nethack/dat/tribute

# NetHack 3.6.0 tribute to:
#
#         Sir Terence David John "Terry" Pratchett
#              April 28, 1948 - March 12, 2015          
# ("or until the ripples he caused in the world die away...")
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%section books
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%title The Colour of Magic  (2)
%passage 1
The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett

It has been remarked before that those who are sensitive to radiation in the
far octarine - the eighth colour, the pigment of the Imagination - can see
things that others cannot.

Thus it was that Rincewind, hurrying through the crowded, flare-lit, evening
bazarrs of Morpork with the Luggage trundling behind him, jostled a tall
figure, turned to deliver a few suitable curses, and beheld Death.

It had to be Death.  No-one else went around with empty eye sockets and, of
course, the scythe over one shoulder was another clue.
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%passage 2
The Colour of Magic, by Terry Pratchett

As he was drawn towards the Eye the terror-struck Rincewind raised the box
protectively, and at the same time heard the picture imp say, 'They're about
ripe now, can't hold them any longer.  Every-one smile, please.'

There was a -
- flash of light so white and so bright - 
- it didn't seem like light at all.

Bel-Shamharoth screamed, a sound that started in the far ultrasonic and
finished somewhere in Rincewind's bowels.  The tentacles went momentarily as
stiff as rods, hurling their various cargos around the room, before bunching
up protectively in front of the abused Eye.  The whole mass dropped into the
pit and a moment later the big slab was snatched up by several dozen tentacles
and slammed into place, leaving a number of thrashing limbs trapped around the
edge.
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%title The Light Fantastic (2)
%passage 1
The Light Fantastic, by Terry Pratchett

'Cohen is my name, boy' Belthan's hands stopped moving.
'Cohen?' she said, 'Cohen the Barbarian?'
'The very shame.'
'Hang on, hang on,' said Rincewind, 'Cohen's a great big chap, neck like a bull,
got chest muscles like a sack of footballs.  I mean, he's the Disc's greatest
warrior, a legend in his own lifetime.  I remember my grandad telling me he saw
him ... my grandad telling me he ... my grandad ...'
He faltered under the gimlit gaze.
'Oh,' he said, 'Oh. Of course, Sorry.'
'Yesh,' said Cohen, and sighed, 'Thatsh right boy, I'm a lifetime in my own
legend.'
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The Light Fantastic, by Terry Pratchett

Death sat at one side of a black baize table in the entre of the room, arguing
with Famine, War and Pestilence.  Twoflower was the only one to look up and
notice Rincewind.
'Hey, how did you get here?' he said.
'Well, some say that the creator took a handful - oh, I see, well, it's hard to
explain but I -'
'Have you got the Luggage?'
The wooden box pushed past Rincewind and settled down in front of its owner,
who opened its lid and rummaged around inside until he came up with a small,
leatherbound book which he handed to War, who was hammering the table with a
mailed fist.
'It's "Nosehinger on the Laws of Contract",' he said. 'It's quite good, there's
a lot in it about double finessing and how to -'
Death snatched the book with a bony hand anflipped through the pages, quite
oblivious to the presence of the two men.
'RIGHT,' he said, 'PESTILENCE, OPEN ANOTHER PACK OF CARDS. I'M GOING TO GET TO
THE GOTTOM OF THIS IF IT KILLS ME. FIGURATIVELY SPEAKING OF COURSE.'
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%title Equal Rites (1)
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Equal Rites, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Mort (1)
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Ankh-Morpork had dallied with many forms of government and hand ended up with that form of democracy known as One Man, One Vote. The Patrician was the Man; he had the Vote.

