------
Present Day . . .
Olaf the Ogre was gorging himself as usual, munching on the daily special with his typical relish. Out of all the regulars, he was the most generous tipper in the entire Troll’s Bridge Tavern. Olaf had standards. He expected impeccable service, local or freshly imported ingredients, copious mead and blood ale, and would not hesitate to batter an annoying guest or useless waiter to death for his own satisfaction. Numerous discussions had been made about his suitability as a patron, but he spent big and tipped extremely well: what were a few expendable visiting dark elves on their gap year holiday from the Underdark, or the occasionally annoying dwarf merchant whom had to be expended to secure his repeat business.
Rufus loved Olaf. He thought he was a gentleman, one of the last great culinary patrons, whose grace and style could only be challenged by the most uncouth. Every time Rufus had an awful tab where some pretentious High Elf, or a greedy goblin, refused to tip him his well-deserved 20%, Olaf was happy to come by and munch on their brains for his “second desert.” For his part, Olaf respected Rufus as an excellent bartender, and he was happy to cannibalize those 0% to 5% cretins.
The Tavern was slow tonight. Only that weird hobbit, whose ridiculous name no one could remember, kept sitting by himself getting obliterated off tipplers and munching on the smallest appetizers not generating a sufficient net tab to garner a decent tip. Notwithstanding, he seemed to be a decent, if not odd, guy -- he always tipped 18%, not great but not terrible, and he generally kept to himself without being too demanding. Rufus gave him a pass, but he would let the new Dark Elf waiter Chuck serve him tonight.
After the past several weeks of the little guy asking him for introductions to “adventurers,” or “heroes,” Rufus realised he was wasting his time serving this odd-ball halfling. It was best to serve him his drinks when he wandered to the bar, yet let the junior staff serve his table. He got his tip-out anyway, so why should he bother with serving a cheap hobbit? Give him a rich, fat ogre self-made millionaire who appreciated fine cuisine; ate half the menu (and sometimes the other guests); always tipped well and was gracious to those who deferred to him, over some pipsqueak or weird backpacking adventurer any day of the week.
Aside from Olaf the Ogre, the typical consortium of Glub, Globble and Grumble LLT. were in conference at their standard table reserved every Tuesday at two o’clock. They had a routine late luncheon scribbled in the books every week which always caroused into dinner, sometimes they stayed late until dinner (even close, you could never predict the ability of a goblin to throw back booze), but they were standard 15% tippers on generally large tabs.
Initially, Rufus was resentful when he learned that they were able to file their dinners as business expenses: he became angrier when he learned that they were able to expense some of them to their clients; but he eventually learned to come to terms with it. They were guaranteed income, and he swiftly learned to abandon his own morality to try and jack up every expense and up-sale possible for their table.
Goblins were misunderstood. They required boundaries and limits, felt themselves the masters of the universe, but they were really just fat ugly little gremlins who managed to succeed past the rest of the pack. Capitalism has its merits, and Rufus certainly never complained. He was more interested in trying to perfect his greatest invention: the blender.
As this casual night went along, the weird hobbit trying to scribble away, Rufus heard Uthlith, the newly hired Dark Elf who may have been living in an alleyway, grumble, “Is this restaurant always this slow? I have alimony payments to make after my ex-wife took the cave, and my bat-hunting business. God, I hate that little nerdy munchkin and those goblins. The worst is that fucking ogre. Do you see how he just throws child bones on the floor? Who is supposed to clean that up?”
Rufus was working on his new cocktail, tinkering away. He did not look up.
“Did you not hear me, gnome? Who the fuck is supposed to clean that mess up?” Uthlith repeated.
Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.
Still focused upon his latest creation, a delicate alchemical concoction infusing mint and elderflower with gin, his new creation he was calling "soda water," and a touch of Disaronno, Rufus murmured, “You are.”
“What?”
“You are.”
“Minotaur shit. Not a chance.”
Rufus sighed. “Just do your job, or I will feed you to Olaf the Ogre. He tips me 35% and is a perfect gentleman. Never talks business, only his interest in classical art and music. Absolutely great guy.”
“What?”
