40d:Stories/Archive 15

The Situation Worsens^DF

(read the below introduction or just view the image with knowledge that this is my first fortress) It was my second spring, and my already bad situation was becoming worse fast. After jumping into the world for the first time with my wiki-supported build, i was working my way through my first year. It was going relatively well, as far as I knew, but I was slowly running out of supplies. By the time the traders came for the first time I wasn't prepared. Though, driven by the knowledge that my meat supplies were already naught, I quickly build a trade depot and managed to trade a mechanism for a small portion of meat. Admittedly, I did not build these to trade them. Sadly the stone items I had crafted for trading were sacrificed to their dwarven leader due to a large misreading on my part. This is a mistake which, I can only assume, was the trigger for my problems in the future. As the trading caravan moved away I tried to prepare for a long winter with low supplies. My food quickly ran low and, left only with seeds due to a large farming accident involving a (poorly)controlled flooding system, most of my dwarven inhabitants were soon hunting for vermin to survive. Though my hope was diminishing I kept struggling to keep my team alive. One day as I was orchestrating their movements I glanced to the bottom of my screen, and to my amazement I read the words "Spring has arrived!". I was not only delighted, but now filled with ideas and hope. So i began to work towards recovering, but because of my lacking knowledge and experience (not to mention the constant flooding of my farm), I could only maintain my current state. I worked along, but one day... (I wasn't quite expecting the 18 new immigrants in the middle of spring...

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Invasion of the Ratmen^DF

It was the third autumn of the dwarven expedition to this mountain. Everything was great. They were trying to build over the monstrous magma river. All effort was put on getting the steel for the bridge. The outpost's warrior was out getting wood for the winter... then the ratmen came. The dwarves had met them before, two or three at a time. This was the ratmens' final attack on the dwarves. 20 ratmen snuck up on them, killing all but the warrior dwarf far away. When he came back, he went crazy, killing them all... or so he thought. One last ratman snuck up behind him and pushed the brave dwarf off the edge of the river, letting him fall to his death.

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A harsh winter^DF

It was a harsh winter, my barreled fish had run out all too soon. My Dwarfs were miserable, some had resorted to vermin. My fisherdwarf was being enterprising, fishing alone in the cavern stream. Unfortunately frogmen jumped from the icy waters and surrounded him biting and pummeling him. He was rescued but the event caused him to lose what little was left of his sanity. He began to start fist fights. He started one with the metal worker, the fisherman's faithful dog interrupted him - he took out his cross bow and shot his only pet dead. (He was later killed by the rest of the dwarf clan.)

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The Dog Dwarves of Inktin^DF

In the year 1052 they arrived at the site of their future mountain fortress, hungry, tired, cold, and with a wagon full of dogs and rum. The rum was quickly drunk, but the dogs stayed with the dwarves as they carved out their home. The dogs... they multiplied. Soon they outnumbered the dwarves many times over. As a visitor in a passing caravan or as a new migrant, you'll find that their home is the safest in all the lands, being guarded by endless hordes of vicious wardogs.

If you spent any time around them however, you'd find them a bit peculiar. They wore leather, lots of it. They made fine crafts of stone and bone... lots of bone. And their larders were always well stocked with meat that tastes unlike most meals that you'd find anywhere else. At that point a thought would strike you and you'd excuse yourself, edging your way out the dining room then running for the exit and your trading wagons, eager to flee, past the kitchen doorway, through which you'd see lots of adorable little puppies milling about a large slab, covered with blood and with a cleaving knife laid across it, a steady stream of bones and hides being borne out towards the workshops.

They really do love their dogs at Inktin.

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Parabolart's Carpenter^DF

"Great. My carpenter got possessed and all he made was a wooden barrel. He gave it a name though!" -- parabolart

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The Lunatic Child^DF

Right before our second winter, a child was born - as his mother was attacked by a pack of frogmen at the well. Strategic parts of the ceiling collapsed on the frogmen and a pair of marksdwarves down the hall opened fire, slaying the intruders where they stood, even as the child Edem came into the world. Edem's mother, Lokem, died of thirst in the winter: she was so distraught over her rambunctious son that she never took a drink of water. At the beginning of the following summer (our third at Netdune), Edem was possessed by a fey spirit. Into a craftdwarf's workshop, he took a turtle shell and two rolls of cloth, one of pig tail and one of spider silk. A month later, he emerged a Legendary Bone Carver. In his Extremely Tough hand lie Onshenfikuk Dalkamkizest Ozor, or "Chantfields the Lean Zeal of Subtetly." Edem had changed: he was Strong and Very Agile, and still less than a year old.

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My First Fortress^DF

As I said, the fortress I'm playing is my first, and I assumed it was doomed. I never got farming going the first year, and I was low on food through the winter. I read here about slaughtering mules and horses, so I did that, and that helped. Although when the first horse was slaughtered like 6 dwarves gathered around and then were kind mopey about it having "witnessed death." Then in early spring, when the farm got running (I never did make a working floodgate, but I just let the river flood my fields) I figured I might just make it. Then the frogmen came and attacked my farm. They struck down one of my peasants but the rest of the dwarves beat the frogmen with their bare hands.