  [Mort, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title Sourcery (1)
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Sourcery, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Wyrd Sisters (1)
%passage 1
Wyrd Sisters, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Pyramids (1)
%passage 1
Pyramids, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Guards! Guards! (1)
%passage 1
Guards! Guards!, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Eric (2)
%passage 1
  No enemies had ever taken Ankh-Morpork. Well, /technically/ they had, quite often; the city welcomed free-spending barbarian invaders, but somehow the puzzled raiders always found, after a few days, that they didn't own their own horses any more, and within a couple of months they were just another minority group with its own graffiti and food shops.
    [Terry Pratchett, Eric]
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  Rincewind looked down at the broad steps they were climbing. They were something of a novelty; each one was built out of large stone letters. The one he was just stepping on to, for example, read: I Meant It For The Best.
  The next one was: I Thought You'd Like It.
  Eric was standing on: For The Sake Of The Children.
  'Weird, isn't it?' he said. 'Why do it like this?'
  'I think they're meant to be good intentions,' said Rincewind. This was a road to hell, and demons were, after all, traditionalists.
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%title Moving Pictures (4)
%passage 1
  This is space. It's sometimes called the final frontier.
  (Except that of course you can't have a /final/ frontier, because there'd be nothing for it to be a frontier /to/, but as frontiers go, it's pretty penultimate...)
    [Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures]
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  By and large, the only skill the alchemists of Ankh-Morpork had discovered so far was the ability to turn gold into less gold.
    [Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures]
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  There was a dog sitting by his feet.
  It was small, bow-legged and wiry, and basically grey but with patches of brown, white, and black in outlying areas...
  It looked up slowly, and said 'Woof?'
  Victor poked an exploratory finger in his ear. It must have been a trick of an echo, or something. It wasn't that the dog had gone 'woof!', although that was practically unique in itself; most dogs in the universe /never/ went 'woof!', they had complicated barks like 'whuuugh!' and 'hwhoouf!'. No, it was that it hadn't in fact /barked/ at all. It had /said/ 'woof'.
  'Could have bin worse, mister. I could have said "miaow".'
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  ''Twas beauty killed the beast,' said the Dean, who liked to say things like that.
  'No it wasn't,' said the Chair. 'It was it splatting into the ground like that.'
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%title Reaper Man (1)
%passage 1
Reaper Man, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Witches Abroad (1)
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Vampires have risen from the dead, the grave and the crypt, but have never
managed it from the cat.

  [Witches Abroad, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title Small Gods (1)
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Small Gods, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Lords and Ladies (1)
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Lords and Ladies, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Men at Arms (1)
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The maze was so small that people got lost looking for it.

  [Men at Arms, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title Soul Music (1)
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Soul Music, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Interesting Times (1)
%passage 1
Interesting Times, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Maskerade (4)
%passage 1
  'Maybe you could... help us?'
  'What's wrong?'
  'It's my boy...'
  Granny opened the door further and saw the womand standing behind Mr. Slot. One look at her face was enough. There was a bundle in her arms.
  Granny stepped back. 'Bring him in and let me have a look at him.'
  She took the baby from the woman, sat down on the room's one chair, and pulled back the blanket.
  'Hmm,' said Granny, after a while.
  'There's a curse on this house, that's what it is,' said Slot. 'My best cow's been taken mortally sick, too.'
  'Oh? You have a cowshed?' siad Granny. 'Very good place for a sick-room, a cowshed. It's the warmth. You better show me were it is.'
  'You want to take the boy down there?'
  'Right now.'
  [...]
  'How many have you come for?'
  ONE.
  'The cow?'
  Death shook his head.
  'It could be the cow.'
  NO. THAT WOULD BE CHANGING HISTORY.
  'History is about things changing.'
  NO.
  Granny sat back.
  'Then I challenge you to a game. That's traditional. That's /allowed/.'
  Death was silent for a moment.
  THIS IS TRUE.
  'Good.'
  HOWEVER... YOU UNDERSTAND THAT TO WIN ALL YOU MUST GAMBLE ALL?
  'Double or quits? Yes, I know.'
  BUT NOT CHESS.
  'Can't abide chess.'
  OR CRIPPLE MR ONION. I'VE NEVER BEEN ABLE TO UNDERSTAND THE RULES.
  'Very well. How about one hand of poker? Five cards each, no draws? Sudden death, as they say.'
  Death thought about this, too.
  YOU KNOW THIS FAMILY?
  'No.'
  THEN WHY?
  'Are we talking or are we playing?'
  OH, VERY WELL.
  Granny looked at her cards, and threw them down.
  FOUR QUEENS. HMM. THAT /IS/ VERY HIGH.
  Death looked down at his cards, and then up into Granny's steady, blue-eyed gaze.
  Neither moved for some time.
  Then Death laid the hand on the table.
  I LOSE. ALL I HAVE IS FOUR ONES.

