Gamebooks (Choose Your Own Adventure Style)

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

You Say Which Way:  Lost in Lion Country Alternate Endings Part 7


When I decide to walk to Habari Lodge in CHOICE #6, Abebi tells me "It is dangerous for someone to travel alone".  She'll send her 16-year-old brother Biko, who has hunted lions before.  We fill up our water bottles by using a sling worn partially like a bandanna, or at least Abebi does.


Biko doesn't speak English, so Abebi is his interpreter.  He says I should stand back to back with him if we find predators, because they attack when their prey is separated from a group. 


Blair Polly makes a mistake here.  "You look to where he is pointing and see a tribe of meerkats.  They are sitting on their haunches on top of a mound of dirt a hundred paces off the road.  The older meerkats are watching for predators as the young ones run and leap about in the dust".  Meerkats live in Namibia and South Africa, not Tanzania.  Watching The Lion King too many times can mess with your zoology. 


A vehicle approaches, but Biko thinks they're poachers.  Abebi confirms it.  I don't understand what they're saying, but Biko learns they're hunting rhinos.  Biko runs off to the poachers' truck and pokes out the tires with his spear.  Rather like what Paulie and one of my previous incarnations did in Dinosaur Canyon.


Now the poachers are shooting at us.  They aren't good marksmen, so we get away, but Abebi had to ditch her water container.  CHOICE #9 is to rejoin the road so we can get to Habari Lodge sooner, or circle around a hill and arrive tomorrow, with less risk of the poachers catching us.


Biko doesn't want to go along with my plan to arrive at the lodge today at first, but eventually gives up.  He tells us to go in single file to avoid alerting animals to our presence.  The poachers are probably far away by now, because they're more interested in ivory than us. 


"The horizon has turned red and orange with intense patches of gold and yellow.  The trees are now silhouetted against the sky and look like structures you'd see in a science fiction film set on an alien planet." 


We hear roaring when we're almost at the lodge.


"You hear movement behind you.  Expecting to be dragged down by a pair of gigantic claws at any second you run even harder.  Then a man runs out of the gate.  He has a rifle in his hands and points it into the air and fires.  Bang, bang, bang!  The noise is deafening.  'Quickly, into the compound!' he yells and waves his arm.  You don't need to be told twice.  The three of you run past the man.  He fires two more shots and turns and rushes through the gate after you, slamming it shut behind him.


'You three youngsters were nearly cat meat', the man says.  'What are you doing out here at dusk?'  You explain to the man how you came to be in the company of the two Maasai and how they helped you get back to the lodge after being abandoned on the savannah.  'Oh so you're the one who ran away from the tour.'


'I didn't run off!' you say.  'The stupid driver left me behind!'  'That's not what he says.  He says you deliberately snuck off.  Your family is very disappointed in you.'  You can't believe what you are hearing.  'But why would I. . .'


'Never mind, your safe now.  I'd better get onto the radio and let the searches know you've been found.  Your family will be pleased to see you when they get back.'  'Get back?  Where have they gone?'  'They're out looking for you of course.  They've been out all day.  Come.  Bring your friends.  You three must be hungry after your long walk.'


This was the first thing the man had said that made any sense.  Why would any sane person get off a tour and walk out onto the savannah alone?  Was he crazy?  You are just finishing dessert when your family comes into the dining room and rushes over to greet you.  After a few hugs, and an explanation of how you came to be left behind, you introduce your family to Abebi and Biko.


Your family thanks the two young Maasai for getting you back safe and promise to organize a ride for them back to their village the next morning.  'Thank you', Abebi says.  'I've never had a ride in a Land Rover before.'  'Oh and we must take lots and lots of chocolate', you say.  'The village children love chocolate".


We are rescued from our incompetence by the Habari Lodge staff.  "Cat meat" would have a very different meaning in several recipes from the Siege of Paris in the Franco-Prussian War. 


I didn't fall out of the Land Rover in the beginning.  I deliberately jumped out to take pictures.  The guy criticizing the player character for that is correct, though it's portrayed as slander in the text.


