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#2 - THE TWISTED HEIST
A star had just gone out in the distance, sending its entire system, planets and moons, into oblivion. So, what was a simple life compared to a sun? Did the human existence that earthlings highly cherished in the past deserve so much fuss?
I would say no, of course, because I’m a cat. Our condition to us felines will never have to pale in front of a shiny astronomical object. Mine specifically, don’t you think?
Oswald Avery was merely a Homo sapiens. A retired buccaneer, fermenting his adulterated wine on the carcass of a drifting supercargo; all under the remodeled features of a former Galactic Trade Company’s pilot. Alas, regardless of the genetic disguise, the FID rarely lied. It hadn’t fooled us and the masks had fallen off. Just like him.
I’m such a poet.
Anyway… Avery had had a long life of crimes and adventures. He was full of energy in his youth. And as in the universe, nothing is lost, nothing is created, everything is transformed, this energy was reincarnated in a nice amount in our bank account once the old picaroon flatlined.
“We finally got it! And it was a traditional Martian contract. Payable remotely, on condition that the FID is validated. How about that?”
“God… Lee … you’re talking to yourself and it’s only 8 a.m.,” Ali grunted behind me.
My couch potato of an associate had her head still stuck in the cereal box she was nibbling before falling asleep binge-watching Captain Caveman on ABC.
“To begin with, it’s 8 p.m., Martian Time. And we do have a positive balance in our bank account for the first time in months! Do you know what that means, partner?”
“Shopping, bitches!” she shouted as she hurled herself into the void, gliding to the bathroom in the weightlessness.
With the cardboard box on the top of her head, this sugar bishop was swimming after the remnant cereals that floated on her path like Ms. Pac-Man.
“Hell! Have I just opened Pandora’s box?”
The liner Danaë and its forty-eight post-nuclear Baltimore-XVIII heavy reactors made its annual cruise from Lunapolis to the suburbs of Ceres, in the belt. Its figurehead with the effigy of the Greek princess was a two hundred meters long, green ceramic statue. The size of the ship exceeded some inhabited asteroids’ diameter so it possessed its own substantial gravitational field.
“It’s quite a symbol of the decline of humanity,” I said to Ali, pointing with my chin at this unique work of art.
“Why?” my partner asked without caring whatsoever. “Spill the beans, Plato.”
The Kitty had obtained permission to dock and began its approach. I concluded then:
“Humanity no longer erects great and beautiful things without turning them into a shopping mall.”
The gold and ivory Danaë was one of the most luxurious epicenters of human decadence in the system; comprising hotels, casinos, megastores and amusement parks spread over a dozen centrifugal rings. There was something for everyone’s wallet, ready to be emptied, whether one was welcomed at the port or had joined during the crossing.
And to my great regret, the cape of the Danaë was just passing by us that week.
“I believe we should keep our savings for the maintenance of the Swallow. The dashboard lights up like a Christmas tree. Some parts need to be changed…”
“You’re such a bore with your adult talks,” my partner said as she left the fitting room of a luxury chain overlooking the main deck. “What do you think of that? Sexy as fuck, right?”
Her camisole didn’t hide a single inch square of flesh and I subtly pointed it out to her:
“It’s a bit of a back-alley Sally.”
I took a blow on the nose which, this time, was amply justified.
“There’s nothing chicer than Borderline. You don’t know anything about fashion. It’s crazy!”
She was furious. It was entertaining. But she was right. The human female fads were way over my head and I wasn’t a good adviser. Mostly because I didn’t care. At all.
Fortunately, the upscale shopping mall where we were staying had provided us with a free assistant who was even more servile than a decerebrate canine. As usual, the robot carrier that accompanied us did the job by flattering her with its unbearable honeyed tone:
“I find you charming, Madame. Here we have the latest fashionable lingerie on Mars. It’s an ephemeral collection that appears to have been specially made to mold your discreet curves, which seem to have been sculpted by the seraphim.”
Ali gave me a satisfied look that I pretended to ignore. Then she backtracked into the fitting room to put her black suit and pink jacket back on.