    [Maskerade, by Terry Pratchett]
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    Ahahahahaha!
    Ahahahaha!
    Aahahaha!
    BEWARE!!!!!
    Yrs sincerely,
    The Opera Ghost
  'What sort of person,' said Salzella, 'sits down and /writes/ a maniacal laugh? And all those exclamation marks, you notice? Five? A sure sign of someone who wears his underpants on his head. Opera can do that to a man.'

    [Maskerade, by Terry Pratchett]
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  Agnes had woken up one morning with the horrible realization that she'd been saddled with a lovely personality. It was the lack of choice that rankled. No one had asked her, before she was born, whether she wanted a lovely personality or whether she'd prefer, say, a miserable personality but a body that could take size 9 in dresses. Instead, people would take pains to tell her that beauty was only skin-deep, as if a man ever fell for an attractive pair of kidneys.

    [Maskerade, by Terry Pratchett]
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  'And what can I get you, officers?' she said.
  'Officers? Us? What makes you think we're watchment?'
  'He's got a helmet on,' Nanny pointed out.
  'Milit'ry chic,' Nobby said. 'It's just a fashion accessory. Actually, we are gentlemen of means and have nothing to do with the City Watch whatsoever.'
  'Well, /gentlemen/, would you like some wine?'
  'Not while we on duty, t'anks', said the troll.

    [Maskerade, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title Feet of Clay (2)
%passage 1
Rumour is information distilled so finely that it can filter through anything. 
It does not need doors and windows -- sometimes it does not need people. 
It can exist free and wild, running from ear to ear without ever touching lips.

  [Feet of Clay, by Terry Pratchett]
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It was hard enough to kill a vampire. You could stake them down and turn them into dust and ten years later someone drops a drop of blood in the wrong place and guess who's back? 
They returned more times than raw broccoli.

  [Feet of Clay, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title Hogfather (1)
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Everything starts somewhere, though many physicists disagree. 
But people have always been dimly aware of the problem with the start of things. 
They wonder how the snowplough driver gets to work, or how the makers of dictionaries look up the spelling of words.

  [Hogfather, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title Jingo (1)
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It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. 
If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? 
After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. 
No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. 
It's Them that do the bad things.

  [Jingo, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title The Last Continent (2)
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PEOPLE'S WHOLE LIVES DO PASS IN FRONT OF THEIR EYES BEFORE THEY DIE. THE PROCESS IS CALLED 'LIVING'.

  [The Last Continent, by Terry Pratchett]
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"When You're Up to Your Ass in Alligators, Today Is the First Day of the Rest of Your Life."

  [The Last Continent, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title Carpe Jugulum (1)
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Perdita thought that not obeying rules was somehow cool. 
Agnes thought that rules like "Don't fall into this huge pit of spikes" 
were there for a purpose.

  [Carpe Jugulum, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title The Fifth Elephant (2)
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You did something because it had always been done, 
and the explanation was "but we've always done it this way." 
A million dead people can't have been wrong, can they?

  [The Fifth Elephant, by Terry Pratchett]
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He'd noticed that sex bore some resemblance to cookery:  It facinated people,
they sometimes bought books full of complicated recipes and interesting
pictures, and sometimes when they were really hungry they created vast
banquets in their imagination - but at the end of the day they'd settle quite
happily for egg and chips, if it was well done and maybe had a slice of tomato.
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%title The Truth (2)
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There are, it has been said, two types of people in the world. There are those
who, when presented with a glass that is exactly half full, say: this glass is
half full. And then there are those who say: this glass is half empty.