Results So Far


6 Good Endings

1 Deaths

0 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

1 Inconclusive Endings

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

You Say Which Way:  Lost in Lion Country Alternate Endings Part 8


For this path, I decide to circle around the hill in CHOICE #9.  The poachers move on and shoot two rhinos, and I take pictures as proof.  Biko's tire-slashing tactic failed because they had a few spares.  Biko finds a rock for us to camp, and we build a fire to keep away predators.  The narration mentions that the stars are much more visible without electric lights.


I have a dream about riding on horseback among the wildebeest, which is supposedly like "the cattle-drives there used to be in the Wild West."  In the morning, we enter the lodge without any more trouble.


"The three of you walk into the compound just as the Land Rovers are loading up for the day's search.  Your family is talking to the driver who left you behind.  When they see you with Abebi and Biko they shout out in surprise and rush over to hug you.  The driver also seems relieved.  When your family finishes hugging you, you walk over to the driver.  'You owe me an apology', you say.  'Why don't you count that everyone is on board before you take off?'


The driver kicks the dirt with his foot.  'I'm so sorry.  I didn't realize you were out of the vehicle.  Is there any way I can make it up to you?'  The driver seems genuinely sorry.  'I owe these two something', you say, turning to Abebi and Biko.  'Without them I might not have made it back.  They put themselves at risk to help me.'  'I will make sure they are well rewarded', the driver says.


While you've been talking to the driver, the lodge manager has wandered over.  You explain about the poachers and how you've taken photographs of them.  'We're in luck', the manager says.  'Normally poachers leave the area before we have a chance to call the authorities, but because of you getting lost, there are police all over the area.  I'll radio them now and let them know you've shown up so they can concentrate on catching the poachers.'


Abebi looks ecstatic when she hears this.  she explains what the manager has said to Biko.  Abebi takes your hand and smiles.  'Sometimes good can come from things going wrong.  If you hadn't gotten lost today those poachers would never had been caught.'  You smile back.  'And I wouldn't have made some new friends".


Hooray for unintended consequences!


Results So Far


7 Good Endings

1 Deaths

0 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

1 Inconclusive Endings

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

You Say Which Way:  Lost in Lion Country Finale


The only thing left to do is to go all the way to CHOICE #1 and climb the acacia tree.  The giraffe I was trying to photograph moves elsewhere.  The hyenas take a while to catch my scent because of the wind direction, but they yip and run at me.


I climb the acacia, and it's easier after the first branch.  The hyenas jump and try to bite my legs like any TV predator.  I take pictures and sip some water.  I take care not to drink much of it because the savannah grasses are brown.  A Land Rover passes by, no matter how much I yell and wave. 


CHOICE #10 is to either throw sandwiches to the hyenas to try to make them go away, or keep them and wait them out.  "A pair of vultures land in the bleached branches of a dead tree not far away.  Do they know something you don't?"


If the Peanut Gallery members paid attention to the math ending of Once Upon an Island, they'll know one of the problems referred to this CHOICE.


Trying to wait them out is successful, but doesn't give us any new endings.  I eat one of the sandwiches, and the hyenas are distracted by elands after a while.  A helicopter passes by without noticing me.  The CHOICE after that is to either go to the dry creek bed (same results as doing so in CHOICE #1), or climb down from the tree and go to the road, which takes me to the Maasai village and gives me a different scene before CHOICE #6.


The Maasai scene shows a lion hunting party that doesn't speak English "any better than you speak their native tongue, Maa".  My sign language is enough to convince them to help me.  They laugh at my makeshift spear and give me a better one.  They like my pocket knife when I give it to them.  In the village, the narration suggest "If you'd been in Scotland you could have made a half decent kilt with some of the patterned fabric on show". 


Unfortunately, this "finale" post is a Dead Ends feature.  Throwing the hyenas the sandwiches. . .leads to the same CHOICE as not doing so.  No new endings here.  There's a scene where the hyenas fight over a peanut butter sandwich though.


