Given that Crugandr is supposed to be in the steam age, would they have developed 5.56 ammunition, or did Shift Happens bring their own? I assume .30-06 would be widely available?
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TEAM HILLBILLY ROLLERS
Earlier parts
PART 0.1 - A prologue to the prologue
PART 0.2 - Another piece of the prologue puzzle
PART 0.3 - Viva la IP 4Z!
PART 0.4 - Robotman
PART 0.5 - Interference problems
PART 0.6 - Can I play Tetris?
PART 0.7 - Tangerine and familiar
PART 1.0 - Now things got serious!
PART 1.1 - Hello, Thibault and friends!
PART 1.2 - Poor kitty
PART 1.3 - Curse you, Team Oil Crisis!
PART 1.4 - Interlude
PART 2.0 - Bird bird bird, bird is the word!
PART 2.1 - D. Head
PART 2.2 - Good night!
PART 3.0 - Freeway Rockstar
PART 3.1 - DISCO TJO DISCO HEJ
PART 3.2 - Van-Werewolf 1-0
After looking for Marie for hours, Janne and Andreas gave up and decided that they would have to go to sleep, and see if they could find her early tomorrow morning. Yet they were a bit worried about the situation.
ANDREAS: Fuck… If we don’t find Marie tomorrow, what are we going to do then?
JANNE: Well, don’t think so much about that then. She probably will come back when she is hungry. Or needs alcohol. That can’t bee too far away.
ANDREAS: What if the wolves eat her then? (laughing)
JANNE: Well… Suitable if they are on a LCHF diet maybe… If not, I don’t know.
Yet Janne and Andreas could not sleep very well since it was actually a bit worrying that Marie was gone. Finding her in Övertorneå municipality was rarely a struggle but this was not really the same thing. That lead to the two of them sleeping very light. Meanwhile, Marie woke up and saw that something really scary was happening. Since she was more or less running on the reptile brain at the moment after some gallons too much of Karjala, fight or flight mode was engaged, and for some reason she decided that fight was the solution. She ran to the van, and decided to start it to run down to where the werewolves were running. When the buzzy four banger woke up, Janne and Andreas did it too.
ANDREAS: FUCK, SOMEONE IS STEALING THE VAN!
JANNE: LET’S CATCH THAT LITTLE BASTARD
Janne and Andreas was running towards the van and managed to open the only working sliding door to jump into the cargo area. Looking through the lexan window in the divider wall, however, they could spot Marie’s hideous new haircut in front of the drivers head rest. Andreas started banging the wall so she should hear him.
ANDREAS: MARIE! Stop the van! WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING! WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?
MARIE: SHUT UP! I’ll explain later.
Bouncing around with tools, food, spare parts and jerry cans, with more or less nothing to hold to, and with the sliding door open, Janne and Andreas were praying for their lives. But when their saw the pack of werewolves they nearly shit themselves, Janne grabbed the sledgehammer while Andreas took the axe, in case some werewolf should jump in through the sliding door. However, there was almost no time for thinking anything more before the van slowed down at an alarmingly fast rate after a loud crunch, causing both of them to headbutt the centre divider wall. The fact that their noses now were bleeding like crazy was nothing they even had the time to think about now.
ANDREAS: OUCH! What the… SHIT! She hit a werewolf!, he screamed as he saw one bounce up on the windshield to fall to the ground again.
JANNE: Yeah but don’t worry about that one, it is already dead, concentrate on… OH FUCK!
What they saw now was Marie being knocked dizzy by the airbag, with her foot still pinned to the accelerator, while the van was coming close to a huge rock at an alarming speed.
ANDREAS: FUCK, WE ARE GOING TO DIE!
JANNE: I CAN’T UNDERSTAND WHAT THE FUCK SHE IS DOING.
Meanwhile in the cab, Marie was regaining consciousness, with her face still planted in the empty airbag.
MARIE: OH FUCK, I CAN’T SEE SHIT, WHAT THE FUCK IS HAPPENING!
When she had put herself in a more comfortable position again, she saw the rock coming closer at about mach 2 and had to swerve, somehow managing to get her hands tangled in the remains of the airbag, causing the van to get up on two wheels, landing on all four again. Andreas managed to grab the handle on the non-working sliding door while Janne was thrown out of the open sliding door, landing on the grass. Unfortunately, the van stopped with a corner hit on another werewolf, causing only cosmetical damage this time, which also meant that the werewolf was wounded and very angry, rushing to attack Andreas inside the cargo compartment. However, Janne somehow managed (during a hefty adrenaline rush) to hit it in the neck with the sledgehammer, if it was dead or just unconscious was unclear, Andreas at least got some time to hit it with the axe so there was no doubt that it definitely was dead. Andreas rushed through the drivers door, with all the adrenaline running he somehow got some strength to push Marie to the centre position on the bench seat, while Janne jumped in through the passenger door, quickly shutting them closed and locking them. They were just quiet, staring on each other, but at least the van was fully driveable. Soon afterwards, they heard Rukari yelling that they all had to leave the camp.
ANDREAS: Well….that was a nice suggestion, how about not choosing campsites like this to start with?
The pink, and now very battered van, took first place after the Bricksley in the convoy, probably because of Andreas driving like Fittipaldi in the adrenaline rush just to get away from the werewolves. Now they could really hope for no more incidents like this in the future.
TO BE CONTINUED
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Team Oil Crisis is the one who brought most of the guns, and their own ammunition.
Same with the few gunslingers in Team Shift Happens, with the exception of Rukari, who can use Crugandr’s ammunition types.
Commonly available ammunition in Crugandr is… Different.
All rounds are black-powder, btw, except for one.
There is .58 Short (bullet is based on a musket Minie ball, and this is made for heavy pistols, like revolvers), .58 Standard (the rifle round, think .45-70 but meaner), .58 Pointed (.58 Standard with a semi-modern pointed bullet. It can, and will, break the sound barrier with a suitable powder charge), .75 Valraad (very heavy hitting cartridge used by the Valraadi military, meant for taking out armored troops or vehicles), and .60-NK Valraad (.60 caliber smokeless (Nekan - No Smoke) with a pointed bullet, used as an anti-materiel round. Also, for smaller pistols, there is the .45 Long (a closer cousin to the .45-70, but about half the case length), and the .33 caliber (Small, close to .357 Magnum in ballistic profile, except it’s black powder.)
If you’re using a shotgun, however, you’re in luck. There are 10 gauge and 12 gauge brass-cased shot-shells.
You can also get plenty of black powder, lead bullets, and percussion caps, if you prefer.
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stream reflect or something idk...? i can't write anything today I don't even have any song lyrics to fit into this filler section. i'm not okaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay i'm not okay, i'm not okay i'm not oh-fucking-kay you wear me ouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuut but if you wanted honesty that's all you had to say That's all you had to say I never want to let you down Or have you go, it's better off this way For all the dirty looks The photographs your boyfriend took Remember when you broke your foot From jumping out the second floor?
TEAM BLAZERS
Romulo let out a sigh of relief as he scanned the red Yamada all around once the morning light had finally shone throughout the campsite. A disturbingly loud crunching of metal in the midst of the night had managed to awaken most people in the camp, and it seemed that Romulo’s hunch was right, as the large station wagon that once sat atop the hill had rolled all the way down and slammed right into the other vehicles in the campsite.
“Anything to say for yourself, detective?” Romulo glanced over at Watson, who seemed to have his eyes set on the bickering between the teams involved in the incident. “I never said that it wouldn’t succumb to a failure, only that our vehicle would be in a perfectly safe position hadst it actually happened.” Watson looked at him smugly. Romulo let out a small laugh and scoffed at him. “Bullshit!”
Whilst that was in effect, Emily and Charlotte finished up writing their notes for the next stage, and despite Charlotte claiming that the pacenotes from earlier would be difficult to do again, this time it seemed as though it were just as detailed. Eventually the two navigators had sat up from the table, and approached their drivers to brief them on the stage plan.
“Right, so this next stage is mostly gravel now, it’s going to be way more slippery than the cobblestone roads that we went through earlier, but with the tyres we have right now, I think we should be safe.” The feline flipped through the pages. “It seems as though Charlotte is quite tired today. Nevertheless, I shalt be taking over for her on this stage. She hadst briefed me on what exactly I’ll be doing, so you can place your faith in me, whoever might be driving.” The blonde smiled proudly. “Speaking of, who will be driving today? Are you feeling better today, Ray? Or will Watson be taking over again?”
“I think I should be good today.” Romulo affirmed. With their roles set in place, and the morning passed with them having ate breakfast, the only thing left for them to do was to repack their belongings back into the Yamada’s rear compartment and prepare to set off. Watson got around to waking Ga’araiya up, who was still in a comfortable slumber as she lay strewn on the warm floor of the tent. Gently, he tapped her feet, but this was just met with an annoyed grunt from her. He eventually decided to shake her awake, but this only managed to loosen the zipper on the back of her loose dress, and as she attempted to shake Watson off, her dress only got looser and looser. Noticing the precarious situation he was in, he attempted to roll her over to zip her dress back up, but it seemed as though Ga’araiya had already woken up, and noticing Watson right there next to her with her dress half-off, she delivered a swift kick to Watson’s face and ran out of the tent towards Emily.
Watson simply sighed as he began clearing the inside of the tent for anything that shouldn’t be folded up, before climbing out and confusedly meeting eyes with the rest of the crew who looked at him with begrudging looks whilst Ga’araiya clung onto Emily. “What?” He said as everyone went back to what they were doing, still occasionally glancing back at him disturbingly. Eventually, it clicked in his mind, and for the first time to everyone, Watson’s face flushed a very slight red as he attempted to clear the matter up. “Hold on a minute, it wasn’t like that!”
“Uh, huh. I thought so too until now.” Emily glared at him. “So you were going after her for a completely different reason this whole time…”
“Oh, in the name of God…”
A few awkward moments later, and the team had finally packed up their belongings and hopped into the car, with Emily in the front passenger seat, and Romulo in the pilot’s. In the back, Watson sat opposite of Ga’araiya, with Charlotte there in between them as what she called a ‘protective barrier’. And from there on out, Watson simply sat sulking.
The bell in the tower at the town of Viravalli rang out, and Romulo went full throttle out of the campsite, the unmuffled four-cylinder roaring out amidst the seventeen other vehicles in the area. The gravel trail up ahead caked in the cloud of dust as released by the other vehicles, and Romulo heavily relied on Emily’s somewhat confusing instructions. This stage was beginning to show itself as rather shaky from the very start. As per Emily’s notes, the vehicle took a slight detour off the main road to an alternative path where there wouldn’t be as much other cars blocking the path with their clouds of dust. This path was a bit slower than the other, but eventually linked up to the main pathway later. Charlotte thought that this alternative route would provide them with an advantage with their drivers behind the wheel, but right now only time would speak of their tale.
Traveling down this path proved a bit more difficult than the main path, as the road was bumpier and the tropical foliage more dense making it harder to sense the road coming ahead. Even with the notes where their timing was perfectly in sync, maneuvering the fairly sizable Yamada through here was a task that was beginning to show it’s fangs, as every small minor error was showing through, and one small error would eventually lead to the vehicle hitting a small bump wrong.
For a while, Romulo felt in sync with the vehicle’s cadence, and Emily too was riding along perfectly okay, but after a while his movements began to feel inadequate, and that driving along this path was a bit more tiresome than usual.
“Something’s wrong with the steering!” He exclaimed through the Yamada’s loud engine slowing down as he eased on his throttle inputs. Emily rolled the window down to inspect the vehicle, pulling the upper half of her body out of the window to look at the right side of the car. Romulo’s inputs seemed to match right with the steering of the front wheels. Eventually the car came to a halt to the side of the road, and now it became apparent to her that the front-right tyre was sagging more than the rear-right, and she pulled herself back in to find a Romulo whose face was tinted a slight red, and a snickering Charlotte in the backseat.
“Looks like the front tyre has lost air. Is there something wrong?” She said as she glanced at the two of them.
“N-nothing… I-I… well…” Romulo seemed unable to maintain eye contact with her, and Charlotte’s laughter couldn’t be held in much more. “Oh my god! Your bottom half was-!” The girl could barely make a distinguishable sentence through her laughter, and Emily simply stared at her confused, before putting two and two together and realizing what had just happened, and her face had flushed a very deep red.
“No way!” She covered her face in embarrasment. “S-stop lying you stupid feline! There’s no way that… m-my…”
With Charlotte’s laughter drowning out the ambient noise all around them, and the two in the front seat now feeling way too awkward with one another, it seemed Team Blazers was wasting too much time. Eventually, Watson had sat up from his sulking after he’d realized the vehicle was no longer in motion, and he looked to the rest of the team who seemed to not be doing anything.
“What the hell? What are you all doing? Why is the vehicle stopped? Aren’t we in a race?”
Everyone paused for a moment as he spoke, and they all stared at him before eventually realizing the situation they were in.
“Ah, right! The tyre’s lost air.” Romulo unbuckled his seatbelt and climbed out of the car towards the rear, and after a bit of digging through the piles of stuff in the back, he found the portable heavy-duty air compressor and quickly set things up. “P-plug this into the… h-hole… in front of the gear selector. Please.” He said to Emily as he handed over the plug, which she took and followed his instruction. The compressor fired up and with a long whirr, the tyre was now back up to pressure. Quickly, Romulo put the compressor back in its compartment and rushed to the driver’s seat, putting his seatbelt back on before continuing yet again on the journey.
The leak continued to persist, and the steering wheel only continued to heave on one side as the tyre lost pressure, but like the leak, they continued onwards at a reduced pace, rejoining the main route before the tyre once again had lost pressure and the unbalanced steering was too much for Romulo to handle. The vehicle stopped yet again off the side of the road and Romulo filled the tyre back up.
“How far are we until the next campsite?” Romulo asked as he buckled his seatbelt back in. Emily took a look at the notes and the map. “We should be close, I recon. I believe we may be less than fourty kilometres away. I’d say about half an hour at most.”
“We just reinflated that tyre about two hours ago. I guess it’ll last even if I go full speed.” He shut the door and once again they settled off, with Romulo finally giving his all into controlling the 1.2-tonne crossover with its slowly leaking tyre. He hit the throttle and sent the vehicle into first gear, a cloud of gravel rising from beneath the vehicle’s four tyres as the vehicle lept from the roadside. Romulo wrestled the vehicle straight towards the road, and Emily once again continued to dictate the pacenotes as they ventured forth. The heft on the vehicle’s right side cursed Romulo for the next hour as he wrestled the vehicle into compliance, through sharp left handers he had to wrangle the steering over and carefully balance his footwork to prevent the vehicle from understeering too much, and in right-handers he had to delicately make sure not to overcorrect by turning too far right. This special tango of driver and non-compliant vehicle continued until they finally arrived at the campsite, and to their surprise they had made it not last as they counted four vehicles.
“What an exercise that was…” Romulo sighed as he placed the vehicle to a stop. “Watson…!” He said, looking behind him. “I’ll need your assistance here.” The two left the vehicle and went towards the back, pulling out his heavy duty tyre patching kit and other tools needed to mend the vehicle. The girls meanwhile set up their tent as the boys went ahead and jacked the car up. They took the tyre off, inspecting it carefully and noticing a small gash in the all-terrain compound.
“That’s… smaller than I thought.” Romulo said as he prepared the kit. With his instructions, and Charlotte later joining in to help them, the tyre was fitted onto the vehicle almost as good as new.
“Right, that’s now out of the way. I’m beat, I’ll go for a nap I guess.” Romulo stretched his arms with a groan. “What are y’all doing?” He asked them. Charlotte looked around the campsite, the tent was already settled down and Ga’araiya was once again sleeping inside. Emily was standing nearby, with a rather thwarted look on her face, something presumably bugging her. “Not much other than the usual duties, I guess. Bathing in the river is a bit too risky, considering what happened last time.” She looked at Emily. “Guess the writer’s got nothing stirring in his mind right now.”
