Chapter 19

I bought a folding scaffold ladder a few days later, and a giant inflatable Santa and mounted it up on the roof. I screwed some eye bolts into the roof and used that to secure it so it would not blow away and plugged it into the outlet. Sue showed up for her first real day of work as an official employee, and I laughed.

“OK, Sue. For future reference, we techs can wear slacks, but not jeans unless we know we will be doing work that can get us dirty. We are spending so much time bending over or on our hands and knees, that for you girls wearing skirts and dresses is not that practical. Unless that is what you actually want to wear, of course. I forgot to let the girls know to tell you that. And even for the girls doing regular office work, skirts and dresses are only the preferred dress, not a requirement.” She smiled and said she would remember that.

And she brought the computers back in and had actually learned a lot in the previous days. She went to the tubs and soon pulled out four boxes a little bigger than a thick paperback book after putting an Atari ST on the bench. She smiled and finding cables and power supplies she soon had one hooked up and fired up the machine again. This time it powered up completely, and she smiled. “OK, this is a, 20 MB hard drive. I will reformat it and we can put this one out also. Oh, and if nobody here wants them you can send them to Becky. Notice this port on the back? That’s actually a MIDI port. Some music people might want them if nobody else does.

Well, turns out that of the Atari and Amiga systems, almost 75% were good. But there was no worry about sending them to Becky, we were down to one ST, two Amigas, and no Macintosh computers on the night before Christmas Eve when we closed up shop for the holiday. And we had hired a guy named Abe who was both helping in the front and working on computers. In fact, most of the computer games had been sold, and the D&D section had taken a serious hit also. I had Becky do up a special “Holiday Edition” run of my adventures for $5 each, and they sold like crazy. And at $125 with a disk drive, all of the C-64 systems sold, and I sold all the bad ones to a guy that did Commodore repair out of his garage for $25 each.

The last few days were busy, it seems a $200 computer was a great last-minute gift. Each night however Becky came home frazzled, she had been making orders almost every day for the last two weeks, and was having a hard time predicting what to order next. “Pete, it’s like I order one item, and the next day they buy two of something else. I can hardly figure it out!”

“Well, things will slow down now, just start tracking it during the next year, and you can adjust again next year. But we both had good years.”

“I’ll say! I’m almost afraid to talk to the accountant now. I always did my own taxes before, not this year. The amount I made was insane.”

“But don’t forget, you also spent a lot, and that will help offset it. It’s the same with my place. I made crazy money, but so much was because I bought cheap and sold cheap, so I did not sit on them. We are taking our inventory on the second, so that will give me a much better idea.”

She then said the next week she wanted to show me a location a few blocks away. I sighed and shook my head. “Sorry Becky, but no. You are selling enough high-end systems that I am very happy, and I still do not want to move.” She knew enough to drop it, but this was starting to become an issue.

We exchanged gifts, and then we made love after going to bed. The next morning we got dressed and headed to Dee and dad’s. We all had hugs and kisses and had pancakes as dad asked me if he could borrow the truck in a few days. “OK, but I need to go up to San Francisco first. I will grab Cliff and Sue, and we will do another 1-day turnaround trip. I am really low of stock now.”

He nodded and said there were some things he wanted to get moved up there that they would not need again. It was a great day, and we all sat around after dinner and sang Christmas songs as Becky and Dee alternated playing. Even Georgie got up and played a bit. Dee had taught him “Jingle Bells”.

On the 26th I told Cliff and Sue I was going to San Francisco the next day, and both wanted to come. So I told them to be there at 5, and we were on the freeway by 5:15. We got there just after 1, and they just smiled as I grabbed a cart and hit the PC section. Over a hundred systems went onto two carts, this time there were forty 386 systems, and most of the rest were 286. Cliff pulled out a box of keyboards and said we would split them as he added it to another cart. More boxes of DOS and software, those had sold particularly well. I grabbed a box of 20 and 40 MB hard drives, about twenty of each.

