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Monogamy's post on Clan leaders' Forums:

 

Hey guys, this is the first of a little mini-series that I would like to create, please bear in mind that I'm not a published author and this is a hobby of mine, also English is not my first language and so if I make mistakes or it does not read smoothly I am sorry. _______________ 

 

What I am trying to do here is show that Clan Leader's have lives too, and many clan members sometimes don't realise that. That a clan leader can have a bad day too, and all it takes is one little thing... One little thing that makes a leader say "I've had enough". 

 

With that set aside, I would like to start by saying that I know this does not necessarily represent all clan leaders accurately, what I am doing here is writing about one archetype of clan leader. 

 

The character in this will be fictional and loosely based off of experiences myself or other clan leaders have experienced. 

 

Secondly, I understand that it's not just clan leaders who go through trials and tribulations but also deputy leaders and clan members, which is why I would like to write similar stories of those in the future of this mini-series. 

 

Finally, leading a clan is a thankless job and many people don't fully understand what it involves and how stressful it can be at times, I am writing this as a tribute to all clan leaders who always do their best, do what they believe is right and stand by their clan. 

 

I do not want to make the actual story too long, and so I would like just to reserve the first page of this thread. With all that being said, thank you so much for taking the time to read.

 

=---- Story starts here ----=

 

» Day 1: 

 

Damian opened his eyes to the sound of rain shattering against the window, somehow it was soothing. He laid there for a moment listening to the constant taps before dragging himself out of bed with a sigh. Drawing the curtains back and glancing at the sky he thought of the day ahead of him. 

 

He had work in a little over an hour but that was okay, he rather enjoyed his job. The people were fantastic fun and he felt good to have something to do. Half smiling he set about getting ready. 

 

Wandering downstairs with toothbrush in hand he put the kettle on and sat down at his desk. Damian always checked in on his clan before work to show his face and let everybody know he was still around, asking how everybody was and generally keeping involved. 

 

He knew that to some people this was more than a game. For them it was an escape, a way to get away from the troubles of real life and distract themselves. He wanted to make sure that his clan was a place where they could do that, where they could enjoy themselves. He was by his very nature an altruistic person. 

 

Saying farewell to his friends he set out for a seven hour shift at work. "It's not too bad I suppose, could be working the nights..." He chuckled to himself. 

 

... 

 

The clock turned five and Damian headed home. There was an event to be hosted at 5.30 and it took him at least ten minutes to walk home... Putting his key through the door and stumbling in he put the kettle on once more, parched and thirsty, then proceeded to his computer. "5.15 not bad, hopefully someone's been announcing the events" Damian thought as he glanced at the clock. 

 

"Hey hey!" he said as he logged in, he checked his phone, waiting on a text from his girlfriend. After being barraged with the usual "Hey boss!" from the clan he issued a reminder about the event in fifteen minutes time. 

 

"Bandos?.. Inb4wecantfindworld" someone remarked. Looking up from his phone Damian informed everybody that they would be fine with finding a world and that

he would be right back. He went out to the kitchen and made himself a cup of tea. Suddenly, a noise began. Smiling broadly Damian rushed back to the living room in which his computer and phone sat, he'd just received a text and anxiously picked up his phone as he set his drink down and logged in to gear up for the event. 

 

"Sorry can't make it today, so tired from work )= love you x" read the text. Sighing and rubbing his face Damian shrugged off the disappointment and resigned himself to a night in, it wasn't so bad after all, he'd arrange a trip to the cinema with his girlfriend another time. 

 

"How many do we have for the event?" Queried Damian. One person responded, but Damian knew better than that, there would be a fair few people attending and he didn't want to let anybody down, so he issued a final reminder and got his killcount. 

 

"9 of us? Split teams?" Asked one member. "No dude, you ask this every time shut up..." responded another. 

 

Rolling his eyes and sighing Damian pulled each of them aside and spoke to them briefly explaining that everyone needs to try to get along and that the event was not scheduled as split teams and as such would continue on as normal. 

 

"I know but this is supposed to be fun for all... 9 is boring" The instigator said once more. 

 

"Look, I understand that mate but as leader I have to think about the majority and do what's right, this event was scheduled as a full team, you knew that when you came if you'd like a smaller team, search the teamwork forums" Damian finalised. 

 

He couldn't fully shake the disappointment of tonight and could feel himself getting aggravated with people questioning everything when they had all day to read the forums to see what the events were. Regardless, he sipped his drink and continued on with the event, forgetting about the situation. 

 

"Gotta update the points tonight before bed..." Damian said to himself as he hit a 612 with his Chaotic Longsword.

» Day 16: 

 

"Okay, no problem... Don't worry I understand" Damian falsely laughed, hanging up the phone. Work had just called him to inform him that unfortunately there were no hours for him to work this week. Damian worked as a sessional teaching assistant and so wasn't always guaranteed work, but he had been lucky recently and had a lot of hours. 

