"Don´t Befriend A Tall Dwarf" by L. ´Frog´ Janas

Draord wasn’t just a normal dwarf though. At 6’4” he was officially the record holder for the tallest dwarf ever to live in the kingdom since the year 804 C.M. Just my luck to meet a tall dwarf. Humph.

When I was little, I secretly hoped a dwarf would come to our school district so I wouldn’t be the shortest one there. The other students laughed at my stature and the elves were so tall they usually didn’t even see me. I grew a little during 7th grade but after I hit 4’11” my body refused to get any taller. I was so close to 5 feet! That was when I started describing my height with the metric system. I was 1.5 meters tall. The other kids just laughed.

I met Draord the summer I was supposed to go to college. Back then he worked at the mall running a little stand by the food court, recruiting for the armed forces. I was on my way to get a latte when I passed his stand. He was clean shaven at the time and I didn’t realize he was a dwarf because of his height. The army is mostly made up of dwarves due to their, well, belligerent nature, and it struck me as odd that there wasn’t a dwarf at the army stand.

I must have said something like “I guess they have humans recruiting in malls now,” and before I knew it, all 6 feet 4 inches of Draord was coming toward me and he grabbed me by the scruff of the neck.

“I am a dwarf, you punk, just like you. You got that?”

“I…I…”

“You what?”

Sheer fright kept me from sounding even the slightest bit angry when I said, “I’m a human.”

“No kidding,” he said. (Well perhaps, his language was a little more colorful.) “What’s your name?” he asked me.

“Synast.”

A friendship was born. I was never quite sure what he saw in me, but I think I amused him somehow. I just liked having someone who understood me and at the same time, could protect me.

We both knew that the relationship had practical aspects as well. We both felt more comfortable in each other’s worlds than in our own. Draord could show me where dwarves buy their clothes. For the first time in my life we both had pants that fit. It was a beautiful moment.

About a month after I met him he took me to his village to meet his friends. That was an experience I will never forget. I’ve never felt average anywhere else! His friends liked me instantly. My only regret was that they seemed to show affection with punching, which got old very quickly.

Otherwise, it was a very interesting experience. Growing up human I had become what Draord called a ‘pansy.’ I must say, I have to agree with him. He and one of his friends took me out over an abandoned mine and taught me how to shoot.

“Just keep it parallel to the ground and aim at the target,” said Draord.

“You mean the oil covered lawn chair?” I asked. “I don’t think that’s a smart target guys.”

“It’s not oil covered. This used to be a bauxite mine,” said his overly tattooed friend. “Besides, you won’t hit it.”

I aimed as best as I could and fired with resentment. I was thrown backwards with such force that I stumbled backwards several feet before falling to the ground.

Draord was laughing. “Beydar, I told you not to give him a rifle!”

“Oh, I’m sorry I couldn’t help it. Admit that was funny.”

“Hysterical,” I said, brushing the dust off of my nicely fitted jeans.

Draord jogged back to his truck and pulled out a similar looking gun and gave it to me. “This one’s dwarf made. It’s bewitched so it doesn’t recoil so much. Absorbs the momentum. Try it again, mate.”

Determined to prove myself I cocked the gun and pointed it at the lawn chair. I unnecessarily rooted myself to the ground and pulled the trigger. I saw the chair blasted a good ten feet straight backwards.

“Hah! Dead on!” I shouted. The two of them were speaking in hushed voices in a language that, at the time at least, I couldn’t understand. “What?” I asked.

And that was how I was recruited for the army. Beydar turned out to be Draord’s commanding officer and became my Training Sergeant. They trained me for special ops and within a very short amount of time I was one of the best snipers they’d had in a long time (or so I was told.) In all honesty, I was very happy in the army. Because the majority of the army was comprised of dwarves, my stature was never a problem and there were enough humans in my squadron that I didn’t feel out of place.

Yes, those were the happiest three weeks of my life. Unfortunately, after that, an unfortunate turn of events ended my stay at the training center. One day, Draord rushed in to our quarters, sweating as I have only seen dwarves do.

“Synast, you gotta help me. I did something bad and I’m going to get nailed for it.”

“What happened?”

“Well, the general has a daughter and I met her at a bar, not knowing who she was…”

“Oh no, you didn’t!”

“I did. It was great…”

“Draord!”

“I know. I’m a dead man.”

“So what do you want me to do?”

“Stand up.”

“Ok, now what?”

Just then, the general walked into the cabin looking as angry as my mother after they canceled Fairy Eye for the Wingless Guy for trademark violations. We saluted as the general’s face continued to get redder by the second.

“Gentlemen, I have just heard a very interesting story from my daughter involving a dwarf from these very quarters! As you are both standing I see exactly one dwarf and one human in this cabin.” I glared at Draord as I realized what he had done to me. “Now, the dwarf, as it were, will be punished for his actions.” The general put his face very close to mine and shouted as loud as he knew how “What is your name, boy?”

“Synast. I’m—”

“I didn’t ask for your life story, private! You are in a whole mess of trouble. You will report to the front gates tomorrow at sunrise. I will arrange for a new bunkmate for the human. I hope you had a nice time with my daughter Synast.” With that, he left in a huff.

“I’m the human,” I said weakly. I wheeled on Draord. “Stand up? You wanted him to think I did it! You rotten bastard! We’re supposed to be friends!”

Anger flooded my body and I threw myself upon him – all 1.5 meters worth. I had the element of surprise on my side and I knocked him to the ground before he could really defend himself.

“Kid, I’m sorry. Look, I stole some mead from the general’s house. You take it.”