I took the opportunity to climb on the shoulders of this silly robot, servant of our servants and last link in this hierarchy whose origins go back to Ancient Egypt.
“One more move like this and I’ll turn you into a gum dispenser.”
The automaton apologized before my partner’s head emerged from behind the silk curtains which were far too fragrant for my taste.
“I just checked; it’s too expensive anyway. I ain’t buying it,” she announced. “Can you order a taxicab to take us to the hotels’ ring? You’d be a sweetheart.”
Happy to leave this irascible human with her robotic slave, I proceeded to the nearest service terminal. By the time I requested a vehicle, a flying cigarette dispenser could light me a Lucky.
“It’s forbidden to smoke in our store, Monsieur.”
The customer attaché, in his blue silk suit with elephant legs, had appeared out of nowhere. Yet, with such a shiny tie, this punk should have dazzled me from the Kuiper belt.
“Please be kind and get me a Pepper Coke instead of ruining my eyesight…” I grumbled in response.
I was in an awful mood. I definitely hated shopping. And people. Yet the pedestrian avenues of the Danaë had a very exceptional population density. Perms were making a strong comeback, as were neon tattoos and overly open flowered shirts. Under the false UVA/B sun, it was a true dance of flesh, steel and plastic bodies with assumed nudity. Implants and surgery erased the hazards of the genetic lottery for better or worse. It was so superficial. So futile. So human.
“Hello, handsome!” Ali cried out, a large smile across her face. “Lee? You didn’t tell me you knew Christophe Lambert! You know I'm a huge Highlander fan!”
My partner had just joined me, arms loaded with bags massive enough to live in it, start a family and park my chromic Pontiac Firebird. All were filled with C$400 t-shirts and sneakers that she didn’t need and would only put on once.
“No smell. Hologram,” I conclude by throwing my cigarette butt through the smiling ghost.
“Shame!” Ali sighed.
She then looked at her terminal, and continued:
“Do you think I have time to grab a watch module? There are sales in the Japanese aisle! I saw some GD-8 that would go well with my new Game Pocket! This boat is fucking rad!”
Ali could not stop humming Who wants to live forever. I had to rub my temples to avoid a migraine before the arrival of our taxicab five minutes later.
These were miniature limousines with double fake leather benches, facing each other at the back. There was a minibar with expensive multicolored drinks and sugar-soaked snacks, the sapiens’ primary source of calories and high Gs space travel drug. For the sensitive, the smart-fridge provided diet sodas with aspartame, but no one took it. Finally, there were free Gauloise cigarettes next to the ashtray on the armrest. And even Tylenol!
“What a time to be alive!”
Right after leaving the fashion district, a soft voice of a young woman, who appeared to us through the armored porthole separating her from her customers, finally emerged from the cockpit:
“Good evening! I’m Miss Meera. At your service. Hotel de Saint-Malo, correct?”
I nodded. She smiled at us. She was beautiful with her incredibly dark night metal skin that contrasted strongly with her silvery-white hair. She also had charming ivory eyes with absolutely no reflection. They were a mesmerizing void of light.
In fact, it was so rare to deal with a real person, and not an AI, that we engaged rapidly in a lovely and honest discussion with Meera. We were mostly talking about life on the Danaë. As she stated, the rules on board were very strict, even military. All was done to make sure that the customer had the most pleasant time at the expense of everything else. Finally, according to her, her condition wasn’t the most to be pitied in the cosmos. And she was fully satisfied with this precarious semi-nomadic existence.
“And what about you? Are you here on vacation or in transit for work?” she eventually asked. “What do you do for a living?”
Should we have told her that we were executing infamous people so Ali would collect expensive t-shirts and I could fulfill my nicotine addiction?
“Don’t get me wrong but I saw that you had a gun. Are you in the police… or are you pirates?”
It wasn’t the first time someone asked us this question. Although weapons were allowed on most ships and stations, it wasn’t wise to display them unless you were looking for trouble. Unfortunately, hiding such a large caliber under such a tight vest was a Herculean task.
“You can get much farther with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone”, simply quoted Ali, her forehead against the window covered with scented stickers.
Meera laughed before continuing:
“Very well, Al Capone. I understand that you’re not the type to let yourself be taken advantage of.”