“Guess so, huh?”
With that rather eventful stage over, they settled off into doing what Blazers did.
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Team Mravolinski-Chitco
Team info: 2022 Shitbox Rally - Out of This World! (Results Out!) - #30 by MrdjaNikolen
Reply to last part, as always
Dyre Battle
-Do we want to go or stay here fighting?
-There are lot of other teams without much weapons or experience. Case in point are those two (points in direction).
Hmmm…where are Connor and…argh, how cant recall his name…ah, Constantin.
-Not sure how Connor might help, but he is machine like me and not exactly afraid of doing battle.
(As you prob guessed already, “two” are Tim and Valentin from RK Racing, understandably shaken by this)
-So what do we do and, if fighting, how could we know weaknesses of our opponents?
-Where tf is Pi?
Answer had revealed itself in few opponents running after our teammate, rather understandably bcos she used everything throwable she could found and started throwing stuff at them.
-I SAW OTHERS SHOOT AT THEM
(Sigh) Dogs shot their beams at werewolves, dealing with them and stepped outside along with Chicota, Pi deciding herself at course of action team should take
-Return to car.
-No, i dont wanna be useless. Could attract attention, see how others are fighting against them…
-…get hurt or killed is dark possibility.
Being eaten is also possible.
Not to mention they could decide to break away from running after you and decide to attack someone else - likely unable to fight back, rocks or otherwise
After observing their colleagues from Oil Crisis and Shift Happens, they also found their way of fighting.
Klimentol and Aydar can actually run rather fast, which was used to their advantage: ofc, Aydar is much faster of the two.
Klimentol was more dependant on this speed, knowing he could be hurt by Dyre and that they seem stronger (they are).
As for Aydar, he is likely much more durable and, unlike his older cousin, can (probably) actually rival Dyre in strength.
(Aydar can reliably lift and carry object weighing 1800 kg)
Chicota had proven to be more durable and versatile fighter than Dyre, tactically compensating for lack of outright size, mass or strength advantage.
He is equipped with two jet engines that can be used for flying. Since exhaust gases of said engines happen to be in range of 600 to 1500 degrees Celsius, they can be used as sort of weapon too, blasting very hot gases to their faces.
I would digress from what i know as member of team and would reference the part in which two Hillbilly Rollers had dealt with one of these.
There were two different attacks dealt by Janne and Andreas that had hurt and ultimately finished their Dyre and exactly neither would be effective on Chicota, implying he is tougher than these werewolfes.
Pi continued to distract werewolfes either to allow rest of team to deliver incapacitating attack or, perhaps more importantly, distract them from rest of teams.
As for this:
Then as he saw Kaylie’s arm covered in Dyre blood, he groaned. “Everyone, listen up!” he yelled. “Watch out for blood splatter. If you’re wounded by a Dyre, or you get Dyre blood in your eyes, you’re going to have a real bad week. Trust me, I’ve learned that the hard way.”
Well…dogs and Pi seem to do hard route too, considering that dogs had encountered this liquid being present and Pi was usual Pi, gathering some injuries in process.
Dyre blood getting in eyes was mostly kinda dealt with via taking a huge run and jump towards or, more precisely, into river
(Madrias might decide to note that water wouldnt fully solve the issue, but i assume this is good temporary measure)
Pi in particular was just throwing some punches with some particularly easy-going Dyre at the moment when this Jayde guy made anouncement, throwing Pi’s attention off-guard and allowing her opponent to smack her very nicely all the way to road.
After finishing her forced movement and directing some “No shit Sherlock”-type phrases at war-hardened Leone , Pi refreshed reserves of rocks and sticks to throw at and continued fight more injured than few moments before.
This fight in particular was ended via draw since, few moments after Pi regained composure and took likely her last stand in this unfair match, Anhultz had anounced its return by mix of engine noise, gearbox whine and road crunching under its tires.
Still, this was very risky thing to do, further proven by Rukari suggesting to pack up after Dione kicked some dust on its return to camp, temporarily scaring Dyres.
With this breather period arriving, we had packed ourselves in Kontir and went away.
There were glances at ones staying after us, but we knew this must be done.
They made the decision and its just left to hope that everyone will be seen at next campsite.
Oh and ye, Tangerine Tank that is Dione was one of those being behind.
We cant possibly imagine how weaker half of that team would respond to this simple fact.
-Lets just hope next campsite has some kind of water around, for ones needing to extract 50 shades of brown from their underwear.
-Chicota, shut up and drive.
-Yes Daddy. (Was hit by Klimentol) Hit me harder, Daddy (Was hit by Klimentol, rest laughed).
-Pi…
-Yes?
-You are fking idiot.
-Will take it as compliment.
-We shall see extent of your injuries when we get to next campsite.
-It seems i was very badly beaten, doesnt seem im dying tho.
(Tries to see if she can guesstimate whats hurt)
CIIXSDVNMCVVBN BNYC NMV
(Decides to abandon checking if pain receptors work, they do)
Yes, badly beaten indeed.
And indeed noone has gravely injuries, not even her.
Car is heading towards Duskriver Village.
Most of us are very tired due to lack of sleep, besides obvious effects this battle had on fighters.
With that, this part is considered finished.
Remains to see if journey to Duskwater would atleast be smooth and without troubles.
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Team Slow
Chapter 2, Part 4: Oh no, the undead! THEY’RE REAL!, oh wait its werewolves not zombies!
Meanwhile at the Addagarda Camp
We finally arrive with the XL53, and then John’s dumbass runs over one of the wolves. WE ARE IN BIG TROUBLE NOW, as the horde of wolves start coming towards us, and we try to find one of the earth weapons we brought, which to our suprise was a shovel, and a rake. And a tomahawk, How did he get a tomahawk, who knows. But they start howling aggressively.
As Matt gets out of the car and goes on the roof to try fight off the hordes of wolves going after us with a shovel, They start aggressively going after us “FUCK THE WOLVES”, Matt aggressively replies, and shoves the XL53 into gear and tries to drive, but the hordes have bitten the tires. The spare tire is the only good tire… “Damnit” John exclaims, as he goes out of his way to throw a bone the other way to the wolves, Shut up and drive. NOW! Matt says to John and he floors it with the bursted tires.
John: So uh, now we’re screwed, Matt, find something and knock them out
Matt: OK
They go find the shovel to whack the wild wolves, but the head of the shovel breaks
John: God damni- as his shovel head breaks off the shovel, leaving them with a STICK. A STICK.
Matt: Where’s the uh, the tomahawk
John: WAKE UP YOU IDIOT, THERE IS NO TOMAHAWK, YOU GOT AN AXE BUT NO TOMAHAWK!
Matt: Oh.
John: i thought so.
We start to leg it with the car driving away from the mad werewolves chasing us with with bad handling after the tires popped from them biting it, Matt’s brick of a phone breaks into bits after throwing it at the werewolf, the phone did not harm the werewolves, it’s a phone
John: Why did you throw your phone? It’d do NOTHING
Matt: I have two phones, remember?
John: Other than that! THEY ARE GO- THE TIRES DISINTEGRATED!!!
Matt: Shit.
John: Also buy a gun, you’d need it. There’s a shop near this camp with one, but they’re black powder rounds. This feels like the wild west after all.
The car struggles with getting traction and speed after the tires came off the car from them being disintegrated and dry rotted
Matt: Oh no, we’re losing the car’s speed, we arent even on tires no more, we’re on bare metal
John: We can source another set of rims
Matt: So yeah, in translation. We’re fucked.
TO BE CONTINUED.
(OOC: if anyone has tires, hit me up. Preferably all-terrains.)
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(OOC: Jayde has magic. He can fix your destroyed tires, you just have to ask him.)
Nice, Right now our team does not know that, btu they will eventually
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"Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.
With consultation and some writing from @Executive
20/7/3251 /// 6 Sun LJT
Dense, thick heat oozed in through a gaping crevasse in the sky, drenching everything that the sunlight touched with a golden afternoon flame. Tanuki was sprawled out over the hood of the Dauer, which sat in the shade beside the river. Her forehead, neck, back, and cleavage all showed telltale signs of perspiration, evidenced by a moist layer that gave her lightly tanned skin a dull sheen. The sweltering humidity drenched her entire body and made her black crop top t-shirt stick to her back, but at the very least the cool breeze wafting over the waterfront helped fight the smothering heat. It was the brief pause in moments of tranquility like this where Tanuki could truly relax, even if it was interspersed between periods of chaos or even if it was almost 100 degrees Fahrenheit.
She sat up and peeked over. Mel was sitting on a tree stump and gutting two exotic-looking birds on a wooden chopping block. “Haaaaaaah?” she raised an eyebrow and groaned, watching Mel pick out the steel 00 buckshot pellets out of the meat with a knife. “That’s all the meat? We were hunting for almost two hours and that’s all we got?!”
“Well, yeah, it doesn’t exactly look like there’s going to be a farm nearby, isn’t there?” Mel shot a glance at Tanuki and shrugged. “These are all wild birds, the meat’s going to be really damn lean.” She dug the tip of her knife into a clump of bird breast as a pellet landed with a clatter into a tin bowl full of bloodstained buckshot. “Besides, there isn’t going to be much left of wild game this small if you shoot them with a bloody 12 gauge!”
Tanuki fell back on the hood and clenched her teeth as her stomach grumbled loudly. Drops of sweat slithered down the sides of her forehead like rain collecting on a rounded surface. Not too far away, Mel spotted the faint two-box profile of a white hatchback. Its shape was strangely familiar to her, and she struggled to recall where she had seen such a car before. After some moments of traipsing through many years of memories, she finally remembered, and her face lit up with a nostalgic smile.
“Wow, a Carica! I got my provisional license in one of those!” Mel exclaimed and looked at Tanuki, who still remained still on the hood of the Dauer save for her chest that rose and fell with each breath. “This is our chance to collaborate with other teams! I’m gonna go take a gander, you coming?”
“In this condition? Hell no!” Tanuki panted, resting the back of her hands on her forehead. “Can’t you see I’m dying? I’ll catch up later!”
As Tanuki lay on the Dauer’s hood, languidly reaching for the water bottle beside her, Mel casually made her way over to the white hatchback, where three young men were setting up camp for the rest of the day. She heard a familiar accent she hadn’t heard in many months, but upon getting closer and hearing their voices a little more clearly, she realized her original assessment was wrong. Very wrong. These weren’t fellow Australians, no. Before she could say hi, the crunching of dried leaves underfoot alerted them to her presence, and they all looked at her.
“Oh, look, another human being,” one of the men spoke.
“…pardon?” Mel tilted her head and raised an eyebrow, perplexed at the odd greeting.
“You saw them, right? Catgirls? Bipedal Cerberus sans one head? Centaurs? How about Mr. Roboto over there?” He pointed all around him towards the other teams in a frenzy. “Look, I’m just glad to see another… person!”
“Person…” Mel muttered, then smiled. “Pleasure to meet you. My name’s-”
“Oi lassie, where you from?” a second man asked. He wore a black t-shirt with ‘HAKARU GB’ printed on the left breast with a logo behind it. “No, don’t tell me… ok, riddle me this. Man U or Chelsea?”
“Man U…?” Mel crossed her arms, her smile turning into an expression of confusion.
“Haha, I knew it! A true connoisseur of football! It takes one to know one!”
“No, you nitwit! Can’t you tell a Kiwi when you hear one? And have you ever seen another Brit this tan before? Knobhead!”
“A Kiwi???” Mel’s eyes darted back and forth between the two quarreling men, their attention gradually shifting away from her until they were both completely fixated on each other. It was as if she wasn’t even there.
“Absolutely not, you muppets! Is this how you greet someone? Where are your manners?” chastised the third man, angrily pointing at his teammates as they quickly shut up. “My apologies,” he said to Mel who was almost about to leave, his voice remorseful. “They can get a bit… excited at times. The name’s Andy. I’m the team captain of Team Gearknobs. And you are?”
“Melanie, but you can just call me Mel! It’s a pleasure to meet you,” she smiled as she shook Andy’s hand.
“I’m Ed,” said the man in the Hakaru shirt as he walked over to Mel and exchanged a single firm handshake. “Mel, right? So, where are you from?”
“I take it you’ve never met someone from down under before?”
“Ahhhh, an Aussie, eh? Wait. Let me guess… Brisbane!”
“Really!” Mel covered her mouth and giggled, almost laughing. “Do I look like an uptown girl to you? I’m actually from Adelaide!”
“Damn, that was my second guess!”
“Jay,” simply said the first man, shaking Mel’s hand gently. “Delighted to meet you, Mel. I’m our team’s navigator and resident mechanic.”
“So you’re the gearhead team, I presume? And this is your car? A Carica, right?” Mel asked, even though she knew the answer.
“An ‘06 Carica SE 4WD,” Jay nodded, gently slapping the roof of the white hatchback as if it was a tired, old friend. “It may not be the fastest car out there, but you know how Hakarus are. Absolutely bulletproof, and with 4WD it gets the job done!”
“Yeah, bloody oath,” Mel remarked, crossing her arms. “These little shitboxes are like cockroaches. I still see them everywhere in Adelaide where people will abuse the hell out of them, and they’ll still run!” Mel bent down and looked inside, in awe at the pristine cloth upholstery and the spotless plastic furnishings. “Looks super fresh for a nearly 16 year old car… wait, 4WD and right hand drive? Only the Japanese Caricas had 4WD… and doesn’t the US have an import restriction on cars newer than 25 years?”
“Well… er…” Andy chuckled nervously.
“-it’s a long story,” Ed dismissed, waving it off. Something wasn’t quite right, but Mel decided to take their word for it. “What’s your team running anyways?”
“That thing.” Mel pointed behind her with a thumb, and the three men looked over her shoulder at the flamboyantly-colored Dauer 632 S. Andy’s eyes sparkled, Jay put his hands on his hips and simply nodded in admiration. Ed however was nothing short of flabbergasted, staring in awe with his mouth wide open.
“Bloody hell! Dauer, eh? I thought this was a shitbox rally, not Paris to Dakar!” He scoffed. “Is that even legal?”
“Better believe it. Tanuki- er… I checked the regs, and it’s completely legal. Trust me, you have no clue how much work I’ve poured into that shitbox just to get it to go around the block on its own power!”
“They have quite a bit of power, don’t they? Over 230 horsepower when new?” Jay squinted and studied the rally coupe from afar like a hunter stalking big game in the savanna. “And lightweight, too, almost as much as our car. It’s a far cry from the humble Carica.”
“You sure you can handle that much power?” Ed smirked.
“I’ve autocrossed in cars with almost twice as much power, of course!” Mel pouted and put her hands on her hips. How dare he doubt her competency in handling high-power rear-driven cars, especially given the fact she owned another one with twice as much power! “It’s my first time racing the Dauer, but it’s nothing I can’t handle!”
“I’ve done a bit of autocross myself,” Jay said. “And Andy here is a two time winner of the Hakaru Open Cup.” Indeed, no matter how much power the Dauer had over other cars, even if it was twice as much, actual drivers’ skill would not only be the deciding factor but the supreme court, the final judge before which one’s mettle would be pushed to the limits. While Mel certainly did have some racing experience in autocross, it was more oriented towards casual enthusiasts, lacking a certain official capacity that Andy’s experience wasn’t in any shortage of.
“So Mel, what brings you here in the first place?” Andy asked.
“Well, I think you’ll all agree with me that none of our cars are perfect,” Mel said. A hard to swallow fact for some, but a fact nonetheless that they would have to gradually accept. “The Dauer’s just about the fastest thing on the grid here but it’s only two wheel drive. The Hakaru is versatile, reliable, and has four wheel drive, but I’ve driven them before and they’re just mind-numbingly slow, almost dangerously so!”
