Mission Three Results
“One after one, by the star-dogged Moon,
Too quick for groan or sigh,
Each turned his face with a ghastly pang,
And cursed me with his eye.
Four times fifty living men,
(And I heard nor sigh nor groan)
With heavy thump, a lifeless lump,
They dropped down, one by one.”
I can’t help but recall that Coleridge verse when I think of the Marina Run. I’m here talkin’ and you’re here listenin’, and Earth burns yonder in the morning sky, so we got the chains somehow, fixed them to the Ark, and made it here after all… but what a heavy price was paid down at the marina, all for some lengths of heavy iron chain and a few pieces of death-dealing loot. I still remember the grim looks on the faces of those who returned from the marina that day. Whenever one of ‘em caught my eye, I remember the Mariner, the “ghastly pang” of their faces… and I wonder if they cursed me in their hearts.
The Smokers were never going to be much of an issue. Barbaric and stupid, they somehow didn’t consider it a gross misallocation of resources to burn gasoline all day in their idiotic jet-skis around the harbor… as if there was no land in sight and it was the only way to stay afloat. They’d cordoned off their section of the harbor with stout chains they’d looted from the Navy docks, keeping the mutant Harbor Squids from infiltrating their territory, squirting ink in their beer, and gnawing off their legs with those sharp beaks of theirs. A couple of squid-generations back, they’d become amphibious, and taken to strolling down the quays on their wobbly tentacles, looking for unwary Smokers to dismember and feed to their Queen, who generally got much hungrier than usual when she was laying eggs, which happened to be every Thursday.
Thursdays just like the Thursday we went down to the marina. If only we’d known…
Major Joseph Talleyrand-LaRoche’s Pink Panther engaged “stealth mode” by closing the open exhaust butterflies on the headers, thus reducing Pinky’s aural footprint to a merely headache-inducing 87 dB at 50 feet. But after years of bouncing across the waves on decrepit 2-stroke jet-skis all day, the Smokers managed to be deaf to the Major’s approach. Grinning with satisfaction at the foe’s inattention, the Major summoned the rest of the squad to “harvest” the harbor chains from right under the noses of the skylarking Smokers.
But with the absence of the chains, came the presence of the squids, who are not so easily distracted from their goals. Their hungry beaks made short work of the screaming Smokers… but it was a Thursday and they knew that Somebody would be getting hungry back at the nest. As the squad loaded the last of the chains into Long Haul Raul’s rig and began nosing among the less-decrepit vessels in the marina for salvage and swag, the Harbor Squids struck.
Slow on land, the squids depend on surprise when they attack the Dry Goods (as they refer to landlubbers), and sure enough, most of the squad were dumbstruck to see so many tentacled, gelatinous blobs wobbling down the docks, clicking their beaks and looking evolutionarily ridiculous. But laughing at the squids is a profound mistake when one should be running, and much damage was dealt to the squad by the mutant cephalopods.
Still, they might have escaped with only a few flesh wounds and dents had the Harbor Squid Queen herself not surfaced, screeching and burbling in hunger, accompanied by her consort, the indescribable sea monster known only as the Ancient Mariner. Invincible, irresistible, and vulnerable only to momentary distraction by the epic recitation of the Ribald Limerick (he’s a Mariner, after all), he proved the downfall of a few of our heroes. If he appreciated the verse (generally meaning he hadn’t heard that one before), he’d pause to applaud and guffaw for a brief moment, allowing his quarry to escape. If, however, he failed to find the doggerel sufficiently diverting, he’d seize the luckless reciter with a terrible transfixing gaze, while his mate impregnated the poet’s vehicles with her squamous, wriggling nymphets and the adult squids had their way with the bodywork.
The Major, bless his soul, thought he’d acquired over the years a nonpareil collection of bawdy limericks and jokes, and liked his chances to stump the squid-lord and get off scot-free. But when he started off “There was an old Bey of Calcutta,” the Ancient Mariner slammed a heavy scaled fist directly onto the hood of the Pink Panther. A watery, rumbling voice like the clogged plumbing behind Niagara Falls said just this: “No fart jokes!” before the Queen shoved her ovipositor through Pinky’s passenger-side window and spewed her famished larvae all over the Panther’s personnel cabin.
Dorcas McGee was the mission’s second casualty. Already limping with a mere 9HP after being heavily battered by the Harbor Squids (unimpressed as cephalopods are by land speed records), the TSSC Prototype caught the gaze of the Mariner and actually thought she might get away with a short tale about some fella from Nantucket. Eyes narrowing with fury, the Ancient Mariner personally chewed open the Prototype’s engine cowling, seized his mate’s ovipositor and squeezed out a generous dollop of fresh larvae like so much horseradish upon the TSSC’s intake manifold, and actually bit through the engine block like a hungry Dodgers fan at a ballgame.
