Community > The Cantina
The Skies have no Limit
Gryphos:
--Wild Winds Inn--
Gareth sat solemnly in the corner with a drink, taking sips after each remembered memory. He rifled through each of his memories of his crew in his head, from the best to the worst and everything in between. He lifted his mug in the air and made a quiet toast to himself.
Gareth
"Here's to Michael, who met his untimely demise at-"
Just then Michael came through the door and looked around. Gareth instantly put down his mug.
Michael
"Oh, hey Gareth."
He walked over to Gareth's table while Lionel, Kay and Hector walked through the door and headed straight for the bar.
Gareth
"You're alive?"
Michael
"Yeah, we made a ditch escape to a cliff top, were picked up later by rescue forces. But, err, this..."
He pointed at the right side of his face, which was covered in burns and almost unrecognisable were you unable to see his left side.
"...This isn't going to go away."
Gareth stared at the burns.
Gareth
"Well, I always said you needed some kind of battle wounds."
Michael
"Battle wounds, yeah. Not racing accident wounds."
Gareth
"I guess you cant be picky about your scars."
They both smiled and chuckled as the rest of the crew came over to them with drinks for everyone.
Lionel
"So, what do you think they'll call it?"
Hector looked at him, puzzled.
"The race, I mean. Events like this usually have some kind of name attached like, "The Fiery Race" or "The Red Race"."
Gareth shrugged.
Gareth
"I'm sure they'll come up with something. Here's to your survival."
They toasted, before Gareth suddenly laughed.
"I just realised. First Lyre, now you, next thing you know I'll be taking bullets or getting burned faces."
Kay
"Faces? Plural?"
Plasmarobo:
--Narration--
The Bloody day was coming to a close.
After the carnage at the race, the festival was very subdued. Most people felt unsafe in the streets and the presence of the guard was heavily felt around the city. Plasma had been dragged into the Guard Office for questioning. He emerged back onto the street of Cathedral much the worse for wear. The report of two Flakfish missing had compounded the problem severely. The millita had been severely crippled, from within no less, and nobody had any answers.
He kicks a loose rock, sending it tumbling out along the cobblestone in front of him and heads back to the inn.
--Wilds Winds Inn--
Plasma looks over the familiar faces and sighs. He nods and offers empty words of encouragement or solace all the while making his way up to the bar. He leans over it, speaking some quiet words to Emily which cause her to frown and shake her head. Plasma seems to accept this and pushes himself back from the bar, heading up stairs to the rooms. Emily suddenly seems no longer quite focused on her work.
Gareth and company enjoy a somewhat subdued drink, loss rippling around them like the eye of a hurricane. It's mitigated somewhat by the joy of watching the dead come back to life, but others have faced real loss this night.
Courage and Lorena are eventually picked up by a guard patrol, and find their way back to the inn as well. Nobody is quite sure what to make of the two entering together, but they part ways politely at the threshold, glaring at their respective friends.
Somewhere in the night a stolen Goldfish floats out from Cathedral. A few baffled engineers aboard her critically examine a small cache of experimental engines, the obtaining of which cost a few more fine men their lives this night. In the morning, another guard craft and a junk transport would be reported missing. The man sets aside his Birdmask, smiling in a most nasty way at a bottle of rather expensive wine.
Birdman
"To a job well done."
And somewhere, an man in a Dune tractor putts through the lowlands surrounding the city, humming a wordless tune to himself.
--End Narration--
--End of Day 6--
--Start of Day 7, Cathedral, Spring--
--Narration--
The rocket race looms over the next day. Many of the trappings of the festival are already gone, with the more elaborate booths and arena's still being torn down. The guard is carefully searching all traffic in and out of the city, but everyone knows how futile this is. The searches become more and more halfhearted as the morning grows late.
The city is quite resilient, and the council is doing all in their power to bring justice to those responsible, but there is only so much they can do. The trade through the city may falter a bit at first, but the stimulus of the festival would make up for it. Meanwhile the Birdman had left the city, at least for a time, and the rest of the world seemed content to keep itself to itself for the moment.
--End Narration--
Plasma yawns as he steps into the bar. The normally small morning crowd seems a bit smaller today. He grants those he knows a quick smile, and then vaults over the Wild Winds Trading and Acquisitions counter. Flicking through a stack of papers, he updates the bounty board, including a bounty for the capture of those responsible for the rocket race fiasco. Additionally, he puts up a propaganda poster for the Cathedral Militia. Apparently new members are sought.
He sighs, steeling himself for the day ahead.
Plasma
"Morning gents. New jobs posted, should you be in need of coin!"
BdrLineAzn:
--Wild Winds Inn--
After the return ride back to the Inn, both Tommy and Charles have many questions to ask BdrLine about this 'Birdmen' and the connections between them. Tired, he says to them that everything will be explained in the morning and when Courage returns. Dawn of the next day, BdrLine wakes up in his room groggy eyed. After getting dressed and heading down for breakfast, he sees Plasma and nods to him. Finding a table, Emily takes his order and leaves to make it. Coming down, the other three, Courage returning later in the night, sees BdrLine and sits at his table.
Tommy
"Ok, Bdr, who are the Birdmen?"
BdrLine
*sigh* "The 'Birdman', as Charles and Tommy already know, an old Pre-War group that came out of what is now the Empire. They are set out for world domination and will do anything to get to it."