The taxicab entered the central expressway after the water park then suddenly swerved violently to the left.
“What is going on?” I gasped.
After crushing the safety railing, we fell from one rotating bridge to the other in a frantic cavalcade. Judging by Meera’s swear words, this ride wasn’t part of the show.
Avoiding the stalls of an art market and a group of children coming out of an arcade, the driver finally managed to recover in extremis. It was about time, because within seconds we were passing through the transparent protective wall of the hotels’ deck.
“A thousand apologies! Another one of those mor… clients from the Middle System who doesn’t know how to use a rental car,” she shouted through the window. “Are you guys hurt?”
“No, thanks to you,” I replied, my tail spiked over my head, taped to Ali’s neck now decorated with bloody scratches.
Although my human forehead now had a bump on it the size of a golf ball, it was true that Meera had just saved our lives. This young girl had unsuspected driving talents despite taxicabs’ lack of handling. She didn’t belong here, playing the steward in a yellow circus uniform. This woman should have been a fighter pilot; or a NASCAR driver on Canyon Creek.
“In any case, here you’re almost in front of your hotel,” she replied. “You don’t have to pay anything, and I apologize again for the scare.”
From the outside, the taxicab now looked like a can of nutrigel after going through a crusher. Yet, it still worked. May God Darwin bless Venusian steel.
After thanking her, we wished Meera a good day. But the cockpit window suddenly went down on the passenger side. The smile of the driver had faded. She had tears at the corner of her white eyes.
“Wait!” she asked. “This weapon… do you really know how to use it?”
So, life on the Danaë wasn’t so sweet. As Meera explained to us in a secluded alleyway, a trio of criminals had come to threaten her a few days earlier, after finding she was a bodacious driver. They were preparing a heist in one of the flying city’s fifty casinos. The young woman was now ready to pay the price to settle the case.
“What is your opinion about this whole situation?” I asked Ali, once in our room, a small yet cozy suite whose glass walls overlooked the vacuum of space.
My human had applied a brownish ointment on her hump, which disappeared soon after, leaving only a slight pinkish hematoma.
“Meera said she would provide us with more details tomorrow. However, if she ponies up the cash, I don’t see why we would refuse. We ain’t mercs but these three guys must have a bounty on their heads. Let’s do our job, right?
“Indeed…”
All we had to do was wait for more instructions. Fortunately, it had been months since we had been able to take days off except on miserable gas stations full of drug addicts, implants scavengers and prostitutes.
After another morning of shopping, Ali went to the thalassotherapy center of the neighboring hotel. Her main occupation? Overeating sushi made by 3D nutrigel printing while getting massages.
Alas, I didn’t have the time to bask under the false sun of the lakeside resort and get my belly stroked. As a good captain, I had to go to the maintenance to fix the numerous damages of the Kitty. As always, the bill would be higher than expected.
Everything was orchestrated so that we would never hold a positive balance in this corrupted system. We had to chain contract after contract.
But Meera’s gig didn’t sound right. There was something I didn’t like and I couldn’t catch it yet. All my cat sensors were in the red. Unfortunately, the bounty hunter’s ones only saw the green of the bills.
Don’t judge me.
The young taxicab driver had finally contacted Ali again by holoconference in the early afternoon, shortly before I joined her at the exit of the tanning booths. Or as I called them: human toasters.
“Have you finished roasting like a Thanksgiving turkey?” I asked her as she plunged into the icy water of the adjacent basin, under the lustful gaze of a group of cadets from the Marine Academy.
“Meera will pick us up with a new taxicab in the hotel parking lot,” she whispered once back to me. “Alongside her, we will meet two of the criminals at the burglary location, shortly before midnight.”
“Go on.”
“We take care of these guys and we catch up with the last one: the band leader, in the storage cavities of the hangar reserved for the ship’s logistics. Below the last rotating ring.”
In Eve’s costume, Ali came out of the basin, not without deliberately drenching me. The water had a nasty chemical taste from being filtered day after day.
“Do you have any intelligence on these jokers?” I insisted while lighting a cigarette.