By the time the wreckage was hauled away to the encampment, the survivors were less than jubilant, the marina was afire with ignited fuel-oil from the Smokers’ trashed jet-skis, and Mr. and Mrs. A. Mariner were on their way back to their submerged lair deep beneath the waves, feeling rather full and satisfied.
Maj. Joseph Talleyrand-LaRoche (peregrinus_bis)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
38 -13 32 35 59 31 65 18 19 0 0 8 Scout
VEHICLE DESTROYED! You suffered 50 HP of damage! You encountered 1 Harbor Squids, which caused 15 HP of damage! The Harbor Squid Queen WAS SUMMONED, but you managed to run away! The Ancient Mariner didn’t think your rimes were fresh enough and held you down while the Queen infested you with squid larvae! Gross! This caused 34 HP of damage! Wow!
bean (beanbreath)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
32 24 28 23 32 13 16 19 11 1 1 32 Mechanic
You suffered 8 HP of damage! You encountered 1 Harbor Squids, which caused 8 HP of damage! The Harbor Squid Queen wasn’t bothered by you! The Ancient Mariner liked your rimes! Fresh!
Long Haul Raul (Garg)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
56 10 39 58 33 66 10 19 23 0 0 30 Mule
You suffered 32 HP of damage! You encountered 3 Harbor Squids, which caused 9 HP of damage! The Harbor Squid Queen wasn’t bothered by you! The Ancient Mariner didn’t think your rimes were fresh enough and held you down while the Queen infested you with squid larvae! Gross! This caused 23 HP of damage! Wow!
"Gentleman" Jim Brassers (sarcadian)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
43 33 60 40 45 48 48 18 16 0 0 15 Escort
You suffered 7 HP of damage! You encountered 3 Harbor Squids, which caused 7 HP of damage! The Harbor Squid Queen WAS SUMMONED, but you managed to run away! The Ancient Mariner liked your rimes! Fresh!
Dorcas McGee (awjt)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
32 -32 25 23 44 11 23 27 20 1 1 26 Mechanic
VEHICLE DESTROYED! You suffered 64 HP of damage! You encountered 1 Harbor Squids, which caused 23 HP of damage! The Harbor Squid Queen wasn’t bothered by you! The Ancient Mariner didn’t think your rimes were fresh enough and held you down while the Queen infested you with squid larvae! Gross! This caused 41 HP of damage! Wow!
Bubba Zanetti (bizmail_public)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
38 17 37 29 57 22 65 31 29 0 0 6.5 Scout
You suffered 12 HP of damage! You encountered 1 Harbor Squids, which caused 12 HP of damage! The Harbor Squid Queen WAS SUMMONED, but you managed to run away! The Ancient Mariner liked your rimes! Fresh!
Bertie Gomez (Palomeque)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
65 60 37 52 27 52 18 20 13 0 0 26 Mule
You suffered 5 HP of damage! You encountered 3 Harbor Squids, which caused 5 HP of damage! The Harbor Squid Queen wasn’t bothered by you! The Ancient Mariner liked your rimes! Fresh!
Wizard (thewizardofwas)
MHP HP FP AR SP TQ MV EN LK RP LI Gas Class
44 5 52 45 46 54 46 28 16 0 0 18 Escort
You suffered 39 HP of damage! You encountered 3 Harbor Squids, which caused 10 HP of damage! The Harbor Squid Queen WAS SUMMONED, but you managed to run away! The Ancient Mariner didn’t think your rimes were fresh enough and held you down while the Queen infested you with squid larvae! Gross! This caused 29 HP of damage! Wow!
As Bertie Gomez and Long Haul Raul hauled the wreckage of the Pink Panther and the Prototype into the shadow of the Ark, Blazer stepped out of his cab and approached the fallen Drivers. "You came through. I know it took everything you had, and I can’t thank you enough for everything you did for all of us. We have the chains and a fair amount of salvage, and the Ark will be on the move tomorrow. We have you to thank for that. I understand completely if you want this to be your end, if you prefer to finally get the rest denied you for the last ten years. But speaking on behalf of the Train… we want you here. We need you. We’ll get you new rides, the best we can find, of any Class you name. Your upgrades are gone, so you’ll be pretty much starting over… but we could really use you if you feel up to the fight.
Call it a day and hang it up for good… or roll a fresh start with us and take your new wheels to Mars.
Just let us know what you prefer, and we’ll make it happen. Dorcas… Major… you’ve both earned our respect, and we owe you this much at least."
