"Mungo bored."

Shamus listened to the big, thick-brained giant groan, for probably the seventh time that hour. Mungo, for all his ability with heaving claymores into peoples' heads and cleaving their skulls in twain, seemed to have a very short attention span, and an even smaller boredom threshold.

"Shuddup Mungo, you're always bored. Go...do something."
"Mungo not want do something. Mungo want be bored." Mungo rose, scratched his ill-fitting pants, and shifted his buttocks slightly more firmly against the crate he was sitting on. Shamus could see the seperate planks that composed the object creaking under the strain.
"Fine. Mungo, you go and be bored whilst you patrol the eastern corridor, alrigtht?" Jonas chipped in now, looking over at Shamus with that resigned, 'yes, I know he's an idiot, but at least he's an idiot with muscles larger than a High Elfs ego' look. Shamus nodded, and shifted inside his armour. Fur was always uncomfortable, but at least it was better than iron. For one thing it didn't rust; for another, it didn't chafe in parts unmentionable.

Mungo stood up and staggered off, his lips glistening from where he'd been drooling. Shamus watched him, before moving over to where Jonas sat by the fire. For the better part of four days the three of them had rested, guarding the first chamber in this labyrinthine maze whilst the others scouted around to see if they couldn't find something of value. Occasionally there were sounds, clanking sounds of armour or twanging sounds of deflecting arrows, from down the hallway. For the most part this once-glorious fort, this fine bastion of the Empire, was silent. It made him uneasy. He'd much rather have been harrassing people on the road.

Of course, that's how he'd ended up with this lot. It had started when he was a child. First he'd watched the passers by and wondered how much they had in their wallet. Then he'd started to beg, asking for the contents of their wallet (and occasionally mooning them if they'd been anything less than polite enough to throw a coin at his head). From there it was a simple step to throwing things at them instead, rocks mostly, to knock them out and nab their wallet. A few goes at that, and he'd managed to get a bow. Now he was with The Five Skulls, an erroniously named brigand band of seven members, and was sitting in a damp and cold dungeon, the walls glistening, making sure nobody would disturb them.

Jonas sniffed, and flashed a smile. "I'd best make sure Mungo's actually doing something. I don't want a repeat of last time." he suggested, before walking down the corridor. Shamus nodded. Mungo was a perfectly adequate fighter of the point-and-he'll-hit variety, but he wasn't born with inherent intelligence. Shamus decided to hang back and poke the fire instead. It kept his feet warm, and kept the rats away. He could hear their scratching on the brownstones occasionally, but never deeper than this level. There was no sound any further down.

Suddenly there was a cry, and Shamus stood up, immediatly on alert. His bow was immediatly to hand, and his quiver in position as he drew up an arrow and looked nervously down the corridor.

He could see something in the shadows, moving, and he hesitated, narrowing his eyes to try and get a better look.
"Anyone there? Jonas?" he asked. There was no reply. The shadows seemed to hang in the corner, and now there was little more than darkness where the flame light of the fire receeded. He breathed easy, and dropped his guard. "Guess I'd better stop drinking the ale..." he mused. It was his last thought.

The silent assassin's arrow went straight through his neck, causing Shamus to collapse to the floor like a ragdoll, before the assassin moved to his corpse and began to uncerimoniously desecrate his body in a blaze of adventurous looting. From down the corridor there was a noise, and the assassin quickly melted into the shadows.

Mungo staggered down the hall, confused. He'd only gone to go loo-loo, and then he'd found Jonas all bloody and bleeding, with an arrow in his back. He walked over to the fire.
"Shamus." he said, his face a picture of idiotic calm. "Shamus. Jonas isn't well. Shamus..." he shook the body, failing to note that Shamus, too, 'wasn't well'. Mungo stood up and gazed at the ceiling, before scratching his head. "Huh, guess you've gone to sleep, huh?" he asked, before walking around in a semi circle.

The assassin watched the idiot for a moment, glad that he hadn't been blessed with as much smarts as his fellows. AI, the assassin called it: Awareness and Idiocy. Those with more 'A' did well, those with more 'I', less so. Mungo had 'I' written all over him. The assassin smiled at the thought, before drawing up another arrow, firing it into Mungo, and then stooping forward to claim yet more goodies from the third bandit to fall in as many minutes.

Ah, poor Mungo. I liked it. Short, but nice.

That was a great short, though not exactly how I expected it to end. With the flashback of one of the character's childhood I figured he would survive and the story would continue with him as the character but this serves just as well. Good job.

I particularly enjoy the descriptions of the characters that you give, which flow seemlessly with the rest of the story.

Mr Oven pretty much said it all!....... a milanius for your effort!

Ah, Mungo. My favourite numb minded bandit. The last mention of him being alive, and the last time he spoke coherent sentences. He went down for his friends and he shall be missed.