“The Broadway Gang. Three brothers. C$45,000 for the trio. We will also be able to recover at least C$10,000 of Techno-federal tax on their ship depending on its condition. Easy cash with the dollar credits that Meera promises us…”
Now sitting on the ledge, my partner splashed her feet to demonstrate her eagerness to head back swimming.
“Excellent! This will pay for the maintenance and allow us to save some money on our way to the belt.”
“Can I go now?” she asked, sliding back into the water.
“You may,” I had concluded before seeing her leave for her absurd wanderings that would fill her afternoon.
I myself was very busy making eyes at the wealthy guests of the hotel restaurant to glean a few pieces of Peking duck or juicy crabs. They were real farm animals from Mars. Not nutrigel. It was worth abandoning a little dignity aside.
With a full belly, I finally joined Ali in the middle of the evening. Arriving in the corridor of our suite, I crossed the group of cadets noticed near the swimming pool. They seemed tired but blissfully smiling as they just discovered the nirvana. And I knew why…
“Ali? Are you ready?” I said as I walked through the half-open bedroom door.
Her dressing gown had been thrown on the floor. Her gun and badge were resting on the bedside table against a giant bottle of Koala Springs soda and a pyramid of little Yoyo Mints.
To be honest, I expected a bigger mess.
“Gimme five minutes,” she replied while in the shower.
An hour later, we met Meera in the staff parking lot behind the recycling stations. Without further discussion, we joined the expressway in the taxicab. Between two noisy info-ads, the radio played Sweet Transvestite then the rest of the mythical Rocky Horror soundtrack.
“I wonder what Tim Curry’s up to these days,” asked Ali while browsing the intraweb on her implant.
“Being legendary as usual,” I answered.
Afterwards, the casino was in sight. But once on the forecourt illuminated by the gold and silver bulbs, we heard gunshots and screams. My partner and I quickly realized that this was a violent robbery rather than a modest heist.
“What the fuck, Meera?” Ali asked, turning to the porthole that separated us from the cockpit.
There was a hint of irritation in her voice.
Meera remained mute, her hands on the wheel and her gaze forward. In the rear-view mirror the young woman looked panicked.
The right door of the vehicle suddenly opened and two men sat down in front of us. They were wearing theater masks: the first was Melpomene, the sad grimace of tragedy; the second, Thalia, the twisted smile of comedy. Each brigand carried a huge metal block under his arm; drawers that were sure to be full of cash. On the other hand, they held their still smoking ZeG-4 machine guns even more firmly.
When they saw us, they both gasped, in unison:
“What the fuck, Meera?”
One… two. One… two.
Four holes in their faded tuxedo. Four bullets as big as a cat’s eye that silenced them forever, before slowly repainting the bench in red.
“What the fuck was that? You killed them!” Meera shouted this time, as she started the electric engine. “You had tasers at your disposal, you psychos!”
She had finally turned around. Her voice was quivering. She was no longer panicked, but angry.
The tasers must have slipped between the seats because I hadn’t seen them. My partner raised her eyebrows and it made me realize that their use had never been in mind.
“We’re bounty hunters, not 9 to 5 social workers!” continued Ali. “Now, you gotta motor, otherwise the cops will shoot our ass on the spot before we could even meet the third dude!”
Meera put her foot on the pedal and one could almost hear the noise of the thrusters melting the white asphalt.
“I can perceive the sirens, Ali,” I concluded before Meera entered the ring's external road reserved for logistic transport.
We then had the shortest car chase we had taken part in. The Danaë security forces may not have had the best elements in the system, but Meera’s talents didn’t give them a chance. We had crossed half a dozen rotative bridges to the rhythm of Take on Me, zigzagging between expressways and maintenance tunnels to arrive before the song ended at the deserted logistics hangar.
It was similar to a huge supermarket with honeycombed shelves. Each of these garages, dimly illuminated by red LEDs, housed a delivery or transport vessel. There was the most impressive fleet I had ever seen.
In one of the first level’s cells stood, between a set of clamps, a Swift-0 scout, from Peugeot Corp, with wings spread. The Swifts were small and very high-end single-seaters. They could be modified to integrate weapons systems, but their primary characteristics were velocity and evasion.