Lost in Lion Country isn't among the best CYOAs featured here, but it was fun for me.  CHOICE #1 not mattering much was a disappointment.  And some of the endings seemed to be variations of the same event, like stopping poachers with a police helicopter instead of a machine gun Land Rover.


There are still two more You Say Which Ways in this ebook volume:  Pirate Island, and In the Magician's House.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

You Say Which Way:  In the Magician's House Part 1


"You can't remember a time when you didn't live and work in the Magician's house.  It is cloaked in mystery and you explore it every day.  There are many rooms inside the Magician's house, but you have to catch them while you can."


That's not an exaggeration.  I "find the kitchen easily most mornings" by smell.  Unlike many of the other workers here, I can go to new rooms more easily.  Other servants are often trapped in "drawing room dreams", as the cook Mrs. Noogles says.  I snap them out of it with a "friendly pat".  These drawing room dreams are everywhere, and include everything from public speaking to steering a train. 


My character lives in a turret above the Magician's house.  There's an allegedly "harmless" red frog living there that sometimes turns to stone, and I keep a jug of water for it.  This sounds like foreshadowing for some CHOICE.


The turret leads to different areas each morning.  Sometimes, it's a simple hallway, but sometimes it might be the conservatory with lily pads or a place with a suit of armor that doesn't stay in one spot. 


CHOICE #1 is to either go down a ladder in a hole in the carpet, or take a secret door behind a suit of armor and a tapestry.  Neither is familiar.


I decide to take my chances with the hole, because it sounds a little more fun.  "In fact most people who live in the Magician's house keep a sandwich or an apple in their pocket in case they don't see the kitchen for a while".  Never trust Hogwarts architecture.


A paragraph has some information about Mrs. Noogles.  She mostly stays in the kitchen because she has to cook all the time, and it's too inconvenient to move elsewhere because of the inconstant rooms.  She has an "easy chair", but I never see her sitting in it.


Whatever the other flaws of the house may be, at least the ladder is fine.  Glow worms provide a source of light, and there are many mushrooms in the cave.  "Suddenly, another pair of eyes opens right in front of you."  Someone's chuckles at me before pushing me off the ladder.  "But as you reach about you realize you aren't falling that fast.  It is like falling through treacle or custard".  I may call it "molasses", but "treacle" is appropriate because the book is set in London.


As I had guessed, my attacker is the Cheshire Cat. "You recognize the eyes, bright green and very large.  The rest of its face is a velvety black so it is hard to see a mouth or nose or eyebrows but it is shaped like a very large shaggy cat.  It grins to show an impressive amount of teeth".  His excuse for pushing me is to send me to my destination faster.  His face disappears and reappears and he asks me to "throw a few mice in the hole" because he's sick of bats.


The frog tries to escape, but lands near me.  It manages to take me back to my bedroom, and I realize the hole is partially made of a silky material.  I put the hole in my pocket because we're stuck in a Looney Tunes cartoon, I suppose.  Will this be a rare CYOA that acknowledges I have an inventory after the CHOICEs begin?  Or will it be 22 Minutos:  Tibicenas and forget about useful items?


CHOICE #2 is to either go down a "green carpeted hallway", or go through the CHOICE #1 door with the armor.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

You Say Which Way:  In the Magician's House Part 2


Going down the hallway in CHOICE #2 gives me this narration:  "You step carefully hoping to find your way to breakfast.  You treat the ground as if it is an icy surface-keeping your back foot ready to take your weight should reality slip away.  The Magician's house swirls with dreams that pool in corners of rooms and cluster on carpets like other houses attract dust".


Mrs. Noogles once gave me an odd expression when I told her about the back foot strategy.  On the grand staircase going down, I carefully avoid the 3rd step because it would have led to a crowded ballroom.  If I went to the party, there was the possibility of taking pies from silver trays, but "unfortunately it is the sort of party where all the food is very small and you are expected to take only one thing from a tray at a time". 


I slide down the banister in true cartoon fashion.  The kitchen door is open, but I have to avoid a dream of walking through a wet summer field.  A "huge thump" can be heard coming from a nearby door.  CHOICE #3 is to either investigate the noise, or ignore it.


