Badstench
06-27-2009, 08:36 PM
BREAKFAST INTERUPTUS
Frzz-Tlarr kept a wary eye on the master as he approached the obsidian throne. One of the demon lord’s heads was catching up on forty winks, one was perusing a contractual document written in the blood-ink of the supplicant, and the third was gazing upward in contemplation.
Frzz-Tlar was relieved that Jhaloth appeared to be in a fairly decent mood.
“Master? Breakfast is ready”.
The third head of Jhaloth roused itself from the reverie of contemplation to regard his servant pleasantly. This un-nerved Frzz-Tlarr. Any time a demon lord looks pleased is usually the pre-cursor to an action of exceptional diabolism. In this instance, Frzz-Tlar was mistaken; Jhaloth was simply gratified to see his breakfast. He was hungry.
Frzz-Tlarr handed the tray to his master: A pot of tea with accompanying cup on an fine saucer, side jug of milk (slightly warmed), rack of toast (lightly browned), boiled egg (not hard and not soft) and a bowl of steaming human intestines. Placed neatly to one side was the morning copy of the Infernal Tribune.
Jhaloth sighed appreciatively, poured himself a cup of tea (milk first, of course) and picked up the newspaper. The brow of the third head wrinkled in surprise. “Frzz-Tlar? Why is the front page missing from my newspaper?”
“Bats Doss”, swore Frzz-Tlarr under his breath. He had hoped the master wouldn’t notice the missing page. “I removed it, master”.
The admission was unwisely spoken. Jhaloth blinked at his servant. “Why?”
“Oh... heh”, Frzz-Tlarr-laughed dismissively, “It was just full of the usual, you know? Bad news and such”.
The second head of the demon lord, the one that had been perusing a document, swivelled to regard Frzz-Tlarr. “I’m a demon lord, you brainless worm. I like bad news!” There was a hint of impatience in the tone that warned Frzz-Tlar to materialise the missing page swiftly or there’d be hell-to-pay. It appeared very swiftly.
At that moment Frzz-Tlarr wanted very much to disappear. He knew what the headline on the front page of the Infernal Tribune proclaimed, and he knew Jhaloth was going to be a very unhappy demon lord when he saw... well, the headline can speak for itself:
JHALOTH DUPED: read all about it!
Below that was the pictorial likeness of a bespectacled human holding aloft an object instantly recognisable to both Frzz-Tlarr and Jhaloth: It was none other than Tzal-Toalth, the staff originally fashioned by the demon lord and recently lost to a human adventurer after an unfortunate occurrence on the material plane of existence.
“!”, exclaimed Jhaloth, but this was only a prelude to the issuing of a string of profane utterances so awful that nothing shall be repeated in this account least the eyes of the reader blind themselves in repugnance.
Finally, Jhaloth sputtered, “That’s my staff!” and, “How in Hell’s name did they find out?”
The ‘they’ he referred to were the gaggle of imps that called themselves journalists who produced and printed the Infernal Tribune. In truth, they were nothing more than a bunch of tabloid hacks given over to scandalous rumour-mongering and malicious gossip, which is exactly the sort of thing denizens of the infernal regions like to read in their newspapers. They like it even more when the scandals and rumours involve the failings of any demon of high standing, and this morning’s edition had targeted Jhaloth.
(Just on a quick side-note, did you know that “imp” is an abbreviation of the word “impertinent”, so that when we talk of our Hellish denizen’s, the Imps, we are actually referring to the Impertinents? This is an apt title for these sordid little creatures, don’t you think?)
Have you heard the saying, “Don’t shoot the messenger”? Frzz-Tlarr shifted uncomfortably in the knowledge that the shooting of messengers was a common occurrence in Hell and he expected nothing less from an angry demon lord who had been so resoundingly ridiculed in a public forum. The losing of one’s weapon is a shameful mismanagement of materials at any time, but when a demon lord loses a prized possession to a Human, it is considered the worst of shameful occurrences. This opens the offending demon to loss of prestige and, ultimately, a down-grading of rank and power.
Frzz-Tlarr was spared the immediate causation of a bullet when the first head of Jhaloth (the one that had been snoozing) woke up and roared, “I’ll bet my granny’s gutted dog it was that spiteful harridan, Ghor-Tiln!”
The other two heads nodded agreement.
The history of the relationship between Jhaloth and Ghor-Tiln is long and interesting, especially if you’re a masochist with a fixation on how relationships shouldn’t work and what happens when they fail. Unfortunately, this story is not about the relationship between the demon lord and the succubus, so it ill behoves me to comment about it except to explain that the fashioning of Tzal-Toalth was actually a combined effort of them both. When Jhaloth ‘lost’ the weapon, Ghor-Tiln took it rather badly; she had imbued the staff with some of her own power through the twin-fashioning of an amulet as a gift to her paramour, and he had mislaid it. The bastard!
The three heads of Jhaloth regarded each other with a mixture of anger, misery and glee; anger that this travesty had happened, misery that Ghor-Tiln had initiated it, glee that they were about to have a good reason for shooting Frzz-Tlarr... which they did!
There is nothing fair about life in Hell.
************************************************** *****
There is also nothing fair about ending a story without a conclusion, and that is just what I’ve done here. I got a bit carried away with detailing the breakfast regimen of Jhaloth rather than writing an introduction to the explaining of some peculiarities inherent of Tzal-Toalth, which had been my original intent.
I shall, in due course, present my findings on the peculiarities inherent of Tzal-Toalth, but in the meantime, you should be aware that, although Frzz-Tlarr was shot, he didn’t die. This is because Frzz-Tlarr is a homunculus, a manufactured creature of magical origin that can simply be re-animated with the replacing of the necessary parts.
