Day Four-Hundred-One: Unplanned obsolescence

Pubton is a big town. I hadn't noticed, but, yeah… we're getting pretty big…

Despite the setbacks, the sieges, the fights and arguments and loss of much of our food, Pubton is prospering. We now have eight complete buildings, the foundations of five more, a bunch of constantly-cleared roads, the beginnings of a sturdy wall around the town, a few traders with portable shops on the streets, and a bustling economy. People buy and sell all the time. A lot of us don't even live in the pub anymore. It's fantastic.

So, yeah, I'm REALLY not needed.

I know this is an old complaint by now, but it stands. Nobody needs me to do anything. Pubton is fully automated. Everyone knows their jobs, and they're willing to take on more duties whenever needed. There's plenty of action and excitement, and even the nobles, who grumbled so damned much about getting their hands dirty at the start, are willing to contribute to the energy. Harold does a great job of administrating the lot of 'em.

I, by contrast, struggle to find things to do with my days. When I'm not buggering up my marriage or fighting unfathomable monsters from beyond time and space, I'm… bored… so bored… to the point that I've taken overnight watch many times, just to feel useful… it's like my old guard days all over again…

Worst part is, nobody bothers me to help 'em out anymore. Hell, if anything, they go to lengths NOT to ask me to help. Not just because I'm liable to screw up whatever they're doing, but because they think I've done enough. Consider my list of accomplishments, diary, and you have to admit they're kinda right:

- I negotiated the survival of the nobles by offering up myself - and died in the process

- I came back from the grave and led a bunch of aimless vagrants to a new home

- I helped them establish said new home

- I worked my fingers to the bone at every job imaginable trying to get that home set up and running

- I successfully negotiated peace with the lord of the lands

- I stopped a witch (who's now one of my friends, go figure) from destroying the town

- I goaded everyone to optimism when the dark things came, led by Kierkegaard, and gave them a reason to keep on living by swearing vengeance on The Baron

- I sent away a dragon that might have destroyed everything

- And, to top it all off, I faced down a sloth and survived - though, granted, they don't know it wasn't real, even though I constantly argue that it was

Quite a list. I don't blame them for letting me take it easy. And, hell, maybe I should. I've been through more than most people suffer in an entire lifetime, and I'm still alive. Somehow.

But I can't take it easy. It's not IN me to take it easy. I feel antsy for work, I WANT to work, because I've been doing it for so long now. I wanna contribute. If Pubton had more to do I might not feel so crazy about this, but dangit all, this town is BORING if you're not working.

So I've set myself to a new task. A task which I know I can accomplish, with a bit of elbow grease and persistence: the release of Robert.

Not my brother. He's, y'know, buried under the Beefiary, bless his eternal soul. No, I mean Robert the Librarian, who's still trapped in June's hut, believing he's in a full-blown library when he's actually stuck in a closet. She's convinced that he'll go mad without a library to inhabit. I have to prove otherwise.

How? By a petition. I'm gonna go around town and ask people to sign a document demanding that June set Robert free. And, hell, if she still refuses, I will MAKE HIM A LIBRARY where he can bloody well live. The poor guy taught me how to write; it's only fair he has his own library again. Even if it's not as good as the one back home, it'll be a damn bit better than the smoke and mirrors he lives in now.

Determined,

Dragomir the Petitioner