Checking out the thump leads me to a room with a chimney sweep covered in soot.  "You have seen them before on London's streets making their way through the city".  He says "Please, I lost my way and I'm in ever so much trouble.  I didn't mean to cause a mess".  Imagine this line in your worst falsetto Victorian boy voice.


I have no clue why there's a chimney sweep here, because the Magician trained "enchanted squirrels" to do this sort of job every other Wednesday.  Anyone who has the power to make squirrels reliable must be a great wizard.


"Cheer up, you aren't in trouble.  I was just about to get some breakfast-are you peckish?"  Oh no!  My character must speak in falsetto too.  The chimney sweep accidentally leaves behind his brush, and reacts with astonishment when he re-enters the room and finds the place is clean.  We arrive at the massive kitchen.  It has 3 fireplaces, work tables, and several ovens.  The windows reach the ceiling and the flagstone floor looks like a chessboard.  Walls are covered with tiles of mismatched colors.  Above my head, we see garlic, onions and herbs hanging.


My friend Henry cooks bacon and sausages, and Mrs. Noogles arrives carrying more food.  "What manner of mess do we have here?"  I start grating potatoes while we talk.  Mrs. Noogles bathes the chimney sweep, and he says "I won't be half in trouble, Mrs. Noogles, if I don't get out and find my boss".  Mrs. Noogles thinks "Himself" will eat here, who is of course the Magician.


The chimney sweep's name is Charlie, and he says "The result of earning more than you spend is happiness but the result of earning less than you spend is ruin.  Well, that's what my muvver said when they were taking all our furniture away."  Charlie's family was sent to debtor's prison, and the Peanut Gallery can probably guess who he really is.  The blurb for this book on Fairytale Factory's website gives this plot twist away.


The Magician has a proposal:  "Charlie, how would you like to work for me for a while?  I could use another assistant at the theatre where I work.  You can room here with the other staff and, if you'd like, you can attend the school room with the others."


CHOICE #4 is to help Charlie get his stuff, or not to go with him.

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

You Say Which Way:  In the Magician's House Part 3


In case you haven't figured it out, Charlie is Charles Dickens.  Or the most overrated 19th century author.  Nobody will shut up about him, despite the turgid prose of his books.  Other Victorian writers could make better serial melodramas than Dickens.  If you doubt me, try 1860s Wilkie Collins, Mary Elizabeth Braddon, or East Lynne by Mrs. Henry Wood.


Now that the public service announcement is over, I decided to not go with Charlie in CHOICE #4.  He may torment me in alternate universes, but NOT in my CANONICAL ENDING.


Mrs. Noogles tells me to help gather herbs, which my character likes.  This is partially due to the smell of spices.  An odd tube says "hope" on it, so I take it with me.  Carrying a book with me is likely to lead to the library.  Perhaps the house works like the Room of Requirement?  The book I need is one not many people will miss:  A Baroness Instructs the Genteel Art of Dance.


I reach the ballroom instead, and not in the usual way of the party dream by stepping on the wrong stair.  The past winter solstice ball the Magician hosted included "jugglers and lion tamers and trapeze artists and illusionists.  There were also a couple from America who were crack shots with pistols and a number of fortune tellers and musicians".


In the ballroom, I see a mosaic on the floor featuring girls dancing with satyrs.  One gardener can be seen who looks out of place in the picture.  Perhaps he's trapped inside.


The dance etiquette book drags me to the library, and Hannah shouts at me "Don't shut that door!"  She explains that if the door isn't open, she'll have trouble sorting the books, because it sometimes opens onto stairs.  The narration mentions homework, which makes me wonder how education works in this place.


Hannah sees the picture change to a scene where a wolf is pursuing the gardener, and insists we rescue him at once.  She's now wearing a "cape with a hood and carrying a sort of basket" like Little Red Riding Hood.  Hannah makes sure to carry a dagger and some chocolate in her basket.  You Say Which Way characters love chocolate!  Hannah tells us not to eat anything in the forest because it may trap us in the enchantment.


