Every Silver Lining has its Cloud: For want of a Nail
"Hi," the woman said as she stepped into the daycare. "I'm here to volunteer by telling a story. I think this is where I'm supposed to be."
"Oh, thank goodness," the exhausted nanny said. "I'm Rita, please forgive the mess. With the flu going around half my help's called in sick. You're Aphrodesia's replacement?"
"For today at least," the woman said. "And you don't have to worry, I've got children of my own. I know how they can be."
"Thank you," Rita said with a sigh. "I just managed to herd them into the nap room. You can start as soon as you want."
"Oh, great!" the woman said, rubbing her hands together in a manner that wasn't exactly reassuring.
"So what were you going to read? We've been through Dr. Seuss enough so I think they've got them all memorized," Rita said.
"I thought I'd go for some old time oral storytelling," Aphrodesia's replacement said. "There's a lot to be said for tradition."
"Well if you're not sure, we've got a few newer books in the lounge," Rita told her. The woman nodded in thanks. "Well, if you're all set, I'll go do the paperwork. Thank you for coming in on such short notice."
"It's not a problem, not at all."
There's a story. I can't remember who wrote it first. But, like many stories, it has a moral. It's basically that a little mistake can have consequences much larger than the initial act. One version starts out:
For want of a nail a horseshoe was lost,
for want of a horseshoe a horse went lame,
for want of a horse a rider never got through,
for want of a rider a message never arrived,
for want of a message an army was never sent,
for want of an army a battle was lost,
for want of a battle a war was lost,
for want of a war a kingdom fell.
All for want of a nail.
It's a lesson in causality. The idea that one insignificant event can have big consequences. Just as there is the theory that a butterfly flapping its wings in Vietnam causes a hurricane to spring up in the Gulf of Mexico. It's part of the lesson that everything is connected. Small events have big consequences.
"Hi, kids," the woman said as she sat down in a beanbag chair. She heard the chorused reply of "hi" and smiled. She glanced around. There were white kids, black kids, Asian kids, Hispanic kids. There were orcish kids, human kids, gnomish kids, goblin kids. She smiled. "Who wants to hear a story?"
Hands reached for the sky and waved with chorused called of "Me! Me!" ringing through the room.
"Well, come in close, because I want everyone to hear," she said, casting her gaze about the room and making eye contact with every child. "Once upon a time, there was a magical town called Sunnydale."
The look of amazement on their faces was something only children could achieve as they realized that they lived in this magical town. The woman nodded encouragingly. "That's right, Sunnydale. That's where we are now, right? Well, some time ago, there lived a young woman. She had long blonde hair and she was quite pretty."
"Was it Buffy?"
"No, no, it wasn't Buffy, but that was a good guess," the woman said. "Does anyone else know?" there were a few suggestions, but none of them came close. "No, her name was Harmony Kendall. And while she was quite pretty on the outside, she was not a nice person inside. She was like an apple with a worm inside." There was something disconcerting when the woman said the word "apple" but the children didn't seem to notice.
"Was she evil?"
"No, she wasn't evil, but she wasn't nice either," the storyteller continued. "You see, she cared about her own appearance more than she cared about other people."
"That's not nice," one girl in the front said.
"No, it's not," the woman replied. "And there was one day when Harmony was supposed to be working, but she wasn't working hard."
"What did she do?"
"Instead of working hard, she chose to check her make up," the woman continued. "And when she left to look in the mirror, she dropped the box of decorations that she was supposed to be moving to the gym. And there it was, a big box of tinsel, balloons and other supplies, right in the middle of the hallway." She glanced around to make sure she was keeping their attention. "Soon, along came Mrs. Pome. Now, Mrs. Pome was allergic to latex, which was all over the balloons that Harmony dropped all over the hall. As Mrs. Pome walked down the hallway, she slipped on a piece of the tinsel and fell face first into the latex."
"Was she okay?"
The woman shook her head sadly. "No, Mrs. Pome got very sick. It's not nice being sick is it? Yuck! But she was so sick that the school had to call for an ambulance. And there she was, being taken to the hospital because Harmony didn't do what she was supposed to. Now, that wasn't very nice, was it? No. But Mrs. Pome was okay because she got to the hospital." She smiled as the kids' faces perked up. "But across town, Buffy, you know Buffy, right?" Those kids showed expressions of hero worship as the woman mentioned Sunnydale's own superheroine. "Across town, Buffy Summers was running to save the town from the evil Angelus. Angelus was a very bad vampire."
