Bleeko the Caveman
Killed on the Plane of Earth by Earthlink

It just goes to show you that you can never take anything for granted.
I had been playing a caveman because the stats showed it as the least
ascended of all character classes.  (Only 64 vs ~100-150 for most, and
250-300 for Vals and Wizards) I got a break with an early wish from a
throne, then after many nights of play, the caveman had the amulet and
was cruising to the astral plane.

By all measures, he was nigh invulnerable -- Level 30, the highest
experience level attainable, well over 500hp, AC-53, a stack of +7
weapons, six-packs of full healing potions and amulets of life saving,
and big stacks of wands of death and scrolls of charging.

I was playing via dialup and Earthlink was in fine form -- sub 28k
connections, with lags, freezes, and frequent connection drops.  The
drops were annoying, but when you logged back in, the alt.org server
would recover the game after a 10 second countdown.  While recovering
the game, the connection dropped *again* and when I logged back in, I
was greeted with:

  "Shall I pick a character's race, role, gender and alignment for you? [ynq]"

Nooooooooo!  Gone.  All gone.

The game just disappeared.  It doesn't even appear in my stats.  The
only acknowledgment I have is the status line that was still on my
account page:

  "Bleeko the neutral male human Caveman was last seen in Plane on
   turn 58645 and with 2280870 points, carrying the amulet!"

All I can do is sing:

    Did he ever return?
    No he never returned!
    And his fate is still unlearn'd
    He may fight forever
    'neath the Mazes of Menace
    He's the Caveman who never returned.