The Sugo of Man

Description

Charion is set to lead. The Heroes of Yearth have been given a simple task: take 100-ish of Ironwood's finest into the forest and rescue the elven denizens. Helping them on their way is a famous sauce chef, with a deadly ambition.

Synopsis

In Ironside, the conscripts of the city ready themselves for battle. Sunbelt Gongbonger wakes up in the tunnel under Blind Tony’s Lasagna and Swords Shop, next to the butthole of the now dead and decaying purple worm. He finds a huge red ruby embedded in his chest, which he identifies as the gem from the Axe of the Sands. Thinking he’s become the axe, Gongbonger tries to discover his new powers by trying to run through rock. At the last moment, a swirl of sand comes out of the ruby and teleports him back to where he started his run up. He is able to hit himself in the dick, though.

Sunbelt enters Blind Tony’s shop, and meets Stephania Germinotta as she makes lasagna sauce (sugo). After Sunbelt tries to drink her sugo, he licks some out of her eyes, and she says she hasn’t seen his friends. She’s stuck working in the store for her father Blind Tony, but all she wants to do is use a sword and kill a man - to “taste the sugo of man”. Sunbelt tells her to come with him, and they leave the gas burners on as they exit.

Meanwhile Charion, Dinner and Polly are addressing one hundred troops assembled from the people of Ironside. “General” Charion is on a wagon with his “battle piano”, and invites Blind Tony to join him. Tony smells his daughter as she and Sunbelt arrive and the store explodes in the background. Stephania convinces him to let her use their other product, swords, and Tony gives her the ancestral Germinotta “spirelli” sword, forbidden by the Geneva Convention (aka Gen Con). But the army can’t march because it has 103 members, and 100 are needed to make a neat square. Everyone boos Charion’s idea to let either three or one hundred ride on the piano wagon; Stephania offers to kill three guys. Sunbelt finds an amateur magician named Pill and brings him forward; as Stephania is about to kill him, Darren questions why and she stabs him instead. Pill can’t save him, and Stephania tastes his blood as he dies. Tony tells her he’s proud of her, but Mordecai Valariant objects and tells Charion to head off. Charion sings them an average song to moderately raise their morale.

As they exit the gates, they see Darren’s wife and children; Stephania tells them Darren got a job and has had to leave “for ages”. As they’re hugging her in thanks for her support, Sunbelt tries to throw Darren’s body to the family, but only manages to piff it into the assembled soldiers, where it’s crowd surfed around to the family’s delight.

The army reaches the Iron Woods and hesitates. One of the soldiers, Baldershire, reminds the others how Charion previously led an army to their deaths, and suggests a “let’s not and say we did” strategy. Polly slaps him and when he gets turned on, kisses him as well, considering her job done. Charion offers to sort out the next dissenter, who turns out to be Pill. When he doesn’t want kisses or slaps, Charion gives a speech about needing to come to the elves’ aid. Stephania backs him up, expressing regret at killing Darren and revealing her new goal: to save the elves, and thus her lasagna, which needs elf cum to make it good. The soldiers, still afraid of Stephania, fall into line and follow Charion into the forest.

Charion takes his “harpsitar” instead of his piano wagon and leads the way, immediately getting the army stuck in a bog. Mean, mimicking monkeys laugh at the soldiers. Polly lifts morale by kissing and slapping all of them, and they eventually make it out of the bog by nightfall. Charion hears a cacophony of cackles; he shouts for everyone to be quiet and goes ahead to scout with the other Heroes. They meet two elves in grey and orange camouflage. When Charion says he’s brought an army to help, they start talking about a party, and ask if they brought booze. Charion and Polly are confused, but he says he can party and she just kissed a hundred men, so they’re allowed entry. Dinner isn’t cool enough, and Sunbelt comes off as a narc. Concetta is initially refused as “he” said no killing or violence, but she promises she’s reformed and they agree she can come in.

Charion asks who “he” is and the elves step aside, letting them into a mystical clearing. It’s a scene of debauchery as elves, humans, dwarfs, even fish people are having sex and doing drugs. In the centre is a spiegeltent whose entrance is a giant grinning infernal face with a sign above: “Dirty Fern’s House of Fun”. The smoke is coming from a bonfire in a huge bowl above the spiegeltent...

Cast

Heroes of Yearth

Guest NPCs

Concetta Caristo as Stephnia Germinotta

NPCs

Blind Tony, lasanga chef and weaponsmith
Pill, an Ironwood conscript and amateur magician
Darren, a childhood “friend” of Charion
Darren’s wife and multiple children
Mordecai Valariant, Duke of Ironguard and Charion's father
Baldershire, another Ironwood conscript
Two Cajun-sounding elves

Bestiary

None.

Places

The Autumn Lands
- Ironguard
  - Blind Tony’s Lasagna and Swords Shop
- The Ironwoods

Themes, tropes and running jokes

Gratuitous Lists
- Concetta is challenged to give the top five ingredients in Stephania’s sugo, and names tomato, salami, paprika, canned peas and béchamel.
- Alex as Polly claims there are many ways to make a man submissive; when asked, she says there are three: slapping, kissing and a wing-slap with swear words.
Cum Jokes - the béchamel in Stephania’s sugo is later revealed to be elf cum.
Baffling Reference for our International Listeners - Dirty Fern’s party is described through several semi-local references:
- The Garden of Unearthly Delights is a long-running independent hub venue and festival-within-a-festival which runs as part of the Adelaide Fringe Festival each March. It started out as a single spiegeltent (see below) in the year 2000 and is now a large carnival precinct with dozens of venues, vendors and attractions.
- A spiegeltent is a large, elaborate festival and performance tent, decorated with mirrors and stained glass (spiegel is Dutch for “mirror”). Originally a Belgian tradition, there are several prominent spiegeltents in Australia, including the Famous Spiegeltent (at the Garden of Unearthly Delights) and the Melba Spiegeltent (the home of Circus Oz in Melbourne).
- Luna Park is a common name for old-school amusement parks, with the original being part of the heyday of Coney Island. In Australia there are two prominent Luna Parks, one in Sydney and one in Melbourne; the entrance to each is the mouth of a large face. The Melbourne one has been open continuously since 1912; the Sydney one has closed and re-opened numerous times since 1935.

Songs

Tom’s rap recap of the plot so far
Charion’s inspirational war song

Trivia

Ironside is a city built into the side of the Iron Mountain.

Quotes

To be added.