Baker's Dozen (Solo)

[Troubled-Crow]

A Baker’s Dozen

Requirements: None.

Synopsis: Jackson the baker has reported his wares to be, for want of a better word, ‘missing.’ Somebody in the town is stealing his buns right from under his nose! Could it be nymphs, goblins, or something more sinister? You’ve been hired by the local constabulary and Jackson himself to get to the bottom of this granary conundrum. Your only lead is a hand print left in the flour in the mill, and a trail of crumbs leading to a crack in a wall on a small residential building nearby.

Reward: There is a reward of 100 gold coins if you solve the case; the constabulary have requested a human culprit be brought in alive, by any means necessary, but the hide or head or whatever beast or kin will suffice. If you manage to recover the stolen buns, Jackson has expressed he will make you the nicest cake imaginable!

Claimed by Troubled-Crow
The day was cold. Clouds sheltered the early morning sun, giving the cobbled streets of Underwood a greyish sheen, as it had been raining the previous night. Nearly the whole town was quiet, apart from the low buzz of people slowly waking up, and one cat meowing relentlessly, surrounded by badly aimed slippers.

And the clatter of feet, arose from the noise.
Warren had been called, or rather had volounteered to solve a case, involving bread. That's what was said in the bar, anyway. He hadn't caught most of the words, because for one, he couldn't speak elfen, and for two, he couldn't speak drunken elfen. However, helpfully a human was there, and due to his replies, there was apparentley a theft of a few rolls.

The baker, who's name Warren had forgotten, had recently found an obvious trail, into a crack. The crack was, according to Warren's information, moderatley small, and that was why Med trundled beside him. His green eyes were fixed on the cat, and when Warren noticed, he sent a loud warning shooting through Med's head, and was satisified at the obiedient, yet hungry whine of Med.
"Were going to a bakery Med, you really don't want to fill up on feline. Plus, it's disgusting."
"Only for human's pathetically high standards." Buzzed through Warren's head, and Warren walked faster, much to the indignation of Med.

Eventually, the bakery came into sight. Or rather, smell. The subtle wafts of bread, and icing floated into Warren's thin nose, and he smiled. "Come on Med. Before this thieving pest eat's all the food!" He said excitedly, before dashing off, leaving Med tumbling behind.

[Troubled-Crow]

As the shop got closer into the pairs sights, they saw the swinging sign dangling alone over the door. In Georgian style writing, it said, Jackson's Bakery
Underneath was a smaller print saying 'The best pies in Underwood!'
Warren's keen eyes also spotted the tiny writing at the bottom, which said 'Probably.'
Warren raised an eyebrow. Legal problems, probably. He proceeded to walk into the shop, and immeadiatley, it hit him.
Cheese rolls, cakes, swiss rolls, danish pasties, gingerbread elves! The shop was strewn in a neatly placed, decorated hurricane of delicous food!
Warren had not eaten in a while. In fact, he had not eaten for a whole week. He almost did it subconciously, until there was a loud, forced cough, and Warren stopped stealing the food, like a Corrupt would devour Nexis' tempations, like the sinners they are.

Jackson was a thin, wiry man, of around the age of 80. He was tall, taller then the average human, but still only came up to Warren's mid chest. He had pale skin, and a mouth set into a scowl, which you could see hardly ever changed, and was topped with a catapillar of a moustache, which fit rather well with his hair, which looked like a fox had been caught in a thunderstorm, and died on this man's head.
Over all, he wasn't very pleasant.

"I hope I've hired a helper, and not the culprit." Jackson grumbled, with a hacking voice. The man obivously smoked more then his furnaces.
"Oh no sir, I'm just... well, where should I start?" Derailing the subject completley, Warren walked behind the counter and up to the man. He tried to smile. He really did try. But he only got a grimace the size of Althanas.
Jackson grunted, and indicated a back door, which Warren swiftly went towards, hoping nervously that Jackson didn't notice that he had stolen half the shop's front-stock, and Med was probably eating the other half.

[Troubled-Crow]

Jackson grunted once more, and Warren sat down on my haunches, reviewing the scene. They has passed through the door, and now faced a trail of breadcrumbs, leading through into an unimaginably small gap. Breadcrumbs trailed inside, and from what Warren could see, trailed a long way further.
"And this building doesn't belong to you, Mistar Jackson?" Warren asked, already feeling his curiosity rise. He loved conspiraries. Big or small, they fascinated him.