“I think I see what you’re getting at,” Andy nodded slowly as his mind put two and two together.
“Can’t you see? We’re perfect foils to each other! My team has the speed, your team has the off-road chops; that’s why I think we could make a great team. We need to form an alliance if we want a real shot at winning this… or even just staying alive. Remember those huge cats, not the event organizers, but the absolutely massive ones in the forest from the first stage? Who knows what else we’ll encounter along the way!”
Quite a proposition, to say the least; their cars were almost as far removed from each other as two cars could possibly be. There isn’t much synergy between a high-strung RWD sports car from an upscale German brand with a stunning repertoire in racing and a frugal 4WD hatchback from a humble Japanese automaker with as much international recognition as the latter. However, where one car failed to perform, the other would excel. Together, perhaps their differences could be compensated by each other.
“Okay, so why should we help you? What’s in it for us?” Jay asked.
“I thought you’d never ask!” Tanuki cackled, appearing out of nowhere besides a very surprised Mel. It seemed as if moments ago she was completely immobilized and suffering from heatstroke, yet now here she was, vivacious as ever. She brandished Mel’s L1A1, presenting it to the trio of bewildered Brits. “Give to the Black Rabbit and it’ll give back; our tools and spoils of war can be yours!”
“Hey! That’s mine!” Mel snapped, snatching it out of Tanuki’s hands. She pulled the charging handle back and looked inside the action. Much to her relief, it was clear, but the sudden presence of Tanuki and the rifle itself still put her on edge.
“Who’s this sassy… lost child?” Andy asked, looking down at the much shorter Tanuki.
“Hey! That’s the CEO of Black Rabbit Limited, Nakajima Tanuki you’re speaking to! Captain of Team Black Rabbit Corporation! Meru-chan here is my lovely capti- escort and driver!” Tanuki and Andy stared each other down in silence for a handful of seconds that seemed like long, excruciating hours, a visible tension of daggers being exchanged between their glares.
“So you’re Mel’s teammate. What’s the mask and sunshades for?”
“For privacy, of course!”
“Oh, yeah?” Andy pried deeper, unknowingly making lighthearted small talk with a war criminal. With Tanuki. “If I took that mask off, what would happen?”
“It would be extremely painful… for you,” she answered with a sinister grin, hidden from sight. Previously under the impression that they were just bantering, Andy’s smirk was gone and he was left speechless at her disturbing bluntness.
“Let’s not get our knickers up in a knot, yeah?” Ed stepped in between the two of them, trying to defuse the situation. It worked: Tanuki’s shoulders relaxed and rolled down as the two of them stepped back.
“Alright, alright, let’s not… ugh,” Mel groaned. “Okay, how about this? We’ll support each other! You pull us out if we ever get bogged down in mud or whatever, and we’ll let you borrow our equipment if you need it. Guns, cooking equipment, you name it.”
“Sounds like a fair deal to me,” Andy nodded. “It wouldn’t hurt to help a fellow team out.” Jay and Ed seemed to be in agreement, but the latter was clearly much more enthused about the possibilities this alliance could bring.
“I don’t know about you two, but I’ve been itching to shoot an actual long gun for years! Not an airsoft, but the real deal!”
Team Black Rabbit amiably parted ways with Team Gearknobs for now, just narrowly avoiding hands from being thrown and bullets from flying. Now it was up for both teams to uphold their ends of the deal.
4 Likes
Shitbox Rally
Stage 3: Addagarda to Duskriver Village
Stage Start: A little after 5 Moon, 20/7/3251, Addagarda Campsite
Weather at Stage Start: Hot, humid, cloudy, a horrifically dark night made worse by fog.
Weather at mid-stage: Hot, humid, and very cloudy, though the fog starts to lighten.
Weather at Stage End (First Car): Hot, humid, and still quite cloudy, though the fog begins to pass.
Weather at Stage End (Last Car): Hot, humid, though the moons can be seen as the clouds begin to lighten.
Stage End (First Car): A little after 7-and-40 Moon, 20/7/3251, Duskriver Village Campsite
Stage End (Last Car): 9-and-40 Moon, 20/7/3251, Duskriver Village Campsite
With hearts still pounding from the Dyre ambush in the camp, a lack of meaningful sleep, and orders to drive as if your lives depended on it, the Addagarda campsite was quickly abandoned. The heavy gravel soon gave way to patches of gravel mixed with dirt, and the road following the river became more of a rough trail. The treeline to your right carries a new level of terror every time you think you see amber eyes in it, and occasional howls remind everyone of the pitched battle in the camp. The night air is heavy with both fog and tension so thick you could carve it with a knife, and it’s very hard to see, even with your high-beams on. It’s not much better with off-road lights, as the fog kicks a lot of that light back into your face, making it harder to see. When everyone arrives, alive and in one piece, in Duskriver Village, everyone is glad that this time, the camp is further from the forest, instead being very close to the village. Several of the guards there show little fear when it’s mentioned that we’ve faced a whole pack of Dyre, and a few even mention that they’ve battled the wolves a time or two.
Notes: Randomization is active. Breakdowns are active. Time is in Earth Time.
New: This camp will still only last one IRL week, but will cover the rest of 20/7/3251, the morning of 21/7/3251, and the night of 21/7/3251. Stage 4 will be 22/7/3251 at 1 Sun.
Team Shift Happens
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 04:00:59
Average MPH: 44.2
Randomizer: 11
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 0
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
Slow and steady wins the race, or so the saying goes. Malavera, despite his back still stinging from the spray of gravel and his heart still pounding from the attack, guides the Bricksley safely along the trail.
Team Wayfarers
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 04:39:23
Average MPH: 38.1
Randomizer: 9
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 1 (Powertrain)
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
Not wanting to stop with all of the Dyre around, Jill and Jack Willow-Wright push onward to the camp, despite Chernobog misfiring on occasion and being a little down on power.
Team Gearknobs
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 06:35:37
Average MPH: 26.9
Randomizer: 7
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 2 (Chassis)
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
Something’s not happy in the Carica. After losing their brakes partway into the stage, the team accepts a tow from the mysterious-and-silent Team Mrezhari, who get them close, but after their tow-rope came loose, Team Gearknobs have to drive their own car into the camp.
Team Fallen Angels of the Past
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 05:51:23
Average MPH: 30.3
Randomizer: 9
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 2 (Chassis)
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
The Claussient was fast until bad luck broke both headlights and forced them to slow way down. The broken bulbs were fixed in the camp, but driving in the dark was not fun.
Team Slow
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 04:27:27
Average MPH: 39.8
Randomizer: 11
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 0
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
Who knew luxury cars could appreciate dirt so much? The Schnell XL53 powers through the gravel-filled dirt with relative ease.
Team Oil Crisis
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 06:08:50
Average MPH: 28.9
Randomizer: 7
Refueling Stops: 1
Breakdown: 4 (Team Caused)
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
It was all going great until someone hit another Dyre. A hasty field-repair of the broken radiator and slamming the hood shut gets the Union Magistrate into the camp, where more extensive repairs can take place.
Team Hillbilly Rollers
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 04:06:24
Average MPH: 43.2
Randomizer: 10
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 0
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
Despite being tired, scared, and/or not quite drunk enough for this shit, team Hillbilly Rollers gets their IP Freeway Star through the gravel and the dirt in one piece.
Team Witchlight
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 04:09:50
Average MPH: 42.7
Randomizer: 13
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 0
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
Elist decided they are not getting eaten by werewolves tonight, and put their foot down. Ambay is slightly disappointed that he didn’t get a chance to take a trophy. The EAAC Aphrodite is now covered in dirt, of course, but that’s better than many of the possible alternatives.
Team Mravolinski-Chitco
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 04:16:29
Average MPH: 41.5
Randomizer: 11
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 0
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
When in doubt, floor it! Clearly that plan worked, because the Kontir Cunningham makes it cleanly this time. Maybe the dirt is better for the truck?
Team Blazers
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 04:49:12
Average MPH: 36.8
Randomizer: 8
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 3 (Tires)
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
The Yamada was very fast in the dirt, and likely would have been even faster if someone hadn’t run over the hand of a dead Dyre in the road. The claws ripped a gouge out of the sidewall, forcing the team to put their spare tire on.
Team Machinas Con Passiones
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 04:55:37
Average MPH: 36.0
Randomizer: 10
Refueling Stops: 2
Breakdown: 0
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
Everyone thought they were going fast. That changed after they passed the Yamada while team Blazers were changing a tire, only to then be passed by the Yamada after the tire change.
Team Quick Rally 47
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 04:54:12
Average MPH: 36.2
Randomizer: 7
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 4 (Team Caused)
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
Good news: The Quantum Xenoanthropology department will be very happy to have samples from the Dyre wolf you hit. Bad news: The radiator on the Mara Kanyon really didn’t appreciate the impact with 600 pounds of werewolf. At least studying the wildlife of Crugandr is part of the mission.
Team Mrezhari
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 06:30:29
Average MPH: 27.3
Randomizer: 7
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 4 (Team Caused)
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
Despite being mysterious, Team Mrezhari weren’t willing to leave another team to the wolves. After crudely tying a rope around the Carica’s tow hook and the other end to the Dunav’s tow hook, they pulled Team Gearknobs to within five minutes of the camp before the knots in the rope gave way.
Team Jockey
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 03:42:03
Average MPH: 48.0
Randomizer: 13
Refueling Stops: 1
Breakdown: 0
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
Fear can be a great motivator. Four people in a tiny sardine can of a car, driving hard through the night on little sleep, dodging real live werewolves and hoping like hell they could find a safe place to rest managed to set the fastest time today.
Team RK Series Racing
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 05:16:06
Average MPH: 33.7
Randomizer: 10
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 0
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
After the chaos of defending the camp, it’s not a surprise that team RK Series Racing took things a bit easy on the Dione here. After all, they got to see the aftermath of speeding down the roads once they got settled into the new campsite and got to watch three teams repairing radiator damage courtesy of a high-speed impact with a Dyre.
Team Black Rabbit
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 05:18:23
Average MPH: 33.5
Randomizer: 11
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 0
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
Trying to drive fast while someone else keeps trying to shoot at the Dyre in the nearby forest isn’t easy. Luckily, the Dione of Team RK Series Racing makes following the road easy. “Just follow the Tangerine Tank.”
(Author’s note: I hope that this is in character for Tanuki. If not, feel free to ignore it and run with your own plan.)
Team Spy Kids
Distance Traveled: 177.6
Time (HH:MM:SS): 05:24:11
Average MPH: 32.9
Randomizer: 7
Refueling Stops: 0
Breakdown: 4 (Team Caused)
Total Distance Traveled: 888.0
Like many others having similar bad luck, the AST Elbrus encounters a Dyre at high speed, resulting in a broken radiator. Fortunately, you do have a spare. Unfortunately, no one wants to put it in on the side of the road (which, considering what you hit, isn’t a bad thing), so team Spy Kids limps their Soviet SUV into the camp. There, they join a couple other teams in doing the same thing: replacing a busted radiator.
Stage Finishing Order:
Team Jockey
Team Shift Happens
Team Hillbilly Rollers
Team Witchlight
Team Mravolinski-Chitco
Team Slow
Team Wayfarers
Team Blazers
Team Quick Rally 47
Team Machinas Con Passiones
Team RK Series Racing
Team Black Rabbit
Team Spy Kids
Team Fallen Angels of the Past
Team Oil Crisis
Team Mrezhari
Team Gearknobs
Team Shift Happens
Previous Chapters:
Over the Hill and Through the Woods - Stage 1
May the Moons have Mercy on Them - Stage 1 Campsite
Helpful Friends are Helpful - Stage 1 Campsite
Tune-ups and Tech Talks - Stage 1 Campsite
Having Mercy on a Missing Teammate - Stage 1 Campsite / The Missing Teammate - Written by TheYugo45GV and Madrias
Sleep? What is that? - Stage 1 Campsite
A Rude Awakening - Stage 1 Campsite
Another One Bites The Dust - Stage 2 Run / Stage 2 Campsite
Repairs / A Good Meal - Stage 2 Campsite / The Green Crystal (Written by TheYugo45GV and Madrias)
A Good Night’s Sleep? - Stage 2 Campsite
“Here Comes the Hound of Death” - Stage 2 Campsite Battle - Written by Elizipeazie, TheYugo45GV, and Madrias.
(Again, a huge thank you to @TheYugo45GV and @Elizipeazie for working with me on the battle, and for keeping it secret until we were ready to release it. Sorry if you wanted to participate but didn’t get a chance. I worked with a couple of people who had picked up on a hint in the Discord and asked me directly what we were going to be attacked by. They wanted in, and together, we worked for the better part of a week to get things right so the three of us could make an exciting moment for the Shitbox Rally. Anyway, now onto the story!)
Addagarda Campsite, immediately after the attack / On the Road
Kayden looked over at Kivenaal and Rukari, both of them still breathing heavy and looking around as if they might be attacked at any moment. “Mal, I hope like hell you can drive stick, because those two aren’t getting behind the wheel in this condition.”
Malavera nodded. “Might be some of the roughest gear-shifts this side of the galaxy, but I can drive.” He got into the driver’s seat and cranked over the engine while Kayden slid himself into the middle of the front bench and Rukari took the last seat up front. Kivenaal and Jayde got into the rear bench, only for Jayde to get right back out, pick up Kaylie, and put her in her usual spot.
Kayden reached for the CB handle and clicked it on, then said, “We’re going to go first. If these beasts have blocked the road, we’ll break the road-block.” He reached back to hang the microphone back up just as Malavera jammed the truck into first and floored it.
“Where the hell are my offroad lights?” Malavera said. Kayden reached up and slapped the switches, flooding the world ahead of them with the full intensity of their homemade roof-light-bar and the offroad lamps in the ram bar. Malavera cranked over the Bricksley’s engine, the 427ci V8 roaring to life moments before he grabbed the selector for their transfer case, rammed it home into 4-High, stomped the clutch into the floor mat, slammed the gear stick into first, and floored the gas pedal. As the revs rose rapidly, Malavera slipped his foot off of the clutch, two wheels kicking up dirt. With a snarl, he clicked the switches on the dash and the spinning tires stopped as the differentials locked up solid.
Kaylie was crying, her left arm a blood-streaked mess that she held up loosely to not stain her clothes or the truck. Jayde sat next to her, using a spare cloth to wipe away the blood and revealing the shining chrome beneath. Twice, Kaylie tried to pull away from him, and both times, Jayde had pulled her back to him. “I’m a monster,” Kaylie said.
“No, you are not,” Jayde replied.
“I killed those two wolves without-”
“We all killed tonight, Kaylie, but that doesn’t make any of us monsters,” Jayde said, cutting her off. “You fought because the alternative was to die.”
“I didn’t mean to kill either of them. Twin Suns, Jayde, this arm was built for war, and I used it without thinking. What if I were to do that to you, or to Kayden, or worse, if I did that to someone like Valentin?”
“You wouldn’t,” Jayde said. “It’s just not your way. You bluster and threaten, but you aren’t violent. I do not fear you, nor do I fear your arm,” he mentioned, cleaning the last of the blood off of Kaylie. He placed the blood soaked cloth into a plastic bag, then dropped it into his bag of holding before turning back to Kaylie and grasping her arm in his. “This arm is a gift. How many others would have died either time because they didn’t have the strength?”
Malavera swore in his native language as the Bricksley hit some rough rutted dirt, the whole truck shuddering and clattering, the mess in the bed clanking, clattering, tinkling, and rattling as tent poles, shell casings, spare parts, loose arrows, and weapons were shaken around.
Kayden spoke up, “Kaylie, it’s okay. When we gave you that arm, we told you it was strong and you’d have to adapt to it. This is the first time you’ve ever had to fight, and you survived. That is what matters. Project Nemean saved your life.”