When I show concern that she's wearing a bright red cloak, Hannah says wolves are colorblind.  But this seems to be inaccurate.  Wolves and dogs see fewer colors than humans, not in black-and-white like some cartoons would have you believe. 


The gardener Ted is happy when I find him and shouts "You've come from the Magician's house!"  I give him some toast from my pocket "and the gardner looks at it as though it is a three course meal on silver trays".


When the wolf comes, Hannah climbs quickly because of her training with the library ladders.  "Looks like we've got ourselves a typical enchanted forest situation".  The reason Ted fell into the trap was that he saw "beautiful girls" and wanted to dance with them.  The narration makes it sound like an allusion to the 12 Dancing Princesses, but I can't confirm it.


A "drumming of hooves" means "three brown pigs" with "long tusks" appear.  These 3 Little Pigs are the satyrs' pets, and now they're fighting over peaches.  At least until the wolf chases them off.  Ted once tried to ask the satyrs for the way out of the trap, but "they answered me in riddles and taunted me".  The Magician's house violates almost as many safety codes as Pokemon Gyms.  What is the point of all these traps for the staff?


I withdraw the "hope" tube, which has "doughnut shaped lozenges".  They all taste like fruit, such as lemon, raspberry, and lemon.  No explosion of flavor because this DM Potter wrote this instead of Blair Polly.  Just "a rush of zingy citrus".  A building that says "Library" appears, and we all rush to it.


"The pigs start to blow at the library and the building begins to buckle and sway.  You pick up speed to try and get to it before it disappears.  Hannah lets out a whistle and the wolf appears and starts snarling and snapping at the pigs.  They stop blowing as the wolf harasses them.  The library is within reach.  Ted opens the door and holds out his hand to you and tosses you inside.  Then he reaches for Hannah who is still encouraging the wolf.  The satyrs have begun to angrily kick at the wolf, which dodges them as it continues to keep the pigs from destroying the library.


At last Ted grabs on to Hannah and pulls her into the library.  He is about to slam the door when Hannah grabs it and lets out a low whistle.  The wolf leaps inside too as she slams the door on the angry pigs and satyrs outside.  The library begins to move as it it has been picked up by a tornado.  Books explode from shelves and whirl around.  The wolf leans into Hannah and whines in fear.  Ted steadies Hannah but she doesn't seem to need any help that you can see.  At last the wind dies down.  Hannah opens the door with the wolf beside her.  She steps out and you can see you are entering the Magician's library.


Across the room you see the door Hannah propped open earlier and beyond that. . .a great big hole in the ballroom floor.  The Magician is standing next to it as though he is preparing to cast a spell.  He waves and doesn't seem too concerned about the mess.  You are the last person to step out of the strange library.  The building melts back into the library wall leaving a door that is framed with intricate carvings of leaves and vines and little pigs and satyrs".


We all survive and rescue Ted from an enchanted forest thanks to my standard player character kleptomania.  The Big Bad Wolf should sue James Halliwell-Phillipps for libel.  It was the real hero.


And an ending where I avoid Charles Dickens counts as Good to me!


DM Potter's gimmick as a CYOA author may be overly long endings.  Between the Stars was written in a similar way.


Results So Far

1 Good Endings

0 Deaths

0 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

You Say Which Way:  In the Magician's House Alternate Endings Part 1


Going with "Charlie" in CHOICE #4 takes us to King's Bench, where his family is imprisoned.  "Do you think the Magician would let me take them some scraps sometimes?  They have poor food there.  It's a bleak house".  You thought I wouldn't notice, DM Potter?  (Bold print not in the original text.)


"It does strike you as odd that someone should be imprisoned for not paying their debts-how would they ever get out?  How could they work?  Charlie explains that often relations pool together to pay debts".  This sentence makes me think the player character is a time travel.  They certainly don't think like an early Victorian if they don't understand the concept of debtor's prison.  They could think debtor's prisons are evil, of course, but for a lower-class kid like the player character to not know what they are seems odd.


