It is said that War never changes. Tell that to the very few veterans of the last few conventional wars of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries who also managed to survive Chelsea’s little tantrum. Finally, humanity had discovered what a war to end all wars looked like. Every lethal confrontation that followed was nothing more than serial murder and skirmishes at worst, just because there were so very few people left to fight. We’d lost the capacity to mount even the most minor war as surely as we’d lost the capacity to put together a formal ball.
Wars need living bodies to devour, and there were so few of us left to kill.
Maybe War could finally take a break from his aeons of rampage, lay down his axe, and catch his breath after an age of hard work. Ah, but Death wasn’t finished yet. Not with us.
We had chosen our champions well. Not one of them was foolish enough to roll down the heavily-guarded throat of the Stark Skunkworks (well, one of them… aw, never mind, we’ll get to that), and the back-door raid started off, at least, without a hitch.
Jack Burton, Jr. played to his strengths after Baltar’s keen eyes spotted the well-camouflaged outlines of the hatch. Jack the Knife Boyer’s old Imperial rolled up, and its cavernous trunk yielded up an impact drill with a stout masonry bit. Some quick drilling, a couple of well-placed lag screws, some stout tow chain, and Junior eased forward in granny gear, gently and as near-silently as possible inching the decade-shut hatch open. Knife engaged the hatch’s prop rods, and everyone peered down the darkened tunnel… and listened.
Near-silence. A faint skittering from the darkest corners, but nothing too alarming yet.
Baltar and Larsson, as Scouts, took point, ready to reconnoiter and report back. The sealed-beam headlights of the Cobra and Volvo revealed nothing but a dust-free floor stretching away into blackness. They indicated as such, and the squad rolled forward. All talk occurred in urgent whispers. Locked doorways appeared at regular intervals, Mad Dog the Mechanic interpreting the strange runes inscribed thereon to the baffled Drivers. “’Launch Control’. Probably nothing in there. ‘Women’. Nah, that’s the shitter, Jack, not an advertisement. ‘Custodial’. Nope.”
Baltar froze.
“Sven, what’s that?”
“Looks like å Gøøgler.”
“The hell’s that?”
“You know… Gøøgler. The sjelf-driver äutø-cjar?”
“What’s it doing down here?”
“I t’ink rechårging.”
“Well, don’t wake it up. Knife, can you disable those motion sensors up there from way back here?”
“On it. Junior, can you make a little room there? Jesus, that fat ass of yours takes up a lot of room down here.”
“Kiss it if you admire it so much, Knife. Ssshhh!! What’s that?”
Everyone froze, ears straining to locate the faint skittering that now seemed to come from behind them as well as ahead. The sound was not repeated, and the Drivers relaxed a bit. Jack began to make room for Knife to pull past. “Seems like ol’ Cougar’s intel was past its sell-by date. I don’t think…”
“Heeellllooooooooo….?”
The corridor lit up instantly with spinning lights and emergency strobes as a deafening klaxon sounded the alarm. Simultaneously a high-pitched screaming came shooting down the hallway in front of them, the faint skittering grew to a squicky avalanche of tiny articulated titanium feet, and the two Googlecars hummed to life.
The sudden aural assault of noises, all of which meant immediate peril, startled the Drivers into cries of alarm. Sir Gonville De’Ath hit his head on his door pillar, sustaining a nasty bruise. Clankenstein’s van backed into Hunter Channing, eliciting a stream of furious profanity from the Escort. Bill the BUM’s blind instinct drove him forward down the tunnel into the first of the howling, tearing Screamers. And Jack Burton was so badly startled by the explosion of noise that his own bowels exploded into the SHITGO intake, causing a burst of overly-enriched fuel mixture that resulted in a titanic backfire from his stacks, directly into the corridor’s fire-suppression sensors.
Now a fresh set of alarms blared, the overhead sprinklers burst forth with foul-smelling water that had stagnated in the plumbing for over a decade, drenching the Drivers and the Googlers as they attempted to withdraw from their charging sockets and engage the intruders with high-voltage tasers and antipersonnel chainsaw blades extended.
There was a flash of light, a burst of ozone-scented air, and the short circuit exploded the battery in one of the Googlers, raining destruction and a flaming shockwave throughout the cramped tunnel.
Jack “Knife” Boyer’s ’68 Chrysler was directly next to the Googler when it exploded.