Kaylie stared at the long scratch down her chrome forearm, the end result of her second Dyre kill. The only one of the group to literally take one out with nothing but their hands. “I’m scared, Jayde,” she said, looking at him. “I’m worried that one of these days, I’m going to hurt one of my friends because I don’t know what I’m capable of.”
“Then we work on that,” Jayde replied. He, too, noticed the scratch, and he placed his hand over it. When he removed his hand, the scratch was still there, but now highlighted in beautiful, vibrant gold. “Wear that scar with pride, Kaylie,” he said. “You did what no one wants to have to do, you went toe to toe with a Dyre and fought them in their own favored way.”
Kaylie stared at the much-more-visible mark on her arm and sighed. “Do I have to?” she asked.
Jayde looked at her, then said to her, “If you insist, I can repair that without a trace. It’ll get rid of the physical scar, but you’ll still have the mental one from this day.”
Kaylie shook her head. “Then I’ll keep it,” she said.
Malavera gave a grunt as he drove through a nasty rut in the road, everyone getting shaken around a little, mere moments before the Yinzer bolted past.
“We’ve just been passed by a yellow sardine can,” Kivenaal quipped.
“No shit, Sherlock,” Malavera grumbled. “Likely they’re worried that their shoebox could be a Dyre’s lunchbox.”
Kaylie, despite her mood, gave a short laugh.
Duskriver Village Campsite, A little before 2-and-60 Moon
The Bricksley roared into what would become their campsite, a cloud of dirt hanging in the air as the brakes screeched. Soon, the members of Team Shift Happens had their tents out of the bed, staked down, and were then sorting through what they had in the bed to put most of it all back away. That is, all except for two members, who had disappeared into a tent under a mysterious purple sound-blocking bubble.
“So, where’s Kaylie?” Malavera asked.
“In the tent with Jayde,” Kayden replied.
“After a battle,” Rukari said, “sometimes one needs to be reminded that they are still alive.”
Kivenaal sighed. “Well, this shit won’t sort itself,” he grumbled.
A little after 9-and-40 Moon, Duskriver Village Campsite
Sure enough, as Team Gearknobs rolled into the camp and yanked the parking brake to stop, Kaylie staggered her way out of the tent with Jayde not far behind, with Kaylie wearing her tank-top and leather pants, and Jayde wearing a light, thin pair of linen shorts and a light brown shirt. Kaylie wandered over to a tree stump and sat down, a smile on her face, while Jayde simply wandered over to the truck to look at the assortment of random junk they’d collected after the fight. There were arrows of various lengths and compositions, hundreds of shell-casings, shotgun shells, loose bits of unfired ammunition, Kivenaal’s shotgun and MP5-K’s, as well as Malavera’s railgun. Likewise, some of the team’s spare supplies had spilled into the truck bed, including a spare barrel assembly for a plasma pistol, several nuclear batteries, a badly-bent titanium armor panel, a box of overturned electronics bits, a huge chunk of copper, and a bunch of loose bolts. Also, there were springs and shock absorbers for the Bricksley, a carburetor rebuild kit, an empty propane torch bottle and the torch head to go with it, a couple of empty purple glass bottles, a plastic jug of kilju, a spilled tool kit, and several spare light-bulbs.
Deciding that the bed cleanup could wait until after they got some rest, Jayde settled next to Kaylie, pulling her close.
“So, how long are we going to be in this camp?” Kaylie asked.
“The rest of this day, the night, and we leave in the morning as usual,” Rukari replied, having overheard Kaylie.
“Biggest thing is, will we be safe here?” Kayden inquired.
Jayde answered, “We’re still in Dyre territory, but the far edges of it. We were outside a den last time. While there might be some stray wolves out this far, they probably aren’t of the same pack we encountered. Even still, I’ll go on patrol tomorrow night to make sure no one starts another fight.”
“How do you plan to do that? I mean, don’t get me wrong, the magic is impressive,” Kivenaal said, “but those fuckers are tough.”
“This isn’t my only form,” Jayde said.
Kaylie smiled. “He was Dyre-bitten,” she added, placing a hand on Jayde’s right shoulder, making sure not to squeeze or irritate the old scar. “So he has the form if he needs it.”
“Wait, he gets to become an 11 foot tall lion?” Malavera asked.
“He is not the only one with that form,” Rukari said. “I can do it too. Wasn’t Dyre-bitten, but it carries in blood and through birth. My father was Dyre-bitten, so I, too, have the Wyld form. I hate using it, though.”
“Why?” Kivenaal asked.
“Getting into that form is painful,” Jayde replied. “Getting back out of it is also painful. Also, some people get really scared if they see someone in that size because, well, it’s hard to tell a Dyre or a Wyld-form shifter apart until you’re so close to them that the Dyre could rip your throat out.”
“So, we’re safe here, right?” Kaylie asked. “Really safe and not ‘Oh, sure, we’re safe’ and then we have to run again?”
Jayde sighed and closed his eyes, reaching out and feeling where everyone was by seeing their energy, then opened his eyes, pointed into the forest, and said, “I felt three Dyre in there, the closest is maybe 500 of my strides from the edge of the forest. They looked to be hunting as a pack, tracking a deer running away from us. They are not aware of us.”
Kaylie nodded. “I guess that’s about as safe as we can hope for, then.”
4 Likes
For the teams with broken radiators, hook me up if you want repairs at the campsite.
1 Like
RK Series Racing; Stage 3 Drive
Most teams have already set off at this point in time, with only Team Oil Crisis and Rk Series Racing remaining on the battlefield. Somehow, nobody within the team was injured or damaged by the Dyre or other cars wildly speeding off. The Dyre had been scattered, which presented prime opportunity to book it out of this campsite.
Tim was currently sat in the driver’s seat, his head resting on the rim of the steering wheel in defeat. Connor quickly approached the driver door, opening it to take a peek inside.
“You managed to temporarily scare the enemies away from here. Please move over.”, Connor orders, having no difficulty in telling how shaken up Tim was.
After quite the time of mental processing of what actually happened, he obliges, freeing up the Cockpit for Connor to take seat.
Meanwhile, Constantin took the opportunity to “pack up”, which meant collecting what belongs to him and temporarily plonking it down behind the car to load his belongings into the trunk. He opens the hatch and swings it open, but as soon as he lets go and turns around, the trunk lid slams shut due to the failed gas struts. Because of this, the rear glass splinters, but manages to stay within it’s housing.
This doesn’t last long, as Constantin already has grabbed his stuff, launching it through the now-closed rear window, showering most of the cargo area in millions of “Detroit Diamonds”.
Still in the heat of the moment, he ignores the damage done and takes seat in the Brick, which then is driven over to collect Valentin.
Speaking of whom, Valentin was still sat in the middle of the now-empty camo, crying his lungs out in fear. The Tangerine-colored Liftback rolls up directly next to him and Constantin pushes the near-side rear door open, almost smashing it into Valentin by accident.
“GET IN THE CAR!”, Constantin blares from the other end of the bench, netting nothing more than a frightened-to-shit look from Valentin on the dirt floor.
“I said GET IN!!”, he repeats, now reaching over and grabbing the first thing of him that comes within reach. Unsurprisingly, that something ends up being a substantial amount of hair as well as his loosely-fit collar. With absolutely zero regards for potential pain inflicted, he yanks the bundle into the car, prompting Valentin to follow suit immediately after. The pull was strong, resulting in Valentin being stretched across the bench, both legs still dangling out the door, with his head mere inches away from the opposite door.
At this point, Connor gives the engine it’s all, the inertia slamming the rear-right door shut. Well… “shut”, as it wedges Valentin’s shins inbetween the window sill and door frame.
It takes a while of repeated shinning, shouting and being flung about before Valentin sort-of comes back to mind and goes about the process of righting himself, still very much mentally scarred from what took place earlier.
Constantin, meanwhile, managed to put 2 and 2 together:
“Could you have like… NOT DITCHED US ALL!?”, he shouts at Tim, even though he scattered the enemy by accident. “I don’t fucking know what to do when an entire pack of whatever-the-everliving-fuck those were attacks literally everyone!”, Tim counters, flailing his arms manically in the process. “At least i somehow scattered them!”
“By running off and leaving comrades behind… good going, lad!”, Constantin blared back, motioning to the still sobbing Valentin, now upright in the rear-right.
“Staying and doing jackshit doesn’t help, but uncoordinated retreat is a recipe for injury!”, he adds, promting Valentin to look up and at him as he was directly referenced.
“You can’t tell me that the navy is worse than this bullshit here… Half the grid on our end is some form of god-knows-what and the Taliban aren’t a mass of Grizzly-Sized wolfes…”, Valentin scoffs, quietly, while also wiping off some eye-sweat away.
This catches Constantin mildly off-guard and, truth be told, he doesn’t really have a way of countering that.
“Just stop lying about worse shit existing… I’d rather be taken hostage by Al-Quaeda than repeat this.”, Valentin adds, complete with finger quotes to round it off.
“Makes you sound like an ego-centric asshole…”
The car mostly turns silent at this point, lingering resentment between the human team members being palpable.
Valentin wasn’t a fan of being left to be turned into minced meat by Tim and Constantin’s exaggeration breaking the inherent trust that comes with military rank.
Constantin felt under-appreciated, given that he actually scored more kills than Connor. Although Valentin did have a point about the unnecessary lie about what being a soldier was like.
Tim just is trying to swallow the fact that he did run off, even if it was a short-circuit move in the heat of the battle.
The rest of the drive was spent in silence, with the Tangerine Tank passing a few broken-down cars which either already have gotten roadside assistance or obviously didn’t need any. On the other hand, they started to form a sizeable train of cars apparently using it as a beacon of sorts, which was rather ironic, given 70s-era headlights and no added illumination.
to be continued
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TEAM HILLBILLY ROLLERS
Earlier parts
PART 0.1 - A prologue to the prologue
PART 0.2 - Another piece of the prologue puzzle
PART 0.3 - Viva la IP 4Z!
PART 0.4 - Robotman
PART 0.5 - Interference problems
PART 0.6 - Can I play Tetris?
PART 0.7 - Tangerine and familiar
PART 1.0 - Now things got serious!
PART 1.1 - Hello, Thibault and friends!
PART 1.2 - Poor kitty
PART 1.3 - Curse you, Team Oil Crisis!
PART 1.4 - Interlude
PART 2.0 - Bird bird bird, bird is the word!
PART 2.1 - D. Head
PART 2.2 - Good night!
PART 3.0 - Freeway Rockstar
PART 3.1 - DISCO TJO DISCO HEJ
PART 3.2 - Van-Werewolf 1-0
PART 4.0 - Calm after the storm
After having loaded their tent as quickly as they only could, the pink van was following the Bricksley close to the new campground, where our friends, still a little bit in doubt, put up the tent again. They were all sleeping relatively light, however. None of them was really sure that there would not be more werewolf attacks, but all of them woke up the morning after, so probably not. Although all of them had major headaches, Marie’s was probably somewhat alcohol related while Janne and Andreas only had headbutted the centre divider wall in the van a couple too many times.
MARIE: Oh god… I think I was drinking way too much yesterday. The shit I remember can’t have happened for real…
Janne pointed at the bump on his forehead and the dried blood under his nose.
MARIE: …oh…
ANDREAS: Seriously! What the fuck did happen?
JANNE: Well, it seems like we have upset parts of the local fauna…a lot.
ANDREAS: Who had the fucking idea to set up the camp there?
JANNE: CALM DOWN! It’s enough that we have had Marie involved in fights already, you don’t have to start one too.
The team inspected the van, which was quite a sad sight now. A good thing: the LED lightbars were still intact. But it really didn’t leave the battle without scars. The windshield was cracked, though not so it hampered visibility…yet. The bull bar was bent. The pink paint had numerous scratches and blood stains (not that it really suffered from an aesthetical standpoint, but still). The right corner was missing from the plastic front bumper, exposing the crash beam. Though, after a quick inspection, Janne’s conclusion was that the mechanics were fully intact. After duct taping the steering wheel centre pad together again and ripping out the SRS light, and washing away some of the blood and dirt for better visibility, the van was good to go. With the stereo cranked up with some quality tunes…
…the van sprinted away through the fog.
Actually, it was more than just a sprinter, it was more or less a marathon runner through the third course. The high seating position meant that they had a better visibility through the fog than most of the teams, and as Janne said, “the roads are rough, but on the other hand, look at South east Asia. Freeway Stars are everywhere and despite taking lots of beating they are like cockroaches!”. So Andreas had no second thoughts about flooring it. After a while, both the other team members were asleep.
MARIE: ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
JANNE: ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
MARIE: ZZZZ…uhhhh where is my beer…ZZZZZZZ
JANNE: ZZZZZ…what the fuck is Constantin Schrant doing here…ZZZZZ
ANDREAS: …who is Constantin Schrant?
JANNE: (briefly waking up) HEY MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS, DON’T ASK SO MUCH!
Janne slammed his fist on the button to the dixie horn, waking up Marie as well as probably scaring the crap out of the occupants of the Team Slow Schnell XL53 that they passed at that moment.
(VERY LOUD BLARING)
MARIE: HUH WAS WHAT THAT?
JANNE: WAIT WHAT!?! Uhhh…nevermind. I just had a strange nightmare.
ANDREAS: So, who is…
JANNE: HEY, MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS!
Blazing through the fog, our friends managed to pass Team Mravolinski-Chitco and then also Team Witchlight, both running at a steady pace, but still, they didn’t seem to dare to keep up with the sturdy Ariyan van that had proved its ruggedness the night before. Some minutes after team Racing Stripes, they arrived at the campsite as the third car, with Team Jockey being the winner.
VEHICLE STATUS:
Interior unusually clean.
Airbag cover duct taped together
SRS light removed
Front bumper broken
Rear bumper scratched
Bull bar bent
Windshield cracked
Left side sliding door caved in, door handle broken
Right side sliding door being stiff to open and close, something must have happened during the werewolf fight
Still running like a champ!
TO BE CONTINUED…
@Fayeding_Spray @MrdjaNikolen @interior @Elizipeazie
3 Likes
i’m not exactly sure as to how, or if, i should react to this, given that my team noticed exactly none of that happening
still a good read 
1 Like
Nah, main reason I tagged you was not for interaction but mainly to notice you about that it happened.
I still haven’t really thought out the story but… 
3 Likes
Somewhere in the Garda Province, Crugandr.
Local time: 5:15 Moon - 7:70 Moon
Weather: Still hot as hell.
The Great Escape
The Magistrate hurtled across the camp, the engine roaring as it pulled the weight of the olive drab station wagon with it. Almost all the other teams had left, but K’mino had other plans than to be left behind. In the rear view mirror of the Dione, Tim sees the green boat complete a spectacular powerslide as it flew around the corner.
“K! Make sure you keep that foot planted, We’ve got to keep going until that fuel gauge shows a quarter of the primary tank left.” Aedan called from the back of the car.
“I’ll try my best. But there’s no guarantees.”
Meanwhile, Orlan was barely holding himself together, horrified that he was the reason that several people almost died. An idiot, a total idiot. Why did he have to go into the woods, why shoot at something that wasn’t trying to kill him.
“I’m an idiot.” He muttered, somberly. “Nothing but a fool.”
Over the sound of the car driving and the tires on the road, his brother somehow overheard him. “You aren’t an idiot, you made a mistake, it happens.” Aedan whispered
“But I almost got us and everyone else killed.”
“Hey, don’t worry about that, all of us got away safely. You saw it yourself.”
“I don’t trust myself anymore, I almost killed you guys twice before. I collapsed the bridge we were standing on, lost control of our ship, and now this.” Orlan explained, “My own friends nearly died then and they almost did today, its a disgrace what I have done.”
Aedan opened his mouth to speak but was interrupted.
“I opened fire on that wolf just because it stood up, an unjustified attack on something that didn’t even try to harm me.”