(And the usual genderless approach in You Say Which Way would break down in a Victorian setting with stricter gender roles, anyway.  Maybe the Magician's a time traveler too.)


Charlie greets someone inside the bailiff's house with "Yes Mrs. Winch-everything's roses!  I've found a man's going to put me up and give me a job and he has a school room!"  Charlie asks if the Magician will pay him, and I assure him that "the Magician is a strange fellow but also a fair one".  Out-of-character, I can't trust wizards based on prior You Say Which Way experiences, especially that guy in Dragons Realm who introduced himself by throwing fireballs at me.


Mr. Winch isn't as kind as Charlie thinks, because he's exploiting the debtor's children for money as they're being sent to factory and chimney sweep work.  The player character seems surprised by this according to the narration.


"You guaranteed me that boy for nine months of gluing.  Assured me you did!  Then he's hopped off to the sweep and he's lost him!  You lost me my worker and he was a good one too-he could read!  He never glued the labels upside down!"  While they're arguing, we might have a chance to escape.  CHOICE #5 is to either stay with a singer in a hallway, or run out the door while the men are distracted.


Trying to outrun the bailiff and his "friends" doesn't work well, at first.


"Halfway down the stairs Mr. Winch steps out above you and the factory manager steps out below.  You both try to get to the door but it's useless, the two men overpower you and truss you up like a chicken for the roasting pan.  You are gagged and put into big sacks and thrown on the back of a cart.  In no time you are carried into the blacking factory where Charlie worked before he became a chimney sweep.  The factory manager throws you both into a room with jars and labels and says just three words, 'Get to work!'


He closes the door and you hear a bolt being slid on the other side, locking you in.  'I'm so sorry', says Charlie.  A tear escapes down his cheek.  'Don't worry', you say.  Then you remember the hole in your pocket.  Charlie watches as you place it on the floor.  The ladder appears and Charlie follows you down.  'Where does this go?' asks Charlie.  You have to tell him you don't know but it seems like a good way to get out of the factory.  After a while you hear the voice of the factory manager above, he's discovered the hole and it sounds as if he's following you down.


'Jump', you tell Charlie and you pull him loose from the ladder.  Your fall is slow, like moving through custard.  When you land you recognize the foot of the grand stairs-you are back in the Magician's house.  'Step exactly where I step', you tell Charlie and head up the stairs.  About half way up, there is a bit of a trap for the unwary traveler.  If you head up the middle you'll end up in the middle of a party, crowded with people.  You know how to avoid it though, by skipping up the side.  Charlie follows and you are nearly at the top of the stairs when the factory manager comes out of the hole.  He is only slightly surprised to find himself in a grand house and immediately leaps up the stairs to catch you both.


Charlie moves as if to run but you tell him to wait.  As you expected, the manager disappears into a crowd of people, he's now trapped in the party.  You and Charlie slide down the banister and nearly bump into the Magician.  'Have you been bringing vermin into the house?' he asks you.  'Sorry Sir', we had to, we were being chased', says Charlie.


'Don't worry lad', says the Magician and he snaps his fingers.  On the stairs appears a fat black rat.  It seems a bit confused about how it go there, sees the hole in the ground and runs down it.  A few seconds later there is a squeak and a purring voice from the hole speaks up, 'Delicious!'  'Right you too, off to the schoolroom', says the Magician".


My character remembers the portable hole!  More than I can say for the forgetful 22 Minutos:  Tibicenas protagonist.


The Cheshire Cat and the Magician murder the factory owner, but he's the official villain, so it's a Good Ending according to Choose Your Own Adventure law.



Results So Far


2 Good Endings

0 Deaths

0 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

You Say Which Way:  In the Magician's House Alternate Endings Part 2


An alternate way to escape the factory owner in CHOICE #5 is to ask the singer for help.  This room only has one door, so if she betrays us, we're doomed.  Her room has many plants and a mortar and pestle, suggesting a place in the Magician's house.  She asks "What do you two want?" with a French accent.  Charlie responds "Pardon Madame, je suis Charles".  Everyone spoke French in the Olden Days, at least based on Victorian novels with occasional untranslated French dialogue like Jane Eyre.  If I were in this novel out-of-character, the best I could come up with would be "Fermez la bouche!"


