by Ryan North
It’s past midnight, and Claudius is probably falling-down drunk. What now?
» Say goodbye to Horatio and go kill Claudius «
☠ Go home for nappy times ☠
* * *
* * *
You raise both hands in the air, and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern understand instantly. They raise their hands as well, and you pull off the rarely seen SPONTANEOUS CONNECTED-GRAPH BRO-PAL HIGH FIVE TRIAD (MUTUAL FRIEND x3 MULTIPLIER).
You love these guys.
Whoah! Your charisma score has gone up 2 points!
» Ask them how they’ve been «
* * *
* * *
“How have you been, gentlemen?” you say. “I’ve been okay, except for, you know, the nightmares. Anyway! What brings you here?”
They look at each other. “What — um, what do you mean what brings us here? Uh, why don’t we instead talk about your, um...plans and motivations?” Rosencrantz says. Your face falls. Man, you knew it! Claudius sent for them! They’re here to spy on you!
“Aw, really? Come on, guys. Were you sent here to spy on me?” you say.
“Well, um...yeah,” Rosencrantz replies. “Kinda?”
“Frig man, I knew it,” you say. “Look, I’ll make it easy on you. I know I’ve been all emo lately and mopey and even though we don’t have the words for it yet, I’m pretty sure I’m what you’d call ‘CLINICALLY DEPRESSED.’ That’s all.”
You sigh, and then look at them with a small smile.
“I guess I’m quite the piece of work, huh?” you say.
“Would you care to explain that in more detail?” Rosencrantz says.
You reply:
☠ “As a matter of fact, I would!” ☠
» “No man, didn’t you hear? I’m clinically depressed.” «
* * *
* * *
You are inspired. You clear your throat and hold out one hand in front of you. You look Rosencrantz and Guildenstern in the eyes, one after the other.
“What a piece of work is a man!” you say, choosing your words (and punctuation!) carefully. “How noble in reason, how infinite in faculty, in form and moving how express and admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god!”
Your friends nod. Humans ARE pretty great.
“The beauty of the world, the paragon of animals — and yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust? Man delights not me —”
You break off as Guildenstern interrupts you.
“Gayyyyy,” he says.
“I said man delights NOT me, idiot,” you say. “Nor woman neither, though you seem to think —”
This time you’re interrupted by Rosencrantz.
“Asexualllll,” he says.
You look at your friends.
“Anyway, whatever,” you say. “I’ve been depressed but it’s great to see you guys, homophobia and asexualaphobia aside.”
“Oh hey!” says Guildenstern, suddenly remembering something. “We met an author on the boat over. We invited her to come say hi.”
An author! This is really really exciting. And who should walk through the door just as Guildenstern stops talking? Why, it’s the very author they just mentioned! How perfect! Having her show up now keeps this narrative moving forward at a nice clip AND avoids any awkward downtime where you’d otherwise all just sit around in a circle waiting for someone to show up and talk to you. Huh! Nicely done, narrator of this story a.k.a.: ME.
☠ Talk to author ☠
* * *
* * *
The three of you and the author get to talking, and she’s really great. It turns out she’s Christina Marlowe, the author of The Murder of Gonzago: A “The Adventure Is Being Chosen by You” Story! Can You Murder Your Brother Gonzago and Then, Playing as Your Dead Brother’s Son, Murder Your Usurping Uncle? I Sure Hope So; Choose From Over 300 Different Possible Endings.
It’s one of your favourite books, and you tell her so, excitedly asking questions about characters and motivation and how she did that thing with the choices.
While the four of you talk, Polonius walks into the room and tries to work his way into the conversation, but whatever, nobody here likes him. Christina doesn’t make any attempt to include him and that makes you love her even more.
You start quoting your favourite passage to her — it’s the bit from the back cover — and she takes over when you forget some of the words. It goes like this:
“You are still really mad that your dad was killed by his brother. You decide that you should murder him for revenge, and that, my friend, is a really good idea. Do you decide to wait to murder him?”
“No!!” shout you, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern in unison. Christina smiles. Polonius mutters, “This is boring,” but nobody cares.
“Excellent. Then you sneak into his room at night and stab him in the neck. A huge fountain of blood erupts from his neck, under such pressure that it bursts through the ceiling and forms a glorious red geyser above the roof. Some kid walking by sees the geyser and says, ‘Whoah’ and while he’s saying the ‘oah’ part of ‘whoah,’ blood lands in his open mouth. It’s so awesome. You have earned 1000 points, and the ‘whoah’ kid also earned 50 points.”
The three of you laugh and cheer and applaud, while Christina smiles politely and Polonius stands around with his arms crossed. “Whatever, I wanted to wait before killing him,” he grumbles.
