As your bike takes the next corner, however, the front wheel gives a disconcerting wobble. The dwarf grunts and tries to wrestle the contraption back into order, but suddenly a nut spins off its bolt onto the ground, the wheel dislodges entirely and the front end of the bike drops into the dirt, flipping you and the dwarf into a conveniently placed haystack and sending the front wheel spinning downhill into a tree.

"Oh blast!" groans the dwarf, as your companions pull up alongside you and check to make sure no one was injured. "That's the third time this week!" He looks around for a bit and, shrugging, stands, dusts himself off and huffs downhill towards the misbehaving wheel.

"You guys see if you can find the nut that came off," he shouts back at you, "we'll need it to get back up and running again."

>Look for nut

You and your companions start scouring the ground for the missing bolt, finally turning it up just as the dwarf comes puffing back up the hill, wheel in hand. He takes the bolt from you and pokes his hand back towards a rucksack hanging over the back of his bike.

"Could you check my bag for me?" he says. "I'm going to need some sort of wrench to get this on good and tight."

>open rucksack

You reach into the rucksack and take from it a Latin-English dictionary, a stale croissant, a clay jug full of water, and a rusty wrench.

>give wrench to dwarf

You hand the wrench to the dwarf, who looks it over for a split second before handing it back. "Nope, it's the wrong size. I need something adjustable."

>Adjustable?

"Yeah," says the dwarf, "you know. Like a spanner, or...something."

>No. Absolutely not.

The dwarf looks offended. "You're refusing to help?"

>No, sorry, I'm not talking to you. I'm talking to this idiot text parser.

I don't understand "this idiot text parser."

> Oh, come off it. You've been carrying on perfectly coherent dialogues for pages now. Stop playing dumb.

Fine then. So what's your problem now?

> I'm not doing this. The whole idea is utterly preposterous, and I won't stand for it.

You have a better idea?

>...

...

>Combine oil can with magnifying glass.

Now you're being silly.

>COMBINE OIL CAN WITH MAGNIFYING GLASS.

You place the handle of the magnifying glass in the nozzle of the oil can, creating a thingamabob.

>Combine tape measure with thingamabob.

You've successfully created a whatchamacallit.

>Combine whatchamacallit with lipstick

You have created an elaborate doohickey.

>Give doohickey to dwarf.

The dwarf takes the doohickey and points it his wheel, instantly repairing it. "Hey," he says, "this is pretty useful! With this we can get you to Glinda's in no time!"

>What, really?

No.

>...

It's an oil can with a magnifying glass sticking out one side, a tape measure wrapped around it and a stick of lipstick lying on top. What exactly were you expecting?

>...

Having second thoughts?

>Take apart doohickey.

You disassemble the doohickey into its component parts.

>Combine croissant with wrench.

You have created a croissant wrench! How clever!

>Oh, shut up. That's not even spelled right.

It's crescent-shaped though. It still counts.

>Club smart-mouthed text parser in the head with croissant wrench.

Now that's not very nice.

>Do it anyway.

You hand the croissant wrench to the dwarf.

>No I don't

Yes you do.

>Fine. Hand croissant wrench to dwarf.

The dwarf gets to work, and in an instant you're ready to go again.

"Keep that stuff from the rucksack," he says. "I won't be needing it."

"You sure?" you ask hesitantly.

"I'm sure. When was the last time you saw a dwarf drinking water?" You nod softly and add the jar of water and the Latin dictionary to your inventory.

"Point taken."

Move on down the road.

You and your (now numerous) gang roar down the road until you reach an ominous structure that looks like a skull that has been shaped from the rocky hillside. There’s a crooked sign out front that says: “Humble Residence of the Evil Genius Mordack (At Work Behind-the-Scenes).

>Enter Humble Residence

You notice that the skull’s giant teeth block your path. Next to the teeth is a gold, square button with a note below it: “Say Light and Enter.”

>Push button.

A cauldron of boiling oil pours down from the left eye of the skull. Fortunately, Lord O’Scars is the only one under it. “At last, my hot oil tin skin treatment!” says Lord O’Scars.

>Say Light.