(The Spanish language gets no respect. . .)


Both my character and the singer are surprised that Charlie knows French.  She thinks the bailiff will lose his job if the authorities find out he's "profiteering". 


Mr. Winch the bailiff says "I'll let that Charlie know there'll be trouble for his family if he doesn't get back to work, that'll fix him.  The other one's probably a stray you can put down your chimneys and nobody will miss them".


CHOICE #6 has the options of either hiding in a wardrobe or under a bed.  The French singer "looks very angry at what she is hearing" and gestures toward the wardrobe.


Within a couple of short paragraphs, Mr. Winch pulls Charlie and me from under the bed.  "There you go, one for each of you.  You'll have to lock 'em up when you aren't using them.  This one knows it's a longer lag for his dad if he don't work and no doubt this one can be convinced to do their duty too.  A bit of hunger will work wonders."  Even when he's about to sell me to the blacking factory owner, Mr. Winch remains scrupulously gender-neutral when referring to me. 


The blacking factory owner thinks I might be useful:  "This one doesn't seem to cough.  I lose them to the black lung after six months of stirring the pots".


They tie Charlie and me up, gag us, and throw us on a cart.  The blacking factory manager comments on how Charlie wasted his workday, and probably made the other workers slack off.  He wants to beat us "black and blue", but we're to "sleep down here for the rats" for now.  He gives us a stick to beat up rats for him.


Charlie cries about losing his books, but I tell him "Charlie, we're locked in a cellar with the light fading and a horde of rats about to bite us and you are crying about a book".  I take out my handy portable hole and throw crumbs from Charlie's toast into it to get rid of the rats.  To find out where the hole leads, Charlie throws a brick in too.  We hear a splash, and Charlie suspects it leads to a "boiling cauldron".


"A big cat face emerges from the hole.  'Thanks for the rats, my friend, but luckily I missed the brick.'  It looks around.  'This isn't the Magician's house is it?'  'Sorry about the brick', Charlie stammers, 'We are attempting to escape from this cellar and I was trying to determine where the hole would lead us.'


The black cat eyes him and evidently decides to forgive him for chucking the brick down its hole.  'Then I suggest the hole be repositioned somewhere which would allow you both an alternate exit.'  After the cat disappears you pick up the portable hole and think about where it might be best to put it next.  Charlie though, is way ahead of you.  'If we put it on the floor and it comes out in the ceiling of the room above, it might follow that if we put it against the far wall we might get out of the front door!'


He's really quite clever and completely wasted putting labels on jars, you think.  The two of you take hold of the hole and then cast it like a fishing net at the back wall of the cellar hoping it will form a tunnel rather than a hole.  It works.  When it lands this time, there is no ladder and you can just walk inside.  Near the entrance of the hole there are glow worms to light the path, but just as before they soon give way to darkness.  You are out in front and before long your foot finds the end of the path and a custardy nothing beyond it. 


'Jump, kittens!'  you hear the cat say.  So taking each other's hands you both leap.  The two of you fall in slow motion.  Eventually, you land on a heap of sacks by the front door of the factory with a large black tunnel seeming to have been blasted into the brick wall of the factory.  Quickly, you roll up the hole and stuff it back into your pocket.  In moments you are both running towards the Magician's house and clapping each other on the back congratulating each other on your escape."


And thus Charles Dickens was inspired to write Alice in Wonderland.


EDIT:  If this were Deadline Delivery, we'd be trapped in the factory for the rest of our lives.  That book wasn't afraid to give me Bad Non-Death Endings sometimes.


Results So Far


3 Good Endings

0 Deaths

0 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

You Say Which Way:  In the Magician's House Alternate Endings Part 3


The final ending in this Charles Dickens subplot occurs when I hide in the wardrobe like the French lady suggested.  Will it take us to Narnia?  (Wait, Aslan didn't create that world until 1900. . .)