"Nah. Some jerk owns it. Steals all my customers with these newfangled 'sandwiches'. Aparrentley there the future." Warren was finding this man stranger and stranger, as sandwiches were not the future, and were not in anyway, 'newfangled'.
"Yeah... okay. Med!" I called, and after an awkward 3 seconds, Med fell through the door. He got up, and dusted himself off, looking at Warren. Warren's eyes widened. Breadcrumbs were scattered all over Med's face! He quickly led Med over to the wall. "If you please." He said, and Med walked forward, arms outstreched.
The stone crumbled, and Warren ducked down to get through, before turning around.
"We'll take it from he-ar Mistar Jackson." Warren said through the crack.
"Yeah, kay. I'll be waitin'." He replied.
Warren wandered into the gloom.

[Troubled-Crow]

Warren using sonar, could 'see' perfectly.
Med, however could not, and this was starting to annoy Warren.
Thud.
"Will you stop banging into me!" Warren hissed.
"Sorry..." Med replied, and continued fumbling forward.
There was a scuttling, and a crash. Warren tapped his foot, and heard the sound of tiles. He guessed they were in a kitchen of some sort.
The scuttling again. They both whirled as they heard a clicking behind them. Nothing!
"Scared." Med said, and Warren sent him a buzz of reasurring thoughts.
Click.
Warren turned once more, and there was, the strangest thing he had ever seen.
In front of him, was a man's head, held by some sort of black pole, over a huge spiders body, with 8 humongous legs, topped with human feet. The face had a beard, and green eyes.
It truly was, disgusting.
The thing gave an unearthly scream, and all buzz that there was outside of the shop stopped. The Spiderman reared onto it's back four legs, flailing the four front ones, and took a step forward.
Warren didn't even realise he took a step back.
"Oh all Nocturna, why did I have to come against this?" Warren thought. "Med for crying out loud kill the damn thing!"
"You wish." Buzzed back, in a mixture of fear and anger.
The thing took another step forward, and the pair took a half-step back.
Straight into a wall.
"Oh. Shit." Warren said, and drew his knives slowly, one in each of his six hands. "Looks like I'm going to have to get my hands dirty." He looked down at Med, who had brandished a wooden plank, which had been leaning on the wall. Sunlight glazed in on the scene, and the spiderman's shadow spasmed as, with a final scream, the thing lunged straight at Warren, and his small partner.

[Troubled-Crow]

The light quickly fell behind the massive creature, giving Warren the advantage. He stopped for a second, two, three. A tendon broke to the surface, as a mass of shadows began to form around Warren's body. He gritted his teeth, hard. He wasn't used to this, at all. He hadn't used Necromancy for a long time, as it was frowned upon. But desperate times called for desperate measures, in this case, to avoid being the lunch of a particular overgrown garden pest. Warren, for this distance, could see breadcrumbs all over the thing, and even a singular bun on it's back! If this wasn't the thief, he would kiss Med!
"I'd like to see you tr- Unholy!" Med's thoughts turned quickly to nothingness, as with a great woosh of air, the spiderbieng came crashing down to earth. Warren's senses flaired, and he rolled under the legs of the massive form. The darkness which had been coated around him stayed at his position, and glimmered. He was surprised. It actually looked like him! Roughly, the shadow-Warren slowly began to react as Warren would have; enough to persuade the man-spider that Warren hadn't moved, anyway! Warren rolled out to the other side, and spun. He was now facing the things abdomen. "I hope the blood comes out of my clothes." Warren grimaced at the thought, before jumping straight onto the things back.

[Troubled-Crow]

The back of the creature was prickly with short hairs, and the skin underneath was as hard as tree bark. Thinking about it, Warren's logic took over his pessimism, and decided that tree bark wasn't that strong against an iron dagger. He should still be wary, though. There was a great crash as the spider eventually hit the ground, and the shadow-Warren fluttered away, to cling to the walls and the corners of the room once more. The Spider-thing was hesistant for about three seconds in confusion, and the silence, Warren stabbed his first knife into the back of the thing. The Spiderman screamed out in anger, rearing itself up again. Warren was going to be crushed if he didn't hold on!
Thank god for Med.
Med rushed up, his wooden plank dull to all light apart from a shining metal nail, and jumped up towards the creatures head. As the beings twin eyes locked onto Med's huge green saucer like ones, it screamed in indignation once more. Med brung his plank crashing down onto the top of the thing's head, bringing it back down to the floor, before Med began a steady rythym of 'dunk, dunk, dunk' as the plank was smashed around the things human head. The first blood of the fight came from the beast, which spurted out of it's broken nose. It wailed in pain, no longer a scream of fury, and retreated, back towards the wall.
Obviously forgetting about Warren.
The knives spun in his fingers, almost because of boredom. Despite the creatures size, it was slow, and as thick as a post. "Time to end this shithole." Warren thought grimly, and raised all six of his arms, ready to strike down.
Before the owner came into the back, to see what was going on.
And was brandishing a very large knife.