The sounds of the engine, the gravel pebbles bouncing off the car and sound of the tire filled the cabin and the silence remained for most of the journey. It took twenty minutes for Aedan to speak up and change the topic.
“Pavel? Where is Whiskers?”
Pavel looked at him and a meow came from one of the rifle crates, to which he pointed. “In… there. I didn’t want her running off into the woods and being eaten. I saw what happened to the cat our friends in the Bricksley befriended.”
Acknowledging the answer with the nod Aedan looked at Malcolm. “Speaking of which, Did we bring everything?”
Malcolm nodded. “Yes, everything that I saw that didn’t look like a stick or a pebble I tossed in the back. Hell, maybe I did throw a few rocks and sticks in. I double checked before we left.”
“I suggest we try to get some sleep. I reckon three hours of sleep aren’t enough for anyone.”
Everyone except for K’mino murmured in agreement. Despite this suggestion, the adrenaline kept the sleep away from them, and when it started to settle in, every small creak and bump snatched it away from them. The Magistrate continued to push on through the night, with the occasional rattle from the roof rack, creaking from the suspension, and the gravel and dirt bouncing off the underside and the fenders.
The 25 minutes of silence were broken by a question from K’mino. “How much further do we have to go?”
“Probably 90 miles? I’m not sure.” said Aedan. “I’m sure we aren’t last.”
K’mino glanced in the mirror. “But it does look like–.”
Suddenly, out of the blue Malcolm gasped.
“K’mino! Watch the road!”
“Huh? Oh Shit!”
The front wheels locked up, but to no avail as the Magistrate jolted violently and something tumbled under the wheels. The car continued for another four feet before it came to a stop, and everyone on board climbed out.
Orlan was horrified at what had just transpired. “You hit one of them!”
K’mino did not respond, only turning around and getting into the car’s passenger side.
“Guys? I have something to tell you. That wolf we just hit was a mother.”
The three remaining teammates ran around to the back of the Magistrate. There they saw the scene of horror, the Dyre’s corpse was laying in the road and there was blood streaked down the gravel road. Almost immediately Orlan spotted the two smaller beings laying next to the corpse, and he quickly fumbled for his sidearm, but something stopped him. He was back in the forest with the Dyre, it was curious, it wanted to observe him, not at all attempting to threaten or kill him. No threat at all, just like these two. The thought was cut off as Pavel placed a hand on his shoulder and shook his head. Looking down, the USP was no longer in the holster, but in his hand. Orlan turned away quickly, struggling to pull himself together and climbed back in the car, horrified that he nearly killed something that wasn’t a threat again.
Aedan sighed, walked over and picked up the two Dyre pups.
A look of concern flashed through Pavel’s eyes. “Are you sure its wise to bring them into the next camp?”
“We killed their mother, the least we can do is to protect them. Can you drive?”
“No, Twisted my ankle when I was trying to get back to the car.”
“Malcolm, what’s the damage?”
“Radiator’s been knocked loose and I’ve secured it back in position with a bungee cord. But, its leaking. I did reconnect some hoses but I don’t know how long it’s gonna last.”
“It needs to last us just until we get to the next campsite. You drive, Pavel twisted his ankle, Orlan and K’mino are traumatized, and I’ve got these two.”
Malcolm obeyed without hesitation got in the car and started the engine. Aedan put the two pups the back with Pavel and Orlan and moved the corpse off the road as best he could. He returned, climbed into the back and shut the rear hatch with out a word. The team then resumed the journey and continued driving through the night in silence, hopeful that they would be safe at the next campsite.
To Be Continued (Like Always) (This one is a little more haphazardly written as I have a bit of a creative block today.)
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YEAH, SOME FOLKS INHERIT STAR-SPANGLED EYES THEY SEND YOU DOWN TO WAR AND WHEN YOU ASK 'EM, "HOW MUCH SHOULD WE GIVE?" THEY ONLY ANSWER, "MORE, MORE, MORE" IT AIN'T ME, IT AIN'T ME I AIN'T NO MILITARY SON, SON IT AIN'T ME, IT AIN'T ME I AIN'T NO FORTUNATE ONE, ONE IT AIN'T ME, IT AIN'T ME I AIN'T NO FORTUNATE ONE IT AIN'T ME, IT AIN'T ME I AIN'T NO FORTUNATE ONEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE NO NO NO NO TURUNNNNNNNNNNN DURUNNNNNNNNNNNNN DURUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN DURUNNNNNNNNNNNNN DURURN
TEAM BLAZERS
In the dead of the night as the gunfire raged on through the lush undergrowth of the alien jungle, the rest of Blazers managed to get a good night’s sleep in their tent, completely oblivious to the warring state that occurred with all the other teams. It was indeed only the rest of them, one blonde haired figure on the other hand, dealt with a certain matter as the dark raged on, and not long after when the air continued to smell of smoke, blood, and gunpowder, Watson rested himself on the Yamada’s door, clutching his 1848 Colt close to him. He pulled out a pipe from his coat, which almost seemed as though it had appeared from thin air, and disappeared from the same way, he lit it up and the scent of tobacco pierced his nostrils as smoke rose all around him, and for the first time in a while the cigarette had a far more bitter taste than usual.
Watson was worn out, much more than necessary. He secured his firearm back into its holster, and pulled out the faded gold stopwatch from his pocket. Still, the device didn’t budge, stuck in the same time as it was back in Negros, the hour hand pointed just after two, and the minute hand before three. The air all around him was a distinct kind of thick, embedded with embers of forces that felt familiar, but were completely distant.
Stuffing the watch back into his pocket, he sighed a puff of smoke as he tossed the still-lit pipe somewhere, where like his coat, it materialized into an existence unknown to everyone but him. He got up from where he leaned onto the vehicle, and covered a cough that originated seemingly from deep within his chest, and when he pulled his hand away, a splatter of deep crimson revealed itself on his pale palms.
And yet, he seemed unfazed as he simply shook it off his hand, with the ferrous liquid landing on the ground below. Still coughing, he looked around the clearing carefully, making sure not a single soul would ever bear witness to him, pointing his hand towards where a square depression was in the tropical gravel, he whispered words in an language unfamiliar. A blue haze took shape before him, slowly and gradually taking the form of a cheap hiking tent one would find at any regular department store. Once again, he coughed out loud, without covering his mouth a crimson red liquid fell out onto the ground, and dissipated within seconds. With his task apparently accomplished, Watson headed out towards the lush jungle before him.
Not long after, the rest of Blazers woke up from what they felt was possibly the best night they had had since their arrival to Crugandr, with Charlotte comfortably taking her place within Romulo’s arms, and Ga’araiya having made a makeshift pillow of Emily’s bosom. They woke up feeling far more energized than they could’ve been, but despite their bodies now being in good condition, something did not seem right at all. Someone was missing from inside the tent.
No stranger to them was Watson being the early bird, but instead of them being awoken by his loud cackling telling everyone to wake, they were instead met with a soft bestirring as they all got up at the same time. Romulo was the first to speak up between the four of them as he made his way towards the tent’s entrance. “Where’d that blonde bastard go this… time…” Romulo’s voice trailed off as he opened the tent up and found the morning still hadn’t come, and there sat a collapsed Watson leaning next to the Yamada, clenching the old revolver in his holster and his white dress shirt stained with an unusual tint that reeked of iron. Watson’s eyelids slowly blinked open, revealing his light blue eyes as they looked back into Romulo’s, and a smug look crept up on his face.
“You’ve awoken, it seems.” He coughed. “I bestow upon you a good night’s sleep and you still choose to call me by the term ‘bastard’. You do seem quite unappreciative of what I’ve provided.”
Romulo immediately rushed towards Watson’s side, patting him around to make sure he wasn’t injured anywhere, and indeed he wasn’t. The bloodstains on the white dress shirt had dried, and he couldn’t sense any other injury on him. “Tangina naman… fuck did you do this time? You sure you’re not hurt anywhere? Why’s it still night time?”
“Do slow down with the questions. My body is in a better state than it could have ever been.” Watson sat up. “Be that as it may, I’m not quite sure about the other teams.” He glanced around, the rest of the campsite seemed to be in a rush, and some of them had the same blood on their weapons and clothing as Watson. Charlotte emerged from the tent as well as the other girls, and immediately a disturbing reek had flown into her sensitive nostrils, and she began frantically looking all around.
“Looks like Princess Katzen knows something that we may not.”
“Dyres…” She said as the emotion of horror clouded her face. “They’re… everywhere…” She pointed her gaze towards Romulo, with clear distress in her eyes. “We-”
Before Charlotte could say another word, a deep disturbing howl sounded from the thick bush around them, followed by more howls that sounded as though a hunting pack had gathered around them. Rustling came from everywhere, and Charlotte’s fur stood up, her claws sheathed themselves, and her ears retracted, as though she was ready to pounce back and fight.
Watson got up from where he sat. “An announcement- or rather, an order was made for us to all evacuate this campsite. It’s not a very safe place where we are at right now. It would be best we make a move quickly. Other teams are already going.” He said, nearly collapsing again as he clenched his arm, muttering some incomprehensible words.
“Jesus fuck, man. You’re not doing fine at all. Get in the car- now!” He ordered Watson, who complied as he had nothing else to do anyway in such a situation. “Charlotte! You’ve got the notes?” He looked over towards the black feline who still seemed on guard, but calmed down at the mention of her name. “I don’t, but I have an idea of what the next stage should be like, I can sit in the passenger’s seat next to you, and we’ll be fine.” She says shaking her head. Romulo tossed the keys towards Charlotte, signalling for her to start the car as he made his way towards the tent, ordering Emily and Ga’araiya to get into the car, and maybe tend to Watson if he needed anything, they quickly complied as well as Romulo hastily folded the tent up, but something made him pause.
He stared into the dark jungle, and felt something stare back at him, deep orange eyes that pierced right into his soul, and muttering unfamiliar noises as it rustled away, leaving him staring into a deep darkness yet again. Charlotte called out to him, and Romulo immediately got back to folding the tent back, never pointing himself away from the bushes where he saw the horrifying reminder of the beasts that lurk in a world very much alien to him.
Not long after, the tent was finally placed into the Yamada’s rear compartment, and with the vehicle started up, they made their way out of the campsite and rushed out towards the gravel road, with Romulo just barely able to follow along Charlotte’s vague instructions, but a slight mistake sent the team’s anxiety levels high, as a sharp pop sounded from the vehicle’s front right.
“That fucking tyre!” Romulo exclaimed as he pulled the car off towards the side of the road, which thankfully was wide enough for him to walk around without getting ran over by the other teams which were all making their way out of the campsite as well. He looked towards the tyre, it was a goner, the sidewall had been torn right through, and a claw of the animal that Charlotte had mentioned earlier was embedded deep into the rubber, causing threads to have been strewn about everywhere. He looked around, and in the distance behind him he saw a disfigured, severed hand sitting on the side of the road, the blood still looking fresh from the point of severance, and a claw missing from one of its fingers. He felt as though he was about to throw up, but he held it in and asked Charlotte for assistance in changing the tyre out.
With the two’s teamwork, they quickly managed to jack the front right of the car up, take off the damaged wheel, and shove one of the spares sitting on the tailgate onto the hub. Romulo initially wanted to just leave the damaged tyre on the side of the road, seeing as there was no real vulcanization shop anywhere in this world they were in, but after a quick scolding by Charlotte, he mounted it back onto the tailgate, and the team once again set off on the muddy gravel road that ran parallel to the river. He stepped on the accelerator pedal which got them up to speed quickly.
Anxiety was high in the car, but still Romulo and Charlotte remained focused on the road ahead of them, the foglights Romulo had installed were working like a Charm, and helped to illuminate the thick dark fog ahead of them, but what it also did was show the true extent of the alien creatures that lined the sides of the road, every few metres a flash of orange would reflect back towards them, and shivers were sent down both of their spines as the howls continued on.
Up ahead, a pair of taillights glowed through the fog, and it slowly approached more and more, and Romulo was forced to back off the throttle until the road opened up a bit more, allowing him to overtake the slower vehicle. He recognised the car, a white van with a large number one printed on the side, a vehicle which had passed the team earlier whilst they were changing the tyre out. He flashed his headlights as he passed, before speeding up and having the van’s faint glow slowly fade away in the thick fog.
The trepidation the team was going through kept everyone awake throughout the drive, not helped by whatever Watson had done to wake everyone up earlier than they would’ve. The events right now were largely inexplicable, Watson’s bloodstained shirt, his seemingly injured arm, the creatures that lay hidden in the dark, lurking through the road, these were things that the team were never prepared to deal with, but now enraptured with the horrors that they bore witness to, they were ready to adapt with the situations ahead.
As they slowly crept along the road, the fog was beginning to slowly fade, but still the night was dark and filled with an eerie inscrutable dread, which sharply turned into an intense consternation upon Romulo’s catching of a flash that ran across the road. He slowed down slightly, scanning the road ahead before continuing back onto the pace he was going at before. He looked into the rear view mirror, in the distance a feint glow of another vehicle’s headlamps shone through above the passenger’s heads, and they didn’t seem to be gaining on them. Through the rear-view mirror, he had also seen the condition of Watson, who was now fast asleep, his head leaning on the headliner right after the door as the seat angled backwards. He could see the man was breathing, but was unfazed by all the bumpiness of the road. Ga’araiya seemed to have a perturbed look clouding her small face as she continuously looked up and down the collapsed blonde man. She rested her palm on Watson’s arm, the same arm he was clenching earlier, and a soft blue glow emanated from it, which quickly faded away, and the stressed look on Watson’s face gave way to a calmer emotion on him. Romulo briefly met eyes with Ga’araiya through the rear-view mirror, before he continued to look back onto the road ahead.
After a couple of hours with an ambience of thick trepidation in the air, the team finally arrived at the campsite, now closer towards the town than in the middle of thick flora, numerous cars were already there, some of which he’d not seen arrive before them. He parked the vehicle close to the river yet again, and took a minute to rest on the driver’s seat for a bit.
“Ray, can you sleep right now…?” Charlotte tugged on his sleeve.
He simply shook his head. “No, in fact, I feel very much energized. I assume you feel the same, don’t you?” He looked at her, and she nodded back.
Charlotte took a quick glance towards Watson, who was still asleep in his seat. “I don’t think we woke up naturally. It felt as though it were a magical spell used upon us. It didn’t seem like the type that people of this world would use, however.”
Romulo remained ecstatic, staring into the vehicle’s windshield at the river. There was a long pause before he would say anything, and when he did, his tone shifted to that of pure vexation.
“You know, Charlotte…”
It was clear in his intonation, intentional or not, and there was a sense of lassitude as he uttered his words of displeasure. No longer was he calm about things, and for the first time in a while, he’d felt as though he’d been peeved of any joyful emotion that could ever remain.
“…I’m pretty fucking tired of magic.”
4 Likes
RK Series Racing; Stage 3 Camp
NOVEL WARNING
The entirety of this post was written in collaboration with @Madrias. His post will seamlessly connect to mine as we have managed to barrel past the 32k character limit.
Duskriver Village Camp; about 2 sun
As the Anhultz Dione rolls up to the camp, it slows down and stops only a few feet short of impacting the Bricksley of team Shift Happens. By the time Connor had shut down the car, the three humans were already asleep, recovering from the rude awakening that was the battle with the Dyre the previous night.
The team gets up at a little after 2 sun the next morning, taking longer than usual due to the less-than-optimal sleeping position all three of them found themselves in.
Constantin, once again, wakes up first, but is pegged in the car by the still-asleep Valentin next to him, as his door and window won’t open to allow egress on that side.
About 20 minutes later, Tim wakes up as well, intensely stretching to loosen up a bit. This results in Valentin kind-of waking up as well, transitioning from true sleep to a state of half-asleep slumber.