Leaning on the flank of the mono-turbine, the last of the three criminals, a tall blond man with a “Chevy Chase” prominent chin was looking down on the approaching taxicab.
“Were they planning to escape on that ship? The three of them?” I remarked when the vehicle stopped a few meters from the small vessel.
But Meera ignored me.
“Hand me the money, I’m going out. That was the agreement.”
The porthole opened at its base, allowing us to pass the steel cash drawers. Once the taxicab’s ignition was turned off, only their holographic numbers glowed in the dark.
“It’s all over if his cronies don’t stick their noses out of the car,” Ali replied, finally giving the second drawer away. “He’s going to figure out that it went south. He will kill you!”
Outside, the man was getting impatient. Blinded by the taxicab’s headlights, he came closer before exclaiming:
“Zéphyr, are you there? Where are my brothers? Security is closing all the departure modules. We will be stuck here, for fuck’s sake!”
He now had a gun in his hand. A machine gun identical to those of his companions currently bathed in their blood, nailed to the seats.
“Zéphyr? Wait… I know that name!” I meowed to myself.
The doors and portholes of the taxicab were locked. Ali and I were now stuck in the back with the two flatlined and most wanted criminals on the ship.
“Sorry guys, but I’ll handle the rest.”
Miss Meera, alias Zéphyr, smiled at us through the armored glass just before leaving the cockpit by the driver’s door.
“What a fucking piece of shit… Lee? Do you have a plan? I think the windows are bulletproof. I don’t feel like testing. Especially if it’s bouncing around with us inside, we will be turned into ground beef!”
“Did you forget who I am, my dear?”
I was already crawling under the seat, between a pair of Méduse shoes and half nibbled fried rat wings. It was time to demonstrate all my infiltration skills learned from Ninja Gaiden. Unfortunately, both the crab and the duck slowed me down and my belly remained for a few seconds stuck under the driver’s seat with my head on the brake pedal. How outrageous!
From the porthole, I saw Ali watching what was happening in front of us, near the ship. Our eyes met for a brief moment and I could read on her lips: “diet kibble”.
“Better off dead!” I shouted.
My paw reached the bottom of the dashboard, activating the mechanical opening of doors and windows. And, accidentally, the loudest horn in this dimension.
“My bad!”
My sapiens immediately jumped outside, pointing her gun to Zéphyr. Surprised by the thunderous din, her target pivoted towards us, uncovered, turning her back to the human with the magnificent chin and his ZeG-4 who yelled:
“What in the whole universe is that? Wait! I know her! Did you bring us bounty hunters? You were clearly planning to double-cross us!”
The man shouted and his gun produced a rain of bullets. It first hit the windshield of the taxicab, passing through the conductor compartment where I was. The rounds bent the windscreen, but it held. This wasn’t, however, the case for the hood, protecting the engine and the reservoir full of coolant, which ended up covering the seat and my face.
Fortunately, the sticky alcohol allowed me to escape from this trap and jump out of the vehicle through the window I had previously opened. But, once again, a fire ring enveloped the ZeG-4’s cannon.
“This is how I die…” I meowed, eyes closed.
I was violently tackled and hit the ground. Zéphyr had saved me at the last moment, just before bullets obliterated the front of the taxicab.
Other projectiles ricocheted off the metal money drawers on the floor and got lost in the ceiling, activating the fire sprinklers. This incident triggered a silent light alarm throughout the hangar while the mobster prepared a new salvo.
“Don’t hurt my pilot, you narbo!” roared my partner.
Ali, this time taken as a target, retaliated. She fired a single shot towards the rascal with a formidable precision. No one knew how to handle such a heavy gun as she did. She was my human. She was the best in her field: murder.
And I taught her everything. Almost.
The leader of the robbers tried to reload the magazine of his weapon, unaware that his heart had been punctured a few seconds before. Adrenaline was doing its job. But the blood loss caused by the explosion of the aorta at its base, near the ventricles, gradually stopped him in his gesture. His pressure dropped and the bloodstream no longer reached the brain sufficiently. He was already in a coma when his shoulders touched the ground. He was luckier than the average Joe and died a few seconds later.