They had some laser printers, so I bought all five of them. Older first-generation HP ones, but I was sure they would sell. I also got a deal on a lot of fifty EGA monitors and cards for $50 each, so I grabbed them all. And when I asked to go in the back, I saw something that took my breath away. And I counted to be sure, Almost fifty Alps P2000 printers! I checked them out and they looked almost brand new. I told the guy I wanted all of them, and onto the cart they went. Cliff found a rack mount desk similar to the one I bought, but this one had a 20” monitor built into it. We each also grabbed ten 20” monitors. Heavy beasts at over a hundred pounds each, but they were branded IBM so we knew they would be worth it. We both spent more than we planned, and Sue even got some tech manuals that I suggested to her so she was happy. We got back just after midnight, and I slipped into bed and held Becky as I fell asleep.

I woke up and I was on my back, Becky resting her head on my chest and lightly caressing me. I smiled at her, and our lips melted together in a kiss. I could feel she was pushing herself into my side, so I decided it was my turn. I let my hand caress her bare hip and waist, then slipped around to her bottom and caused her to press her lightly furred mound more firmly against my hip. After several minutes I pushed on her shoulder to cause her to roll onto her back, and I started to kiss my way down her body. After loving her breasts and licking and sucking on her amazingly firm nipples, I did not feel like any more teasing. I quickly kissed my way down her body and took a deep breath.

Hmm, the scent of my lover, my Becky. Heady with her arousal, I moved right down and started to lick up and down between her legs. Her wetness was already leaking from between her lips, and I licked it up. I looked up at her face, and I could see her hands already massaging her breasts as our eyes locked. I stiffened my tongue and heard her moan and her eyes mostly close as my tongue slowly speared inside. I felt her hips rocking slightly as I slid my tongue in and out a few times, tasting her and swallowing her wetness before I moved up and wrapped my lips around her clit. She moaned my name, one hand reaching down to rest on the back of my head. I released her hips with my hands and encouraged her to bend her thighs up. I moved them so her knees were just over my shoulders, and her legs were bent as her feet rested on my back. Her thighs were now pressing against the sides of my face, and I moved my right hand up and caressed her labia with it. Becky’s moans were a bit louder, and then a groan as I eased my middle finger inside. Slick, hot, tight, and wetness surrounded my finger as I started to ease it in, my tongue moving faster over her clit. I alternated between caressing inside and slipping it in and out, then added my ring finger. Now both of them were slipping in and out.

And the muttering in Spanish told me she was getting closer. And I was much more familiar with “lame mi coñcha” and “lame mi pequeña perla”. “Conch” and “little pearl” were indeed very appropriate words for what I was licking at the moment. Her moan was longer as I added my pinkie inside of her, and instead of thrusting them in and out slowly rotated them inside. Feeling her soft clinging walls clutch at them and quiver as I rotated them back and forth, her thighs now almost squeezing my face. And only a minute later with a string of Spanish I could not hope to follow, her hips bucked up and down. Her thighs were feeling like they would pop my head they were squeezing so hard as I felt her convulsing in orgasm. I was now giving soft licks, as her thighs fell off of my shoulders and flopped to the side on the bed, at almost a 90-degree angle from her body.

Becky’s chest was flushed and covered with a thin covering of sweat, and she was still breathing heavily. She reached down and pulled me up, our lips kissing in a passionate as she reached down and pulled me to her opening. She was moaning constantly, and I slipped inside of her. The tightness of her opening still amazing as I eased into her, and started a fast pace. I slid my hands down under her, grabbing her bottom in each hand and fucking her quickly, not even trying to hold back. I decided that this morning, while I won the first round I would let her win the second round.

I could hear my belly slap against hers, and her thighs went around my waist, pulling me tighter. We were kissing almost savagely as I pummeled her pussy with my cock. And we moaned together as I plunged down hard and buried myself as deep into her as I could and filled her with my love. She clawed my back, and broke the kiss and whispered “Yes, oh yes my lover, I feel it! Give it all to me, fill me with it.”