"Why was he bad?"
"He liked to hurt people, and he really wanted to hurt Buffy," the woman said and stifled an amused laugh at the scowls of the children. They didn't like Angelus either. "But because Harmony didn't do her job, Mrs. Pome had to go to the hospital. And Buffy was running across town to fight the evil Angelus, but halfway there, Buffy had to wait for the ambulance to pass."
"Was she too late?"
"No, she wasn't too late, but she was later than she wanted," the woman replied. "Buffy arrived and fought the evil Angelus. She showed up, but Angelus had already opened a portal. Buffy and Angelus fought with swords, blade to blade. Each would strike and the other would block. And then, Angelus struck, cutting Buffy."
The children gasped in horror.
"But all was not lost," the woman said. "At the hospital, Willow, the Red Witch, was sleeping."
"Buffy's friend?"
"Yes, Buffy's friend," the woman agreed. "She had been attacked by the evil Angelus' vampire daughter, the mad Drusilla. And Willow was sleeping because of the attack."
"But she's a good witch!"
"Yes, she is, but even good witches need time to heal, and doctors to help them heal," the woman replied. "And because Mrs. Pome was in the emergency room, the doctors had to wait to wake Willow the Red Witch." She glanced around once more. "All the while, Buffy fought the evil Angelus. She wasn't about to let him hurt the world. When that first attack hit, Angelus thought he had won, but Buffy quickly told him otherwise and counter attacked, forcing the evil master vampire back as only a Vampire Slayer could. But Buffy was a living girl, even if she was the Vampire Slayer, and she'd been fighting for a long time. She was starting to get tired."
"Oh no!" one of the kids exclaimed.
"It was okay, because back at the hospital, the doctors had finally given Willow the Red Witch her medicine," the woman told them as she continued the story. "Willow woke up and had her friends help her cast a magic spell."
"What did the spell do?"
"It turned the evil Angelus back into the hero Angel," the woman said. The looks of glee on the children was quite a reward. If there was anything a story needed more than a hero it was a villain that was restored to herodom. "As Buffy and Angelus fought, she felt her opponent stop his attack and realized that Willow had saved Angel. Together, Buffy and Angel stopped the portal." The children cheered.
"What happened after that? Did they live happily ever after?"
"No, not yet," the woman said. "But they did have some more adventures together. I'll tell you the Story of How Sunnydale came to the Realms when I stop by tomorrow."
"Not now?"
"No," the woman said. "Now it's time for you to take a nap."
"But I'm not tired!"
"Remember what almost happened when Harmony didn't do what she was supposed to?" the woman asked and watched as eyes bugged out. "Uh-huh, Buffy almost got hurt."
"I *yawn!* guess I could take a nap," the boy said.
"I thought so," commented the woman with a mysterious smile.
The next day the woman was back and Rita had never been more happy to see someone in her life. Rita grabbed the woman's hand and shook it in relief.
"Oh, thank you, so much," Rita said. "They've been talking about your story ever since they woke up after their nap. Judging by what parents said as they dropped them off this morning, they didn't stop talking about it when they went home, either."
"I'm glad I made an impression," the woman replied with a sly grin. She was greeted with hugs as she walked into the story room. "Okay, okay, calm down. Let's all sit down and we'll listen to another story."
As the days went by, the woman told of Buffy vs. the Green Dragon, and Buffy in the Mountain City and eventually told almost every story there was about Buffy the Slayer, Willow the Red Witch, Xander the White Knight, and Giles the Watcher. Drizzt Do'Urden was another popular figure, but every story always started with an accident and every story had a lesson like the stories of old. Just as ancient fables had lessons and morals, so did the woman's stories, but each and every one was true to a certain extent and showed people that the children knew. It was a sad parting when Aphrodesia got better and came back to work. One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish just didn't cut it after hearing Buffy verses the Master.
As the woman was about to leave for the last time, Rita stopped her.
"Was it true, did the Kendall girl really cause all this to happen?" she asked.