Quotation marks, please.

>Say “Light.”

Use the ancient tongue.

You wonder if this means ancient D’ni, Elvish or Latin.

>Refer to Latin Dictionary.

“Lux,” you say.

The teeth slowly rise, revealing a long bridge that looks as though it might once have been a tongue, now patched in various places with rough asphalt. This leads to an open door, from whence come the sounds of chanting. A brilliant light makes everything inside the door difficult to make out. You proceed to the door and notice a trash can next to it, with something that looks like a device with an emerald on it tossed casually in the trash.

>_

Is the "common theme" here "do your own thing" maybe?

Hi sierramindy, we try to be a little consistent & remember what's happened before & what inventory has been picked up along the way & follow on from the post before, but to continue the story, yes! just do your own thing! Ooh! please join in!

Sorry, but all I can think of is the obvious:
Take device
OK
Examine device

And that's all I can think of to do. I usually hope at this point that the game will tell me something useful about the object. My imagination doesn't run to this type of scenario. I like opinions, not actions!

Now that you're getting a closer look at the device you see that it is, in fact a statue of a young woman, done in a style that strikes you as possibly Aztec-like. The emerald you had seen was her large green eye. Where her other eye should be is an empty socket.

You know you should remember where that other emerald is!

North is the open door with brilliant light, beyond which is the sound of chanting.

South leads you out of Mordack's humble residence. (Through the raised teeth you can see Perry, waddling drunkenly toward you. How admirable that Perry is still bringin up the rear!)

East is an alcove with a machine called The Speculator that shows a large bar code, with an arrow pointing to a hole where you can insert things.

West is an alcove with a square silver button and a sign that reads: "Speak the truth or suffer the consequences."

>

REM Trying to catch up on some urgent paperwork for work (unpaid overtime ) - back at the weekend! END REM

REM I'll be back tomorrow, first I have to read me back into the story!


Bernard

REM -- I did that a couple of days back. It was fun. There's a lot here.

>Go east

You approach The Speculator

>Look at the speculator

The device is utterly inscrutable. Possitively impossible to scrute.

>Go West

You return to the entrance to Mordack's.

>Go West

You approach the alcove and its strange silver button

>Use Latin-English dictionary

You take out the Latin-English dictionary. Look up a word?

>Look up "truth"

truth: veritas

>Press button

You press the square silver button.

>Say veritas

Nothing happens.

>Yay.

*waves a flag*

>Use walkthrough

You pull the semi-existent walkthrough from your inventory. It's inordinately heavy.

>Turn to page 100

The walkthrough continues, "Be careful entering the pyramid. If you stupidly walk in without proper preparation, you'll set off a boulder trap which crushes a very important artifact you'll need later in the game. Instead, you should--"

>--Stop. Turn to page 3,912.

You wrestle the pages as best you can, eventually landing somewhere near page 3,912. The walkthrough continues,

"DO NOT THROW ANY INVENTORY IN THE WELL. Especially not your gold credit card. You will regret this later."

>This walkthrough is kind of detailed, isn't it.

Well, it has to account for all possible paths you could take.

>How many paths are there, anyway?

There are approximately BUFFER OVERFLOW

>Approximately what now?

At least Eighteen quintillion four hundred fourty-six quadrillion seven hundred forty-four trillion seventy-three billion seven hundred nine million five hundred fifty-one thousand six hundred fifteen, plus one. I can't count any higher.

>You've stopped using digits now?

It's more impressive that way.

>Well then, turn to page.... 463,912.

The walkthrough continues,

"and with the defeat of the Whizzer, your true enemy finally reveals himself. This is all rather predictable, since you read about it weeks ago in the walkthrough, but still--who would have thought that the greatest threat to your continued existence would be--"

WARNING. SPOILER ALERT. EMERGENCY WALKTHROUGH SHUTDOWN COMMENCING.

>What was that?

Nothing.

>That was the future, wasn't it?

It was one of your many possible futures. You probably won't survive that long, anyway. Weren't you supposed to be solving a puzzle?