Then a trapper started throwing a tantrum. She was doing it in her sleep, so I look, and she was married to the dead peasant, AND had a miscarriage, so was distraught over that. I was going to put a door on her room and lock her in, but she got better. But then later on when the human caravan showed up (with nothing but food ) she went nuts again and struck down a peasant herself. Then she ran off next to the lake and I figured she'd mope herself to death.

Nope. She eventually came back in and started hitting people. The carpenter smacked her right in the head (yellow!) and she finally went back to her room to lie down. I ordered a door put on her room but she went nuts when the laborer came by to do it and ran out (with a wounded head!) and smacked a jeweler in the head as well. Finally I got a door on her room, and when she went back in, I locked the door. So now she's in there raging and throwing tantrums, but I am NOT going to let her out. I've lost enough dwarves over all her PMS.

-- Doctor Zero (Aug 21, 2006)

Postscript: She eventually calmed down and hadn't thrown a tantrum for quite a while, so I started feeling bad for her. Who wouldn't go a little nuts after losing a husband and baby? So I let her out of her room, and she immediately runs down to the dining room and strikes down a peasant. Before I can do anything about it, a dog comes out of nowhere and rips off her arm and tears out her abdomen. She struggles with the dog for a while, rapidly losing strength. She finally slips unconscious. The dog, now tired from the struggle, proceeds to slowly (and I mean SLOWLY) tear her apart limb from limb right there in the entry to the dining room. It took so long, she woke up halfway through and started struggling with the dog, but only having one good limb at this point was kinda detrimental. She finally bled to death.

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The Secret Desire^DF

A healthy colony of dwarves was bolstered by the arrival (as usual) in early fall of a metalsmith. She was a hearty and jolly spirit named Etur, and she worked hard to become a part of the thriving community.

Soon after Etur arrived, a trader caravan of two mules was spotted in the distance, across the river. Unfortunately, that side of the river was also the domain of a crazy herd of elephants, and some vicious tigers. As the caravan drew closer, the elephants charged and stomped one of the mules and it's attendant. The rest of the caravan was scattered to the four winds, and the corpse remained with oodles of booty for looting laying out on the ground around the mule's corpse.

After some quick raiders managed to bring some bolts of silk back to the fortress, Etur was entranced by the beautiful fabric. She thought of nothing more all day than getting herself a bolt and fashioning a dress, and maybe a collar for her cat. But the elephants and tigers across the river meant that salvaging anything from the corpse was risky.

But one night, while the rest of the community lay snuggly in their beds, Etur and her cat set out towards the river. After crossing the bridge and seeing no Elephants in sight, Etur made a mad dash for the stash, kitty in tow. But just as she began to head back, silk tucked under her arm and cat chasing behind her,a rogue elephant came charging after her. She ran as fast as her stumpy little legs could take her. In a heartbeat, she was across the bridge and heading for home, but the elephant stormed across and stomped her into paste.

As the insane pachyderm left her corpse behind, Etur's cat cuddled up at her lifeless feet. Her comrades remained asleep and did not find her body until the next morning.

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The Tragic Miner^DF

Kol Sedilònul had a good life at the fortress of Atöllogem (translated as "Findpaint" in the human tongue). She worked hard day in and day out at her mining duties, and attained the rank of Legend. How could she have know that the day ònul Eraraban arrived at the settlement would be the beginning of the end for her?

Despite the master's prohibition against hunting, ònul set out for the wilds immediately after arriving to see what beasts he could trap or kill. Unfortunately, he decided to try his luck against a herd of gorillas. Even more unfortunately, he lived through his massive head injuries and managed to crawl back to the barracks.

For the next year, ònul spent his time tantruming in the corner bed, refusing to let his wounds heal. One day he finally snapped, took up his crossbow, and shot three other dwarves before being put down by the highly trained swordsdwarves of Atöllogem. One of those three was Kol.

Though she took only a glancing blow to the head, Kol was never the same after that day. She found herself losing consciousness on the way to the dig sites. When she woke up, she would painfully crawl back to her bed, by which time she felt strong enough to go back to work, only to pass out again and again.

On the final day of her life, Kol felt herself swooning. She summoned all her rage, fought back against the darkness, and stayed on her feet. She knew she couldn't go on like this... so she went straight to the only bridge across the cave river and dropped it out from under herself, frustrating the sheriff, who despite his best efforts couldn't shackle her drowned corpse. Kol had washed up on the far side of the river, just a few paces away from the newly dug tombs.

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Olon the Kinslayer, leatherworker of Yore^DF

So I barely made it through the winter. Didn't have to eat the dogs, but I was at the point where half my dwarves were hunting for vermin, while my few desperate fisherman fished up a storm from the underground river, and tried to clean the damn things at a pace to meet demand. Lost a dwarf to starvation, but made it to spring and finally got some crops in the ground. My early spring migrants doubled my population, bringing all sorts of useless talent (oh hurray... more jewelers...).

The only solution of course was to make the jewelers hunters. Armed with the few crossbows I had around, or their fists, Olin and Edem set out to hunt deer. Edem has become a rockstar, wrestling 5-10 deer to death, occasionally deigning to fire fish bone crossbow bolts to do the job. Olin on the other hand got his ass handed to him, and is currently being starved to death in his room.

