Discworld and Member Articles
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Written by TheJackal
Saturday, 27 August 2005 |
Around the same time that Nemoy was becoming acquainted with Ice-Man, in an only slightly related incident, an unusual individual going by the name of Bert Harris, was travelling a few miles from the tavern. He wasn’t in a good mood for it had been a terribly disappointing few weeks.
To know why Bert wasn’t happy, you would have to know him and have been following recent events in his life. For instance, it is important to know that Bert is an alcoholic. Although in saying that, he stretches the boundaries of the stereotype.
Those who know him would profess that he could “drink for Druids’ Realm”. However, over Bert’s lifetime, he has consumed well over the total amount of alcohol currently located in Druids’ Realm.
Some of the lads down in the local had tried one night to roughly work out how many pints Bert had actually drank in his lifetime. Unsurprisingly, they couldn’t come close and quickly gave up trying. They eventually settled on proclaiming that Bert had drunk “a feckload of the stuff”.
Bert himself had the lifetime goal of living past sixty, while still drinking like a mad eejit. Presently, he was fifty-four and things were looking dodgy. With only one working kidney and liver left respectively, it looked like he wouldn’t make it.
Therefore, Bert had searched for a new goal. It came to him one night while in conversation with a guy he hadn’t met before or since, regarding what the stranger called “wine lakes”. From what Bert had understood of the conversation (which wasn’t very much), wine lakes were apparently being created due to the over production of wine in the Southern Realm because of intervention pricing. Bert didn’t know what ‘intervention pricing’ was and had never been to the Southern Realm. However, he liked what he heard and it was just the type of goal he’d been looking for lately. Wines lakes! It was amazing what foreigners could do.
That was two months ago. Bert had left Druids’ Realm and headed south. It had been a long and arduous journey through all sorts of unruly weather. Upon arriving in Southern Realm, Bert had looked high and low for the lakes but never found them. Finally, with a heavy heart and a light pocket, Bert gave up.
Today Bert was heading home, dejected and disappointed. The lakes must have dried out, he reasoned. It was summer after all. What he needed now was a strong drink and someone to give out to. He hadn’t passed a tavern in hours and was beginning to sober up. That was never a good thing. But now Bert was nearing a seller on the road. As he got closer, it seemed to be a vegetable seller of some kind.
‘Excellent, someone to give out to at last,’ said Bert to himself.
‘Excellent, someone to sell to at last,’ said Norb, with premature delight.
Nemoy sat in one of the tavern’s many corners. There were two things that you couldn’t help but notice when you entered the establishment: Its unusual shape, and the strong, pungent smell that encircled it.
Nemoy was sitting alone, like always. His only companion was his pint of beer. That was pretty much how things had usually been for Nemoy. He had never known proper companionship, so had never missed it nor felt the need for it.
Nemoy’s mother had drowned when he was only eight years old, and his father had never really been good at being there for him. Perhaps his father had been so inadequate due to never really recovering from his wife’s premature demise. Then again, his dad had been a crap father even before Alice’s death.
Life had been pretty hard for Nemoy during his youth. He hadn’t had much time for fun or friends; labouring on the farm had taken up most of his time.
And so Nemoy gradually grew to loathe his father and that feeling had made life even more unbearable as he progressed in years. He regarded his father as being spineless and nothing more than a bully who got his way in everything simply because they apparently had the same bloodline. Nemoy sometimes maliciously wondered if he had in fact been the result of another man’s secret endeavours. This wicked thought had filled him with a solace of a kind over the years, though Nemoy knew it not to be true. Faith had cursed him with a strong family resemblance and Nemoy despised having his father’s general features.
At the age of sixteen, Nemoy had had enough of life on the farm. He left with nothing more than the clothes on his back, some food, and a wooden whistle that he’d carved some years earlier and learned to expertly play. Father wouldn’t miss him; the horse could take his place in the fields. Nemoy’s leaving would be nothing more than a mere inconvenience, quickly fixed.
That had been fourteen years ago. Nemoy vowed as he left to never return to that hole.
The years in between then and now had been interesting to say the least. At first, there had been the excitement of simply seeing the outside world. During his younger years, Nemoy had never travelled more that a few miles from his home; now he was free to roam where he pleased. And roam he did. He travelled far and wide.
In his early twenties, Nemoy had regarded himself as a man of leisure, who went from place to place with not a care in the world. Of course, he had to work to pay his way. But the rich farmers and landlords were always looking for a labourer here and there, especially come harvest time. Nemoy would stay for a while, make some money, then move on. He was reluctant to stay in the one place for too long in case he should be taken by an urge to settle down.
There was so much to see and there would be plenty of time to settle down when he was older. Now, aged thirty, Nemoy had been to each of the four Realms many times over.
As a result of his sheer fondness for travelling, Nemoy’s life had never had any other real purpose, other than being on the road. Perhaps this was why, with a goal now being positively pressed before him, he was feeling somewhat reluctant to pursue it. Part of Nemoy said that he should just ignore it. Why should he risk his health to find someone with a vendetta against him?
Another part of him thought otherwise. Who was this bastard and why was he out to get Nemoy? He was torn between logic and pride. Eventually, pride won out.
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