Fear and Loathing in Vvardenfell

Passing Time in The Eight Plates

I sat in silence shocked by what Pip had told me. I didn't know how to process it, didn't know what lens to view the broken explanation of his past few days. Was this a dangerous and murderous Argonian that I was about to embark on a journey with that would put my own life in peril? Or was he like any other person who had slightly snapped under the stress and pressure of life? Everyone breaks down periodically and if I never broke down in the twisted and brutal way Pip had done I was still appreciative of the fact that maybe it was an unusual example of his behavior. My nearly perpetual hangover the past few days didn't help my anxiety over the matter.

"We go to Ald'Ruhn now. We leave now. Must make good time," he insisted.

"You disappeared the past half week and now you're in a hurry?"

"Yes. No time to waste. Old Imperial be mad at Pip."

***

I had kept busy to the best of my abilities in Pip's absence. There were things to take care of in the meantime although I didn't feel anything was too pressing. Perpetual hangovers always destroy motivation which didn't help the situation at all.

There was nothing new to report from my temporary room for the past four days in The Eight Plates; Pip the Argonian had all but disappeared from the face of Nirn and I was wondering if the entire ordeal was only an effect of [REDACTED]'s second-hand skooma smoke. But I was certain that Pip was as real as I was if only for the fact that I had a bunch of hastily-scrawled notes in my journal about him as well as some sloppy notes taken from [REDACTED] and Pip's assignment, whatever it may be. Unless the second-hand skoom-induced dreams were more vivid than I imagined they could be.

So I waited. Endless waiting. I'll spare you the griping about it because I complain enough about it. All life seems to be waiting. Oh, I'm complaining again. To hell with it. You must pass the time somehow when you're holed up in a place like The Eight Plates. Life is punctuated by moments where things actually happen -- life defining things -- but they are few and far between. Years pass with only a handful of notable moments that you look back on and think, "Yes. That changed my life. That altered my life. It broke the tedium. Maybe things are moving forward?" You meet a good friend, you lose another friend, you find the love of your life, or get horribly injured and addicted to skooma/alcohol. If you wait long enough the boredom will surely end. Fate will surely deliver you where you must go, but in the meantime? Boredom.

But until then? Who knows. You write I guess. Piss away time until the mistress of fate shows up knocking on your tavern room door disguised as an aloof Argonian with a Colovian hat towering precariously above his head. If he even is the mistress of fate, which I doubt he is.

You can only play games with the drunks in the tavern long enough. There's one game perpetually going on called The Dunmer's Gambit, a card game -- and I won't explain the rules here because they're terribly complex -- and I lost the rest of my money learning how to play with these scoundrels. I funded their drinking for at least a few days before I finally figured out what I was doing. These guys were pleasant, and drunk, enough but were only playing The Dunmer's Gambit for something to do, and while better than I was, didn't withstand my long game. Eventually I would end up with a hand called "a cliff racer" (which is four cards in numerical order) or "an ogrim" (two pairs of matching cards), and began taking their money. And luckily I raked it in. Not enough to be charged with cheating or unsportsmanship-like conduct, but enough to turn a slight profit. At least while Pip (if he was real) was off fucking around somewhere on Vvardenfell I could earn free drinks and minimal cash from my drunken ashen-skinned friends.

And let's not forget the productive trip to the Imperial Shrine at the nearby Fort Moonmoth, just outside Balmora. Yes, that's right, I actually made it there, turned in my reports, and received a fat payment of 500 septims for my efforts. It sounds like a ton of money, but wouldn't last long with living in taverns and constantly buying food/booze from the locals.

But I survived long enough for Pip to finally show up, and he was insistent that we left immediately.

It only took a few minutes to round up all of my scattered belongings from living days in the bleak tavern room. Tossed everything in the pack I had, cluttered everything into the bag and set out. And we set out quickly in the middle of the night to the north towards Ald'Ruhn.