"Not everything," the woman replied. "But everything is connected. Harmony Kendall's upbringing with a lack of responsibility did make things worse. Maybe if she hadn't left that box to check her makeup, things would have been different, but speculation won't help you now. She did what she did, and it had consequences. So, yes, the Kendalls are responsible for the situation Sunnydale is in right now."
"It's like that, if a person gets up on the right side or the left side of the bed thing, isn't it?"
"Everything has causality, Rita, everything," the dark skinned woman said. The woman smiled slightly, reveling in the chaos it would cause. While the blame couldn't really be put on Harmony -in truth the cheerleader's responsibility ended with Mrs. Pome- but the rumors would spread, blaming it on the girl which would taint her father in turn. A little lie can grow, just as it takes a single pebble to start an avalanche, or a butterfly's wings in the Amazon can start a hurricane that hits New York a few weeks later. Causality, as it has been said, is a bitch. She cocked her head and reached into her pocket. "Apple?"
Some lines of causality don't make as good stories for children as others. One that wouldn't have made as much sense was the Story of How Giles Moved Out.
You see, with the change of status Giles had, he just simply didn't have the same kind of time on his hands. Running the Initiative and acting as a member of the cabinet made things a bit more difficult and he had decided that a displaced family could better use his flat, than he could. He was moving his books to the Initiative anyway, and it only made sense for him to find a smaller place.
As such, it only made sense to have some others move his belongings for him.
Sunnydale Movers was a typical Sunnydale company. The owners had been attracted by the low housing costs and only later discovered why. However, in their case, they no longer had the long range shipping that they did before, and had become responsible for moving people from housing unit to housing unit after the Shift. For them to be moving Giles' possessions was no big deal.
But then they hired Jack O'Toole. As everyone of a certain age was required to work, Jack needed a job and only Sunnydale Movers, a company that hadn't been in town long enough to learn his reputation, was willing to hire him.
Young Jack was your typical Sunnydale ne'er-do-well. He was a chain smoker at 13, into drugs less than a year later, an amateur black magic dabbler (no doubt due to his necromancer grandfather), and occasional thief. And now he was responsible for moving, packing and handling other people's things. It should have been no surprise that a box here and a box there vanished from the wagons as so many people were consolidating living spaces.
However, most of his usual avenues of illicit sales were closed after the Shift, so he was forced to try something else. His opportunity arrived with the Zhentarim.
The Zhentarim, as some might be aware, are not the most respected organization. Several hundred years old, it was founded by Manshoon, a well known evil wizard of great power who still holds significant power in the organization today. They tend to go about taking a place over in one of three ways: economy, religion or force. After witnessing the power Sunnydale displayed against the demonic horde of Hellgate Keep, Manshoon was well aware that force might well be a poor choice. Religion was an equally, or greater, problematic choice as Sunnydale was not quite as willing to convert and had strict protections of freedom of religion. This was regardless of what the fool Fzoul thought. So that left economic means, which would be, by far, the easiest choice.
Sunnydale needed things and the Zhentarim could provide them.
It was rather simple.
And it worked: a trade of illicit goods went in and out of Sunnydale.
Now, as word of this new metropolis spread (and a community of 40,000 people in the Forgotten Realms did constitute a metropolis), so did a market for Sunnydale "artifacts." It wasn't long before excess, superfluous goods were showing up in markets as far as Waterdeep and Baldur's Gate, or even the desert cities of Amn. And this brings us back to Jack O'Toole.
There were three boxes that he had purloined from Giles' possessions. The first contained little more than a few old, worn tweed suits that had entered the black market via the Silver Marches merchants. From there it went west to Silverymoon and the individual pieces were spread around, some entering the wardrobes of such people as the Herald of Neverwinter and two of the masked lords of Waterdeep. The styles were copied and began a new tweed trend in Waterdavian fashion causing Giles to accidentally be at the height of fashion.
The second box contained another series of clothes. These were in garish colors and sized for young human children or tall, slim gnomes and halflings. If Giles had been asked, he would have identified them as some of the many costumes leftover from Ethan's Halloween celebration which the Watcher had been attempting to analyze, but seemed to never have the time. There were many of the costumes on the market. Most of the children that wore them the first time had grown out of them, and costumes weren't very practical clothes, especially the cheaper versions. In fact, those costumes were one of the most common items sold off. While they weren't worth much individually, the value was added the further and further one traveled from the transported city. Twenty-Five of these garishly colored costumes arrived in the hands of a halfling acting troupe that had been staying in the tavern Selune's Smile in Waterdeep. Several of various styles arrived at the High Temple of Gond also in Lantan. One of the few adult sized costumes went to a pirate from Luskan. The others went all over the Realms, many to people of various levels of wealth, but only a select few were regularly worn.