Hunter Channing and Sir Gonville emitted twin war cries of rage and vengeance, and the battle was joined. The Armor-Plated Cockroaches were everywhere, infesting the SHITGO engines and gnawing on the armor of all comers, though strangely (and fortunately) they seemed to have lost their taste for biological substances over the years. The Screamers did their share of damage as well, particularly Mad Dog Jackson and Bill the BUM, near the vanguard of the squad, before the last one was finally vanquished, its earsplitting shriek fading at the same time the sprinklers ran out of water and the intruder alarm died out. Silence reigned for a few seconds, broken only by the ringing in everyone’s ears and the sporadic dripping of low-grade fire retardant.
And then a sepulchral growl broke the stillness.
“What is this new devilry?” muttered the oil-spattered Sir Gonville, to which Channing replied, “Stark’s pet. Form up, everyone! Let’s take him on all at once. He can’t hit all nine of us.”
Well, it turned out he could.
A shining red and yellow blur sailed out of the darkness, full of fury and remarkably hard to hit. Junior, being the biggest target (though heretofore undamaged save for a nasty infestation of APCs in the SHITGO pipes) sustained the heaviest damage, losing 36HP to the furious four-legged assault. Knife Boyer’s Imperial, already hobbled by 12HP of damage from the Screamers and 7HP from the explosion, took another 12HP from the red and yellow blur, and it proved too much for the venerable old Chrysler, which would never move again under its own power, having suffered a fatal thrown rod through the block and stress fractures throughout the frame. Still the two-tone devil scampered from opponent to opponent as the Drivers poured a murderous fire at it, landing hit after hit in turn.
Finally, Sir Gonville saw what looked like a weak spot, and squeezed off a carefully-aimed round. The red and yellow blur broke apart into several pieces in a small explosion of plastic and titanium. As the smoke cleared, the Drivers beheld an altogether unexpected sight.
Freed from its cramped suit of bionic armor, a large cyborganic dog scratched itself in apparent satisfaction, then trotted over to the astounded Sir Gonville and proceeded to lick his face. A few last uncommitted roaches chose that moment to scurry up the Iso Grifo’s tires, but the dog’s muzzle moved faster than the eye could see and gobbled up the APCs, leaving the Iso clean as a whistle.
“Who’s your new friend, Gonny?” cracked Junior halfheartedly, but nobody laughed.
Exhausted, the Drivers pried open the doors labeled “Armory” and “Deniability Research” and loaded up Junior’s rig with all the contents of those rooms that were even remotely portable. Then Knife’s Chrysler was gently attached to Clank’s tow hook, and the party rolled home with its fallen and its prizes.
Nobody was convinced it was worth it.
“What I wanna know,” mused Bill the BUM, “is who the hell it was set off the alarms?”
Mission 1B
Desmond Baltar (Steampunk Banana)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
31 19 34 37 63 31 56 19 15 0 0 8 Scout
You encountered 2 screamers, which caused 5 HP of damage. You WERE infested with APCs! And, you received 1 HP of splash damage from cars exploding in the tunnel. Rex caused 6 HP of damage!
Dog “Mad Dog” Jackson (xdijio)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
31 12 24 31 44 11 15 16 20 1 1 32 Mechanic
You encountered 2 screamers, which caused 15 HP of damage. You WERE infested with APCs! And, you received 1 HP of splash damage from cars exploding in the tunnel. Rex caused 3 HP of damage!
Jack Burton Jr. (funruly)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
55 18 35 54 36 70 11 27 12 0 0 29 Mule
You encountered 2 screamers, which caused 0 HP of damage. You WERE infested with APCs! And, you received 0 HP of splash damage from cars exploding in the tunnel. Rex caused 36 HP of damage!
Clankenstein (davide405)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
31 21 32 28 43 13 24 32 16 1 1 30 Mechanic
You encountered 2 screamers, which caused 0 HP of damage. You WERE infested with APCs! And, you received 1 HP of splash damage from cars exploding in the tunnel. Rex caused 9 HP of damage!
Channing Hunter (gwwar)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
53 27 56 47 43 54 41 30 13 0 0 15 Escort
You encountered 2 screamers, which caused 0 HP of damage. You WERE infested with APCs! And, you received 1 HP of splash damage from cars exploding in the tunnel. Rex caused 11 HP of damage!