Tim immediately exits the car to extend his stretching, the slam of the door kicking Valentin the rest of the way out of sleep.
The zombie that currently is in the rear right also more or less falls out the rear right door, managing to not hit the deck completely. He then joins the stretching session, though with substantially more structure behind it, starting at the neck and working his way downwards.
With the team now awake (mostly, anyway) they head out back and prepare breakfast, mostly in separation, as neither Tim nor Valentin seem mentally capable of meaningful conversation.
With that done, Constantin was the first to speak to the others, who in the meantime “warmed up” enough to be considered truly awake.
“I gotta go talk to the guys up front for a bit. I’ll be back soon.”, he exclaims, the others nodding in acknowledgement as he turns around and walks up to the Bricksley.
Back at the rear end of the Brick™, Valentin and Tim were once again discussing the events of last night, albeit with much less shouting…
“So you left all of us out there to die to save your own ass?”, Valentin accused Tim, still not happy about it.
“I was scared shitless and my brain went: here danger, need go, car can go. Thinking straight ain’t trivial when there’s a goddamn fight going…”, Tim replies. In hindsight, he knew that what he did was very much not cool with anyone. “And from what i know, you weren’t much better off, all curled up and such…”
“None of us were well-off… Can’t say i was mentally straight either.”, Valentin confirms, the thought of having his hair tugged halfway across the car prompts him to get his hairbrush out. He then starts going about trying to un-messify his hairdo as he always does.
Valentin and Tim were busy killing time and venting a bit by playing some Rummy (
;local names may include: 
Rommé; 
Rami; 
Jolly/ Rummy), when an enthusiastic Kaylie dragged Kayden and Malavera towards them.
“Oh umm… Hi.”, Valentin notes, being the first to see the group of three approaching. He still wouldn’t say that he’d be perfectly comfortable around them, but at least he knew some of them well enough to know that neither of them were an immediate threat.
“Well hello. Wanna join?”, Tim adds as he shuffles over to increase the available space in their little circle.
“Hope you have brought some chairs… we only have those two and the rear bumper…”
Kaylie stared at the table, recognizing all of the signs of a game in progress. “Don’t let us interrupt your game, we can wait. Plus, let’s face it, we don’t really know many card games. I’ve picked up Go Fish, but I know that’s a children’s game in the United States,” Kaylie admitted. “That, and no matter what we play, we’d have to teach Malavera, because he’s never really had a chance to play cards with anyone.”
Kayden settled down onto the ground, just glad to get off of his feet for a moment, and Malavera did the same. Kaylie looked around, then decided, tentatively, to sit on the Dione’s bumper, clearly testing to make sure she wasn’t going to break anything. Then, after a moment of thought, she looked at Malavera and asked, “You wouldn’t happen to have a spare shirt, would you?”
Malavera sighed, then shook his left head. “No. And I’m not giving you mine.”
Kayden chuckled and said, “Kaylie, you’re not going to scratch their paint. Your chrome is too smooth for that.”
Constantin walks up once more and retrieves his equipment, namely bow and quiver, from the trunk which, to his surprise, was still broken, but not mentioned yet by anyone. Being in a self-imposed time crunch, he doesn’t mention it either, instead electing to report his intentions to the others:
“I’ll head into town to get some replacement arrows. I’ll be back later.”, he says, already on the way back towards Jayde waiting near the Bricksley.
“Copy. See ya!”, Valentin responds, unintentionally slipping into the communications code he usually uses when cycling out with some local friends.
Him and Tim return to the game, which Tim ends up winning my a small margin.
With Valentin having lost, he was in charge of cleaning up the playing field.
He then goes to sort the cars by back-face color, separating the two 52 card decks from each other.
“Go Fish? Never heard of that.”, Valentin remarks, still sorting blue back-faces from red ones.
“Me neither”, Tim adds, despite being in a better position of knowing it, being an American and all.
“If you wanna play that, you’ll need to explain”, Valentin says as he finishes sorting and holds the blue stack of cars up towards Kaylie.
Kaylie nodded, then said, “It’s really a fairly simple game, as far as I’m aware. Everyone gets dealt five cards, the rest go face down in a stack in the middle. Any matching numbers, you put in front of you, face up, in pairs. On your turn, you pick a card from your hand, pick a person, and ask if they have that number. If they do, they give you that card and you get another turn. If they don’t, they say ‘Go Fish,’ and you take a card from the deck. Then the next person goes. This might just be a variant we learned, but we’ve played by the rule that the game ends when one person runs out of cards, and whoever has the most matches wins. It leads to slightly quicker games.”
“So, then, who would go first?” Malavera asked.
“Typically, either oldest or youngest first. Then it’s either clockwise or counterclockwise, depending on table preference,” Kayden said. “Whenever we play,” he said, nudging Kaylie’s left arm, “we have to flip a coin for who goes first because we’re twins.”
“Let’s do youngest first,” Kaylie said, smiling. “I mean, Kayden and I are, well, both of us are 67 back home, but we’d be about 102 years old if we used Earth years.”
“I’m 51,” Malavera said.
“On Khalara Five, yes, you are. You’re 357 years old on Earth,” Kayden said.
Malavera groaned. “Fine, I’m the eldest, but I’m counting that as a technicality,” he said, shaking both heads. “I still think it should be who feels the oldest.”
“Says the guy who’s older than some countries,” Kaylie quipped with a smirk on her face.
“Tim’s starting then.”, Valentin remarks, setting the game up in the way Kaylie described instead of handing the deck over for her to do it. Strangely enough, the wildly disproportionate claim of age didn’t bother him as much as he thought it would. His mind simply went: “Well if they think they’re THAT old, so be it… With all the gender and sexuality stuff it isn’t surprising.”
A set of five cards was dealt to each player, with the remaining 32 cards forming the face-down drawing pile.
“Yeah… 19 does undercut 23.” Tim adds, marveling at what he thought was immense dedication to their roles.
“U got a King?”, he starts, looking up from his own set of cards and towards Kayden. He didn’t know his name, but also didn’t care enough to ask.
Kayden grimaced as he handed over the king he had in his hand.
Kaylie chuckled, then said, “Well, you get to go again.”
Malavera tried to relax, holding his handful of cards in his left hand and resting his right hand on the ground. Being around two strangers was mildly stressful for him, even if he loosely knew one of them from talking before.
Kayden fished around in his pocket and slid a slim, black rounded rectangle out of it, taking a quick scan of his cards and trying to get Nova, his AI assistant, to help him decide who would be best to ask when, or if, he got a turn.
Kaylie spotted this and lightly punched her brother in the shoulder. “Hey, Kayden, we’ve agreed on this on the ship, no AI assistance in card games!” Kaylie said.
Kayden set the smartphone-shaped device down on his right knee and rubbed his shoulder, mere moments before Nova herself materialized as a six-inch tall golden tigress in an elegant dress standing on the screen. Nova put her hands on her hips, looked over at Kaylie, and said, “Oh, I’m just the AI now? What did I do to you to lose the first name basis?”
“Nothing, Nova. Was trying not to freak out our new friends here,” Kaylie said.
Nova spun around on top of the sleek armor-glass screen, spotting Tim and Valentin in the process. “Oh. My apologies. I am Nova, a Class 3 personal assistant to Kayden,” she said, motioning to Kayden as she did so. “Forgive me for my diminutive stature, projecting myself at my preferred size would generate more heat than I can safely dissipate in this atmosphere, and I doubt that I could convince Kayden to assemble his armor frame for my personal use.”
“Yeah, not happening, Nova. You still haven’t apologized for kicking me in the ass the last time,” Kayden replied.
“To be fair, you did deserve it,” Kaylie and Nova said at nearly the same time. Nova followed up with, “See, even your sister agrees with me.”
“Deserve it for what?” Kayden asked.
“Trying to use me to gain an advantage in Go Fish. So, I guess that means when I get the chance next, I owe you another kick in the ass,” Nova said, giving a light laugh before sitting down on the screen. “Don’t mind me, I’ll just watch the game.”
“Got one!”, Tim cheerily shouts, placing his pair of Kings face-up onto the dirt in front of him.
“Need a seven”, he continues, now looking at Malavera.
As Kayden pulled out what looked like a phone, he didn’t really pay much attention to it until Nova appears on the screen. This also grabs the attention of Valentin, who isn’t all that surprised anymore that Nova assumed the shape of another Tigralian, though the digital nature made it far less unnerving than the initial contact with Kaylie was.
“Looks like you have your own, digitized spin-off of Connor, it seems.”, he notes, not really knowing what exactly Nova was other than some glorified form of Siri. “Well hello there.”, he speaks, leaning forward to get an idea of how detailed the projection of her was.
Upon hearing about Kaylie using Nova to cheat Go Fish, Valentin wasn’t exactly impressed, though didn’t say anything about it.
Malavera looked over his cards, then shook his right head. “Go fish,” Malavera said, watching as Tim reached to the pile of cards.
Nova seemed to pause for a split moment to ‘think,’ then responded with, “Cyberlife model RK 800, serial number 313 248 317 - 60. Designation, ‘Connor.’ I believe it is possible we have met, but that information would be on my better half. Sorry, my local storage is a little limited.” When Valentin leaned in to get a better view of her, and said hello, Nova smiled. “If you’d like to see me better, please, just ask. I don’t mind scaling up a little for a short time.”
Kayden chuckled. “If you need to, feel free to pick up Nova’s handheld. It may be a little bit warm, but at least then, you’re not bending over quite so far.”
“And don’t worry, I won’t use that to read your cards. And even if I did, I’d give Kayden the wrong information anyway,” Nova said, before turning momentarily to face Kayden. “Because you know better than to use AI support in games. Seriously, you’re never going to improve if you don’t try,” Nova said, pointing a finger at him.
Kaylie just chuckled as her brother grimaced and pulled his head backwards as if he’d just been scolded by their mother. “Yeah, this is classic Nova. We have to restrict her to her Class 3 mode for games because her Class 7 ship-board AI is a master strategist.”
Nova, not willing to let Kaylie steal the show, cocked her head with a smirk and said, “My other chassis is a starship,” in the same tone of voice one might read a bumper sticker in.
Duskriver Village; about 2 sun
The bed of the Bricksley stayed a complete disaster overnight, getting worse as various needed items were dragged out of it, often overturning items or spilling other boxes and bins in the process.
For the first time since they had started, all five tents were used and the Bricksley remained empty. Jayde and Kaylie’s tent remained shrouded in the translucent purple orb, blocking all sound from leaving their tent, though the two of them could still hear what was going on outside. Rukari slept lightly, on alert even though he was asleep. Kivenaal was exhausted and sleeping heavily, having barely gotten out of his clothes before collapsing on top of the sleeping bag. Kayden occasionally growled in his sleep, albeit quietly, and infrequently enough that it could be mistaken for snoring. Malavera, on the other hand, couldn’t sleep and spent a few long minutes pacing the camp until he eventually got tired enough to go to bed.
At 2 Sun, however, things were different. Malavera was the first out of his tent, followed by Rukari. Kivenaal woke up slowly and got out, sitting on a log and just trying to let his brain get up to speed. Kayden crawled out of his tent and looked over at the truck, half expecting to see Kaylie or Jayde crawl out of it. Instead, the purple bubble dissipated and Jayde could be heard grumbling, “Ow. Kaylie, get off of my arm.”
“Sorry, Jayde,” Kaylie said, getting up and getting dressed, this time in a light tan tank top and denim shorts before crawling out of the tent. Jayde took a few minutes more, wandering out in light brown linen pants and a light tan shirt, not caring that they didn’t exactly match.
“It’s fine, Kaylie,” Jayde said, sitting down and helping Rukari prepare breakfast, mostly by providing a surprising amount of supplies.
“How the hell do you have fresh bacon and eggs in that bag, Jayde?” Kayden asked.
“Standard bag of holding with a stasis enchantment. If it’s fresh when it goes in, it’s fresh when it comes out,” Jayde responded, while Rukari fried the bacon in the pan, transferred it to everyone’s plates, then whipped up some scrambled eggs. Between the bacon, scrambled eggs, and one of Jayde’s loaves of piping-hot fresh bread, the team had a simple but satisfying breakfast.
“Right. We really have got to clean up that damn truck bed,” Malavera said. “It’s a real mess.”
“I could do a basic like-to-like sorting spell. Anything similar ends up in the same spot,” Jayde said.
“As long as you don’t sort everything into ‘junk,’ that should work,” Kayden said, chuckling. He then yowled as Kaylie grabbed Jayde’s staff and hit her brother on the butt with it. “Ow! What was that for?”
“He’s offering to make the job easier and you’re teasing him,” Kaylie replied. She let go of the staff as Jayde grabbed it, walked over to the truck, and focused his energy. Sure enough, things rapidly shuffled around in the bed, sorting by truck parts, weapon parts, ammunition (unfired, primitive, and expended each in three piles), clothing, weapons, and finally, camping supplies. With everything made at least a bit neater, though it would still have to be sorted through later, the truck bed was made a bit more presentable. Jayde scooped up all the spent brass and decided the best he could do with it was to compress it into an ingot, making it somewhat useful and a lot less of a mess. After that, he grabbed up the arrows as Constantin walked up to the truck.
“Good morning… allies.”, he goes, deliberately avoiding names as he simply doesn’t know most of them. He immediately goes straight to the point, as is customary with military-grade efficiency.
“We kept the others safe in that… conflict yesterday. Has been an honor to fight alongside you, despite apparent lack of firepower on my part.”, he speaks in a powerful, but also sincere tone while standing sort-of at attention.
As Constantin mentioned that he thought it was an honor to fight alongside them, standing at attention, it was Rukari who responded first, turning to face Constantin, standing to his full height, pulling his heeled boots together with a quiet click, and snapping both fists up to cover the twin hearts on the left side of his chest with a light thump. His brass tags quietly clinked from the force of the action, before Rukari said in a quiet voice, honed from years of duty, “The honor was mine.”
Jayde looked a bit surprised, knowing that not many people at all would outrank Rukari. However, Jayde quickly recovered and said, “From my perspective, there was no lack of firepower from you. I’ve fought alongside archers. You matched the best I’ve seen for firing speed and surpassed them for accuracy, and I know that isn’t easy.”
Kaylie, on the other hand, went a bit pale and tried to turn to hide her chrome left arm, now marked with a bright golden scar. Jayde, however, saw this and pulled Kaylie closer so she couldn’t hide her arm. He turned to her and again reminded her, “That arm saved your life. Also, in all the time you shared with me, not once have you harmed me with it.”
“Still hate that I killed two Dyre,” Kaylie said. “I thought I was going to knock the first one out. The second one, I didn’t mean to tear his throat out.” Kaylie had tears in her eyes as she buried her face in Jayde’s chest, and Jayde just wrapped an arm over her back to support her, understanding.
“No one sane likes killing,” Kivenaal said, rummaging through the toolbox and putting some of their supplies away.
Malavera, likewise, looked over to Constantin and said, “If anyone was lacking effectiveness last night, it was me. I shot one and knocked the other one out.”
“I’ve never been in a battle before,” Kayden admitted, “and if I never have to face a fight like that again, I’ll be quite happy.”
Initially, Constantin is rather confused by Rukaris reaction, but it soon dawned on him that he was in the Military as well. He stiffens up his posture and executes a textbook salute, albeit “earth-style”. What he wasn’t sure of was Rukaris rank, as him saluting first indicates Constantin being of higher rank than Rukari. The fact that he did not wear uniform or other rank insignia did not help either.
He maintains posture during the time in which Jayde compliments his archery, nodding in acknowledgement once he is done doing so.
Constantin also took note of Kaylie and knew how it feels to be a murderer, even if it was in self-defense.
“You are very much not the only one mentally affected by this.”, he calmly states, taking a step aside and motioning to the remainder of the team sat near the Tangerine Tank, with Tim and Valentin apparently playing a card game of sorts. Though Constantin wasn’t sure as to what the others knew about what Valentin did during the battle.