The world belongs, however, to those who can look at the glass and say: What's
up with this glass?  Excuse me?  Excuse me?  This is may glass?  I don't think
so. My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!  Who's been pinching my beer?

  [The Truth, by Terry Pratchett]
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The world is made up of four elements: Earth, Air, Fire and Water. 
This is a fact well known even to Corporal Nobbs. It's also wrong. 
There's a fifth element, and generally it's called Surprise.

  [The Truth, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title Thief of Time (1)
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"No running with scythes!"

  [Thief of Time, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title The Last Hero (1)
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Too many people, when listing all the perils to be found in the search for lost treasure or ancient wisdom, 
had forgotten to put at the top of the list 'the man who arrived just before you'.

  [The Last Hero, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents (1)
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The important thing about adventures, thought Mr Bunnsy, was that they shouldn't be so long as to make you miss mealtimes.

  [The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title Night Watch (1)
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When Mister Safety Catch Is Not On, Mister Crossbow Is Not Your Friend.

  [Night Watch, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title The Wee Free Men (1)
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"Nac Mac Feegle! The Wee Free Men! Nae king! Nae quin! Nae laird! We willna be fooled again!"

  [The Wee Free Men, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title Monstrous Regiment (1)
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Monstrous Regiment, by Terry Pratchett


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%title A Hat Full of Sky (1)
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A Hat Full of Sky, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Going Postal (1)
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Going Postal, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Thud! (1)
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Thud!, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Wintersmith (1)
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Wintersmith, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Making Money (3)
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Making Money, by Terry Pratchett
  'I'm an Igor, thur. We don't athk quethtionth.'
  'Really? Why not?'
  'I don't know, thur. I didn't athk.'

    [Making Money, by Terry Pratchett]
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  The Watch armour fitted like a glove. He'd have preferred it to fit like a helmet and breastplate. It was common knowledge that the Watch's approach to uniforms was one-size-doesn't-exactly-fit-anybody, and that Commander Vimes disapproved of armour that didn't have that kicked-by-trolls look. He liked it to make it clear that it had been doing its job.

    [Making Money, by Terry Pratchett]
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  'The world is full of things worth more than gold. But we dig the damn stuff up and then bury it in a different hole. Where's the sense in that? What are we, magpies? Good heavens, /potatoes/ are worth more than gold!'
  'Surely not!'
  'If you were shipwrecked on a desert island, what would you prefer, a bag of potatoes or a bag of gold?'
  'Yes, but a desert island isn't Ankh-Morpork!'
  'And that proves gold is only valuable because we agree it is, right? It's just a dream. But a potato is always worth a potato, anywhere. A knob of butter and a pinch of salt and you've got a meal, /anywhere/. Bury gold in the ground and you'll be worrying about thieves for ever. Bury a potato and in due season you could be looking at a dividend of a thousand per cent.'
    [Making Money, by Terry Pratchett]
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%title Unseen Academicals (1)
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Unseen Academicals, by Terry Pratchett


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%title I Shall Wear Midnight (1)
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I Shall Wear Midnight, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Snuff (1)
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Snuff, by Terry Pratchett


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%title Raising Steam (1)
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Raising Steam, by Terry Pratchett


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#-----------------------------------------------------
# Currently this section is not used. It is added
# to illustrate how these could be added and adapted
# should they be useful for something
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%section Death
%title Death Quotes (2)
%passage 1
WHERE THE FIRST PRIMAL CELL WAS, THERE WAS I ALSO. WHERE MAN IS, THERE AM I.
WHEN THE LAST LIFE CRAWLS UNDER FREEZING STARS, THERE WILL I BE.
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I AM DEATH, NOT TAXES. *I* TURN UP ONLY ONCE.
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