Finally, we were kissing and caressing each other’s faces, and smiling at each other. “Hmm, I love you Peter, that was the most perfect way to wake up ever. And now I can remember this all day long, as I will have you inside of me all day long.”

We kissed for only a few minutes before her alarm went off. She kissed me a final time before turning it off, then she urged me to roll off. We both sighed as I slid out of her, still half-hard and without the long lingering soak inside of her that we both treasured after making love. She headed in to take a shower as I made breakfast.

I drove to the shop after we shared another kiss and told each of us said how much we loved the other. I was unloading when Cliff showed up. We got it all unloaded into our shops, and I went ahead and took two of the 20” monitors and put them in the back of my car. Once everything was locked up again I drove to New Dawn, and as expected Becky was working. I dragged the monitors inside, and she kissed me when I lugged one of the beasts upstairs and set it on her desk. I soon had it set up and she said it looked amazing. I then put the other on the workstation for graphics downstairs, and I told her I had one more I would put on her home system.

The big New Year party was held as planned. Dee printed up fliers inviting everybody over for live music, and the stile was between the yards again as the Geek Crusaders were playing on the small portable stage in our backyard. Almost everybody complimented them on how much better they all sounded compared to the year before, and they said they had been practicing together for the last year.

And at midnight, I held Becky tight and we kissed each other deeply. Welcoming in 1989, then whispering how much we loved each other.

Dad and I loaded the truck up the truck the next day, and mostly it was furniture and boxes. Becky and I had gone through the house the week before and pointed out some things they were going to leave that we would not need. She tried to tell them to take the fridge, and I told her we could just take her fridge to her shop and use it there. She nodded, and I told her I would move the small one up into her office. However, we also loaded the truck with two 386 systems, one for Dave and Darla, and the other for Kim. And a dozen sets of metal shelves. “You can use them, dad. Use them at the ranch, give them to Dave, sell them, we have so many of the damned things now! It seems like every other month I am buying a new store, and I get a half dozen or more of the damned things!” Dad laughed and said he would find something to do with them.

I opened the shop with Abe the next day and was walking him through the opening procedure when Julie arrived. She went right to work on the inventory with us, and we were done by noon. Thankfully it was short because she and Dee had inventoried all of the store items already, we only had to hit the stock in the back room.

I got a call from Brad, and we wished each other happy holidays. “Pete, I gotta ask, are you working on anything?”

“Sorry Brad, I’ve just had no time. But I will try to have something in a month or so. Now that the holidays are over and Becky’s shop is running fine, I am cutting down to five days a week so I will have time again.”

“That’s OK, but we have already gone to press with Spillikan’s Beastiary. I had a bird whisper in my ear and tell me TSR is releasing Second Edition D&D next month. I already got a copy, don’t ask me how. And I’m going to send you a copy so you can take a look. There are no major changes, mostly it’s a refinement of the old one. Oh, and one other thing. The old Monster Manual is gone, this time it’s the ‘Monster Compendium’, and it’s in a binder.”

“Hmm, bold idea. That will make it easy to add more monsters in the future, just send out the sheets and it will be cheaper than making an entire book.”

“True, but it also will be more fragile I think. Pages getting torn out, lost, put back in the wrong order. It’s a clever idea, and we talked about doing the same thing but decided against it. Not only for those points but because there is just not enough time to have it done over to hit the deadline. But I do have people working on a second version, that will go in the binder. I figure a cover price of $15 for the bound and $10 for the binder version.”

“Good call. I will look them over when I get them, I do have some ideas. Maybe we can do a closed test on Memorial Day, and an open one on Labor Day.”

“Oh, and we want you to do two for Labor Day. The first on Saturday at the convention, then again on Sunday at a theater.”

“What, again? I thought they were doing Phantom of the Opera there in a month.”

“Oh, they are. We have a preliminary booking at another theater on Wilshire. It’s smaller, but it should be similar. So go ahead and get to work, let me know when you are ready to tell me your idea.”