Charles
"Anything? Like yesterday... with the shooting...and that light...Why am I not surprised."
BdrLine
"That is not even close to what they are capable of. Remember that Guild force that came in and all of those abominations running around?"
Courage
"I can't forget that, they weren't even close to human."
Charles
"Easily killed a lot of good men, wait you mean to say they did that?'
BdrLine
"Yup, myself and the others faced even more deadly ones back at Lu Tower."
Tommy
"May I ask, who are the others?"
BdrLine
"Lets see, it was was me, *whisper to them closely* Yiski, Zill and Jun'ko, *back to normal voice* my sister and Roland. Who else, ah, Papa Paradox and Shink, finally i think Sunderland and Spoon."
Amazed at the list of names, the lot didn't realized that many people they knew were involved with this.
Tommy
"How come you didn't tell us?"
BdrLine
*sighing* "I don't want to relive those memorys again. Plus after what we did at Lu, we all thought they were gone for good. Guess not after yesterday's incident."
As they were talking, Emily brings in the plates of food BdrLine order and places it in front of them. As they are eating, Tommy looks at BdrLine
"Well I think they got the guys from yesterday, maybe we can see if we can interrogate them."
BdrLine
"Hmm, alright, let me ask Plasma."
BdrLine gets up from his seat and goes over to the board where Plasma is at.
"Hey Plasma, can I ask something...."
He trails off as he sees a new bounty notice and reads the paper. Going wide eyes, he turns back to him.
"Don't tell me they got away."
Gryphos:
--Wild Winds Inn--
Gareth came down the steps and, with him, Lyre, using Gareth for support. They eventually hobbled over to a table and Gareth sat her down, before taking his own seat.
Gareth
"You know, didn't the doctor say you should wait at least another day before leaving that bed?"
Lyre
"Yeah, but screw him."
Gareth
"Your funeral."
Just then Michael, with his half burned face came through the door and towards their table. Lyre stared at him.
Lyre
"Uh, what happened to your face?"
Michael joked around.
Michael
"Oh, is it noticeable?"
Lyre
"Half your face is missing."
Michael
"I guess so, that would explain the funny looks I got on the way here."
Lyre continued to look at him expectantly.
"Oh, it was a racing accident."
Lyre
"What happened?"
Michael
"I learned the consequences of packing rockets on a squid and burning moonshine."
Gareth chuckled before addressing Lyre.
Gareth
"In fact we were joking yesterday about how I'm next in line for an injury."
Lyre
"Yeah well, 'the universe has a way' and all that."
Piemanlives:
--Warehouse, South Docks--
The crew gathered for a late breakfast, the captain was still out for the count. According to the doctor the worst has passed but they shouldn't move him from the inn, just in case something happened. Still the events of last night still lingered in the minds of the entire city, and by extension, them too.
Travis
"Exactly what are we supposed to do now?"
Richard
"Exactly as we have been doing, we're heading out to salvage something."
He pulled out a map of Burren, it was quite large to say at least but they still had room for their food.
Richard
"The captain wouldn't want us to worry about him, so we're going to get busy."
He rotated the map and pointed to a section on it. It was an area of high cliffs and deep canyons.
Richard
"According to what I've gathered, there are several facilities located here, their purpose or why they're there is somewhat of a mystery. However that shouldn't dissuade us from checking it out anyway, who knows what we can dig up there."
He then pointed to another location, this one closer to the first. This one was more a mountainous region, it was possible several valleys would dot the landscape around it.
Richard
"If the first area should either prove dry or there are only a few things of interest, we'll head to this location, this one is some sort of facility as well, however it is more of an obvious tech facility, we should be able to find something there should we look."
He took out several yards of string and several pins, marking several different colored routes to and from each location.
Richard
"These are the possible ways into and out of each location, for the canyon facility I would like to take this route here."
He traced the yellow route from Cathedral the canyon, it seemed safe enough. He then traced three more routes, a green one from the canyon to the mountain facility, a blue one from the canyon back to Cathedral, and an orange one from the mountain to Cathedral, several hand flew up, obviously wanting to ask questions.
Richard
"Alright, ask them."
Travis spoke up first.
Travis
"Why are taking this yellow one? why not this dark green one here-"
His finger stopped when he realized what he was pointing at.
Travis
"Oh, right, never mind."
Richard
"Any other questions?"
Lorena
"I was thinking we could rig some sort of carrying pad for the small craft, we could build one and then one of the craft we have as a scouting vessel, I think yours would be best seeing as it has a balloon inside of it just in case you need to stop."
Richard
"That will have to wait until after this mission, though that is a good idea."
Dalhia
"What kind of weapons should we be taking?"
Richard
"The usual, front howitzer, Side artemis missiles and mortars."
Reynold
"Should we take any provisions?"
Richard
"Yes, we might not make it back till the morning tomorrow, so pack lots of dried meats and anything else that won't rot. Now to the ship, is it ready to fly?"
Preston
"The ship is in prime condition to fly when you need it sir."
Richard
"Good, we set out in two hours, get cracking people."
The crew finished their breakfast and went about their duties, they were back in business, and they knew it."
--Wild Winds--
Alex was still out of it, yet his mind was still working, pulling out painful memories from the past. Even if he didn't know it, he didn't like what was coming up.
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version