 

"A week without work... That's gonna hurt the pocket" he moaned. Leaning against the kitchen table he opened the cupboards to look at what was in to drink, he was getting fed up of nothing but tea. "Coffee... Nice smell, poor taste. Apple juice... Eh..." Another disappointment today had left him feeling glum. 

 

He sat up on the kitchen counter and moved his eyes upwards as he began to think. Today his clan had a major event in the JaGeX clan cup which required them to pull twenty people, Damian wasn't an ignorant person, he knew they could do it, but it would take a lot of nagging. 

 

He hated nagging, but it was part of the job, and he knew if he couldn't handle the simple facets of leading then he didn't deserve to do it. 

 

"Okay everyone, Round one of the combined cup today, let's make ourselves proud we can get past the first round but we need to work together" Damian told everybody. 

 

Daydreaming slightly, the ringtone of his phone snapped Damian back to reality harshly. Scuttering to answer it in time he picked it up to hear his girlfriend on the other end "Hey" she said happily "are we still on for tonight?". 

 

Damian's heart sank and he got a horrible feeling echoing through his stomach. Preparing himself for another let down Damian mustered his strength "Sorry babe I don't have the money right now, there's no work this week... We could have a night in though, watch some films and have a nice meal?" 

 

... 

 

 

No matter how hard he tried Damian just couldn't shake the sound of his girlfriends obvious disappointment out of his head. It bounced around the inside of his skull like a tennis ball. 

 

"Lol we lose tonight" Was the

first thing he saw as he glanced at his screen. 

 

"We'll never know unless we try, I think we could surprise ourselves" the leader said ambitiously. He knew he had to lead by example, he was the person everybody looked up to, if he didn't handle things properly how could he respect himself, how could the culture and community of the clan remain in tact. 

 

After all, it was only one or two people causing issues. "Kick them..." He thought to himself. "No, I can't kick them without a valid reason, it just isn't right, and they have friends... It could really hurt the clan" another voice in his head responded. 

 

... 

 

7 O'clock came and Damian had managed to get together twenty people for the J Cup tournament. He signed into TeamSpeak 3 and tried to rally the troops without going over the top and making everything awkward. 

 

"Thanks for coming everyone, the result today doesn't matter, it's about working together towards a common goal and having fun, so let's just do our best yeah?" enthused Damian. 

 

"Someone help me what the **** are you all doing???" someone said in TeamSpeak as they were killed. "Oh my God I just lost everything you guys are useless!" he continued. 

 

"Stop raging, this is a team effort and no one knew where you were, you're not helping matters here" Damian responded, he was so stressed right now, he still couldn't forget about his girlfriend, his job and on top of that, he was trying to focus on Stealing Creation and control an unhappy clan member. 

 

After several more rants from the same person, Damian banned them from the server and sighed, knowing that they'd lost. He then removed the person from the clan. 

 

"You kicked Jason?" one of the removed clan members friends asked. To which Damian answered "Yes, he was flaming on TS and it wasn't helping matters, I've warned him in the past and he was dragging the community down, I have 56 other people to think of here, not just him". 

 

Jason's friend messaged Damian "55, if you kicked him, I'm leaving too".

 

» Day 35: 

 

Humming away to his favourite song Damian smiled. The sun shone golden rays of light through the kitchen window which seemed to bounce off the magnolia walls. Today was a good day, for the first time in a month he felt great. He'd had a call from work confirming that they had more hours for him, his brother was visiting within the hour and just yesterday he'd had a nice day out with his girlfriend. 

 

Looking out the window once more waiting for his brother to arrive Damian caught his own reflection. Striking blue eyes with clean cut short dirty blonde hair. He ran his hand through his head and half grimaced half laughed. "Bad haircut mate..." he said to himself. 

 

Damian had not always had short hair, in fact, he used to have long hair cut to fall over his left eye however he'd had to cut it smart for his job interview and still hadn't adjusted to seeing the new him. 

 

His brother had managed to slip through unnoticed while Damian had been watching his own reflection and joked "Give the guy your number if you like him that much". Looking over Damian rolled his eyes and shook his head. 

 

... 

 

"Gold 4 U @ *****.com!" "Gold 4 U @ *****.com!" "Gold 4 U @ *****.com!" 

 

"What is this!?" Damian howled "attack of the megatrons? Damn it! Do I have to be here 24/7?". Kicking the spam bots and wondering why none of his admins had handled the situation Damian altered the clan permissions to prohibit guests from speaking. 

 

Shortly after, a new user joined the clan chat. After noticing Damian hastily loaded up their recruitment thread to see that the new guy had applied. "God I knew this would happen..." a voice said in his head said in agitation. 

 

"Hey IpwnBandos I'm just in the middle of the Fight Kiln atm but I'll get someone to invite you as soon as possible! (=" 

 

Damian began to pm each of his admins asking if they could invite the new guy. Half refused to respond and the other half were busy. Growling to himself in frustration he asked the new recruit to wait a little

15-Jul-2012 20:39:59  Last edited on 16-Jul-2012 01:16:49 by Monogamy

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while for an invite. At which point the guy left and removed his application. 

