Something was strangely amiss. I thought for a moment. Where the hell was everyone?! Then I had an idea. That strange person in the tea-room, he's always there, he can tell me where everyone is. I left the land (via the controller on my arm) and I found myself back in the tea-room.

Whoa I thought, as I looked around to see loads of people in the tea-room. There was a lot of shouting going on, and everyone seemed to have their back to me. I tried to look over the crowd. After searching the crowd for a moment I spotted Cora, and went over to her.

I tapped her on the shoulder, and she turned saw me and smiled, then looked back up the tea-room. “What the hell is going on?” I asked trying to be heard over the din. “Were voting for a bash general” she replied casually. A bash? What the? “Who we bashing” I asked, trying to sound like I knew what she meant. She turned and looked at me quizzically, then realised my misinterpretation. “Sorry, I should explain” she said, “every Thursday night we have a bash. You know how every now and again, you get points when the amount of mobiles in the land, goes down to 100 or 50” Well I didn’t, but I do now I thought. “Well when the count drops to 0, everyone who has killed something, gets 3000 points”. I looked at her with my eyes wide open, “3000” I repeated. “Yep, well we organise one of these every Thursday night we elect a general to lead us through the bash. Occasionally we have spontaneous bashes, but they don’t usually work”. I looked up to see who everyone was looking out, and I saw a few people being pushed forward, obviously the candidates for the bash. I also saw a couple of other people dressed impressively, one of them, looked incredibly familiar to me, but I couldn’t put a name to it. “Who are they?” I asked Cora, pointing at the regally looking people. “They’re a couple of wizzes, that ones Cat (the one that looked familiar), and the other is Gandalf. They decided who is going to be the general based on our votes.” I looked up to see Foz standing up they’re trying to sway the crowd in his favour. The other two up there I didn’t know. Gandalf and Cat turned for their mini conference, and the crowd fell suddenly silent. I slurped my tea, and everyone turned to look at me. The two wizzes turned back to face the crowd and the crowd turned back for the answer.

Gandalf spoke to the crowd. “Today’s, bash general, will be, ……….. Foz! The crowd cheered, and a few booed. Foz stepped forward and announced his plans for the bash. “Ok then, who wants to take out the dragon?” he asked the crowd, and about 4 people shouted out “me” in unison and Foz picked out one of them for the job. “Ok then, he said, I want Maniac to lead the attack on the dwarfs, contact who you want with you afterwards. I’ll be leading the keep teams etc, when the time is right. Ok, don’t get killed, and KILL KILL KILL.

After Foz’s last commands, everyone left into the land, to get a few more points, and to catch up on their sleep. I told Cora I’d catch her up in the land. I stood there, looking at Cat, when I realised who he was. Everyone else had gone; even Gandalf had disappeared in a flash. Cat turned to me. He was just about to disappear himself when I said, “now I know who you are”. He looked at me quizzically. “At first, I wasn’t sure, but now I know for a fact. Your that strange man that keeps chucking me into the land aren’t you?” A smile rose on his face, and he nodded his head to agree. “Answer me this, why am I here?” He didn’t reply. The smile on his face grew wider and wider, and the rest of him seemed to be disappearing. “Don’t you leave, I want answers” I shouted, but he still gave no reply. I made a run and jump for him, but I fell straight through what was left of him, and landed hard on the ground. I rolled over quickly, but he was gone. “Dam it” I said to myself, “DAM YOU” I shouted up. There was no point; I might as well get back out in the land. My arm controller beeped the two-minute warning, so I rushed out to catch up with Cora.

I ran into the lounge where I found Cora sleeping. She awoke, as I stumbled in, and she said “rngstilde”. “What?” I asked her. “The dream word, if ever you hear a strange word in a dream, say it when you wake up to gain more stamina, IM full now”. I decided to understand later. “What are we going to do in this bash?” I asked. “IM going to show you some of the other sites in the land” she replied with a smile “it’s not all spring and dwarfs
you know”. I had noticed other areas of the land when I awoke after the spring, but I took no notice of them. “We might even get you up to hero before the bonus” she added. “What about you” I asked. “Me, oh I should be able to get most of the way through superhero with the bash points. “Whoa, that was quick, you’ve nearly got 6000 points already?” I asked surprised. “Oh yeah, it’s holding on to the points that’s the problem” With that she
chuckled to herself. Then our time was up, and the old reset faded out, as the new one began.

What else is there beside dwarfs and the spring? What will Rocko find? Will he ever find out why he was put in this land? Will Cat stop smiling? Will the bash be successful, or fail? If it does fail, is there a ritual hanging of the general? All this and more, in the next exciting episode of……

Rocko’s (not so modern) Mud Life!!!