The third and final box was of more interest to the Zhentarim agent that purchased it. Unlike the other two, that, while heavy, contained relatively worthless goods, this had a series of notebooks detailing Rupert Giles' stay in Sunnydale and detailed notes on the various magics he and his Slayer had encountered over the years. These were boxed up and forgotten since Willow had long since transcribed them into digital media. In particular interest to the Black Cloaks, the arcane arm of the Zhentarim, were Giles' notes on the long term effects of Ethan Rayne's Halloween spell. The concept that a relatively simple spell could grant important skills and knowledge was an instant delight. Giles wouldn't miss these notes for years.
The problem with using these notes is that Giles tended to only jot down what he wouldn't remember; minute details while the broad facts were still stored in his long term memory. That the costumes were the impetus for the transformation was not something that he would record as it wasn't something any of the people involved were likely to forget. It was rather common knowledge with Butters' talk of being Abraham Lincoln for a night. That the ritual took place on Halloween wasn't recorded either, as that too, was common knowledge to Sunnydalers. These were facts that the Watcher had recorded in his official Watcher's Journal, but those tomes were well protected and not something Giles would have someone else move, no matter how busy he was.
The notes were studied in detail in the Citadel of the Raven. This was a castle that the Zhentarim had spent many years trying to take and had finally succeeded. It had many of the rare magical items that the organization had acquired over the years and had sequestered for further study. And that brings us to Giles' notes.
"Ah, yes, I see," said Kaleen, a young Black Cloak mage. She wasn't one of the more active members, but a secretive and bookish mage. She had long black hair, pale skin and dark eyes. She wore the eponymous clothing of her order, but the purely combat spells she knew one could count without having to take one's shoes off. Her true mastery was in the creation, analyzing and reproduction of magical items and enchantments and rare spells and had a deep knowledge of magical creatures and effects. In other words, she was the Zhentarim's industrial espionage expert crossed with their Giles. For five months she had been studying the texts. It was clear that they were incomplete, but she was confident that she had managed to fill in the blanks.
She had the bust as a magical focus. Unlike Ethan, who had used Janus, she used her personal patron deity, Azuth. It had been expertly crafted from alabaster by a master of the craft. The notes mentioned Janus, but she lacked the cultural knowledge for context, so she had made her own.
Kaleen had no more knowledge of the precise incantation Ethan Rayne had used than Giles did, and so she had made her own.
She had no knowledge that it was tied to costumes, so she didn't bother to make them.
With a series of arcane phrases in the near forgotten language of Netheril, Kaleen began her spell.
One of Azuth's tenets is the expansion and diffusion of magic and knowledge. He considers it to be one of the most important duties of any spellcaster and there is nothing that he hates more than those magic users who hoard magic like dragons hoard wealth. So even when the spell probably shouldn't have worked, Azuth gave his worshiper a little push.
NOW:
Laspin Skullsplitter was a nasty piece of work. He was born in Luskan to a dockside innkeeper's daughter in that same Inn. He'd killed his grandfather and grandmother when he was ten. He'd kept his mother around because he could. When he was fifteen he left her after selling the inn and took up on a pirate ship. By eighteen he'd managed to kill, fight and work his way up to captain, not necessarily in that particular order.
He had arrived in Skullport two days ago. Skullport was the Mos Eisley of the Forgotten Realms, as never would you find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy as the unlawful subterranean city. Situated under Waterdeep and not far from the legendary dungeons of Undermountain, Skullport was where criminals went to work. About the only goodly people who weren't passing through the city were the drow followers of Eilistraee, the patron deity of good drow. Needless to say, a piece of trash like Laspin Skullsplitter fit right in with most of the crowd and with his reputation, he was feared enough to even stand above the heap to a certain degree.
