Bay 12 Games Forum

It's the clanking that wakes me at first. I'm dreaming about something pleasant - not food, not sex, it just feels really comfortable, like the most awesome couch ever when there comes this sharp ringing clang that burrows inside my ears and sends me lurching awake, sitting blearily upright in my bed, which now felt inadequate somehow in comparison to the dream. I look with a bit of difficulty around my room, moonlight falling astray on it as it is. Nothing's unusual in it, so why did I-
There's all of a sudden a massive crunching noise coming from somewhere downstairs, followed by a massive clamour best described as a few hundred little help desk bells having several thousand pebbles fall onto them at once. I've leaped out of bed at this, listening intently for any further noise, but get only silence in response. Thinking I'd better check out whatever happened down there, I throw on my housecoat before realizing there might be someone downstairs. I'll need something to ... I'm not very good at hitting people, so something to throw at them while I shriek and run away. Looking around, there doesn't seem to be anything substantial enough for my purposes before my eyes light upon a hefty-looking book on my dresser. I lift it up with both hands and start creeping downstairs, glancing at the title as I do so. What I see confuses me; where in the hell did I get a copy of Finnegan's Wake? I drop the question for later, as I'm nearing the bottom of the stairs and I can see movement in the kitchen. Holding the book high, I tiptoe to the doorway and freeze as I see something that honestly puts all my mundane expectations of what might have happened to shame.
There's a wizard in my kitchen.
What the fuck.
There is an old man with a silvery-white beard three-quarters the length of his body standing in my kitchen in a goddamn wizard robe and hat, with an old-fashioned staff leaning against the counter. He's holding a jug of milk in each hand, chugging one down without even apparently breathing, and he's standing next to a former drawer that he's pulled entirely out of the counter, spilling all my cutlery everywhere in the process. Any doubts I have about him be in a legit wizard and not a nutcase are answered when he finishes the one jug of milk and starts on the other, pulling a third one out of the fridge after he throws the empty jug away. I don't have that much milk in my fridge. I can't really find it in myself to do anything other than stand there, as he drains another milk jug, and another, and another. Eventually my astonishment at his milk summoning fades as he hits the 11th jug, the discarded ones forming a small pile around his feet. Gritting my teeth, I step out into his line of sight, Finnegan's Wake raised. He doesn't even stop drinking, just raising his eyebrows a little and holding a finger up at me as if to say 'wait'. I stand there rather awkwardly, waiting as he finishes his 48th litre of milk. At last he tosses the jug aside, burps, and says, "Yes?", swaying on his feet slightly. Is he drunk or something?
I can't really think of what to say. Good god, did I really confront the magical milk-summoning man without any idea of what I was going to tell him? In my nervousness, some random words come slipping out of my mouth.
"Uh. ... Who are you?"
He almost seems as if he's going to answer my question for a moment - he looks upward and starts muttering to himself as if considering something, but then his gaze slowly slides over to my fridge once more, and as he holds his hand out toward it in an imperious fashion I can hear him mumble something like 'I'm hungry.' The next moment I have to duck because a veritable flood of cheese, ham, and butter comes bursting out of my fridge, what looks like hundreds of packets of each of them. He holds out his other hand toward my breadbox and it bursts open, a torrent of bread slices whirling out into the air. He starts waving his hands like an orchestra conductor and my cutlery floats off the floor and joins the swirling cloud of food surrounding him. Then all the ingredients burst out of their packaging and ... start assembling sandwiches. More knives than I'd had in my entire life up to this point spread butter on hundreds of pieces of bread, sliced cheese which arranged itself on top of the butter, and a storm of ham slices fluttered their way on top, followed by another bread slice. In a matter of seconds, the wizard in my kitchen was surrounded by a swirling bubble of sandwiches. He opens his mouth wide and several fly in. He chews supernaturally fast, going through his sandwich swarm at an impressive rate. All the while I'm standing there rather frozen, though I do lower my arms when they start to hurt from holding the book up. After a minute or two, though, he's somehow eaten all the sandwiches, and the massive amount of silverware still swirling about him drops to the floor in a loud clash. At this point he almost seems to notice me, standing there in my bathrobe with Finnegan's Wake in my hands. He blinks several times while staring at me owlishly, then seems to hit upon an idea, judging from his widening eyes. He fumbles at his sleeve for a moment before pulling a ring off one of his fingers. It doesn't look like much, just a plain goldish coloured ring. He puts it down on the counter and addresses me: "That should -" he hiccups before continuing - "That should cover the ... stuff." His piece apparently said and done, he lets out an ear-piercing belch, totters back a few steps, disturbing the milk jug pile, and disappears in the middle of tripping over my destroyed drawer. I stand there for several minutes, the events assuming an ever-more ridiculous slant in my mind. That couldn't have just happened, right? I must be still dreaming. I stare blankly at the mess made of my kitchen for the next few minutes.
Screw this, I'm going back to bed.