Rukari gave a polite nod and left his salute first, and as Constantin mentioned to Kaylie that she wasn’t the only one mentally affected by the battle, he spoke up, “We all were in different ways, and all have our ways of handling the aftermath. I have seen many battles in my time, the worst are always the ones up close.”
Kaylie slowly started to relax as Jayde held her, and as she regained her mental strength, she tried to put a brave face on and just get through with this meeting. “Most of us were in the fight, trying to keep everyone safe,” Kaylie said, her voice still a little shaky. “I wasn’t expecting to be in the middle of it.”
Kayden stepped closer to his twin sister and rubbed her natural right shoulder lightly. “None of us expected to be in the middle of that, sis. Look on the bright side, no casualties on our side.”
“Depends on your definition of casualty,” Malavera said. “If you mean deaths or physical injuries, then yeah, no casualties. If, however, you mean everyone got out unharmed, even mentally? No, we have casualties. Kaylie killed two in self defense. Tim stole the Dione and went on a joyride mid-fight. Valentin’s had a rough night behind the Elbrus. Gods only know how fucked up Orlan’s going to be considering he started that mess. Aedan had to face one down as it tried to kill him,” Malavera added. When Kaylie, Kayden, and Rukari stared at him, he sighed. “Two heads, guys. I can look through a thermal scope and still see my surroundings. That and I barely did anything in that fight.”
Constantin knew that it would take a while for some people to truly recover from the fight, though standing there wailing about it after the fact surely ain’t helping.
“Let’s not get caught up in the past and look ahead.”, Constantin tries to motivate the others present.
“I see you even found the time to clean up afterwards. Commendable to stick to your own rules.”, he adds, looking at the bundle of arrows Jayde was holding.
“Cannot say that about myself, recently…”, Constantin continues even further, remembering how he lied to Valentin about having seen worse in the military.
Jayde nodded, then handed Constantin the arrows. “I can’t tell how good they are. I’ve done some archery in the past, but I’m not good at it. Took a few classes a long while back when I got disappointed in archers who couldn’t hit their targets, and learned a whole new respect for the art of archery,” Jayde admitted. “Had an instructor who was left handed. I’m ambidextrous, but learned to shoot left handed.”
Kaylie looked over at Connor, Tim, and Valentin playing cards. “I wonder what game they’re playing,” she said, thinking out loud.
“Considering you cheat at Go Fish,” Kayden said, smirking.
“I do not! Those cards were stuck together and you know it,” Kaylie shot back.
“I know,” Kayden said, chuckling. He knew it had worked, his sister was no longer thinking about the battle.
Malavera shrugged. “I’ve never played cards. Never really had anyone to play any games with, and no one to teach me.”
Kaylie grinned, then grabbed Kayden and Malavera by their hands and practically dragged them over to the trio, with Kayden protesting the whole way that he hardly knew them, didn’t want to scare anyone, and wasn’t dressed enough to play cards.
“Twin Suns, Kay, it’s not like they’re playing strip poker, you big wimp,” Kaylie quipped at her brother. “Sorry about this, Valentin, if he’s scaring you. He’s probably more scared of you than you are of him,” Kaylie said, teasing her brother.
Kayden sighed. “In front of new people, Kaylie? Really?”
Malavera chuckled. “Don’t worry about Kayden, Valentin. He’s big, but, well, he’s Kaylie’s brother, and I know him well.”
Back at the truck, after Constantin had taken the arrows from Jayde, it was Kivenaal and Rukari who both realized they had weapons to clean after last night, and decided the cab of the truck was out-of-the-way enough to start cleaning. Rukari swabbed out the barrel of his murdaira while Kivenaal disassembled his four Colt Peacemakers, grumbling the whole time that he should have brought bigger guns.
Jayde, on the other hand, looked at Constantin and asked, “Do you have any way to check those arrows, or are we just going to have to go into town? Because if you need new ones, well,” Jayde paused for a moment, rummaging in the messenger-bag-sized pouch hanging at his side, then pulled out a bag of coins and handed it to Constantin, “at least now you’ll be able to pay for them. Any extra, you can keep. Best if your team has at least some of the coin of the realm.”
Jayde knew that the bag contained 80 silver Syrkals, the currency used all across Crugandr, and that if they had to buy anything, that would almost certainly be enough. “And don’t worry about repaying me. I’ve got enough that I can afford to give a little bit of coin away. At least this way, I know the coin isn’t going straight into the local tavern for a mug of ale.”
Constantin accepts the bundle of arrows and shuffles through them. The coinage is also accepted and promptly is stored in one of the multitude of pockets of his combat uniform trousers.
“First off, you took more from the field than i shot. Some of those aren’t even mine.”, he explains, discarding three arrows noticeably shorter than the remaining ones. He then goes about the remaining five, taking each one individually and mildly bending it a few times.
“The very bad ones are easy to filter. If you bend them a bit, and they break, they would’ve broken when you shoot them, fucking your bow in the process.” Constantin explains, just as one of the remaining arrows breaks in twain under the load. “See? That one was unsafe, as i call it.”
The remaining four pass the bend-test, which leads him to the next stage of filtering.
“Normally, i’d trial-shoot the remaining ones to see if they still behave as i expect them to. Though it’d take the better part of an hour to test that, so i’ll just see if i can get replacements. They are consumables anyways.”, he continues, mentally flagging all of them as altered, which is his way of saying that the arrow’s characteristics don’t match his expectations anymore.
“Let me get my stuff and then we can go.”, he finally finished as he turns around on his heel to grab both his bow and quiver, together with the 8 remaining arrows stored within.
Jayde nodded as Constantin explained that he’d gathered up more than just Constantin’s arrows. “I didn’t have time to be picky, I just gathered up everything reasonably close,” Jayde mentioned. “Better to have cleaned up too much than to have not done enough.” As Constantin, however, explained how to spot bad arrows, Jayde smiled, glad to learn something new.
When Constantin headed back to the Dione, Jayde stayed near the Bricksley out of respect for Valentin, watching as Constantin got Kaylie to move at least enough that he could get his bow and quiver and not hit Kaylie with the hatch.
As Constantin returns back at the “pickup truck”, he took a few moments to free up both hands. To achieve this, his quiver is slung across his left shoulder, with it resting by his right thigh, just like he did when the Dyre battle happened. The bow, meanwhile, was also parked on the left, but was resting vertivally instead of going diagonally across his chest like the leather strap of his quiver does.
“I’m ready when you are”, Constantin states, now having finished the procedure and having both hands empty.
Jayde retrieved his staff from where he’d left it leaning against the Bricksley, then headed onward down the path to Duskriver Village, being careful across the wooden bridge crossing the river. “It’s slower here than down by Jaduvira, but try not to fall in,” Jayde said. “I can swim well enough to get you out again, but I’d rather keep dry if possible.”
He knew it was only a couple minute walk to get into the village, and knew that the fletcher and bowman were relatively close to the guard-house, which wasn’t far from the wooden wall they’d put up to keep the Dyre out. Almost instinctively, he found himself walking at Constantin’s left side, so that if he had a bad step and fell, he wouldn’t take Constantin down with him.
“Well… my workplace is a ship, so swimming capability is basically mandatory, as are rescue procedures if any seamen were to go overboard.”, Constantin chuckles, following the instruction of taking care to not break the bridge. Granted, he wasn’t overly heavy, but the bridge apparently wasn’t made with sturdiness in mind.
Not long after they cross the bridge, a violent sound, similar to someone breaking a 2x4 in half by jumping onto it, can be heard.
Said 2x4 wasn’t actually a 2x4, but instead Constantin’s bow, which after close to 4 years of near-constant use finally gave way.
As it breaks in half just above the grip-portion of it, splinters are sent away from the bow, most of which flying out back and away from him like tiny wooden pieces of shrapnel. Some, however, make their way into his skin on the back.
The bow’s string releases it’s tension, digging into his chest in the process.
After that, the bow leaves his shoulder entirely out the front, with the lower limb going out sideways and impacting Jayde’s walking stick as a result. It comes to rest in pieces, both limbs now only connected by the string at either end, the middle heavily splintered.
Immediately after, Constantin curly up in pain, the string having done substantially more initial harm than the splintering on the back near his left shoulder blade.
“[Swedish expletive]. Hnnngrgh…”, he groans, being caught completely off-guard by the sudden equipment failure, also curling up and crouching down to ease the pain just a little.
“Ah, a navy sailor, then,” Jayde said. “My apologies for assuming otherwise, I’ve met too many people who can’t swim.”
As Jayde heard the loud snapping crack, followed by the crash against his walking stick, Jayde swore in Valraad. “Skadu vi!” he said, moments before kicking the slightly-displaced end of his walking stick with his right foot, leading to an almost comical half-hopped step to keep his balance. As Constantin curled up in pain, and Jayde saw the broken bow laying on the ground, he put two and two together and realized what happened.
“Are you okay? If you need help getting those splinters out, let me know. I can’t do much for the pain,” Jayde said.
Constantin stays crouched down for the moment to recover from the pain.
A few Civilians roaming about the place look at the events from afar, without saying a word or offering help.
“I’m good… i think…”, he replies as the pain caused by the bow string subsides, though it left a very visible red imprint on his chest and parts of his shoulder. The splinters, though, were more of an issue.
He gets up and tries to reach for that one pesky splinter, managing to touch, but not quite extract it.
Multiple attempts with both arms from different angles prove futile, as his right arm isn’t long enough and his left one not getting there due to poor flexibility.
Not wanting to admit defeat, he keeps trying, but it was almost painfully obvious that he wasn’t getting that one out without outside help.
Jayde saw Constantin struggling with one rather troublesome splinter, then carefully removed it. “Friends do not let friends suffer,” Jayde said as a way of apologizing for not asking first. “If there’s any others you can’t reach, I’ll help,” he added.
As the crowd wandered around, Jayde sighed and shook his head lightly. “And this is why they need heroes,” Jayde muttered to himself, though loud enough that Constantin might be able to hear it, “No one wants to help each other. No one wants to get involved. Then evil takes root and someone has to cut it out.”
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Team Shift Happens
(As mentioned before, this was written in collaboration with @Elizipeazie and is split among a couple of posts because we shattered the 32k limit)
Duskriver Village, 2-and-10 Sun
The splinter removal was as successful as it was painful, ending in him flinching hard when the splinter made it’s way back out of his skin. Very minimal bleeding follows it out of the puncture wound.
The other part of what Jayde said was drowned out by Constantin’s focus on dealing with the pain both up front and in back. Well… the chest was more along the lines of heavily irritated than truly in pain, but the splinter would will linger for a while.
“Thank you”, he simply goes, collecting himself a bit before picking up the now-broken bow.
“[Swedish Expletive]. What a waste of money… Thought it’d do a bit longer than that.”, he grumbles. The bow may have seen heavy use, but he did not expect it to fail this early in it’s service life, let alone catastrophically.
“Well let’s hope the local bowyer has better stuff…”, he continues, visibly annoyed at the fact that his bow that set him back a hefty four-digit sum went bust.
“My apologies for the pain,” Jayde said, after Constantin thanked him. “As for wasted money, I would think otherwise. Given the situation, I’d guess at some point your bow took a good hit, probably while strung. At least, if there is one good thing from this, it’s that it broke now and not after we got back to camp with new arrows.”
When Constantin mentioned that he hoped the local bowyer has better supplies, Jayde smiled. “There are two here in town who compete with each other regularly to see who makes better bows. I have one for… Well, my other form,” Jayde said, pulling the unstrung bow out of his bag of holding to show Constantin, “made by Kiyaru, here in Duskriver Village, as a gift from Queen Nuwala of Miravall.” He then put the large bow away and said, “If I had to trust anyone to make a really high-quality bow, it would be Kiyaru Lisven-Endavi. She’s… She’s a Valraadi, like Rukari,” Jayde said.
He sighed, then said, “Long story short, she’s one of their famous soldiers. Fought in the Grundzahiri, Marinzahiri, even the Adazahiri. Never made Vilzagrund or Vilzamarin, and became Vilada of the Adazahiri. Lord of the Sky, roughly. A flight instructor. She looks a bit torn up from her war wounds, but that hasn’t stopped her.”
As they walked into the bowyer’s shop, Kiyaru looked up at them, clearly blind in her right eye and missing the ring finger and little finger on her left hand. “Vuri ada ahd nevuri marin, Jayde. To your friend, calm seas and strong wind,” Kiyaru said. Her light brown fur was, unlike Rukari or Kivenaal, completely lacking in stripes, and despite being female, she was still physically quite strong. Likewise, it appeared that she was missing half of her tail, and walked with a noticeable limp. “What do the two of you need?” she asked.
“Leaving it in would’ve been worse, especially with it possibly getting infected…”, Constantin counters. “I mean it going while drawn to length would’ve done much more harm, i guess… And it going now already hurt like… a lot.”
As Jayde pulls his bow out of the bag of holding, Constantin is visibly confused: “How the fuck did you get that to fit in there? Is that a takedown bow?”
He looks at that bag for a bit, then returns to Jayde himself with his eyes, as he explains something about a master bowyer in the village.
“It’s not like i have a lot of choice if i want to retain some defensive ability.”, Constantin says, shrugging, and sets off further into town.
Upon entering, Constantin took a look around the small shop they found themselves in. He knew that Kiyaru was part of the military, but not knowing their procedures or her rank, he decides to treat her as Civilian for the time being.
“Greetings. As for what i need… Well… some new equipment, so to speak. My current bow has blown itself into pieces and it needs replacing.”, Constantin explains, calmly, placing the broken bow onto the counter.
“I don’t know your procedure regarding manufacturing them, so if you need any info, measurements or something like that, go ahead.”
Jayde smiled and showed Constantin the bag. “No, the bag is… There is magic in it. Somewhat a bit like the portal, there’s more space in here than you might think,” Jayde answered, simplifying things a bit. “It cost me a fair amount to get it.”
Kiyaru nodded. “I can see the stripe it’s left on you,” she said, after Constantin set his broken bow on the counter. With great care and respect, she removed the string from one end of the broken bow and aligned the broken halves together to get a rough idea of what she’d be working with.
“Good news is, you’re within one of my favorite patterns,” she said. “So, what exactly do you need? While you tell me that, hold this,” she said, handing Constantin a short stick, “in the hand you hold your bow with, and pull an arrow back. If you have to use an actual arrow, I don’t mind. I just need to know your draw.” As Constantin held the stick in his right hand and drew an arrow back with his left, Kiyaru smiled.
“What are the odds of three left-handed archers in one room?” Kiyaru said with a smile. “Do you know your draw weight? I’ve dealt with a few heroes in the past, I know a Fist is about one of your kilograms.”
She looked over at Jayde and raised an eyebrow. “You need anything?” she asked as well.
Jayde sighed. “I won’t take up your time. I get the feeling you’re going to need it.”
Kiyaru smirked. “I see. Well, I know you have a bow and arrows for it, both for your other form. I’ve had this one,” she said, grabbing one made for Jayde’s normal form, “waiting here for the last two weeks for you.” She set the bow on the counter with a quiver of sturdy black arrows. Jayde paid for the bow and his arrows, placing both into his bag, having at least loosely explained it to Constantin.
“Now, on account of you being here with Jayde,” Kiyaru said, looking over at Constantin, “I’m not going to charge you as much as I would most others who show up here.”
The excuse of “magic” wasn’t exactly satisfactory to him, though given more pressing problems at hand, he saw no real reason to dig further.
“Had it slung across my shoulder when it went bust. Hurts like high hell is what i’m gonna tell you…”, Constantin remarks, looking at Kiyaru as she aligns the two halves to vaguely form a complete bow.