He had arrived to take up an offer by several other pirates of an alliance. And there he was, in his Sunnydale costume. The material itself was thin, but had padding inside to make the wearer seem to have much bigger muscles. On his belt, on bandoleers and on his back were the other parts of his costume, plastic weapons that had no functionality, but looked impressive with sounds and glowing lights when buttons were pressed. It was a symbol of his wealth that he was able to afford to buy or steal a Sunnydale item. It was complete with a thick pair of boots on his feet. It was black from head to toe with the exception of a white skull in the middle of his chest.
He was in mid-laugh when the spell went into effect. His laughter stopped as Laspin vanished, the plastic became steel, the pineapple shaped balls turned into grenades and Frank Castle took over. Frank watched as one of the other pirates threw a knife at a bound boy, just because he could. Frank might not know much about dimensional transportation, but Frank knew a criminal when he saw one.
He didn't even say anything. The Punisher shot the pirate in the head with a shotgun. Frank spun around, pumped the twelve gauge and put two more in the chests of the pirates next to the first.
"Laspin! We had a truce!" one of the remaining pirates yelled in outrage. Frank put a bullet in his brain pan. Knives came out and the Punisher burst into motion, guns blazing. Knives are good weapons. They can be thrown, they can be hidden, and they're great for close combat fights, but there's some truth to that adage about bringing a sword to a gunfight.
Frank Castle in Laspin Skullsplitter's body stood above the boy with the knife wound. The boy only knew the reputation of the body, not the man currently in the driver's seat, so he cowered in fear of what he would do next. The man had, after all, just killed nearly everyone else in the tavern. Frank bent down and bound the boy's wound with a scrap of cloth.
"Let's get you to a doctor, kid," he said as the Punisher picked up the wounded boy and carried him out to the bright sun, a rather long task considering where the deal had taken place.
Lantan was a land of innovation. While most of the Realms were strictly middle ages in terms of technology, Lantan was progressively Renaissance. They had black powder weapons, of poor reliability, but they had them. Their ships were stronger, although not perfect. Their knowledge of mechanics was greater than most other places. They even had zeppelins that didn't need magic to run, although they usually gave it a boost with a touch of the Weave. They even had more extreme weapons and technologies that nearly mimicked magic. Rumors had it that some could even harness the power of lightning for awesome feats.
So when Sunnydale arrived, a nation with technology several steps beyond what most Lantanese and Gondsmen could even imagine, they were filled with delight at the possibilities. They wanted more and more. Anything that they could learn about Sunnydale was wanted, needed even.
Most of what they collected, at great cost to them, was next to useless. Parts of computers, old radios and the like had no context as to how they worked, but the Lantanese were breaking them apart and putting them together and even making perfect reproductions. These reproductions were sold to others as status symbols showing that they had "real" Sunnydale goods. In the process, they advanced their knowledge of metallurgy and plastics by leaps and bounds. They began producing rubber and other raw materials to replicate tires and other "useful" items.
Contrary to what most Sunnydalers thought, most of the recycled goods were not actually being recycled. Most were being sold in the markets as luxury goods. In Waterdeep, an opened can of baked beans with lable sold for 40 gold pieces only to spend time on a shelf next to a priceless Kara-Tur vase. They could have made their own can of beans for much less than one gold piece.
Soon, though, shipping merchants learned of the thirst for Sunnydale goods that Lantan had and started bypassing the Sword Coast all together and heading by ship right south. The gold they made greatly outweighed the greater costs of a longer trip. Costumes were just one of the many things that people ferried down south to the industrious island nation, they went north with cheaper reproductions that they sold to other cities along the Faerune coast. A year after the Shift, there wasn't a Noble within 40 leagues of the coast that wasn't a proud owner of a Lantanese reproduction of a Sunnydale original. Of course, thanks to silver tongued merchants, most of those customers were ignorant of the reproduction nature.
Then a miracle happened.
That would be Kaleen's spell.
Like in Luskan, the various people who regularly wore pieces of Sunnydale costumes took on the aspects of their costume, regardless of how ignorant people were of their own costumes. Some costumes were sold in pieces, so there might be five people wearing parts of the same costume.
But the miracle wasn't another superhero. It wasn't the numerous gnomes who started healing quickly or were able to make blades spring from their knuckles that changed everything. It wasn't the human who discovered she could climb buildings and swing from a thread of alchemically generated spider-silk. It wasn't even the gnome who could fly, shoot fire from her eyes and lift a galleon over her head one handed. She might have been faster than a speeding arrow, more powerful than a charging dragon, able to leap mage towers in a single bound, but she wasn't Lantan's greatest hero.