Christina recited her book with such heartfelt emotion that you actually feel pretty bad about not murdering your own uncle yet.
Wait a minute, that gives you an idea!!
» Go murder your uncle «
☠ Instead of murdering your uncle, go grab your copy of the book! Then you can get it signed and then you can see if you can get Claudius to read it and then if he chooses the “murder your brother” path and then if he looks guilty, you’ll know he did it even though a ghost already investigated it and told you he did. ☠
* * *
* * *
Okay, but one thing at a time, buddy! First, you go back to your room and get your copy of the book for Christina to sign, which she does. “To Hamlet: Best wishes! I hope you like to read these words that I wrote on a piece of paper. Cheers, Christina,” she writes. Amazing. It’s perfect, and now you’ve got the perfect book to entrap your uncle!
You excuse yourself and go back to your room to flip through Gonzago again. You get absorbed in the adventure and, a few playthroughs later, you’re convinced: it really is a great book, and it should work perfectly for your plan.
Now all you need to do is find Claudius!
I’m pretty sure he’s in the royal court, dude!
☠ Go to the royal court ☠
» Nap for a while «
* * *
* * *
You go to the royal court and it’s — deserted? Practically, anyway. It kinda looks like maybe Ophelia is there in the corner reading a book, but PLEASE it’s not like you have time to make certain.
Well, this sucks. You had this perfect plan ready, but if Claudius isn’t around then he can’t read the book and the whole thing is useless and stupid and you hate it!
You feel some introspection coming on. Yes. Oh man, this is going to be a big one. It’s gonna all boil down to this: is it even worth LIVING in a world where things don’t always go your way? Or to put it differently: “being alive is good, or MAYBE...being dead is good?” Or to put it a third, more copula-tastic way: “to be, or not to be?”
Man. This is the big one, Hamlet. This is the speech this book is named after. I guess you’d better talk it out, huh?
CHOOSE WISELY.
You clear your throat and raise one hand in front of you.
☠ To be ☠
or
» Not to be «
* * *
* * *
This is what you say to nobody in particular:
To be, or not to be, that is the question:
Whether ’tis Nobler in the mind to suff
er
The Slings and Arrows of outrageous Fortune,
Or to take Arms against a Sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them: to die, to sleep
No more; and by a sleep, to say we end
The heart-ache, and the thousand Natural shocks
That Flesh is heir to? ’Tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wished. To die, to sleep,
To sleep, perchance to Dream. Ay, there’s the rub,
For in that sleep of death, what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause.
Man. NICELY DONE, Hamlet!
☠ Hey, wait a minute! Ophelia’s here! ☠
* * *
* * *
You say hi to Ophelia, but she’s acting all upset, trying to give back the presents and all the love letters you’ve sent her over your relationship. Weird!! It looks like someone’s convinced her that you’re not marriage material after all. To be fair, you did just finish talking out loud about killing yourself.
Huh!
And though I know you’re now frantically looking for the “Whatever man, she’s just doing this because chicks be crazy” option (Hamlet, you are nothing if not classy), I’m not going to give it to you. Listen, I’m going to help you out. You think Ophelia’s crazy, but maybe...maybe she’s just ACTING crazy?
In considering that possibility, you think to yourself that Ophelia doesn’t have any real reason for being as upset as she appears to be — sure, you’ve kinda ignored her for a few weeks, which was selfish and jerky, but on the other hand this isn’t the first time you’ve been caught up in something and you’re sure she can handle it as she has before, with understanding, and not by, you know, ABANDONING THE RELATIONSHIP ENTIRELY IN SOME STUPID CASTLE ROOM. So maybe it is entirely possible that she’s being fake crazy too. Maybe — maybe because she’s figured things out and also wants to murder Claudius?
You decide you need a way to see if she’s faking crazy while you’re simultaneously also faking crazy, without revealing to anyone who may or may not be listening in that you’re both actually just faking the crazy. Hmm...is there a code phrase or something you can use?
» Say “The wolf stalks the quiet evening prey” «
☠ Say “I never loved you” ☠
» Say “A hip, hop, a hippie, a hippie to the hip hip hop” «
* * *
* * *
“What?!” she says, furious. I don’t think those were the secret code words, bro.
“Um,” you say.
Try again?
☠ Maybe the code phrase is “Get thee to a nunnery”? ☠
» Go with “A hip, hop, a hippie, a hippie to the hip hip hop” «
» Go with “The wolf stalks the quiet evening prey” «
* * *
* * *
You tell her to get to a nunnery, because if she has sex, her kids will be awful because everyone is awful, and man, if you only had the time, you’d be the awfulest person ever. Also, only a fool would marry her, because anyone smart knows that women are awful.