A man asks her if she's seen the debtor's kids, but she says she hasn't.  He ignores her when she asks him to leave and looks under the bed from CHOICE #6.  After the bailiff leaves, she reveals her name is Mignette.  She sympathizes with us because she had to flee during the French Revolution.  She says her business is perfume.  "All the rich ladies need perfume so they do not have to smell the filth of the streets and to make the men think they are like flowers themselves'  Charlie glues some labels for her and she gives us perfume as a reward.


We arrive at the Magician's house in time for lunch, and Mrs. Noogles has a "disapproving face".  I haven't done my homework either.  But it beats slave labor in the blacking factory, at least.  The teacher Miss Spurlock is happy to have a new student.


"The thing about Miss Spurlock is she always comes up with fascinating math problems.  The first one is about calculating how many cream cakes you would have to eat if you were trapped in a pile of them and the way out was a trap door in the floor.  Her instructions always say show your workings.  Miss Spurlock says the workings are more important than the answer when you are learning to reckon.  You know there may not be a perfect answer but it is fun to consider.  You sit down and think about what you know and soon your mind is deep in numbers and their logic.  Charlie scrawls furiously beside you.  When Miss Spurlock sends you out to help with lunch he is still scribbling.


Back in the kitchen with Mrs. Noogles you set out the dinner plates and she again tells you the Magician will join you all for the meal.  You are slicing tomatoes for the salad when everyone else arrives to eat.  Miss Spurlock is looking very happy.  When the Magician arrives she suggests to him that Charlie read his story to everybody.  The gardeners look a little uncomfortable at this and you can tell they think the story will be boring and might interfere with the Victoria sponge cake Mrs. Noogles has ready for dessert.


Charlie looks nervous but the Magician says it is a magnificent idea and he would love to hear it.  So Charlie stands up and begins his tale.  You can't believe it!  He has taken your adventures this morning and dressed them up.  He describes Mignette and her escape from France with so much more detail.  The maids gasp and worry if she will make it to safety.


Then Charlie describes fisticuffs between the bailiff and the chimney sweep and finally the hero-Charlie Dickens-is saved with his friend (You!) and is able to attend a fine classroom and eat first-rate food.  Everybody cheers at the end and Miss Spurlock tells him he has a talent for telling stories and he should keep it up".


We created the true timeline with this ending.  But there aren't as many fantasy elements in Dickens's books as you would expect from being educated in a wizard's house.  Sure, there's A Christmas Carol, but Christmas ghost stories were common at the time.


Results So Far


4 Good Endings

0 Deaths

0 Bad Non-Death Endings

0 Neutral Endings

0 Inconclusive Endings

[Herman Gigglethorpe]

You Say Which Way:  In the Magician's House Dead Ends


Ignoring Charles Dickens pounding on the door in CHOICE #3 does not create a new route, but does provide a few new lines.  "You have a nagging feeling you missed out on something but breakfast is the most important thing on your mind".


I learn that the doors to the pantries and herbarium stay in the same place, uncommon for places in the Magician's house.  A friend of mine named Henry finds Charles Dickens in this alternate timeline, and although he "seems like fun", I can't go with him.  Mrs. Noogles gives me a CHOICE which I won't number because both options lead to the CANONICAL ENDING with the Three Pigs.  "Help with the herbs" leads directly to it, while polishing the suit of armor directs me to either asking Mrs. Noogles about "another task" (i.e. getting the herbs), or returning to the beginning of the book.


Since this part isn't treated as an ending, I'll quote the last paragraph of armor polishing in normal font:  "She points out what needs to be done.  Each suit must be dismantled and each piece polished and oiled.  You'll be lucky to be out of here by dinner.  Oh well, you think, better get started, it's not always an exciting day in the Magician's house.  You have just finished the first one when you look up and find a fourth has arrived.  This could be a really long day".


If I post about this book tomorrow, it will involve going through the door behind the armor in CHOICE #1.