“I will feed you to Olaf the Ogre. Go do your damn job, and bus your tables. That Orc couple, Gulag and Moblug, specifically made that table as part of their reservation tonight. They love the view of the sulfur and torture pits. He told me that he is going to propose marriage to her. Make sure Chef knows that we need more horse-flesh and man-meat tonight. He tips 25% -- I have a bottle of elf blood infused wine from the Nefarious Estate Winery, fermenting for 10 years before the Cataclysm, waiting for them in the cellar.”
“You pathetic little gnome, how dare you speak to me like that. Do you not know that I have a First in Drow from the Underdark Academy before I came to this shitty country?”
Rufus sighed. Every year, another batch of these uncouth dark elves came from the Underdark to see the world; yet they were the worst tourists. They spent all their time underground at awful nightclubs, filling their faces with whatever amount of pixie-dust -- whether it was pure or not -- that they were able to wrangle off their dealers, and kept insisting the civilized above world correspond to their subterranean standards. In town, they were known as Boguns.
“Just do your damn job,” Rufus sighed.
At this point, the door burst open and the most heroic group of adventurers which had ever graced this part of Westernmost of Middlemost Earth strode confidentially through the threshold. They were marvellous. Beyond compare. A slice between a pornographic modelling orgy, and a heavy-man lifting acting competition. The entire restaurant gasped in amazement at their beauty and splendour, and poor Olaf the Ogre actually chocked on a piece of talus bone for a few moments before he hacked it up onto his plate.
This was the famous Silver Company of Heroes. They were renown throughout the twelve kingdoms as the greatest band of adventurers West of Central Middlemost Earth, and they burst in with purpose. Hair waving majestically in the afternoon breeze, muscles gleaming with oil and sunlight, and weapons brandished; they came for a purpose.
“Olaf the Ogre, your time has come! As for the rest of you monsters in this vile den of horror!” shouted their leader, Valerian the Noble, a tall handsome nobleman with flowing dark hair and shining armour. The papers called him the greatest swordsman of the age.
“Surrender now, and we shall be merciful,” he added.
Rufus was furious. He had not had a chance to ask if anyone wanted desert, little alone collect the cheques.
“Excuse me?” piped the little gnome. “Do you have a reservation? We have a dress code,” he added, glancing at the beautiful barbarian woman wearing only a loin cloth, her heaving golden breasts exposed in the glaring sunlight washing in from the door.
“We can’t let you in if you are not properly attired, my apologies,” Rufus continued. “We do have courtesy dinner jackets available if you like, but I have a full wait list tonight.” The little gnome grabbed a few menus, heading swiftly toward the door. “If you would like to look over these, I can sit you at the bar; and we might be able to see if a table becomes free.”
Valerian slapped Rufus with the back of his left hand across the face, knocking the gnome to the floor in a tumble. He shouted, “Silence, cretin! We are here to deliver justice!”
It was at that moment -- the fateful slap, with Rufus tumbling over and somersaulting backwards -- that Silas woke up. He had been passed out in the very corner booth of The Troll’s Bridge Tavern, one table next to that weird hobbit Hildago Buttertart, droop slathering down his face and clothes. The sound of the slap made his blood-shot eyes open, and he glowered at the door.
To his right, that strange little halfling was ecstatic with glee. He positively started jumping up and down on the leather cushion seat in his booth, clapping his hands and shouting, “Adventure! Adventure! I found it!”
Silas stumbled out of his chair, knocking over an empty bottle of Sémillon. He pushed the hobbit over, muttering, “Shut up, you little fool. Hide under your damn table or I am feeding you to Olaf the Ogre. He owes me a favour.”
“Hey, prissy boy,” Silas burped. “Why don’t you take your anti-ogre racism out of here before you get hurt?” Silas shouted at Valerian.
The band of heroes let out a hearty, deep-bellied laugh.
“Go back to sleep, grandpa. We are here to meet justice to the wicked, not to take you back to your retirement home,” Valerian answered.
“Retirement home?” Silas replied. “Retirement home!”
Silas pulled his staff out from the seat next to him, his eyes glowing a brilliant turquoise, and he shouted, “Let’s talk about retirement homes, you pomaded motherfucker!”
If Hildago Buttertart wanted to be involved in an adventure, the actions of the next several minutes would guarantee his place in the history books.