Now then, this finally brings us to my story. As a result of having all this deer carcass to process, I set the butchery to repeat butcher, and rooted around to find my one novice butcher, and set him to work. A day or so later, tragedy strikes. "Olon Erithseneb has been taken by a fell mood! Olon Erithseneb has killed Vabok! Olon has claimed a butchery!"

So here I am panicking a moment. As I take a look, it appears he entered his little craftsmen's trance, seizing the butchery for his holy/unholy work (already I am a little concerned). As my butcher was currently in there trying to butcher deer at a frantic pace, murder was obviously the answer.

So after a day or so of dedicated work, Olon emerges victorious having created this:

Olon Erethseneb has created Kessoshosh, a dwarf leather leggings!

Now unless I am misunderstanding this, his fey trance led him to murder a fellow countryman.... and create pants from his still bleeding corpse.

Simply stunning. He is of course a legendary leatherworker now... I can only hope he will be happy working with more mundane materials in the future....

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The Goblin Siege^DF

In the early spring of 1058, the glorious dwarven fortress of Faththatthil, or "Sackautumn" to the merchants, entered the 6th year of its reign. Nearly 100 dwarves had hollowed a massive dwelling out of the sheer mountainside. Food and drink were in plenty, all dwarves were content, and children roamed the halls.

Without warning, the Dwarves were suddenly besieged by a massive host of Goblins. The moat ringed the outside perimeter of the mountain, called Shantytown for its hodgepodge collection of workshops. There were three entrances, the North, South, and West bridges. All of the local soldiers were standing down, practicing archery, or sleeping in their beds. They were quickly roused by a call to arms. Dwarves ran through the halls, grabbing weapons, shoving on armor, drafting a militia.

The ragtag group assembled on the West Bridge, guarded by a now ammo-less ballista. It's sole shot had been used to destroy a renegade carpenter, and had not been reloaded recently. First one squad arrived, then two, then nearby dwarves were drafted and sent to pick up crossbows. The defense looked like it had a chance. The goblin horde rolled across the plains, heading south along the river to the bridge. The goblins numbered at least 15, and were bringing foul dogs with them.

By now all nearby dwarves had been enlisted, and they were standing grimly at the West Bridge. Only a handful of soldiers and an equal number of conscripted miners and carpenters were there. Kogan Keskalolin, the founder of Sackautumn, was at the head of the pack. A massive dwarf hefting an iron pick as though it were so little weight, he inspired the others. The Champion and Captain of Sackautumn remained inside, readying a secondary defense and patrolling the traps.

The goblins came, blotting out the sky with arrows. Shafts rained down on the dwarves, piercing flesh and armor. The dwarves mounted a shaky charge, faltering under the horrific onslaught. One dwarf was down to arrows, now two, several more wounded and bleeding. Finally they reached the goblin lines, hacking and bludgeoning. Heads and limbs flew through the air, and the goblins routed. All of the fleeing goblins were cut down easily. Unfortunately a band of looting monkeys attempted to raid the battlefield, but the weary veterans quickly destroyed them.

West Bridge was littered with the dead and dying, covered in fallen armor, weapons, limbs, and blood. Slain monkeys added a touch of humor to the macabre sight. Kogan Keskalolin, the Eldest Dwarf, had fallen in battle, and the Fortress mourned.

All in all 11 goblins had been killed, with the loss of only 4 dwarves. The siege was lifted and the dwarves began replenishing their depleted army.

Unfortunately, only a few months later, the goblins returned. This time there was a full 30 of them, each bringing a pet beak dog with them. The ponderous Human caravan was brutally massacred and 30 dwarves were slain alongside it. The goblins were eventually killed after breaching the fortress and catching the attention of the fortress guard.

The dwarves, sick of so much death, relocated to a new fortress.

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The Doom That Came to Ghostgates^DF

Ghostgates, the most staggering and impressive dwelling of the Dwarves in all of Emeecamo, the Land of Prophecy, had a small amount of trouble with its first captain of the guard. See, the dwarves of the Ghostgates felt that amassing great wealth was a far more promising enterprise than joining the Fortress Guard, so the Captain took out his loneliness on the fortress' trade depot. Which had human merchants (and their wares) currently occupying it.

The Captain was eventually put down when the rest of the dwarves didn't feel like coping with his bullshit, but as for the human merchants...they just sat there. For years. Finally, they disappeared.

Six years passed without a wagon caravan from the human civilization. Four years of Ghostgates' hoards enlarging and caverns deepening. Its cup runneth over with ale, and the tables were buried under platters of plump helmets.

And then the humans returned. At their head, a swordmaster, with about forty troops in tow. No warning. Ghostgates paid for its hubris. The token twelve military dwarves assembled at the ivory gates, brought their crossbows to bear, and were promptly RENDED INTO PULP by the human leader. He then proceeded to cut a swathe towards the river, where he HACKED THE BRIDGE IN TWAIN, leaving horrified "east enders" to starve while he painted the walls with the dwarves on the west side of the river.