He accepts the stick and proceeds to draw an imaginary arrow, taking great care to emulate his form as closely as possible as if actually drawing to weight. It definitly wasn’t easy to maintain posture, with the lack of resistance the bow usually would provide. Once the stick was drawn to what he felt was full length, he retains the pose, starting at some wall off to the side as if aiming at it.
Constantin’s positioning gave a crystal clear view at his front, with the stick facing left, from Kiyaru’s perspective.
“If you need the numbers, i’m drawing 100 pounds to 34 inches.”, Constantin says, hoping that the raw values provided some help to Kiyaru. Even though she said something about metric, Constantin only really knew the accurate weight in pounds. “Last measured a year ago when having this bow made.”, he adds, briefly glancing at the counter before re-focusing on the non-existant target until other instructions were issued.
The mentioning of not being charged as much is acknowledged with a nod, but not really of use for him since he’s not paying out of his own pocket anyway.
Kiyaru nodded slightly, taking a measurement with a basic string, setting that down, and saying, “You may relax.”
“So, you need two bows of equal nature, both around 100 pounds as close as I can manage, with a 34 inch draw by your reckoning,” Kiyaru said. “That’s about 45-and-a-half kilograms, which is a common hunting draw for my kind. Your draw is,” Kiyaru picked up the string and checked it against herself, “remarkably close to mine, actually. I will get started once both of you leave, and if all goes well, I will be done by 8 Sun. I’ll send your measurement to a friend of mine to get your arrows made so that I can focus on the bows. May you always walk with Yawli’s favor,” she said, before turning to look for two identical pieces of wood.
Constantin releases the imaginary draw, in proper form as soon as he’s instructed to do so, handing back the stick to Kiyaru. He simply nods, confirming the order for two identical flatbows and takes his broken one back off the table.
“I’ll keep that one as a sort of service trophy.”, he states, before following Jayde out of the shop.
Jayde led Constantin out of the shop and back toward the camp, mentioning, “She’s the one who taught me archery. I’d been having a lot of fights alongside archers where I seemed to be doing far more than they were, and rather than blindly assume that they were terrible, I tried it for myself. Not as easy as they make it look, and I know that now,” Jayde said.
“I don’t know how well you are shooting, but i do appreciate the respect for the sport. Shooting a bow in itself isn’t that hard. But being accurate is.”, Constantin explains, mildly smiling at the pleasant surprise being brought up with Jaydes respect for archery.
“By the way,” Jayde mentioned as they walked onto the bridge, “I think Rukari honored you. I don’t know your military rank, but I saw your uniform in Nevada. The only one who can give Rukari orders is the Emperor or Empress themself, as they would call them, the Vilzahir.” Before he could say more, however, there was a quiet ominous creak mere moments before Jayde took another step, releasing the tension stored in the loose plank and tipping Constantin sideways into the river. Jayde looked as he heard a heavy splash.
Constantin couldn’t even react in time, as the plank gave way below him, on his currently weighted foot, no less. As a result, he slips into the gap formed by the now-gone plank, the loose combat uniform pants getting caught on the adjacent one, friction burning his right shin in the process. The other end of the plank is sent sky high, coming around to impact Constantin’s left shoulder, pushing him into the river.
“Shit,” Jayde said, making sure to avoid the same plank as he looked for Constantin in the water.
After having taken the plunge, he finds his way to shore quickly and climbs up the foot-an-a-half of banking onto dry land, soaking wet all over, including his boots being filled to the ridge with water. All that while throwing Swedish Expletives about the place in annoyance.
His face at that point is best-described as the “grumpy-cat-meme”, as he takes off his boots and socks, resorting to bare-footed walking for the time being.
Jayde grimaced as Constantin crawled out of the river. “I am sorry that happened,” Jayde said, his tail lower than usual. “That was my fault.”
“How? Seems like i found the ominous plank you mentioned…”, he replies, totally oblivious to the fact that Jayde was securing him by having stepped onto the other end of that plank first.
He then realizes that his broken bow and most of his arrows have gone missing.
“Hold on… gotta at least save my trophy…”, he remarks, hopping back in to retrieve the two individual pieces, slowly being carries away by the current.
Upon returning, he collects his soaked pair of boots, and shakes his head to indicate readiness to continue.
“It’s actually rather refreshing, given the scorching heat out here…”, Constantin comments, trying to make the best of the extraordinarily bad luck he’s been having today.
Jayde sighed. “I was standing on the other side of it. I knew there was a bad plank, I didn’t know which one, and, well,” Jayde looked back at the mess they’d made of the bridge, now with a completely missing plank, “when I stepped off of it, it came up.”
When Constantin had retrieved his broken bow from the river and returned, Jayde shrugged lightly at Constantin’s comment regarding the dunk in the river having been at least somewhat refreshing.
“You warned me… or… us. And it happened.”, Constantin shrugs.
“Either way, has been pleasant. See ya!”
As they approached the camp, Jayde left Constantin’s side so he wouldn’t disturb the game in progress.
Constantin walks over to the back of the Dione, boots and broken bow in his arms and still soaking wet to the point of leaving a very wet trail everywhere he goes.
Meanwhile, at the Duskriver Village Campsite, 2-and-10 Sun
Kayden chuckled. “If you need to, feel free to pick up Nova’s handheld. It may be a little bit warm, but at least then, you’re not bending over quite so far.”
“And don’t worry, I won’t use that to read your cards. And even if I did, I’d give Kayden the wrong information anyway,” Nova said, before turning momentarily to face Kayden. “Because you know better than to use AI support in games. Seriously, you’re never going to improve if you don’t try,” Nova said, pointing a finger at him.
Kaylie just chuckled as her brother grimaced and pulled his head backwards as if he’d just been scolded by their mother. “Yeah, this is classic Nova. We have to restrict her to her Class 3 mode for games because her Class 7 ship-board AI is a master strategist.”
Nova, not willing to let Kaylie steal the show, cocked her head with a smirk and said, “My other chassis is a starship,” in the same tone of voice one might read a bumper sticker in.
Connor, who wasn’t doing much up to this point other than silently progressing his language pack for the local tongue via the supplied ring, was now prompted by Nova’s incorrect declaration of him.
“As far as i am aware, we have not. It seems like have encountered a later copy of myself.”, Connor replied.
Both Valentin and Tim turn around to look up at Connor standing a few feet outside the little play-game circle. Neither one said anything, but their faces told “you know each other?”
They quickly return to the game, when Valentin realizes that it’s his turn.
“Tim, you have a four?”, he asks, looking over at him.
“Nah…”
“Damn…”
Valentin reaches forward to draw a card. The offer of holding Nova to get a closer look was known, but is discarded without much of a reaction as he was doing his turn. Even then, he wouldn’t want to break it somehow.
“Yeah i’m good, thanks.” Valentin politely declines the offer, having satiated his initial curiosity for the time being.
“Oh. My apologies, then, Connor,” Nova said. “My local storage says there was an interaction between -60 and my other half that ran for 300 milliseconds. But I don’t have a transcript of the data, so I don’t know what they were talking about.”
Kayden, realizing it was his turn, turned to Valentin and asked, “You wouldn’t happen to have a Queen, would you?”
Malavera looked at his cards and tried to hide a look of relief that Kayden hadn’t asked him that.
Kaylie looked at Nova, then said, “You better not be giving Kayden answers.”
“I’m not!” Nova said defensively. The only answer I’m giving him is this," she said, before flipping Kayden the bird.
“Great. Now even my own AI is giving me attitude,” Kayden said, shaking his head.
“Well, you were the one who tried to involve her in a game she wasn’t invited to play,” Malavera said. “And it’s not like she can hold up a set of cards on her own.”
“Excuse me?” Nova said. “I’ll have you know,” she said, stepping off of the screen and mimicking a fall under gravity from Kayden’s knee to the dirt, pushing tall grass out of her way, “that I am perfectly capable of interacting with something as light as these playing cards.” She walked up to the stacked deck and, although it seemed to take Nova some significant effort, slid the top card half a centimeter sideways.
“Nova, the last time you did something like that at this size, you overheated your hard-light generator. Leave the deck alone,” Kaylie said.
Nova, on the other hand, vanished for a split second, only to reappear while lifting the whole deck of cards. Two seconds later, she said, “Oops,” just before she vanished again, dropping the deck of cards neatly where she’d picked them up, not even really scattering them.
Kayden looked down and grimaced, setting Nova’s handheld on the dirt instead. “She’ll be back in a few seconds,” Kayden said. “Though she won’t be able to physically interact with anything for another hour.”
“I’m still here!” Nova said, appearing on the screen in 2D this time.
“For a Class 3 AI, you do some really foolish things sometimes, Nova,” Kaylie said.
Connor just looks at Nova, mildly befuddled. At some point, he returns to his in-progress dictionary, silently.
Valentin simply nods and hands over a Queen of Spades. The snappy nature of Nova wasn’t exactly to Valentin’s liking, but the ensuing hilarity made him chuckle a bit anyway. Tim also is getting a good, genuine laugh out of Nova’s trashtalking.
“Never said she wasn’t invited. I just didn’t know Nova being a thing in the firs place.”, Valentin remarks, watching Nova move… attempt to move the cards in a state between confusion and interest.
“Still your turn.” Tim remarks toward Kayden, also intrigued by Nova’s capabilities.
Kayden smiled and matched the Queen of Spades with the Queen of Hearts, then looked to Kaylie. “Got any 8’s?”
“Go fish,” Kaylie said with a cheery smirk.
Kayden groaned and grabbed a card. “Two steps forward, one step back,” he said.
Kaylie looked over at Malavera and asked, “So, do you have any Queens?”
“How on Earth did you- Never mind,” Malavera said, handing over the Queen of Clubs to match with Kaylie’s Queen of Diamonds.
“It was all over your face, Mal, when Kayden asked Valentin,” Kaylie said. She looked over at Tim and asked him, “Got any 7’s?”
Nova, by this time, had cooled off enough from her little trick to show back up on top of her screen. “Well, that was embarrassing. Squished by a deck of cards,” she said.
Both Valentin and Tim just watch the game unfold, not really saying much as either of them are trying to figure out suitable strategies for winning.
After being asked, Tim groans mildly and hands over his 7.
By this time, Nova had reappeared, with Valentin smirking at the return of the Karma-Cannon to bite her in the… charging port.
Kaylie smiled, then looked to her brother again after putting the pair of sevens down on the table. “Got any twos?” she asked.
“Go fish,” Kayden said, grinning at Kaylie’s mock pout as she grabbed another card.
Malavera looked over at Kaylie and asked, “Any aces?”
“Go fish,” Kaylie said, chuckling.
Malavera reached for the deck, trying to be careful only to take the top card without scattering cards everywhere, and managing to do so with only minimal chaos caused to the deck. “Sorry, grabbing small things with these hands isn’t easy.”
Kaylie gave a smirk as she looked over at Malavera.
“Don’t you say it, Kaylie,” Malavera said, causing Kaylie to burst out laughing.
Tim took the honor upon himself to crack a cheap joke.
“That’s what she said.”, he exclaims, grinning ear to ear, before returning to the game.
“Need a three.”, he demands from Kaylie.
Valentin’s lack of humour may be near-bottomless, but high-school quality dick jokes couldn’t miss him. He starts laughing and calms down rather quickly, though a latent, occcasional chuckle escapes him every once in a while.
Malavera sighed and covered his right muzzle with his right hand.
Kaylie shrugged, handing the three over to Tim, still smirking at Malavera.
Kayden was almost bent double, still trying to recover from the unexpected dick joke. “Glad you did that,” Kayden said, trying to catch his breath. “If I did, I still have to live with him in the truck.”
Nova sat there on top of the screen, amused. “I have to admit, I’m trying to… Oh! Right. Got it. Physical joke,” Nova said, suddenly figuring out why everyone had gotten a good laugh.
Tim simply places the pair of threes down onto the ground, proudly smirking about having produced genuine laughter in most of the team.
“Gib Jack!”, he orders to Valentin, who is simply shaking his head, after which Tim draws a card from the pile.
“I’ll take a ten.”, he says, but it’s not exactly clear as to who he is referring to, as his massive hairdo makes it hard to see which player he is looking at.
“From which one of us?” Kaylie asked, smirking.
Valentin was startled by the question, having forgotten about his hairdo obstructing the view, as he also hid his cars behind the curtain of blonde hair.
“Err… Kaylie?”, he stumbled, opening the blinds, so to speak.
“Should really get a haircut… or at least some bands to tie it down. Isn’t the first time now, is it?”, Tim pokes at Valentin, who doesn’t take too kindly to this as he stares him down as best he can, letting off very quickly after realizing that Tim is right… Tying it up to a massive ponytail would probably help.
“Ah, damn. Yeah, I’ve got a ten,” she said, pulling the card out and handing it to Valentin.
When Tim poked at Valentin’s wild hair, Kaylie remembered she often kept a couple of hair ties around for the purposes of carrying tools strapped to her left arm. She set her cards face down on the grass, then popped one of the covers off of her left arm. “Damn. Left my hair ties in the Bricksley,” Kaylie said, completely uncaring that the mechanical internals of her left arm could be seen. “I normally keep a couple here to hold onto wrenches when I’ve gotta climb to fix things,” she said, before clipping the cover back in place.
Nova, meanwhile, decided to poke fun and said, “Kaylie, I know you’re not a robot, but it is considered rude to have your parts showing. It’s as bad as being naked.”
Kaylie groaned. “Low hanging fruit, Nova.”
When Constantin walked over, Kayden raised an eyebrow at the amount of water dripping from him. “Out of curiosity, how was the water?” he asked, genuinely curious. “Considering taking a swim myself to get out of this heat.”
Valentin casually chucks the other ten out in front of him, before taking Kaylie’s ten and setting it alongside the previous one.
When Nova jumped onto the NSFW-joke-bandwagon, both Valentin and Tim were surprised by her behavior once again.
“Oh snap!”, Tim exclaims, as Valentin collects himself again to address Kaylies offer.
“Thanks. Maybe we have some lying about in our car. If need be, a reuseable zip-tie will do as a stop-gap.”, Valentin explains. The zip-tie trick he adopted when starting work on bicycles, as his hair had a habit of tangling up in the intricate shifting mechanisms.
“Tim. U got a six?”, he asks, getting denied quickly, prompting to draw a card, ending his turn.
“Unintentional, but rather pleasantly refreshing.”, Constantin calmly replies to the question regarding water quality, plonking down the boots and bow onto the Dione’s roof. “Though i would scout the riverbed first. May be rather shallow in places…”
Kayden looked at his cards and smirked, remembering someone at the table had an ace, but he couldn’t remember who, thanks to the perfectly-timed dirty joke. Was it Mal or was it Val? he thought. He looked to Valentin and asked, “You got an ace?”
Valentin shook his head and Kayden sighed. Tim smirked in response as the turn passed to Kaylie.
Kaylie gave a polite smile, then said, “Tim, I know you have a Jack. May I have it, please?”
Tim’s smirk evaporated as fast as water in the hot desert sun as he handed over the jack, watching as Kaylie put it in her pile. Then Kaylie looked back at him with one card left in her chrome hand. “Got a two?” she asked.
Tim reluctantly handed over the card. Kaylie added it to her collection, then said, “Thank you, everyone. Good game,” before politely cleaning up her cards and adding them back to the deck. Likewise, Malavera placed his handful of cards on the deck, and Kayden straightened up his one match, added it to the cards in his hand, and placed them in the deck.
“That was surprisingly fun,” Malavera admitted.
Kayden chuckled. “You did alright for it being your first time, Mal.”
Malavera groaned and shook both heads while Kaylie chuckled.
Soon after, the three of them got up, with Kaylie heading over to Jayde, Malavera returning to the Bricksley to at least attempt to make sense of the now-organized chaos it was in, and Kayden heading straight for the river in his light-gray shorts, planning on getting a good relaxing swim in.
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That is one hell of an essay
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