Jack “Knife” Boyer (drman321)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
29 -2 33 38 41 17 12 15 20 1 1 30 Mechanic
VEHICLE DESTROYED! You encountered 2 screamers, which caused 12 HP of damage. You WERE infested with APCs! And, you received 7 HP of splash damage from cars exploding in the tunnel. Rex caused 12 HP of damage!
Sir Gonville De’Ath (daneel)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
53 18 57 43 51 43 40 31 25 0 0 13 Escort
You encountered 2 screamers, which caused 0 HP of damage. You WERE NOT infested with APCs! And, you received 1 HP of splash damage from cars exploding in the tunnel. Rex caused 21 HP of damage!
Sven Larsson, aka "The Swedish Chief” (Tetrix)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
42 13 37 34 63 23 60 15 20 0 0 6.5 Scout
You encountered 2 screamers, which caused 7 HP of damage. You WERE infested with APCs! And, you received 1 HP of splash damage from cars exploding in the tunnel. Rex caused 11 HP of damage!
Bill the BUM (webiii1976)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
31 14 27 27 33 14 26 16 16 1 1 36 Mechanic
You encountered 2 screamers, which caused 10 HP of damage. You WERE infested with APCs! And, you received 1 HP of splash damage from cars exploding in the tunnel. Rex caused 6 HP of damage!
Rip Torn Van Winkle (jlw)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
37 24 39 33 64 34 53 19 12 0 0 7 Scout
You encountered 2 screamers, which caused 5 HP of damage.You WERE infested with APCs! And, you received 1 HP of splash damage from cars exploding in the tunnel. Rex caused 7 HP of damage!
Back at the Ark encampment, Cougar and Blazer approached Knife’s Chrysler, hanging forlornly from the tow hook. Knife himself was only semiconscious, kept alive by the biofeedback loops of his SHITGO apparatus. Bill the BUM and Clankenstein caught Cougar’s eye and gave her a subtle shake of the head. The Imperial would ride no more.
“Jack. Hey, Knife. Look at me.” Knife opened his eyes, barely. “She’s gone, Knife,” whispered Cougar. “Your Chrysler is finished. What do you want us to do?”
“…Do?”
“You know how it works. We can get you a new ride. It’s L.A., there are cars and trucks lying around all over. We can reinstall you, SHITGO and all, into a new ride of your choosing. It won’t have any upgrades at this point, so it’ll be like starting over. You can even be a new Class if you like.”
Knife squeezed his eyes shut. His Chrysler… God, he couldn’t imagine being without her. He couldn’t remember the last night he’d spent outside her Corinthian leather-uphostered interior. And now she was so much scrap metal. Could he bear the thought of forming that bond again, with a completely different car?
“Or you can just go with her, Knife. We know what it’s like, and I couldn’t do it. I’m Cougar and she is me. When she goes, I go. But it’s a very personal decision, completely up to you. Hang it up and fade away and get out of this fucked-up world a bit early… or pick a new ride and fight another day. You think about it, then tell us what you want us to do.”
Knife nodded, Cougar squeezed his shoulder and moved on.
Sir Gonville De’Ath sat in his Iso Grifo, regarding the cyborganic dog resting comfortably in his passenger seat. “Hey, Rex,” said Cougar. Rex whined in recognition of his name.
“Didn’t you say you’d never seen Stark’s pet?” asked Sir Gonville.
“That I did, but I’d heard Stark mention the name now and then. Seeing him now… he couldn’t have been anything else but the Rex I’d heard about. What are you going to do with him?”
“Me? What have I to do with him?”
“Well, he’s obviously taken a shine to you. You could take him with you, though he’ll slow you down a bit. Those cybernetic implants are heavy. But maybe he could be useful. Then again, he would slow you down, and who knows how helpful he might be. You could take him out back and shoot him real quick, maybe salvage one of the weapons in his suit for your own use. Or I guess you could just let him go.”
De’Ath considered. “I shall think on it. In the meantime…" He handed Cougar a creased card of stiff paper. “Right where you said it’d be.”
Cougar nodded, took the card, then strode away. The crew from the Navy Depot run were coming in soon.
And more blood and transmission fluid will have been spilt this day.
(EDIT - added Results for @jlw at 7:25 PM PST, 2/03/14)