“Is everything all right?”
My voice was trembling, still in shock from this disaster. I was wet and frozen.
Zéphyr got up with difficulty. Next to us, one of the metal drawers was opened, revealing a bunch of green bills and a much stranger booty: an eight-inch gold diskette with suspicious Chinese symbols.
Well… I couldn’t read them but Chinese symbols on stuff are always suspect, aren’t they?
But there were more important matters. Because my partner, on the other hand, stayed on the ground. Blood was dripping from her black suit and mixed with the clear firefighting fluid that was falling like an endless rain.
I tried to talk to her again but my voice was lost in a groan.
“Why are you whining, you big baby? It’s just blood.”
With her nose in a puddle, my sapiens smiled at me. Her left hand was compressing her abdomen. The bullet had passed through the external oblique muscle, far from the stomach.
It wasn’t that bad after all but she had scared me. And that deserved a scratch on the wrist that made her scream:
“What the fuck?”
“And the medical expenses? Have you thought about medical expenses? We don’t have insurance!”
“God, Uncle Scrooge! I hate you!”
“We won’t be able to fix the Kitty with your heroic outbursts!” I fulminated to mask my joy of seeing her in one piece.
“I will kill you, Muppet! I almost died! I don’t give a fuck about your rusty trash can which flies like a brick!”
It was true that we hadn’t had a fight for a long time.
“Guys…” intervened Zéphyr.
“What?”
Ali and I had spoken together.
“These three ruffians had planned to steal the diskette drive from me once I got back. I needed a hand, so… thank you… I guess.”
“You’re welcome,” my human answered dryly while sitting.
Although Zéphyr saved me, I didn’t share the same kindness:
“Wait, we’re not letting him go! Do you know who he is?”
Zéphyr. Prince of thieves. And yes, he wasn’t much of a princess either. Just an androgynous cyborg. A breakout king wanted throughout the entire system for his affiliation with the Data Brokers’ Guild. With an incredible bounty of C$800,000, she or he… whatever… was the knight of the brokers’ chessboard.
“I think we’ve had enough for today,” Ali said. “Unless you hope to go after him with these big fat guts of yours.”
“By the 79 moons of Jupiter, you shall pay for this, woman!” I meowed, angry.
My ears were backwards and my hairs were spiky. But soaking wet, it just made Ali and Zéphyr laugh.
Disgrace!
“He’s so cute when he’s furious,” he joked.
Now on his knees, the night-skinned androgynous was blotting Ali’s wound with a torn piece of fabric from his driver’s uniform.
“But more seriously, I need to go. With the bounty, you’ll be able to repair your vessel. As for the hospital fees, I will contact a good friend who will take care of you for free. She’s the ship’s chief medical officer.”
“Thank you,” I simply replied as he helped my partner get back on her feet.
“It’s the least I can do. I wasn’t interested in money. More important information is contained in this,” he said as he was picking up the floppy disk.
This golden diskette must have been worth a lot of cash for Zéphyr to play a taxicab driver to ensure coverage. I had perceived that something was fishy!
Then, halfway to his Swift-0, Zéphyr stopped. I witnessed his hesitation.
“There was nothing personal, you know. We’re all just trying to make our way. The best we can…”
And he ultimately left before adding:
“Maybe we’ll see each other again! You seem like fun.”
Before fleeing away, Zéphyr abandoned one of the boxes near the criminal’s corpse. Thus, he validated the theory of a robbery that had gone wrong. When the security arrived a few minutes later, we were the heroes of the day. And with a little bribe, nobody cared about Zéphyr’s missing ship.
This whole story surely left us a bitter taste. A feeling of defeat and humiliation that the swimming pool under the synthetic sun couldn’t make disappear even a week after.
“He undoubtedly played us as we were rookies, with his little face of a young innocent girl in distress,” I said to Ali right after the end of the daily Brett Maverick.
This old show was dispensed on a couple of giant screens suspended by drones.