“I am in so much trouble.”

He handed me the mead and I drank. After that, all was forgiven.

I reported to the front gates the next morning as directed. There were a bunch of other soldiers there, although none of them looked as nervous as I did. There, they informed us that we were to be shipped out as infantry to fight in the northwest Goblin War that afternoon.

I knew instantly that they didn’t just think I was a dwarf, they thought I was Draord. I was trained for special ops and no matter how angry they were at me there was no way they would send me out as infantry. I knew that I could get out of this whole mess with a flash of my dog tag. Still, I couldn’t rat out a friend. I went in his stead.

My first mistake was befriending a dwarf. This was my second mistake. They sent us to patrol the border of the territory the goblins had seized earlier that month in hopes that we would be able to invade and assassinate the ring leader of the insurgence. Patrolling borders is quite possibly the worst assignment anyone could be assigned to. It’s dangerous as hell since goblins are often randomly violent and start shooting anyone they see for no apparent reason. Since we were on the border of two territories, we were actually in the middle of nowhere. Patrolling is also the most boring job ever invented. It’s too dangerous to slack off, yet there is no real job to do. We spent our days standing, sitting, or walking, all in silence. I actually hoped I would die of boredom.

We slept in muddy tents in the freezing cold and we ate only when we could steal it from others. You see, dwarves require very little nutrition and they are just as happy to eat dirt as real food since they can’t taste much anyhow. Oh, how I tried to convince them I was human! They just chuckled and patted me on the head. “You’re not even 5 feet tall,” they would say. “Dwarves are so stupid. They should know they’ll never pass for human.”

“I am a human!” I would cry angrily. Of course by then it didn’t matter; I had stolen the officers’ food from his bag by then.

After a few weeks I really couldn’t take it any more. Their incompetence was overwhelming. An attempt at an invasion hadn’t been made and I’m not even sure they knew who we were trying to assassinate. One evening I took my gun and invaded the goblin zone myself.

Although I can easily pass for a dwarf, a goblin is another thing entirely. I robbed a sleeping goblin soldier I saw by the fort and donned his cloak which effectively covered my face. I slept the rest of the night in my disguise and awoke the next morning ready with my rifle. After less than two hours of eavesdropping and trickery, I had a name, a location, and a photo of my target. I waited on the rooftop of a supply station until he came into view.

My first shot was good. I couldn’t have asked for an easier hit. I jumped down off the roof without making a sound. I began walking back through town towards our camp.

I hadn’t gone more than 20 feet when a goblin, who had just walked around the corner carrying a loaf of bread, dropped his bread and punched me in the face. After that I blacked out. When I woke up I was tied to a chair in a cell that I presumed to be somewhere in the fort.

“He’s coming to, sir,” said the goblin who had hit me.

“That was one hell of a punch,” I muttered vaguely.

“You, soldier.” A goblin that appeared to be in charge of things came toward me. “What is your name?”

“Draord,” I said. This response had become somewhat automatic during my patrolling duty.

“All right, Draord, why were you in our territory?”

“To assassinate Ight'rak Schasiv.”

“Well then it’s a good thing we caught you, isn’t it soldier.”

“But, I did assassinate Ight'rak Schasiv,” I said, confused.

“What? Why didn’t I hear about this?” cried the goblin. “Get central command on the phone, Bortz!” The goblin that hit me handed the officer a phone. “Bloody giants!” he shouted. “Never again will we ally with the giants. They make awful secretaries. He turned back to me.

“So that was your only job then? To kill Ight’rak?”

“Yes.”

“Oh. Well, do you know anything else about what your army is planning? Any information you can pass on to us?”

“Um, not really.”

“Do you have anything you want with us?”

“May I ask you,” I gestured toward the goblin who had the bread, “how you knew I was the enemy?” That question had been driving my insane. I was the best sniper in the army! How did I slip up?

“I didn’t,” he said. “I just felt like hitting something. I was just lucky it was you.”

The great irony of this statement pacified me. “Oh. That’s all I guess,” I said.

“Ah. I suppose that’s we need from you then. Take the dwarf to the main cell then Bortz.”

“I’m a human!” I groaned before I could stop myself. To my surprise, the officer laughed.

“That was witty! Bortz, take him to the labor camp instead.”

“Yes, sir.”

And to my incredible confusion, they brought me to the labor camp in the heart of the goblin state in a town they sadly dubbed ‘Gollywood.’ There, I worked where all prisoners of war work – I became a screenwriter.

Gollywood turned out to be the most vicious place I had ever encountered. The goblins who worked there were cruel, stupid, rich, and forced us to work much harder than them for no credit. Forcing us to work in show business was far worse than any cell they could have put me in.

It got worse before it got better. I was picked up by the public broadcasting network and I was forced to write children’s television. It was torture. I had to work daily with tone deaf songwriters and goblin psychologists about how we could best keep the violent instinct alive. It was so much worse than I could have imagined.

After the Goblin War ended, they released most of the POWs. I moved back to my hometown but I was never the same after my experience in Gollywood. I became quite addicted to various substances and spent a lot of time in AA or in rehab, where I met quite a lot of other POWs I remembered from Gollywood. At that point in my life, show business was all I was suited for. I met a girl in AA and we produced a reality television show together. Somehow, we lost the film crew and I am now stranded on a deserted island. I did manage to find our supply of mead from the show and I sent a cry for help in a bottle this morning. After I finish the bottle I’m drinking I’ll send my memoirs out, too.

I have one final warning for all short humans – don’t befriend a dwarf, especially a tall one.