“Why are you saying these horrible, horribly sexist things?” she asks. I’ve gotta say...it’s a pretty good question?
Last chance, Hamlet.
» Say “A hip, hop, a hippie, a hippie to the hip hip hop” «
» Say “The wolf stalks the quiet evening prey” «
☠ Say “Women are idiots who just want to get a sexing” ☠
* * *
* * *
I’m sorry to hear it. I mean, it makes sense, but...sorry about your feelings, buddy?
Okay! So you’ve just said, “This means the spooky ghost was correct!” and Ophelia has looked at you strangely, and now she’s speaking.
“A ghost?!” she says.
“You’re crazy.”
Then she looks at Horatio and says, “You’re crazy too,” and then she looks at you again, sighs and says, “I don’t even know why I’m here,” and leaves, shoving past Rosencrantz and Guildenstern in the doorway.
Looks like you two are still broken up, which makes you sad! But on the plus side, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are totally awesome. Bros before woes!!
You’re about to greet your best bros with your choice of high fives, slaps on the back, or hugs all around, when Guildenstern holds up his hand and speaks.
“Your mom wants to see you,” he says. “As you know, in this time period if you want to talk to someone, you have to literally walk over to where they are to chat them up, which I can hardly believe; anyway, she’s lazy so she wants you to walk to her instead.”
“Dude. She said she’s ’stonished by your behaviour,” Rosencrantz adds.
“’Stonished isn’t real slang,” you say.
“Just trying it out,” Rosencrantz says, and you high five to linguistic experimentation.
“Well, I guess I’m off to see her,” you say. Just then, Polonius enters the room and says, “Hey, your mother wants to see you.”
“I KNOW; NOBODY WANTS YOU HERE, POLONIUS!” you yell at him. “GOD, I COULD JUST STAB YOU THROUGH A CURTAIN.”
Hey, that gives you an idea!
» Go stab Polonius through a curtain «
» Go stab the king, which is what you wanted to do in the first place! «
☠ Go talk to your mom ☠
* * *
* * *
On your way to your mom’s room, you pass by the church (you live in a very fancy castle, were you aware of that?) and who should be there engrossed in prayer but Claudius! I guess after he ran off to his room, he decided to go to church to pray instead? He’s such a wiener.
Wait a minute.
YOU COULD TOTALLY KILL HIM IN A CHURCH. How badass is that?
☠ Man, pretty badass! Let’s kill Claudius in the church! ☠
» No time for murders now, I’VE got a date with my mom! «
* * *
* * *
“Hey Mom, what’s up?” you say. She jumps back from the curtain she was just messing with. Moms, am I right?
Okay, I’m going to interrupt the story here to tell you that this isn’t going to go well for you no matter what you do. I’m spinning around a chair so it’s backwards and I’m sitting on it, straddling the back of the chair with my legs, so you know we’re about to have some Real Talk.
You know how in this story you’ve been choosing the crazy options and doing some crazy stuff? Here’s the thing. Sometimes people do that in real life, with their own actual real-life lives. I don’t know why, but they do it and it happens.
Just throwing this out there, but your mom has married her husband’s brother-murderer, and literally served appetizers left over from his funeral at the wedding. This is an actual thing she, a queen of comfortable, can-certainly-afford-more-appetizers means, decided to do. She’s not in the best frame of mind, and I’ve been minimizing her role in the story as much as possible in order not to embarrass her and to give her some space, but you’re talking to her now and there’s not much I can do to avoid it. Try to understand if she acts crazy.
Okay, lecture over! I’m turning the chair back to its normal orientation. We don’t have to rap about our feelings anymore.
“Hey Hamlet,” Gertrude says. “Listen, you were a dick when you messed up Claudius’s reading earlier.”
“I didn’t mess up anything!” you say. “He’s the one who read the murdery options! If anyone messed up, it’s YOU, because you married Dad’s brother and that’s messed up, MOM.”
I thought we were going to be nice to her?
Your mom looks at you like she’s seeing you for the first time. “What are you going to do: murder me? ARE YOU GOING TO MURDER ME??” your mom asks. Terrific.
“No, Mom, I’m not going to murder you.” you say, holding your palms out in front of you in what you hope reads as a “be cool” motion. “Why would you even think that? Oh, is it because I’m wearing a sword? Listen, all the princes wear sword
s these da—”
“Help!!” she screams at the top of her lungs.
A voice from behind the curtain says, “What?! Help! Help!!”
It seems your mom has a spy eavesdropping on this little conversation! Remember what I said before about giving her the benefit of the doubt? This is kinda the perfect chance to give her the benefit of the doubt.
» Tell her you’ll talk to her later when she’s a) less crazy and b) you can talk in private «
☠ Show her how non-murderous you are by killing whoever’s behind the curtain ☠