So as Sue and Abe were working in the back, I hopped onto my system and started making notes. I was feeling a bit perverse, and this time decided to make it in an abandoned village of moderate size, around three dozen buildings. They would come across it, and it appeared to only have been abandoned a day or two before they got there. The first part would see them exploring the village, and finding no clothing, just huts and furniture, assorted foods, nothing to indicate who lived there or where they went.

Only later would they discover in one of the huts a child’s room. Inside one of them, they find dolls depicting what appears to be a male human in armor with a great helm, and a female dressed as a princess, and several dolls that are of shorter and darker-skinned humanoids. And only if they check or try to use it will it be obvious the furniture is for a humanoid of smaller stature than a human, say halfling or gnome sized.

If they stay overnight in the village, a pack of five wolves will start to prowl the village. They will growl at the party, and may charge them but will always withdraw before actually attacking. Any druids in the party or others who can talk with wolves/animals will get the idea this is their home and they are protecting it. On the second day, a party of Goblins will approach the party from the woods to the east. If the wolves were not harmed they will approach cautiously. If the wolves were killed, they approach prepared for a battle and will attempt to ambush the party.

If hostile confrontation is the result, there will be two more groups that approach, one of twenty and the next of twenty-five. All males, and once down to less than half of the group, they will attempt to flee. If the last group is defeated and not wiped out, they can be followed into the woods where the party will find them acting as a rearguard as around two dozen women and over a dozen children trying to run to the east, four more wolves protecting them.

The goblins only speak their own tongue, and basic orc. The leader and the shaman however can also speak basic Common Tongue. If hostilities are avoided, the party will learn that this is their village, they found it abandoned three years prior and fixed it up. They will show the graves where they buried all those they found, and that they were hiding from “The Light One”. If checked, they are all Lawful Neutral, and are the last survivors of their tribe.

The Moon Stone Tribe was once ‘vast like rice seeds’ they will be told, but twenty years ago they followed the father of “The Light One”, and then in battle, most of their tribe was destroyed. That was three years ago, and the leader was killed along with most of the tribe. And “The Light One” took command of the host. Their shaman had a vision telling them to remove themselves from the conflicts with men and take refuge in the west. That is when they found the village. They realized that they themselves had destroyed it in the war, and instead of battle and war they made the choice to become pastoral.

If they are calmed down, they will return to the village. And if they play with a little girl goblin, she will tell the story of “The Light One” as she plays with her dolls. The Princess is “The Light One”, and the fierce warrior her husband and lover, and was the general under her father. And the smaller dolls represent some of her ancestors who fought with her father. “The Light One” and her mate formed a new alliance of goblins, orcs, and others to help restore order and drive the “bad humans” from the area. “The Light One” was eventually defeated as her father had been, but continued to live in the woods deeper to the east.

But signs have been found by divination that said another war was coming, and their old Overlord was returning to order them to battle again. Three days to the east, they will find a Warband of orcs heading for the village, and they must be defeated or they will attack and destroy it. Another band the next day, and finally five days travel to the east they will find a decrepit castle. More orcs and some goblins defend it, along with a few ogres. And in the throne room of the castle is “The Light One”. A lovely female human, but a level appropriate chaotic evil magic-user. And her husband, a large figure in full plate armor with a full great helm covering the face.

After the battle, the party will discover the warrior was an orc, and in the sleeping chambers is a 2-year-old half-orc. Who if checked shows that he is chaotic evil.

This is one I set up with a large index of events in an appendix. If the baby is taken to the village, they will welcome it and promise to raise it as one of their own. If the baby is killed, the party is thanked for eliminating the threat of “The Light One”, but the goblins will leave the village, insisting that this proves they can not peacefully exist with humans. Who but a monstrously horrible human would kill a baby that has done nothing wrong? And there were many endings possible, many of which would depend on what they did with the child at the end.