[Troubled-Crow]

"Of all the people to walk through that door, it had to be the one holding a bloody knife!" Warren thought angrily. The person was short and round, and had shocks of black hair spurting around a large bald spot. The mans eyes were blue, and his teeth set back into the most awful scowl. He was wearing all white, and a drooping chef's hat. "Wut you doin' at back ov my sharp?" The man said, and Warren resisted the temptation to say something along the lines of 'Pardon?'. Instead, he focused again on the huge spider, which was still wailing as Med hit it relentlessly. He stabbed three more of the knives into the thing's back, making a square. The white clothed man gasped in shock, and with a roar of. "Mah precious Lily!" He tackled Warren off the back of the huge spider.
With an almighty 'oof!' all the breath in Warren's lungs dissapeared. He tumbled into the stone wall, and his sonar bent and twisted, the symptoms of a Varime near unconsiousness.
This was absolutley the wrong time for sleeping.
Warren's half lidded eyes snapped open, just as the roaring man brung down his knife, straight for Warren's heart! His arm's came up in a rush of spasmic panic, and in the flurry of movement, the knife was stopped by clenching hands. Warren started to push back with all his bodily strength, which, compared to the weight of this man, was nill. Med was nowhere to be seen, although a great lot was nowhere to be seen, behind this great girth of a man.
"I'ma kill you." The man said.
"No... no your not."
And in that moment Warren began to shake, and his muscles locked up, not allowing the knife to move at all. He was concentarting fully on the knife.
Necromancy really wasn't for use in one day. As the man roared and screamed death threats at Warren, Warren counted down from ten, in his head. The room seemed to get considerably lighter, while his hands darker, filling up with concentrated shadows. 3...2... and with a stop in the roaring, and the man's voice only a quiet "Wussat?" He launched the compact ball of dark energy straight into the man's face.
He screamed, let go of the knife, and Warren turned it, and sheathed it in his overcoat, brandishing a more familiar one. "Am blind! You've taken mah sight!" Warren's face was flared with fury, and he took a step forwards, before bringing down the knife straight between the mans shoulderblades. Blood spurted in a great fountain out onto Warren's clothes, and the man gasped with astonishment. He slid off the knife, face down onto the floor, and muttering, "Oh. Can see now." His breath left him for dead. Looking up, and breathing heavily, covered in the red life blood of the former fat psycho, Warren saw Med twisting the knives which had been on the Spiderman's back until he had carved out a square hole in it's back. By now, the spider was what could only be seen as crying, and with a final wail, it lay still. Med looked up, and threw my knives to me one at a time. The green gunk of the spider was blathered on the knives, and Warren cringed. He took the larger knife he had taken from the man, who Warren thought was probably this infamous sandwich maker, and hacked the Head of the beast off from it's suspensions, it tilted off, and with a final slice, it fell from the thing's body. Warren sat down in exhaustion, and took a well needed nap.

[Troubled-Crow]

The mid noon sun blazed into the windows as Warren woke up. Immeadiatley, his sonar buzzed a few form's in front of him. Med, and one other...
He snapped his eyes open wide.
"Look's like my helper took a little beauty rest, don't it?" Jackson said.
"Sorry. Just the spidar...thing was-" Warren tried to reply, but was cut off by Jackson's wrinkled raised hand. "Don't matter, sunshine."
"I found one of the buns." Warren handed Jackson the single bun, which he thouroughly inspected, before putting in a box. "There were five more, lad." Jackson said, whilst lending a hand up for Warren. As Warren stood up, he noted that Med held the head of the spiderthing, and also a bun behind his back. Warren raised an eyebrow, and Med guiltily handed the bun to Jackson, who thanked Med. "I'll find those buns for you Mistar Jackson, don't fret." Warren said, almost smiling, and turning to see... a trail of crumbs. "Oh yeah. Looks like that spider thing wasn't eating the bread afer all. Well, better go find it!" Jackson said cheerfully, walking towards the front entrance. "I'll be at my shop if you need me!"
Warren's eye twitched. His fists clenched.
"What's the matter?" Med sent to Warren.
"Shut the fuck up, and knock down that bloody door!" Warren screamed, and Med ran straight into the wall, faster then he had ever ran before. A cloud of dust blew up through the hole, and a pillar of light fell upon a rather more common creature; a goblin. Around it were piles of gold coins, probably stolen from the sandwich maker, and 4 buns, owner; Mr. Jackson. Warren was furious, and as he reached down to clench the little creature, his mind was blank to a slightly bigger thing in front of him.
A human.
"Top 'o' the morning to ye!" He said.
And Warren's sense of logic in that second disspeared without a trace.