 

Running his hands through his head Damian looked around the room pouting and asking himself if he'd chosen the right admins. He found himself having a conversation with himself. 

 

Voice 1: "I'm gonna have to derank them..." Voice 2: "But who can replace them?.. 55 members and we lack anybody with any real leading potential, depressing" Voice 3: "Yeah and they're friends, they'd feel betrayed" voice 1: "Well, gotta do what you gotta do really, friends or not" 

 

Damian had always promised himself and everybody else that he would maintain a strong clan, maybe not the biggest, maybe not the greatest at PvM or PvP, but the best at what they do. He'd always said that he would derank anybody, even himself if he thought they were no longer doing the job to the best of their ability. 

 

Snapping back from his little conversation with himself Damian remembered his Kiln trip and looked at the screen just in time to see a Ket-Zek kill him as his prayer dropped. "Oh my God are you serious?" Damian laughed at himself despite all the stress he enjoyed leading, he hated some of the decisions he had to make, but it was an adventure, a journey where he could prove himself, and make something fantastic to share with other people. 

 

"What? Why am I losing my rank?" Lucy demanded to know. "I've done a lot for this clan!" she continued. 

 

Damian consoled her, he did his best to defuse the situation "I know you have, but you have to understand that I need people working with me here. This isn't a decision I 'want' to make, but it's one I 'need' to make. You're very busy irl atm and I respect that, I don't want to give you any extra added stress. When you have more time, there'll be a place here for you, until then, I have to give it to somebody else". 

 

Lucy sulked and accepted the decision, but Damian knew he'd just lost a friend. Disappointed at what he had to do Damian did his Squeel Spins and logged out.

 

» Day 89: 

 

"Hey can we talk?" a familiar person messaged Damian. Lowering one brow and raising the other in anticipation of what was about the be said, Damian proceeded; "Sure thing, what can I do for you?" 

 

"Damian! We need to talk!!" came another message, pushing the others before it out of Damian's chat log. "Sure thing, can it wait a second though mate, I'm just dealing with something right now, I'll get back to you, hold that thought". 

 

Damian composed himself and began again with his first correspondence. "Sorry about that, I had a few messages other than yours, can you repeat that, I missed it :/" he hated making people repeat themselves, he knew that most people were impatient and didn't have a second to spare, even for him and those that did would leave out important information the second time around. 

 

"Erm... Yeah I guess no problem I was wondering if we could set up an irc channel, it could be useful for so many things!" came the reply. Damian had never used irc before and as such was reluctant to have somebody set up an account under his clans name when he could not moderate what went on. 

 

"I'm not sure, I've never used it before and I don't really have the time to learn to use it right now" Damian hinted, hoping and praying that the person he was speaking to had the wit to read between the lines and take no as an answer. 

 

"That's fine, I'll manage it all, I don't mind doing it!". Shaking his head, Damian rubbed the sides of his mouth as he prepared to reply. "Thank you for the offer but I can't see it serving enough purpose to warrant you spending so much time doing it, we'll leave it for now and I'll think about it in the future". Being the kind of leader who enjoyed leading others to form decisions for themselves, rather than outright telling people what to do Damian hoped that this would finally end the conversation. 

 

He didn't want to be seen as a dictator, and wanted to encourage people to see things his way, rather than force his way on them.

 

Looking frustrated at the message he received once more Damian stared in disbelief at his screen reading "Sure, we can talk again at a later date". 

 

"There is no later date..." He groaned to himself. Sighing and turning to his second clan member who wished to speak with him, Damian reminded himself that this was not the person who had frustrated him and forced himself to play nice. "Hey, sorry about that, what's up?" he asked. 

 

"I think Andy is botting... He is on 24/7 on world 6 and never responds". Taken aback and half hoping that the information was false, Damian checked the time. 11 O'clock, on a Thursday night. 

 

Damian was far from stupid, he could put two and two together. The clan member in question attended school and should really be asleep now, but he knew that was not definitive proof of botting. Loading up Andrews adventurer log Damian noticed the member had risen from 94 to 98 strength in two days. 

 

"Strange..." Damian thought to himself. If there was one thing Damian held in high regard it was fairness, and in his clan it was innocent until proven guilty. With one final attempt to redeem Andrew's reputation Damian loaded RuneTracker to check where the bulk of experience was in Andy's stats this week. 

 

"2.6M hunter... 5M Strength... This just isn't possible in one week given his circumstances, hunter is a highly botted skill also..." came the thoughts in Damian's head. Once more however Damian argued with himself "Yeah but that's not proof, I mean what if you're wrong?" 

 

... 

 

It had been two days since Damian had kicked Andy when all of a sudden he received an unexpected message from him reading "Why was I kicked? Did I do something wrong? I'm sorry". 

 

Damian felt so harsh right now, he hated feeling like the bad guy, it dragged him down. Breathing in deeply and trying to console himself Damian answered "You were found to be botting and we can't have that here I'm sorry, but really you're lucky you weren't reported, take care and good luck".