Eric and the Gazebo by Richard Aronson

Let us cast our minds back to the early days of fantasy role-playing... In the early '70s, Ed
Whitechurch ran "his game" and one of the participants was Eric Sorenson, a veritable giant of
a man. This story is essentially true: I knew both Ed and Eric, and neither denies it
(although Eric, for reasons that will become apparent, never repeats it).

The gist of it is that Eric... well, you need a bit more about Eric.

Eric comes quite close to being a computer. When he games, he methodically considers each
possibility before choosing his preferred option. If given time, he will invariably pick the
optimum solution.It has been known to take weeks. He is otherwise in all respects a superior
gamer, and I've spent many happy hours competing with and against him, as long as he is given
enough time.

So... Eric was playing a neutral paladin (Why should only lawful, good religions get to have
holy warriors? was the rationale) in Ed's game. He even had a holy sword, which fought well
and did all those things holy swords are supposed to do, including good or evil (by random
dieroll). He was on some lord's lands when the following exchange occurred:

ED: You see a well-groomed garden. In the middle, on a small hill, you see a gazebo.
ERIC: A gazebo? What color is it?
ED: (Pause) It's white, Eric.
ERIC: How far away is it?
ED: About 50 yards.
ERIC: How big is it?
ED: (Pause) It's about 30 feet across, 15 feet high, with a pointed top.
ERIC: I use my sword to detect whether it's good.
ED: It's not good, Eric. It's a gazebo!
ERIC: (Pause) I call out to it.
ED: It won't answer. It's a gazebo!
ERIC: (Pause) I sheathe my sword and draw my bow and arrows. Does it respond in any way?
ED: No, Eric. It's a gazebo!
ERIC: I shoot it with my bow (rolls to hit). What happened?
ED: There is now a gazebo with an arrow sticking out of it.
ERIC: (Pause) Wasn't it wounded?
ED: Of course not, Eric! It's a gazebo!
ERIC: (Whimper) But that was a plus-three arrow!
ED: It's a gazebo, Eric, a gazebo! If you really want to try to destroy it, you could try to chop it with an axe, I suppose, or you could try to burn it, but I don't know why anybody would even try. It's a @#%$&* gazebo!
ERIC: (Long pause - he has no axe or fire spells) I run away.
ED: (Thoroughly frustrated) It's too late. You've awakened the gazebo, and it catches you and eats you.
ERIC: (Reaching for his dice) Maybe I'll roll up a fire-using mage so I can avenge my paladin...

At this point, the increasingly amused fellow party members restored a modicum of order by
explaining what a gazebo is. This is solely an afterthought, of course, but Eric is doubly
lucky that the gazebo was not situated on a grassy knoll.

[Reprinted from the SIG's fall '87 Spellbook #13]