[Troubled-Crow]

"I really am sorry for my language, but what in flying fuck are you doing living in a hole in the wall?" Warren asked after about half a minute of awkward silence. The golbin had made it's way up to the man's broad shoulder. The man was tall, around 6"5, and with a very large build. He was tanned, strange for a person living in the smallest place imaginable, and had dark brown hair. He was wearing corroded iron armour, with a small insignia at the right breastplate. Warren squinted at it, and his eyes widened. He was a paladin!
"Indeed, it is a long story, friend, and no time for it now. Let's just say my little friend here led me into this place. Somehow, in fact, I was as drunk as an orc, I haven't the blazes where I am!" He laughed merrily, as if the fact he was stook in a low oxygen filled room with a goblin, gold, and 4 buns was merely a hinderence.
Med was already starting to collect the buns, whilst Warren helped the man and the golbin out of the hole. "Thanks lad! Appreciate it. I'll tell people about you." He winked, and strolled out, the goblin lurching behind.
"That was..." Med started, before Warren just said "Just pretend it didn't happen. That did not happen." And Med went quiet.
Stunned by the recent events, they made their way back to Jacksons.

[Troubled-Crow]

After a lengthy explanation and a few questions from both sides of the conversation, Jackson gave a chuckle. He shook his head, and looked up at Warren. "You did a good job, kid. Now I won't have no competition, or thieves. Two in goddam one." The guy actually smiled. Warren thought it would be impossible for someone with a face like that to smile, but he did. He stood up straight, and proud, and then deflated when the old man said "Now move out. I've got customers to get through." Warre's faced contorted into utter despair, and with a 'Go on then!' From Jackson, he turned around.
His back to laughter.
"You really are quite stupid for a mage! 'Ere's your gold, and that cake I promised!" The man was grinning, truly a miracle in it's own right, as he handed the leather pouch and cake to Warren. "There ye go. Lead good lives." He said, as the young boy walked out of the shop, eyes as huge as Med's who limped behind Warren, who was smiling hungrily.
Food, at last.

[Duffy]

Baker’s Dozen Rubric

Hello there, you requested a condensed rubric but I always try to ply one or two comments where appropriate to help you improve and highlight any outstanding parts of your thread to think about in the future. If you have any questions, or indeed concerns regarding any aspect of this judgement, please feel free to send me a PM or contact a member of staff. As ever it was a pleasure to read, so onto the rubric itself.

Story (11/20)

Continuity – 4.

Setting – 5. The strongest aspect of story in your thread, as you’ve evocatively given life to all the senses through description of noise, sight and sound. The introduction and the attempt at humour paid off, but you trailed off towards the end of the thread with a heavy concentration on dialogue where you could’ve improve your score further with metaphors interwoven into the narrative, and certainly, more jokes and innuendo about a lovely pair of baps. Try colour, to inflect the setting with more vibrancy, and not simple greys and reds – crimson apples and magnolia bushes along prim hedge rowed streets in Underwood go a long way.

Pacing – 2. The thread fell both too short, and too quick of the mark to achieve anything noteworthy. Part of the issue here is the length of post, as well as the length of the thread when compared to what you tried to achieve. The brief describes a criminological mystery, but you went with done, dusted and back in time for tea, so in that regard you did not succeed.

Character (9/20)

Dialogue – 4. Dialogue was certainly the strongest part of your writing. Several points to take note of to improve however; are to be weary when using curses. Not only does it inflect speech with modernisms, it also becomes too overbearing when used too often. I have nothing against it, but it felt out of place with the setting and the tone of the thread. An alternative is to invent slang terms such as feck and similar, which will in turn improve setting, and ultimately, the character score on the whole. Tonality too, should be less high school drama, the off the cuff ‘flying fuck’ in post nine is too informal for a first meeting, but you pulled it back with simple accenting in the conclusion post – explore that more.

Action – 3.

Persona – 2. I didn’t get any feel of your character, certainly not the one you describe in your bio. There’s no inner thought, no historical perspective, no turmoil or joy in his deeds. As far as the reader is concerned, this is a generic character with a bad mouth, try to draw on your characters pool of intrigue and his background to spice the thread.

Writing (10/20)

Technique – 3.

Mechanics – 3. When writing, please separate paragraphs more clearly. It is difficult and off putting to read in this current layout. You can do this either by spacing them out with an empty line, or using indents. There were consistent mechanical errors through the thread, from grammatical and formatting to tense and verb based, such as ‘theft’ in post 1 and comma errors and awkward clauses in posts 4 & 7. Take the time to proof read and run it through a word processor and read back sentences aloud to see where it clangs and you’ll iron these out with nothing more than a little practice.

Clarity – 4.

Wildcard – 4. It’s always a pleasure to see and welcome new writers to the site, I have high hopes you’ll continue to improve and save more cakes from dastardly villains in the future!

Total - 34.


Spoils:

Warren's Iron Knife is approved, and both characters receive a half cake piece.

Trouble-Crow receives 291 experience and 160 gold.

[Taskmienster]

Exp and GP added.