It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time

It seemed like a good idea at the time. The fraternity had a good reputation - that is, they didn't buy bottom-of-the-line beer for their off-campus parties, and they had a good stash of old tests from the professors that he was taking classes from this quarter. And he saw some cute women hanging around that frat house.

So Fred was willing to put up with a lot of strange things to get accepted. How bad could it be? The fraternity system at Tech was regulated.

It started out fine. He thought he recognized Lance as the King, as he was blindfolded and led to the place of initiation, the "Southern Caves." Lance gave his pledge name, "Lord Fred." One of his future frat brothers handed him a piece of paper, and then he heard the car racing away. He lifted his blindfold, only to find - that there were two caves, where the map only showed one.

And that was fine. Part of the pledge program. He lit his torch, and went inside.

Then he thought, "Damn! These guys are good." Someone had created what he thought of as a huge paper-mache dragon lying on some mock gold. It must have taken the frat years to create it. And a 'talking dog' spoke to him! It must have been someone's PhD thesis.

But Fred played it cool. He belonged to this group. He did not want to look too impressed. So he bantered with the dog.

Fred started questioning things when the dragon spoke to him. "No way in heck they are going to animate that." For some reason Lance gave him this unconvincing 'English' accent, a bad imitation of Colonel Blimp. So he played along, making a smart-alec remark about the wonders of the metric system. Fred, like many engineering students, hated to do all the conversions of the imperial system, and would challenge his new friends at the university with this hobby horse. He had argued this the night before with Tony, the frat's sergeant-at-arms. Tony insisted that any system that had the 'slug' as its unit of mass was worth preserving. Now Tony was probably in the cave somewhere, maybe in the 'dragon', and Fred thought that he could get a smart-alec remark in return.

When the dragon agreed with his remark, Fred started to worry. This pledge initiation was crossing the line from confusing to bizarre. What the dragon did next obliterated that line.

"Let me shrink to my natural size," he said. Fred's pupils dilated and his eyes bulged from their sockets as the hundered-storey high dragon shrank to about four metres in length. ("OK, twelve feet, Tony," Fred thought.) Fred snapped his head around, looking for a projector beam, but he did not see any.

When Fred turned around, the dragon was now looking him in the eye. "Velus" was very quiet, the one thing about this that did make sense. The dragon continued, "Now, sir, we haven't been formally introduced. What is your name?"

"My ... name ... is ... Lord Fred."

"Very good. Lord Fred of ...?"

"Uh, the Beta Kappa chapter of Gamma Sigma fraternity, Sir."

The dragon snickered. "Lord Fred, I am not a knight, although I have had dealings with them in the past. You may call me Lester of Leicester."

"Yes, Lester." There was an awkward silence. Then Fred whispered, "How am I supposed to kill you?"

Lester did something close to smiling. "I really do not know. Typically swords are involved. But it doesn't look like you brought a sword?"

"No. I thought that I would be supplied one, as part of my initiation."

The dragon shook his head. He then said, "No offense, but the standards for being knighted have slipped in the last hundred years or so. Back in my day, knights would come armed, or would at least have the pluck to fashion their own swords."

Fred was now completely lost. He memorized the secret oath, the secret handshake, and had polished his pledge medal. He did not think that he was going to have to take initiative. But it was obviously time to do so.

"Let us leave the cave and discuss the matter further."

"Quite."

Fred stared at the now-not-talking dog and the deadly but polite dragon, looking for signs of a seam, or something artificial. The damned dragon looked real. Not quite reptilian. As the approached the cave entrance, Fred asked, "What species are dragons? You don't look as much like a reptile as I was led to believe."

"Now that is an intelligent question. Usually my visitors don't ask questions like that. I have been keeping up. I would say that I am a mammal, of class Montreme. An egg-laying mammal, along with the playpus and the spiny anteater."

"This is really bizarre," thought Fred.

As Fred walked into the light, he could swear that this dragon was real. He also looked at the little glade. "Oh, no," he thought. Lord Fred, although he was not the sharpest man on a lot of things, knew the local fauna and flora well. Unless they had taken him to a botanic garden somewhere, he was not near the university. He couldn't be.... ?

"Are we in Leicester?" Fred blurted out. If Lance and Tony are around, they had him faked out. But Fred would not have minded being the butt of their joke for the whole quarter. This was good.

Lester did not answer directly. Instead he said, "I do not get too many visitors nowadays. The weather is fine, and it would be a shame to waste it. Would you mind joining a few of the lads in a game of rucket?

"Rucket?!" thought Fred.

"Certainly," Fred said aloud. "It's been a while. Been all work and no play, you know."

"Of course." Lester seemed to be very happy. Fred stared at Velus. Velus was not saying a word, but giving a weak shake of the head.

"Well, Fred, we will have to get a rucket bat, a rucket ball, and some men for the scrum." Fred and Velus followed the dragon to a sort of park that had a number of people walking and picnicking."

The dragon approached one of the men that was sitting on a blanket, smoking a cigarette and drinking something out of a themous. He grinned broadly. Fred did not recognize him from the fraternity, but he thought, "I hope this starts to make sense soon." The man mumbled something that Fred did not understand. Fred looked at the blanket. There was something that looked like a fraternity paddle, a red baseball, and a sort of fat version of an American football, along with some loose wooden sticks that thought that he remembered seeing as part of a croquet set.

Lester then said. "Oh, Stanley, how inconsiderate of me. I should ask, would prefer rucket league or rucket union? My minions and I can play either variation."

1. Rucket League
2. Rucket Union

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