I finished the ten page proposal, and sent it to Brad’s BBS and gave him a call. He pulled it up and asked what I thought I was doing with it. “Well, I am trying to make interesting adventures, Brad. Do you not like it?”

“Actually, I like it a lot! But you seem to have a pattern now of taking what should be enemies, and almost making them friends.”

“Well, blame it on Japan. A nation we were mortal enemies with, now we are allies. We found common ground with them, same as say England, or Germany. Or even France and Mexico. And this lets the party make decisions, that will then affect things later on. I can see one party killing the child, it will be chaotic evil and the child of two powerful chaotic evil characters after all. But it is a child, and like any child, it can learn new behaviors and beliefs so can be ‘turned’ to being even lawful neutral or any other alignment with the right nurturing.”

“And you wrote a lot of this with ‘level-dependent’ again, is this another of those where the monsters will scale, depending on the party?”

“Yep, I figure any group level five and up, if they are harder I will make harder monsters and the DM can throw them in. I admit I do not like how TSR and most do them, where ‘Levels 14 and up’ is the requirement. This way a DM can throw it almost anywhere, and it will be challenging.”

“Do it, let me know when you can run it and send me the critique sheets.”

Becky came over for lunch, and she brought beef bowls for everybody. We went into the office, and after kissing we sat down to eat. She told me she needed five more black and three blue systems, and I said I should be able to bring them home that night. “I will put them in your car, and that way you have them in the morning.” She smiled, and I gave her a basic idea of the adventure I was working on. “I am restarting the group here next week, and hope to have this ready for a test in two or three weeks. Is Friday a good night for you?”

“Hmm, not really. That night I am getting ready for the event on Saturday. How about Thursday?”

“Mike is doing his then, how about Wednesday?”

She thought about it and said Wednesday should be good. So once we finished we kissed for a few minutes, then went to tell the rest. “OK, Julie, think of a sign and put it up on the game counter over there. We are restarting the game group on Wednesday night, 6 to 10. D&D and you all are invited. All are welcome, to play or observe. But if anybody asks, let them know that on some nights there will be no observers as it will be a closed game.”

“Pete, why a closed game?” Sue asked.

“Simple, those are nights I would be testing an adventure I am trying to submit for sale. Everybody will have to sign a simple ‘Non-Disclosure Agreement’, basically saying you can not give more than the basics to anybody until after it is published. Think of it as say you are doing a read-through of ‘The Return of the Jedi’, and you wanted to run around telling everybody that not only is Darth Vader really Luke’s father, but that Leia is his sister. But like the movie, once it is released the NDA is largely ignored.”

They all nodded, and Sue and Abe both said they would be there, but Dee shook her head. “Pete, I’m leaving soon, so it would be best if somebody else can play that will stay with the group for more than a few months. But I will be there, I love watching your games. I may even do a Mandy at times.” I chuckled, then had to explain that when Mandy started, she played the part of the monsters as we had a full group and that was where we could fit her in.

Julie did the sign and it looked great, and I was showing Sue and Abe how to add accounts to the server when Julie called me up to the front. It was two high school kids, and they were asking about the game. I told them I would be running it, and we would be meeting every week. One asked if his girlfriend would be welcome, and I laughed. “Of course! Most times almost half of the groups I have been in are girls. We welcome all, all we ask is that you enjoy and have fun.”

That Wednesday it was Sue, Julie, Becky, Abe, the kids, and their girlfriends which they had dragged along. We spent the first hour making characters and teaching the new players the basics, and Dee was there helping. I did a simple dungeon crawl I made up as I went along, and they all seemed to enjoy it. I fast-tracked it so they were second level at the end. This was repeated the next week, and by the time I was ready to test “The Light One”, they were from levels five to six.

Thankfully Dee had agreed to run a character that week, I admitted to her this was a bit inexperienced of a group of players for this adventure. So she ran a half-elf Ranger, and when the wolves came prowling she sent her wolf out to contact them. “Go away” and “our home” was the basics of communication. But since the wolves did not attack, the party just shut themselves in the huts and played it cool.

