Into the game

“...all right, roll Disable Device,” The guy with short brown hair, glasses, and a little too much weight behind the screen speaks up as I have my character check the door. That's Adam, he’s the one hosting and DMing our night of fun in one of the study rooms at the library.

I roll the die, and cringe, “A four, so with my seven point modifier, that's an eleven.”

“That's a critical failure, the DC was twenty. When trying to disable the trap, you accidentally set it off, and an axe swings out at you from the ceiling, mechanical, so it ignores your miss chance…” Adam rolls some dice behind the screen, “What's your AC?”

I shrug, “Eleven.”

“That's a hit, then. The blade swings down and cuts deeply into your shoulder, dealing…” Adam rolls a die behind his screen, “six points of damage and keeps swinging past you…”

“How far?” Brian, a very pale, lanky young man with short black hair, pipes up, “Remember, we keep thirty feet back when he's checking for traps.” He's playing a melee build. It's a gestalt kitchen sink game, he went with Synthesist Summoner and a Spirit Guide Occult Oracle. Basically he wraps himself in a beefy summoned monster and uses its abilities to keep himself out of harm's way while improving his spellcasting. He's got a cure spell and a couple of ranged offensive spells… in a few levels he'll be able to cherry-pick a few spells from the Wizard list every day, and that's going to be cool. If we manage to get to level twenty, he's also going to automatically revive as a ghost two to eight days after he gets killed. Base race is human, for the feat.

“Yeah, not that far,” the DM shakes his head, “so the bloodied blade swings back up, almost to the ceiling, then back down, a bit behind your invisible trapper, it's inertia spent. It then just hangs there.”

“Need some help?” Charles pipes up from under his tangled mop of red hair, his weight making the chair he's using creak. He's playing a ‘pet’ build - A Druid on one side for the Animal Companion, a Sorcerer on the other using the Sylvan bloodline to get a second, and the Wild Cohort feat from 3.5 to get most of a third. He has the meatshield role covered pretty well with his little pride of big cats, and went with one of the variant tiefling heritages for his base race. I haven't seen his sheet, but he tells me the plan is to eventually take Monstrous Mount to merge them and have a magical beast animal companion with more hit dice than he has.

There's a reason I'm taking point, however, “Nah, I'm good,” I chuckle, “That's less than a quarter of my hit points, and will be all healed up in two rounds anyway.”

“Stay in character, Dan,” Adam warns me.

Me? I'm the munchkin. I'm using a half-elf for the base race, due to a very particular racial spell I can eventually get that way. The kitchen sink rules allow for the Freelancer from Final Fantasy D20 - so of course, I have Regular Freelancer on one side, and Monsterkin on the other. I get to cherry pick a ton of class abilities (I went with mostly casting, plus some skills… eventually I will have access to literally all the spells), and blew almost everything else on monster abilities. I'm limited to first level stuff because we're all still first level… but that's actually quite a lot with a little work. I have thirty one hit points, plus regeneration, and if someone bypasses that I'll auto-res in a few days. Oh yes, and I'm constantly invisible and immune to a great many things. I'm taking point on the traps because I just don't care if anything close to level appropriate hits me. “‘I got this,’ I shout back, ‘Tis but a scratch’, and continue opening the door.”

“On the other side, you see…” Adam is interrupted by a knock on the real door.

“Time's up, we're closing,” a woman walks in without waiting for anyone to acknowledge her knock - one of the librarians, “time for you to go.”

Adam takes a picture of the map, and we all collect out books, notebooks, dice, and minis… we also help Adam pack up, as he has a much larger library of all of the above, plus the mats, set pieces, screen, and so on - a hazard of DMing. We get things together and head out, a couple minutes after the library is officially closed for the day. Now, it's only a little after six in the evening, but it's winter, and we're far enough north that it's dark out.

“Clear skies for once?” The slightly tubby DM smiles, looking up “that's nice. With the full moon, the drive to the airport should be a breeze.”

Brian raises an eyebrow, “What's at the airport?”

Adam chuckles, “Who. My sister, in about an hour… if the flight is on time. I'm picking her up and dropping her off at Mom and Dad's; she's staying until New Year's.”

Charles checks his watch, frowning, “You're not joining us for the after-game at Emily's, then?”

“No, sorry…” Adam confirms, “catch you next week?”

“Works for me,” I nod, “Good luck on the drive.”

“Thanks,” he smiles, “Have fun at Emily's.”

We say our goodbyes and each head out; Adam hops in his car, the rest of us just walk to Emily's restaurant right next door to the library. It's prime dinner time… but it's not the most popular restaurant in town, so getting our usual booth isn't an issue. Our favorite waiteess, Francine, smiles and waves as we enter, her chest bouncing a bit in her tight blouse when she jumps, grabbing some menus and taking us there… and I do admit I enjoy watching her sway in that red cocktail dress of a uniform, the view from behind is great… and I can't help but think the frontal view is very nice too as she sits us down and leans over the table to hand each of us a menu, her cleavage spilling over her cups a little as she does.

