Elan tries to get some patrons to spill their knowledge concerning Girard.
Cast
Transcript
- Panel 1
Establishing shot of the outside of a building. A sign over the door reads, "INN". The background is of the dark red city skyline of Bleedingham.
Patron: —And then she said, "I don't care how many charges are left in your wand, you're not getting near my Portable Hole."
- Panel 2
Four adventurers stand around a table drinking beer.
Patrons: Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!
- Panel 3
Lizardfolk Patron: Or what about that time with the Gynosphinx?
White-Caped Patron: Oh, man! She was so angry, I can't believe we got out of that one alive!
Gnome Patron: I still don't understand why she got so mad at me for staring—when you're my size, you learn to pay attention to a pair of giant pink boulders headed straight for you!
- Panel 4
Black-Haired Patron: Ha ha! Hey Sphinxie, I got yer riddle right here:
Black-Haired Patron: What's hard in the morning, soft most of the day, and hard again all night?
White-Caped Patron: I don't know, but I think you've got one in your pocketses!
- Panel 5
Elan walks up to the table and joins the merriment.
Patrons: Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!
- Panel 6
Elan: Hey, and remember that time we met those guys from that secret organization that lived in the desert—
Elan: —and one of them spent a lot of money and another bought a bunch of food and maybe they had face tattoos?
- Panel 7
Elan: ...
Elan: No?
Elan: Nobody?
- Panel 8
Elan: OK, next table, then.
D&D Context
- A Portable Hole is a magic circle of cloth which when placed on a surface becomes an extradimensional space. The hole can then be picked up and folded up like cloth again, making it an excellent method of storing things without needing to carry their weight.
- Gynosphynxes are sphinxes with the upper body of a human woman.
Trivia
- Sphinxes in mythology demand that those they encounter answer a riddle, or be killed and eaten.
- In panel 4, the white-caped patron mimics the speech of Gollum, a fictional character from J.R.R. Tolkien's beloved 1937 novel The Hobbit. Gollum challenged the protagonist, Bilbo Baggins, to a riddle contest. Bilbo's final riddle is not much of a riddle; he asks what is in his pockets. Gollum is frustrated by this question, and does not know what is in Bilbo's "pocketses". Gollum also appears as a character in Tolkien's 1954 epic fantasy, The Lord of the Rings.