No, the true hero of Lantan came in the most mundane costume of all.
The High Cleric of Gond had, like most others, bought as much Sunnydale goods as possible. He, unlike many others of his faith, was a fairly humble man and had forgone the yellow and blue spandex. He was not a man who was interested in capes and primary colors. The good cleric had little trust for large, impracticable hammers with statements of worth printed on the side. He had also ignored the gleaming plastic armor that provided no protection; red and gold weren't his colors anyway.
No, this humble high priest had chosen a simple gray suit with a name tag: Henry Ford. And he brought forth the Miracle of Mass Production. The Church of Gond canonized the industrial revolutionary as a saint, although they tended to gloss over Saint Henry's racist beliefs in favor of his inventions.
Frank Castle had been forced to flee Skullport when the true rulers, thirteen disembodied, flying, burning, intelligent skulls, had decided to take action against him. The one thing you never do in Skullport is disrupt trade, and that includes the slaves quarter that Frank had managed to damage severely. Frank is not, has never been, and will never be, a fan of slavery.
By the time the spell was broken, the symbol of the White Skull was well known along the Sword Coast. No one knew who he, she or they were, but most assumed the White Skull was a paladin that had decided a longsword was not the weapon of choice.
Frank Castle did have an effect on the field of combat. His weapons, transformed due to the spell, had not lasted long. Soon after his first rampage in Skullport, he had been forced to have new ones built to the same specifications. The dwarf he recruited was an old grizzled fellow that went by the name of Pillar of Gold who lived in the layer between Waterdeep and Skullport.
As the old dwarf had told Frank, the six Pillars of Gold were the Chosen of Dumathoin, one of the greater deities of dwarvenkind and the Patron of underground dwarves. Pill, as Frank had come to call him, was glad for the work, as being stuck in the ground was rather boring when you had nothing to do but stay there to keep Dwarfkind strong. The only thing Frank had to acquire was raw materials and he supplied these in the form of the weapons and armor of the fallen. Together, Frank and Pill had built an entire forge and factory in the sewers of Waterdeep.
The boy that Frank rescued would have a varied life, but would later be known as Mirt. Some would call him merciless, others would call him moneylender.
Kaleen was disappointed that her spell had not given her apprentice the knowledge of Elminster like she had hoped it would. She had tried several times with several different incantations, but the apprentice remained an ignoramus who could barely cast a light spell. With a growl of frustration, the Black Cloak researcher had moved the bust to storage and went back to the drawing board in an attempt to figure out what she had done wrong. It would remain there for five months before an overzealous Baneite decided that such a work of art was unworthy of existing.
The bust of Azuth destroyed, the spell ended.
But just like how the original victims of the Sunnydale version had lasting memories, so did those affected by this new version. The difference was that where Xander, Buffy, Willow and the others of that fateful night were affected for only a short period of time, a few hours at most, this new spell was in effect for months. The changes were rather dramatic.
When Laspin had been naught but a passenger in his own body, he experienced everything that Frank did. He knew the motivation, the reasoning and the feelings behind the Punisher's actions. He had also witnessed a single minded brutality that even the feared pirate Laspin Skullsplitter could have only dreamed of before the spell. The Punisher was hard working, dedicated and had a strict code of honor that superseded his belief in the sanctity of the law and the consequences for those who broke it. And then he had a zealot paladin's stance against evil and harmful criminal activity.
All that passed over to the man who had once been Laspin Skullsplitter. He would be legend.
In Lantan, four months after the High Priest of Gond felt the Spirit of Industry (as Henry Ford had become known as on the isle) the first Lantanese personal automobiles rolled off the lot. Their ships were outfitted with steam engines and their airships assisted with automated rudders and fans. The Industrial Revolution of Faerun had begun.
I do not own any character referenced in this chapter. Thanks, be they many, go to Janessa Ravenwood, she of the great proofreading whom I bow before in fear and diffidence.
On the Subject of Henry Ford, some will say that there is some debate about how racist he was, but in the end the paper he published printed Nazi statements. It's a fair bet that he had at least some anti-semetic leanings or otherwise he wouldn't have allowed those statements to be printed.
Next time: When Emus Attack!