Until now, Ali had remained silent on her deckchair; with a brick of sour juice stuck between her breasts and a pair of straws between her teeth. Only inaudible grunts emanated from her mouth since the departure of the sexually unclassifiable mugger.
“I wonder what information this fucking cyber-Tootsie could have been looking for in that casino,” my human mumbled as she squeaked her rainbow flip-flops.
“Admit that it’s not really that question that puts you in such a state…” I answered, now well installed on my motorized buoy that I had gotten as a gift in a diet kibbles package.
“You bet! I will have a nasty tan mark on my stomach with these bandages!” she exploded, spitting out her plastic straws with infinite curls.
My float slipped towards the ledge as a robot came to bring us our next glucose overdose.
Ali finally added:
“I swear that if we run into him again, I’ll smack his fucking angel face.”
Back to business! submitted by So the last 2 weeks have been fucking AMAZING compared to the previous 4, and I have actually been spending more time on the road at a clip and making money hand over fist. 79 ratings last week, all 5 stars with a compliment "Awesome driver!". I'm feeling good as hell and today's no different.
Until I got in the car at 0435 and the interior lights wouldn't go off. Dash says there's a door open, mine. I open and close it. Still telling me the door is open. Ok, so I kill the interior lights and live with the dash telling me it's open, right? Right. I put the car in gear, crank the wheel and let off the brake, press the gas..... HOLY FUCKING HELL WHAT IS THAT EAR PIERCING NOISE!?!?!?
Yep. Door ajar. Dash is flashing red like I just won at the casino and alarms are going off. Oh, and throw a new "Check Engine" light into the mix! I slowly back up the 3 inches I lurched forward before slamming on the brakes and sloshing the coffee from my mug all over the center console and shifter. (Black with a touch of raw sugar, for those wondering) I go back upstairs, lay back in bed and wait for 7, then drive to the dealer. Alarms blaring, dash flashing, my road rage at an all-time high at nobody's own doing, I'm not even a full cup of coffee into the day and I have a fucking car screaming "Hey dumbass, your door is open!" This machine telling me that -I- am in the wrong when clearly a part of it's central fucking nervous system has decided to quit. I can't even describe the sound. It's worse than that Dumb and Dumber scene "Most annoying sound in the world". It's 10. Long. Fucking. Miles. 10 miles to the nearest dealership.
Of course the whole ride there, to add to my new found hate fire, I KNOW that the car is going to spend at least the day, if not the weekend at the dealership and there's nothing I can do about it. I arrive 30 minutes later, I hit the Dunkin next door because I know there will be no coffee in the waiting room, because fuck Covid. I need a coffee before I get told my week is finished. I pull in the garage and get waved in by an advisor who takes down the info he needs, then we go in and he says that there's no way he can look at it until this afternoon. I plead with him to at least get me a prognosis by early afternoon so I can see what I can do about an alternate with the hub.
A couple issues here- The hub has no phone number, e-mail, nothing. You go in you get seen. Or you can set an appt through the app. I wait and wait, finally at 3:59 this cat calls me and says "door handle, sensor and latch have all gone bad, known issue, but the best I can do is Tuesday"
/week.
By the time I figured out you can only go into the hub, and can't get them to contact you through the app (BTW, wtf happened to Lyft customer service? They used to be so amazing!) and all they do is throw a bunch of copy+paste responses that basically say "Fuck off somewhere with this bullshit". I decide to Uber or Lyft to the hub... Lyft- $51 to go less than 5 miles. Uber- No drivers, $44 if there were. Finally get a ride at $33. 19 minutes away, arrival time? 5:08. Ok, maybe I'll get lucky and someone will still be there on a Friday at 5:08 that kicks off a three-day weekend for all of them? I better have a lucky horse shoe up my ass, amirite?
Driver cancels. No. Cars. Available. Lyft? LOLFOURTYFUCKINNINEDOLLARSTOGO4MILESNOWONDERMYPASSNEGERSDON'TTIP! But I still bite on it. Lose fifty bucks but have a chance to make $500? I like to think I take solid bets. But this driver is 14 minutes out. I lost 5 minutes, but still end up there at around the same time. Can you guess where I live though? Right off the expressway. The problem is that the expressway section where I live is notoriously fucked at all times of the day. Nobody, including me, wants to be around this area ferrying people around. And the area I'm going to? If they did the math right like I have learned to, they knew they were going to the badlands. Another place most drivers don't really like fucking around in.