>One of them's inscrutable, and the other one's unsolvable. And after what the walkthrough said about the pyramid I entered earlier, barging into the Wizard's celebration in there seems like a very bad idea.

So what?

>Ask Michael for advice

You're kidding, right?

>Ask Dirk for advice

"Well," says Dirk, "I suggest we try blasting the door down."

>That's great. Ask Cassie for advice.

"Don't look at me," says Cassie, "the three of us have been trying ever since we got here. We've tried thirty-seven different languages including Old Ozzish and Morporkian, and we've tried saying true things, and even lied a couple of times, and nothing's happened. Not even consequences.

>Ask everyone else for advice

"Maybe," says Lord O'Scars, leaning back against the wall, "the door opening IS a consequence. I'm not really sure we want to go in there, you know."

"He has a point," says the dwarf. "I've never found it a good idea to dig too deeply into these things...or too greedily. To tell the truth--"

The dwarf is interrupted by a deep rumble as the door slides open, followed by a loud metallic clunking as Lord O'Scars tumbles down a long flight of stairs behind him.

"Um, Cassie," says Mia timidly. "You did try ENGLISH, right?"

Enter Room.

You enter a semi-circular room with stone benches on descending tiers. Stairs frame the sides of the room. At the bottom of the room is a stage. A purplish glow issues from the walls, and a blinding light enters though a hole at the top of the ceiling, which is open to the sky.

On the benches are robed figures, chanting an eerie, repetitive melody. Hanging from the ceiling on the stage is what looks like a beautifully carved metallic microphone, and near the front of the stage are curtains made of stretchy plaid fabric with tassels.

Lord O’Scars has fallen all the way down the stairs to the foot of the stage. You and your companions race down the stairs to join him, where he is brushing himself off, apparently unharmed.

The curtain begins to open and the chanting ends abruptly. A figure emerges. It is wearing a mask that looks vaguely like an Aztec god, and it is wrapped in the same fabric as the curtains. (In fact, as you look at the figure, you realize that what seems like a robe actually IS an old curtain.)

Speak to masked figure.

“Hail, mighty Mordack!” you say, bowing deeply. “I am the road manager for the infamous band: Full Metal Throttle. May we set up our equipment so that we may perform for you, O Great One?”

“Mggfflemsnisnifl,” says Mordack.

>I beg your pardon?

At last! I was hoping your would beg! What would you like to be pardoned for?

>I don’t understand.

Of course you don’t. Find out who picked up the wrapper in the Emerald City with the bar code on it.

>Could I just talk to Mordack now?

“Your words are the very essence of wisdom, O Mordack,” you say. “But could you, perhaps, speak a bit more clearly?”

“Mgg…fffle…msni…snifl,” says Mordack, slowly and quite loudly.

>Use doohickey on Mordack.

You want to tell me how to assemble it again, Mr/Ms Mechanical Genius?

>Open jar of water.

You remove the lid from the jar of water.

>Use jar of water on Mordack.

You toss the water straight into Mordack’s face. You are thrilled to see that, as it drips down his mask, the mask is melting into clumps of paper-maché. You are looking straight into the face of…

“Officer Sock!” you hear Dirk gasp. "How did you get here? This is impossible!”

“No, merely logical, Captain,” says Sock. “I performed a remote mind meld on Becky, and realized that she was about to send you to see Mordack. So I hacked into Mordack’s file, and I am now appearing in his stead.”

“You have to be in physical contact with someone to perform a mind meld, Sock,” says Captain Dirk. “You can’t just invent a new talent in order to make the plot progress.”

Sock raises one eyebrow, but says nothing.

“I am here to help find the uniforms,” he says. “I’m tired of wearing this curtain.”

“Where is the real Mordack?” you ask.

>_

REM Thanks Demosthenes and Becky for making it so easy to get back in the story again


Bernard

REM Don't worry, Bernard, this is all just part of our sinister plot to seize control of the thread for our own nefarious purposes.

REM I knew it, I knew it, I knew it!!!


Bernard

REM I've printed the thread up to immortalize it. Used up nearly an entire ink cartridge!

So the thread has been "published" (if you count putting it on paper as publishing). Someday I will read it to my grandchildren.