wristwatch. It looked like a combination of mechanical gears and electrical doohickeys held together by magic energy. "It's waterproof, too," said the Auditor with a wink. "But I've got to go, there's a leak over on the Steampunk Tour. Remember what I said."
And then he was gone, as if by magic.
o ~ o ^ o ~ o
Opening her eyes with some difficulty, Ari was suddenly overwhelmed by an uncontrollable urge to cough. And cough she did. Though this had the unintended side-effect of stirring up the dust that inhabited the area around her face, making her breath in even more of the stuff and making her wheeze even more. Finally realising the vicious-circle created by the faithful laws of action-and-reaction, she pushed herself to her knees, narrowly avoiding scalping herself on the outstretched arm of a cactus.
A cactus? There were no cacti in England! Barring, of course those fake blow-up ones or one of the rare specimens lovingly cultivated at botanical gardens. But, as she surveyed her surroundings, it became painfully obvious that she was not in a botanical garden. Or any place that even remotely resembled England, for that matter. In front of her stretched, as far as her eyes could see…a desert. Actually, wasteland was the more appropriate word because deserts housed flora and fauna, of which she could see none here.
Turning her gaze to the left, her eyes widened in surprise as she saw a long queue of people waiting with varying degrees of patience in front of a wobbly plastic table. Beyond that, a wooden sign-post bearing a single word: 'HERE' in big capital letters. Frowning in confusion, she pushed herself to her feet and dusted herself off as best she could, realising (with some distaste) that she was dressed in some ridiculous costume…
She groaned as her memory kicked in and reminded her how she had ended up in this… place…whatever and wherever this was. The table down there seemed to be manned by a serious-looking, no-nonsense chap, so for want of anything else do to, she made her way down the small rise.
Pushing her way to the front of the ridiculously long queue (leaving behind her a cloud of angry protests and a few choice references to her mother), she halted in front of the suited man with a balding head and planted her hands squarely on the table. She fixed him with her best 'I-am-not-happy-and-you-better-fix-my-problem-or-else' expression.
"Yes? May I help you?" the man asked, without looking up from his paperwork.
"Yes, you bloody well can help me!" she gritted through clenched teeth. "Where in God's name am I? And how the hell do I get out of here?"
"You are Here. Didn't you see the sign?" the man asked in a voice that was probably intended to make her feel like a stupid child. This only served to irritate Ari further.
"Of course I saw the bloody sign, but it's not very informative now, is it?"
The man sighed, put down his pen and gave her a level gaze. "'Here' is the Starting Point of all Fantasy Tours, located on the edge of Fantasyland. And you would know that had you read your Tour book. You would also know that the only way to leave Fantasyland is by successfully completing all three tours. Now, if there is nothing else, then I suggest that you step aside and stop obstructing the queue."
"No! I am not going anywhere until I speak to The Management! I have a very long list of complaints to make and I demand that you take me home now or I'll…"
"In that case, I am sorry but I cannot help you. I am simply a Tour Operator subcontracted by The Management to ensure all of your Tour needs are fulfilled. In any event, all complaints are to be submitted to The Management in writing."
"Then where can I find The Management?" This man was seriously testing what little patience she had left.
"I'm afraid that's classified information."
"W-what?" spluttered Ari. "You can't be serious! As a consumer I have the right to submit a complaint and I fully inten-" She only vaguely realised that she was screaming, but she didn't care. Plus, being angry was far better than being scared, which was what she really was. She had no idea where she was, how to get home, and the staff were being worse than unhelpful. For all she knew, she had been kidnapped and these people intended to sell her to sex-traffickers or something equally horrendous…
"Security, we have a Code 501B," the man said into a walky-talky he had pulled from his pocket. "Requesting back-up." The next instant, two men muscular men, who looked like they had just stepped from The Matrix, appeared out of thin air and grabbed her. She struggled in vain. "Young lady, I suggest that you make your way quietly and without fuss to the town. There you can get all the necessary supplies and start your Tour." The man's voice was steady but it belied an ominous undertone. "Otherwise these fine gentlemen here will be forced to carry out their job descriptions."
Ari gulped and gave a small nod. She had no wish to find out what the details of these 'job descriptions' were. The beefy hands released her and with a small pop the agents were gone. Taking a shaky breath to calm herself and to stop herself from shedding the tears that were gathering, she started walking towards the ramshackle town.