And because half-elves know orc, Dee and the others got into defensive postures when the first goblin band appeared and were able to defuse the situation. Becky was running a cleric, and I had added a ring in an earlier adventure that let the owner cast “Detect Alignment” three times a day. They realized that these goblins were not evil, and soon they returned to the village.

And thanks to Dee and her leadership the rest of the night played almost perfectly. They defeated “The Light One” and her mate, and brought the child to the goblins. They also turned over half the treasure collected and all of the common weapons and armor.

They were filling out the forms, and the kids admitted they had never played an adventure like that. I just smiled. “Yeah, run across a bunch of goblins, charge in with swords swinging, kill them all and get a magic sword, right?” They both nodded and said “Pretty much.”

“Well, my early ones were more like that, to be honest. Sometime soon we will have to hold this on say Sunday, so I can have a friend come by. She lives in Long Beach, but she would kill me if I did some games without her present.” Julie smiled and said “Holly?”, and I nodded.

“Oh yes, that will be awesome! Guys, trust me. I have never played before we started this group, but I have heard about Holly in the game, you will not want to miss that.”

I handed Becky the forms, and she said she would fax them all off the next day. We then all headed home. She said she liked it and asked me again the plan for the presentation. I told her, and she sighed. “I already have a big Memorial Day sale planned that weekend.”

I nodded and told her to plan at least one night in August. “Brad is telling me he wants the premiere on Saturday at the convention. Then another theater presentation on Sunday at the Wiltern Theater.” She at least promised she would make the theater presentation.

The next week Becky called and said she could not make game night. She was in the middle of doing up some documents and had to get it finished. I sighed and told her I loved her, and Dee ran her cleric that night. Abe had already stopped playing, and another guy about my age took his place. And both girlfriends dropped out, but another couple from the college took their place.

I also always had at least one or two NPCs, so in case Mike or Mandy or somebody else came by they could join in, even if it was already in progress. I had taped “The Light One” and passed those to Mandy, and she had already done some great art for it. Including one for the cover, with the party standing in front of “The Light One” and her husband. And it was hard to tell if it was an audience or a battle about to start. The perfect look I had wanted.

Finally, it was moving weekend. And since we had already started moving things over, it only took the four of us a day to finish emptying Becky’s house. The office was mine once again, and dad laughed when he saw I had set up my computer in the exact same place it had been in years before. The first night though was a bit strange, as I almost walked into my old room, forgetting that Dee and dad were sleeping in it now.

Dad used the truck to run another load up to Idaho, he said that one more and they should be done. This time he took Dee and George with him, and both Becky and I spent that weekend at home together, the first in a long time. The clothing for both of us was nothing more than panties and underwear, and we made love so much that I think we were both feeling tender come Monday. I know that at the end of our last coupling as she had me sit in my chair in the office. I was shooting blanks and my balls were sore, and she was walking a bit gingerly as she went in to take a shower before bed.

Dad called the shop on Monday afternoon and said he needed some help unloading something at home. So I drove home and was surprised to see a large chest freezer in the back of the truck. “I already measured it out, this will fit in the garage where the washer and dryer used to be.” It was heavy and locked so it took both of us to get it down the ramp and into place. He got it plugged in, then unlocked it and hung the key on a tack he stuck in the wall above it.

And no wonder it was so heavy! The thing was full of meat! He laughed and said that time he had insisted that Dave give us at least part of our share. I looked through the white paper bundles. Hamburger, roasts, steaks, even some liver. I shuddered, but said I would pass those on to Holly’s family.

That night during dinner, Georgie told us how much he loved their new home, and he had already selected his bedroom. And Dee smiled and told us he loved Kim and her family. “Oh, and he really likes that he has a cousin now. You should have seen him Pete!” Dee handed me a photograph of Georgie laying on a blanket with Grace. She was asleep on her back, and he was laying on his side watching her. “If she started to cry he would get upset and insist we come to take care of her. And he would lay like that every chance he could, or played with her.”