In a misty city a lonely figure mutters to himself as he makes his way along a quiet, lamplit street. Passersby clear from his path as he growls his anger and swishes his cane back and forth. Mothers take their children indoors and close the curtains lest his ire fall upon them or their charges. He is well known but not well loved.
As
his path takes him to a more salubrious part of town, the last of the street
urchins and ne’er-do-wells are left behind. A lofty tower looms before him and
he climbs up cracked and broken steps to the black lacquered door. Fumbling for
his keys, his eye chances upon the ornate knocker and, for a fleeting moment, he
could swear it looked just like the face of his old partner Jacob Darra. Not
being constrained by Victorian narrative convention he thinks ‘Load of old bollocks!’
and proceeds inside.
Who is this unhappy individual you may think? Why, it is none other than Ebeneezer Tet – misanthrope, miser, and sometime commissioner of Red Rose Gaming Bloodbowl League. Lighting a candle, he proceeds down his gloomy hallway casting curses and shadows before him as he goes. After a cheerless meal of hard cheese and sour wine our unloved soul takes himself off to his dusty bed chamber and falls into a fitful, restless slumber…
‘ooooOOOOoooooOOOOoooo!’
‘I
said ‘ooooOOOOoooooOOOOoooo!’
‘Who’s…who’s
there?’ Our heroic commissioner trying to sound braver than he feels.
‘Ebeneezer
Tet…it is I…Jacob Darra…your Bloodbowl mentor and former commissioner’ cried
the voice ‘I have returned from beyond the grave to bring you a dire warning…’
There
before him, festooned in chains of unpainted miniatures and block dice, was the
terrifying apparition of Jacob Darra.
‘Are
you dead then?’
‘What?’
replied the phantom face as white as a fish’s belly.
‘ARE
YOU DEAD?’
‘Didn’t
you hear the ‘ooooOOOOooooOOOOoooo’? Would I do that if I were not dead?’
‘You
look like you’ve just covered your face in flour and put on a bedsheet’
‘Yes,
yes’ said the spirit ‘I bring you a dire warning…you have fallen out of love
with Bloodbowl statistics and have let slip my beloved legacy. If you do not change
your ways and complete ALL the outstanding Darras you too will be damned for
all eternity to wander the Earth as a lost soul…’
‘A
lost soul covered in flour who isn’t actually dead?’
‘Alright
then…let’s drop the pretense and the tortured parody and get on with the main event,
shall we?’ said the un-undead Darra ‘Isn’t it about time you stopped sulking
about that bounced ball in the playoff final and gave the good people of the
RRGOBBL what they are waiting for?’
‘The
Darras?’ replied the Commissioner like a chastised child.
‘YES…THE DARRAS! ALL OF THEM!’
‘Oh…go on then…’
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