In effect, that is as close to "A Happy Ending" as you will find in any story that takes place in Hell.
Frzz-Tlarr kept a wary eye on the master as he approached the obsidian throne. One of the demon lord’s heads was catching up on forty winks, one was perusing a contractual document written in the blood-ink of the supplicant, and the third was gazing upward in contemplation.
Frzz-Tlar was relieved that Jhaloth appeared to be in a fairly decent mood.
“Master? Breakfast is ready”.
The third head of Jhaloth roused itself from the reverie of contemplation to regard his servant pleasantly. This un-nerved Frzz-Tlarr. Any time a demon lord looks pleased is usually the pre-cursor to an action of exceptional diabolism. In this instance, Frzz-Tlar was mistaken; Jhaloth was simply gratified to see his breakfast. He was hungry.
Frzz-Tlarr handed the tray to his master: A pot of tea with accompanying cup on an fine saucer, side jug of milk (slightly warmed), rack of toast (lightly browned), boiled egg (not hard and not soft) and a bowl of steaming human intestines. Placed neatly to one side was the morning copy of the Infernal Tribune.
Jhaloth sighed appreciatively, poured himself a cup of tea (milk first, of course) and picked up the newspaper. The brow of the third head wrinkled in surprise. “Frzz-Tlar? Why is the front page missing from my newspaper?”
“Bats Doss”, swore Frzz-Tlarr under his breath. He had hoped the master wouldn’t notice the missing page. “I removed it, master”.
The admission was unwisely spoken. Jhaloth blinked at his servant. “Why?”
“Oh... heh”, Frzz-Tlarr-laughed dismissively, “It was just full of the usual, you know? Bad news and such”.
The second head of the demon lord, the one that had been perusing a document, swivelled to regard Frzz-Tlarr. “I’m a demon lord, you brainless worm. I like bad news!” There was a hint of impatience in the tone that warned Frzz-Tlar to materialise the missing page swiftly or there’d be hell-to-pay. It appeared very swiftly.
At that moment Frzz-Tlarr wanted very much to disappear. He knew what the headline on the front page of the Infernal Tribune proclaimed, and he knew Jhaloth was going to be a very unhappy demon lord when he saw... well, the headline can speak for itself:
JHALOTH DUPED: read all about it!
Below that was the pictorial likeness of a bespectacled human holding aloft an object instantly recognisable to both Frzz-Tlarr and Jhaloth: It was none other than Tzal-Toalth, the staff originally fashioned by the demon lord and recently lost to a human adventurer after an unfortunate occurrence on the material plane of existence.
“!”, exclaimed Jhaloth, but this was only a prelude to the issuing of a string of profane utterances so awful that nothing shall be repeated in this account least the eyes of the reader blind themselves in repugnance.
Finally, Jhaloth sputtered, “That’s my staff!” and, “How in Hell’s name did they find out?”
The ‘they’ he referred to were the gaggle of imps that called themselves journalists who produced and printed the Infernal Tribune. In truth, they were nothing more than a bunch of tabloid hacks given over to scandalous rumour-mongering and malicious gossip, which is exactly the sort of thing denizens of the infernal regions like to read in their newspapers. They like it even more when the scandals and rumours involve the failings of any demon of high standing, and this morning’s edition had targeted Jhaloth.
(Just on a quick side-note, did you know that “imp” is an abbreviation of the word “impertinent”, so that when we talk of our Hellish denizen’s, the Imps, we are actually referring to the Impertinents? This is an apt title for these sordid little creatures, don’t you think?)
Have you heard the saying, “Don’t shoot the messenger”? Frzz-Tlarr shifted uncomfortably in the knowledge that the shooting of messengers was a common occurrence in Hell and he expected nothing less from an angry demon lord who had been so resoundingly ridiculed in a public forum. The losing of one’s weapon is a shameful mismanagement of materials at any time, but when a demon lord loses a prized possession to a Human, it is considered the worst of shameful occurrences. This opens the offending demon to loss of prestige and, ultimately, a down-grading of rank and power.
Frzz-Tlarr was spared the immediate causation of a bullet when the first head of Jhaloth (the one that had been snoozing) woke up and roared, “I’ll bet my granny’s gutted dog it was that spiteful harridan, Ghor-Tiln!”
The other two heads nodded agreement.
The history of the relationship between Jhaloth and Ghor-Tiln is long and interesting, especially if you’re a masochist with a fixation on how relationships shouldn’t work and what happens when they fail. Unfortunately, this story is not about the relationship between the demon lord and the succubus, so it ill behoves me to comment about it except to explain that the fashioning of Tzal-Toalth was actually a combined effort of them both. When Jhaloth ‘lost’ the weapon, Ghor-Tiln took it rather badly; she had imbued the staff with some of her own power through the twin-fashioning of an amulet as a gift to her paramour, and he had mislaid it. The bastard!
The three heads of Jhaloth regarded each other with a mixture of anger, misery and glee; anger that this travesty had happened, misery that Ghor-Tiln had initiated it, glee that they were about to have a good reason for shooting Frzz-Tlarr... which they did!
There is nothing fair about life in Hell.
************************************************** *****
There is also nothing fair about ending a story without a conclusion, and that is just what I’ve done here. I got a bit carried away with detailing the breakfast regimen of Jhaloth rather than writing an introduction to the explaining of some peculiarities inherent of Tzal-Toalth, which had been my original intent.
I shall, in due course, present my findings on the peculiarities inherent of Tzal-Toalth, but in the meantime, you should be aware that, although Frzz-Tlarr was shot, he didn’t die. This is because Frzz-Tlarr is a homunculus, a manufactured creature of magical origin that can simply be re-animated with the replacing of the necessary parts.
In effect, that is as close to "A Happy Ending" as you will find in any story that takes place in Hell.