First appearance: S3E15 — Sunday Slam — Belet v Derick · watch it on YouTube
Derick was an old hippo cleric who sailed the rifts and black holes of space on his Spelljammer ship until the Arbiter plucked him out of one and dropped him into a Deathmatch. He arrived in his brother’s armor, armed with a lance and shield, with no idea where he was and no tea, which he had left on the ship. What followed against Belet was one of the arena’s more lopsided and more affectionate beatings: a wagon flipped onto an old man, a gift of pipe weed to a very grateful box, and a blunderbuss that nearly turned the fight around.
Story
The Arbiter found Derick “in a black hole in space” and pulled him through a portal into The Dread Fortress, where the Arbiter announced him as “Derick Taladin versus Belet Bladesimmer. Or something like that.” Derick greeted everyone with “Hello. Welcome to me, Derick. I don’t know where I am exactly.” When the Grandmaster wondered why he hadn’t been told, the Arbiter explained that he makes champions sign release forms, and it isn’t his fault they don’t read them. Derick remembered soon enough and cried “To battle!” The arena was the site of a battle long lost: a damp, bone-strewn ring of smashed wagons and broken barricades where the soil “has hungered for blood for hundreds of years.” When Derick remarked that this was not even among the top five worst places he’d seen in the galaxy, the offended Grandmaster threw a handful of mud straight into his mouth. It was goopy and tasted like shit, and she declared the arena a no-smoking zone. Doug the Pug then came out to size up the champions. He respected that Derick liked his personal space, glared at him, and trotted back to his owner.
Derick was slow off the mark (“Slow and steady wins the race, they say”) and took two of Belet’s javelins before he could act. He pulled one out of his chest plate, raised his lance, asked the heavens for power, and summoned a floating weapon shaped like a giant filigreed teacup. Belet demanded he spill some tea about himself. He had left his tea on the ship, so she asked his favorite color instead, and he admitted it was bronze. Belet called it the third-place color. Then he flourished her javelin, still soaked in his own blood, and threw it back for a devastating hit. In the next round Belet flipped a heavy wagon on top of him, and he spent much of the fight holding it up on his shoulders while she stabbed down at him through the planks. He healed himself, fumbled spectacularly when he tried to shake the wagon apart, and finally wriggled free. Along the way he ripped off his trunk, which turned out to be glued on, and explained that he now had “an even larger nose.” A section of the crowd gasped in horror and covered their noses.
When Gerald crashed into the wreckage, Derick offered the box half a pound of pipe weed from a high-oxygen planet far away, where “it takes quite a little bit to go a long way.” The box answered Belet’s outrage with “I’m a complicated guy.” Gerald reappeared with bloodshot eyes and a giant blunderbuss that went off by accident past Derick’s head, then drifted out of the arena on his own cloud of smoke, bound for Les Mis. Derick poured all of his healing touch into himself and announced, “This blunderbuss better fucking work!” Then a chaos event seized both champions’ muscles (“Oh, it’s the arthritis again”), and Belet tripped him into the mud. The Arbiter took pity on the old hippo and wrapped him in a glowing magical barrier, and the Grandmaster justified it on the grounds that hippos are endangered.
Lying on his back in the mud, Derick scooped three dried apples from the cart into his mouth. Then he rolled over, cried “Call the city guard, but not for me!” and fired the blunderbuss three times. Every explosive shot landed, and the champions ended up nearly even. In the final round he forgot his own floating teacup entirely, and Belet’s killing blow found its mark. She tucked a retirement pamphlet into his shirt pocket, and with his last breath he ripped it up. His final thoughts went to his brother Larry, whose armor he had borrowed: “He was a fighter.” The Grandmaster proposed hippo steaks, then pushed Derick’s face into the mud and settled on hippo-shaped cookies and tea in his remembrance. At the table, the player admitted he had meant to play Derick as the heel, a rich capitalist against Belet’s union sympathies. As the Arbiter observed, that’s hard to do when you’re getting the crap kicked out of you.
Personality and Abilities
Derick was large, elderly and genteel, a hippo who wore a fake trunk until he decided not to. He spoke with old-fashioned politeness (“Come at me, madam,” “Dear heavens!”), smoked a pipe and favored bronze. He was also forgetful. He forgot where he was, forgot his opponent’s name within a round, forgot his tea, and at the crucial moment forgot the weapon floating beside him. He had no rhythm either: when he banged his lance on his shield to intimidate Belet, he produced the worst cadence the arena had heard. He also took the Grandmaster’s side in the argument over whether “bop” is still a word.
In battle he was a war priest with a lance and shield. He could conjure a floating spiritual weapon, which took the form of a giant teacup, and he could heal with prayer and a holy touch. As a hippo he could add a burst of astral force to his blows. Gerald’s blunderbuss drew on his wisdom as a cleric, and its explosive shots were the high point of his fight.
Relationships
- Belet: His opponent, who flipped a wagon on him, mocked his age and killed him with a longsword strike.
- Larry: His brother, a fighter, whose armor Derick wore. With his dying words he admitted that Larry was much better at this.
- Gerald: Accepted Derick’s pipe weed and, a little too relaxed, gave him the blunderbuss.
- The Arbiter: Found him in a black hole and later shielded him out of pity.
- The Grandmaster: Threw mud in his face, pushed it into the mud when he died, and promised hippo cookies in his memory.
- Doug the Pug: Respected that Derick liked his space.
Memorable Quotes
- “I have been to worse places in the galaxy though. This is not even amongst the top five.” (S3E15)
- “I left my tea on the ship. I figured I’d be back before brunch.” (S3E15)
- “I have an even larger nose now.” (S3E15)
- “Looks will only get you so far, madam.” (S3E15)
- “This blunderbuss better fucking work!” (S3E15)
- “I shouldn’t have taken my brother’s armor. He was much better at this than I was.” (S3E15)