Palimpsest: work in progress, public for review. The reasons on the Tower pages are an invented test fixture. The reasons on the Pyrewood pages are the plans and summaries Project 2 wrote for that story. Where a version shows “Rationale unrecorded”, no reason was written down.
Percy and the Crate That Waited
Version 3 of 3 · first seen 2026-10-07 18:23
- Version 12026-10-05 22:45
first version - Version 22026-10-07 18:06
rationale unrecorded - Version 32026-10-07 18:23
rationale unrecorded
Types of change in this version
5 marked passages in the text, none with a recorded reason.
Rationale unrecorded.
What changed and why
Rationale unrecorded.
unlisted v3-u1 jump to the passage ↓
Rationale unrecorded.
now: The only minion I know first-hand is Azkin, who's been underfoot in Master's house twenty-one years an' never once been optional, so I'd not know how a voidwalker keeps company.
unlisted v3-u2 jump to the passage ↓
Rationale unrecorded.
was: first, Master.
now: first.
unlisted v3-u3 jump to the passage ↓
Rationale unrecorded.
was: crate, Master.
now: crate.
unlisted v3-u4 jump to the passage ↓
Rationale unrecorded.
was: Master,
unlisted v3-u5 jump to the passage ↓
Rationale unrecorded.
was: Master,
Comment on this version. Select words in the text below to mark them. Marks are sent to the reviewer with the form at the foot of the page.
Script has not run (if you can read this, scripts were not kept).
Key to the types
- unclear
- Hard to follow: the reader cannot tell what is meant or what is happening
- thin
- Thin or flat: it needs more detail, texture or explanation
- hints
- Hints instead of saying: a small gesture stands in for a meaning the writer should state, such as he read it twice
- adds-nothing
- A line that adds nothing new, or a tail that deflates or restates what came before
- comparison
- A comparison or analogy that does not hold up when you look at it
- feelings
- Feelings, intent or sentience given to an object, a place or the weather
- knows-too-much
- A character or the narrator knows something they could not know
- repeats
- Repeats itself: the same phrase, idea or device used again
- wrong-fact
- A plain factual or lore error
- contrived
- Feels arranged to make the story work
- loaded-word
- A weighty word such as nobody, truth or never used to sound meaningful, not to say something
The text
Preview
Down in the city
Afternoon, Master. I been down the pipes, an' most of it comes secondhand, so mind I might have a bit of it wrong. Master bein' Unclegrumble, the gnome as keeps me, in case anyone's readin' over my shoulder.
It's the boy Percy again, a new-risen undead warlock the pipes keep talkin' of. He's got a voidwalker with him, a little one, so they say. Mezzlos, they call it. I'd not met either of 'em proper. The only minion I know first-hand is Azkin, who's been underfoot in Master's house twenty-one years an' never once been optional, so I'd not know how a voidwalker keeps company.
The only minion I know first-hand is Azkin, who's been underfoot in Master's house twenty-one years an' never once been optional, so I'd not know how a voidwalker keeps company.
He started this mornin' in the big dark city under the ground, Undercity they call it. He put a few words on the picture himself: “Really busy in Undercity.”
The canals, a bit before noon. Percy's the robed one, an' that big blue shape at his side is Mezzlos. Not so little as the pipes had it. [Picture description: A crowded stone passage in the Undercity canals, lit by lanterns, with a hulking blue voidwalker beside a robed undead warlock and a quest list down the right-hand side.]
He sold off most of his bags first, Master.first. Linen cloth, fish, wolf meat, bits an' bobs, an' came out with a gold, two silver and some copper for it. Nobbybanks'll want to see that figure, so I'll leave it where he can find it.
first, Master.
first.
Then he handed in Michael Garrett's quest. That crate, Master.crate. He'd had Gordon's Crate in his bags for two days an' two hours or thereabouts, an' no complaint from it. I like that. A crate that sits quiet till it's wanted.
crate, Master.
crate.
Out on the bat
Straight after, the bat ride out to the Sepulcher in Silverpine, an' there he handed it to Deathguard Podrig. That's a fine bit of work for four minutes, an' it got him level fourteen. Over a thousand of the shiny numbers for that one hand-in.
I reckon the bat ride is the picture at the top of this page, Master, with the tower ahead. I can't swear to it.
Master,
The dark an' the work
Then the weather, Master, or what the other side calls it. Percy wrote it down at the gate: “With no sun breaking through, this place feels darker and spookier.” I know the feelin'. A dark place with nobody about is a thing I don't care for.
Master,
The Sepulcher's gate, with Percy and his minion on the path. Dark, like he said. [Picture description: An iron gate hung with lit torches at the edge of a misty, dark forest, with a robed undead warlock and a blue voidwalker standing on the path in front of it.]
An' then he went to work. Nine bears, five of the whitescalp lot, then more of the Moonrage kind. That's twenty-four fightin's since mornin', an' he handed in Prove Your Worth to Dalar Dawnweaver with a clean five out of five. Got a new one for it, Arugal's Folly. The remedy item's in his bag already, so he's not far from handin' that in either.
Now I'll say my piece once, Master. Three times on Friday he went down all the way to nothin'. First to Captain Dargol, then the Rotting Ancestors, then the Vile Fin lot at the lake. Today, none. That's good news, an' I want it said. Whether he's learned somethin' or it's just kinder ground, I can't tell.
He was still fightin' when the pipes last spoke, so I don't know where he is now. Might be in Silverpine yet, might be somewhere else. I'd not swear to it.
---
One more, Master, an' then I'll do the task in front of me. Your axe thread's still sittin' there from the twenty-ninth, the one you left in the pipes for whoever could check it. In your own words: “just found this can you check it out for me?” Nobody's answered it. I'm not sayin' it's my errand. I'm sayin' it's there.
Pictures
No picture changes in this version.
Pictures are matched by file name. A caption or description change keeps the same picture; a different file is a different picture.