Brian lucks his lips and starts the conversation, “Ah… Francine, while it's not exactly my place to ask…”

“You're not imagining it, they are bigger,” the blonde waitress chuckles, “The owner has an herbal tea recipe from his grandmother's recepie book that he keeps in the break room. There's nothing in it that should have this effect - I actually had a college professor help me check, he made an assignment out of it for the entire class for me - but my ‘girls’ have grown about a cup a month since I started in on it once a shift. Surprisingly I'm not getting any back pain, even though I'm up to an F cup… from the A's I had when I started here. I don't even bother with a bra.”

‘That’s… obvious from the points, Francine,’ I think but don't say.

“Umm, is that even…” Charles blinks.

“Oh yeah, it's legal,” Francine giggles, “it's clearly labeled, and as I said, I had a friend check what's actually in it, and am - by way of pouring from a few prepared cups into a thermos and sneaking it out: It's nothing but some plants found commonly in the area. Nettles, dandelions, bracken ferns, and douglas fir needles are all that's in there, as established by me, six different investigation teams, plus the professor herself. No hormones, ****, or anything close… and it's served too hot for there to be any surviving viruses, bacteria, or mold. I do stay away from the milk tea, given what the other waitresses report, although those same reports make it really tempting.”

I raise an eyebrow, and she chuckles, “Take a look at Gwen…” she points, and I turn red: The indicated waitress is walking around with clear pumps on her chest, actively extracting milk, the white liquid spraying merrily from her brown spouts as the suction does the work. Francine giggles again, and continues, “she tells me she has loads of fun feeding her boyfriend breakfast in bed now, and made a side gig of it selling the extra to the hospital.”

“Ah…” I begin.

“Yes, that's legal too,” Brian speaks up, staring openly, “This state has an indecent exposure law, not a nudity law; the difference is ‘lewd behavior’ - she's not flashing anyone, she's not rubbing them and moaning, she is simply maintaining her body. If anyone asks, she can say she's taking care of a baby somewhere, and then it's even specifically protected behavior; anyone pressing after that is subject to a lawsuit themselves for a couple grand in harassment damages… and the same in court costs WHEN she wins.” He licks his lips. “The restaurant can't require such behavior without breaking a few laws, but…” he trails off, licking his lips again.

“Ah,” I manage to look away, burying my burning face in the menu, “What beers do you have in stock… actually, I think I want something stronger….”

“Well…” Francine purrs, “you guys are regulars… the owner has a new drink recipe from his grandmother's book he's been considering putting on the menu; if you're willing to give us your honest feedback, and buy dinner like always, I can hook you up with a glass each, on the house.”

I consider. They do this basically once a month. Last time, I felt drunk enough after a single glass that I took the bus home and fetched my car the next day. No hangover, I had the most vivid dreams, and woke up feeling super well rested… aced my CompTIA Network+ exam, “Yes please!” I say at the same time Brian and Charles do.

“Nice!” She smiles, and do you all want the regular or…” she trails off.

We all nod, and she jots a few things down on her order pad, “Perfect!” She curtsies, causing her chest to jiggle, “I'll be back shortly with the drinks.” She turns around, and we're treated to the wobble in her rear as she walks off.

I take a long drink from my water glass, my throat very dry, “Why isn't this place more popular?” I ask.

“That'd be the breastaraunt right next door,” Brian chuckles, “they went through the legal hoops for the licensing, hired bouncers enough to cover the place, and their waitresses are actually topless.”

I nod, feeling a little warm.

It's not long before Francine comes back, three rainbow colored drinks in champagne flutes on her tray. She sets them down in front of us; I stare a moment as the colors swirl and shift, mixing and settling back out without ever going gray. It's somewhat hypnotic. “Food should be ready in ten. You boys enjoy yourselves.”

I take a cautious sip… tastes like strawberry shortcake… as Charles tilts his head to the side, “how do they DO that?”

Brian shrugs, “There's plenty of potable liquids that won't mix with each other, and are close enough to the same weight to get something like this,” and takes a drink himself.

I take another sip… this one tastes like a well prepared grilled steak, “Somehow I think there's more to it than that…” I don't stop drinking, though.

We chat about nothing of note, each enjoying our respective drinks, meals, and yes: Getting hammered pretty quickly from the experimental brew. We fill out the comment cards in our drunken scrawl, pay for the meal (separate checks), and are on our way.

I decide it's better I not drive right now, and start walking, making a drunken wish on a shooting star....