Roy is called to account for his decisions in life.
Cast
- Roy Greenhilt (as spirit) ◀ ▶
- Elan ◀ ▶
- Eugene Greenhilt ◀ ▶
- Bureaucratic Deva ◀ ▶
- Second Level Bandit ◀
- Other Bandit who Abducted Elan ◀
Transcript
- Panel 1
Bureaucratic Deva: …and you can earn double points when you use your Archon Express card. Would you like to fill out an application?
Roy: Uh, no, thanks.
Roy: Wasn’t there going to be some sort of judging here?
Bureaucratic Deva: Oh, right!
- Panel 2
Bureaucratic Deva: Let’s take a look at your Permanent Record, shall we?
Roy: Permanent Record?!? I didn’t know there really was one of those!
Bureaucratic Deva: Wow… your grade school principal had quite a few choice things to say about you—
- Panel 3
Roy: It was just a joke! We didn’t know Mrs. McNulty was allergic to weasels!
Bureaucratic Deva: —but we generally don’t consider childhood escapades.
- Panel 4
Pan out. Roy and the Deva discuss his case, while Eugene waits stage right.
Bureaucratic Deva: Let’s see… what do we have here in the adult file…
Bureaucratic Deva: Resisting arrest?
Roy: It was an illegitimate authority.
Bureaucratic Deva: Taking gifts intended for a king?
Roy: Would’ve been destroyed in the explosion anyway.
Bureaucratic Deva: Dangling an oracle out of a window?
Roy: Really? I don’t remember that one.
Bureaucratic Deva: Abandoning a—oh my.
Roy: Uh oh.
- Panel 5
Flashback to Elan being abducted by the Bandits of the Wooden Forest.
Bureaucratic Deva (inset): Abandoning a friend to an unknown fate.
Roy (inset): Oh. Right.
Roy (inset): That.
Elan: Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet?
- Panel 6
Roy: Look, OK, what I did was horrible. It really was. I shouldn’t have left Elan to those forest bandits, even if he IS some kind of Avatar of Annoyance.
Roy: But I don’t think you’re looking at the whole picture. I abandoned him for, what, a few hours? Then I came to my senses.
Roy: I realized what a putz I was being, and rescued him. (And the rest of the party, I might add.)
- Panel 7
Bureaucratic Deva: Oh? And what if Elan had been killed during those few hours?
Roy: Then I…
Roy: …I don’t know.
- Panel 8
Bureaucratic Deva: Hmmm. Well, at least you’re being honest about it, I’ll tell you, if you hadn’t gone back, then whether he lived or died, I would be chucking your file into the True Neutral bin right now.
Bureaucratic Deva: As it stands, there is a lot to be said for learning your lesson before you died, rather than trying to backpedal now.
- Panel 9
Bureaucratic Deva: Because apparently just a few weeks later, you saved the same coworker from death by donning a Belt of—
Roy (whispering): Please do not mention that incident within earshot of my father. I’m begging you here.
- Panel 10
Bureaucratic Deva: So, I’m willing to let this black mark slide.
Roy: Nice! So what’s next?
Bureaucratic Deva: Your association with “Belkar Bitterleaf” a.k.a. “The Belkster” a.k.a. “Death’s Li’l Helper”.
- Panel 11
Roy: …I don’t suppose we could just weigh my heart against a feather instead?
Bureaucratic Deva: Oh, no, we haven’t done that for years.
Bureaucratic Deva: The scales are a bitch to calibrate.
Trivia
- This Is Your Life was an NBC radio program from 1948-1952 and TV program from 1952-1961, with some returns to television in the three decades that followed. The show would surprise a guest and then proceed to take them through their life in front of an audience, with surprise reunions with significant people from their past.
- In the first panel the Deva refers to their Frequent Dying Miles mentioned in the last panel of the previous strip.
- The items in the adult file from panel four refer to:
- Resisting arrest: Roy resists Miko's efforts to arrest the Order in #200, and again in #251.
- Taking gifts intended for a king: Roy accepts the Royal Suite and numerous extra services intended for the King of Nowhere in #227.
- Dangling an oracle out of a window: Roy and Durkon intimidate the Oracle of the Sunken Valley by danging him out of a window in a flashback to the period before Roy formed the Order of the Stick in #329. The Oracle's memory charm erased Roy's memory of the event.
- The fifth panel is a flashback to #152; when Elan is kidnapped by the Bandit Clan of Wooden Forest, Roy does not want to rescue him. After the rest of the Order formulates a plan without him (and get themselves captured), Roy eventually decides to save Elan in #162.
- Roy saves Elan (who had been poisoned by the Shadowdancer) by donning the Girdle of Feminity/Masculinity in #234.
- Belkar has committed numerous crimes, but most notably the murder of his prison guard in #261.
- In Egyptian mythology, the goddess Maat (or sometimes Anubis or Osiris using Maat's feather) performed the Weighing of the Heart upon souls seeking to leave the underworld (Duat). Those whose hearts weighed less than or equal to her feather were allowed to enter paradise (Aaru) and those whose hearts were heavy were condemned to remain in the underworld or be devoured by the crocodile-headed demon Ammit.