In a Hostile Country: The Saga of Cahmel (Let’s Play Morrowind, Part 25)

When we last left our hero, he was seriously contemplating defecting to another house. I mean, intelligence-insulting quests? I can handle that. Larceny and murder? Comes with the territory. Harassment? Creepy, but bearable. But asking me to escort an NPC through bandit-infested territory to a town that I’d been forced to streak through twice? This isn’t so much a quest as a world tour of frustration and humiliation.

Okay, calm yourself, Cahmel. It’s not that bad. They probably won’t even remember me, right? It’s not like a drug-running nude courier tends to stick in the memory. Oh, and I’ve got a full-faced helmet now. Also, and this is important, NPCs have the attention spans of goldfish on bathtub acid. Yeah. Yeah, I should be fine.

Except for the whole escort quest part. Yeah, that’s still gonna suck.

I meet up with my “traveling companion.” I must admit, my concerns that he’d be a blundering ignoramus were immediately allayed by his choice in wardrobe. I mean, tell me this doesn’t scream, “walking across dusty ash country and trying not to get noticed by bandits.”

Yeah. I could tell this guy was just as sharp as butter.

We set out on our journey through the wastes. I stick to the roads whenever I can, not trusting him to navigate any terrain rougher than a papal game of badminton. Still, he manages to lodge himself on rocks, fence posts, stiff bits of grass, passing scribs, passing bits of scrib jerky, unusually humid air, the farts of gnats, etc, every few minutes or so.

Somehow, it’d surprise me each time. I’d be jogging along at my little clip and then I’d turn around, knowing even as I did so that he’d have mired himself against some bit of microscopic geometry. I like to imagine his expression grew a mite sheepish; I don’t know if that’s true, and I suspect it’s not, but it makes me feel better to project some sort of remorse onto his damnable smug grin.

Of course, it’s no picnic even when he’s right behind me. That bastard is slow. Maybe it’s because he won’t take a walk without a highly-trained escort, maybe it’s because he’s a sack of bureaucratic pudge, or maybe he just enjoys screwing with me…

Ooh. I bet it’s that last one.

…but he moves at the pace of a stunned sloth. Alright, maybe he’s a bit quicker than Granny Pruneface, but he’s still a burden and a half.

Still, for several minutes, wrangling this guy was the only challenge of my position. I was half-convinced that this whole story about bandit attacks was a ruse, and they just needed a more graceful way of saying, “We need someone to hold this guy’s hand, keep him on the path, and make sure he doesn’t eat too much paper while he’s away.”

That’s when I see the bandit.

He’s a Dunmer, he’s well dressed, and he’s got a magic weapon. He’s a highwayman, but he has a polite demeanor and is basically nonthreatening. Funny how this is the second such guy to appear around Pelegiad. Is this some sort of backwards gentleman-thief mecca, or is this guy a particularly pathetic copycat criminal?

Whatever. I talk to him. He’s all cordial and polite, and seems genuinely concerned for my welfare vis-à-vis him not having to kill me. I guess the whole cultured bandit thing’s supposed to endear me to him, but it’s really just irritating at this point. It’s like how someone will take something without permission or shove their shift onto you, and will act all apologetic the whole time, as if that excused the fact that they just royally screwed you over.

Right, ball’s in my court, then. Ten drakes or I have to face you in combat? Terribly sorry, dear chap, but it seems we’ve reached a bit of an impasse here. If I might be so bold as to offer a counter-proposal, I would heartily recommend you piss up a rope.

Time to make with the hacky-slashy. The fight is pretty one-sided, for all of his cultured trash talk, and he’s on the ground before I know it. Got a decent sword, too—think I might hock that for training montage money.

Luckily, I don’t’ have to dwell in Pelegiad long. I get in, get out, and try not to make eye contact with anybody. Especially not that old woman I collided with the first time. And the second time.

Glad to have that spot of bother over with, I leg it back to Vivec. Right, time to check out my next quest.

…okay, let me see if I’ve got this right. You send a team of fighters—people who are trained in combat, who you bankroll for the sole purpose of making things dead—to a dangerous Telvanni base. None of these guys report back. Your response, then, is not to send a bigger squad in their place, with mages and spikes on, but to deploy…one man. Who you’ve previously used to transport your mail.

I mean…okay. This is how I advance. Doing these quests is what I do to get a higher rank. If I want a promotion, I can’t not do these quests. And yet, when you look at Crassius Curio, my bosses’ boss, you get the sense he’d lose in a boxing match against a down comforter.

So, my question is this: does every Hlaalu intern have to be a human killing machine, or is it just me?