Driver cancels, next driver 19 minutes out.
I mean on the bright side, it's their car. It's a warranty and/or recall/rapid response issue that is apparently known about, now I am just going to hope that they help me out a little with the rental for 3 days. (lol I know)
So uh, yeah.
submitted by https://www.reddit.com/dndstories/comments/kc5k4p/the_crashed_tower_of_the_late_zephyros_skt/ - Previously our heroes found Zephyros' tower crashed in the wilderness and a bunch of stone creatures were attempting to burn all his notes; among them was a Large Dragon also made of stone but also possessed a regular Dragon's lightning breath. After crumbling all their enemies to rubble the party gathers up as much of their late Cloud Giant friend's notes as they could and put a full day's travel between them and the tower in case any other statue-like minions showed up to finish the job. .
The cast of DnD Comrades.
- Ransom - Tiefling Cleric of Thor.
- Paxton Hightower - Human Wizard.
- Otto Norona - Gnome Rogue/Fighter.
- Creedun Grungerock - Dwarven Bard.
- Sir Oswald Pinkerton - Human Paladin/Warlock.
.
Paxton spends a good part of the evening using a Language-Comprehension spell to pour over Zephyros' journal and other loose pages. He finds pages of recipes, philosophical musings, and several pages relevant to their previous experience together, along with where he went after he dropped them off in Triboar.
- 1st Page - "I picked up a group of Adventurers yesterday and am giving them a lift to their destination: Triboar. Nice bunch, not nearly as rowdy or treasure-grabby as some Adventuring groups. I especially liked that extra-small-folk with the eyepatch - Otto was his name. He got way to high off some of my less-potent pipe grass and... (at this point Paxton stopped reading to the group as he realized Otto still doesn't know what he did when he was blackout stoned).
- 2nd Page - "A Storm Giant Herald named Iymrith, from the court of Maelstrom visited me yesterday. She was quite condescnding to my guests, but it didn't feel right correcting a Storm Giant - Ordning or no Ordning. Iymrith claimed the Lords' Alliance murdered Queen Neri, and when King Hekaton went to confront them he went missing. Iymrith also added that Hekaton's youngest daughter sits on the throne, but that her inexperience is throwing the court into chaos and weakening the Storm Giants' Influence.
- 3rd Page - "That thing the Storm Giant Herald told me last week has been weighing heavily on my mind. If the Lords' Alliance is truly behind Neri's death and Hekaton's disappearance, might they also be responsible for the Ordning breaking in the first place? I will finally make my pilgrimage to the 'Eye of the All-Father' to seek answers for myself."
- 4th Page - "This temple is much more magnificent that I'd imagined; our ancestors were the pinnacle of Giant-kind to have made all this. The bad news is that it's about as cold as one would expect this far North. On the other hand, for some good news: I finally formulated some pipe-grass with the right potency for myself but now I'm TOO high - I grabbed the wrong weapon and stumbled off with it, hahahahahahaHahaha. Did I really just take the time to write out 'haha?' Oh man..."
- 5th Page - "They've been pursuing me since I cleared Lurkwood and will be upon me soon. The Dream Spell failed - my friends, if you find this: if what the Oracle told me is true, then I..."
.
After some deliberation, the group decided the notes don't provide enough new information for them to step away from their quest to find the Giant-Slaying weapon presumably left behind in Yartar by the missing Harthol Zymorven so they continue on, but mean to seek out more answers about this 'Eye of the All-Father' at a later time.
Around midday Paxton's Owl familiar communicates to him, "Don't look up, but there appears to be a dragon circling high above us."
Paxton quietly lets his comrades know of the situation. He casts Mage Armor on himself and Sir Oswald casts Armor of Agathys on himself. Their casting of spells seems to have alerted the dragon of their awareness of them as it begins to dive. Paxton then casts Invisibility on himself.
There's a nearby tor jutting out of the bog nearby that Paxton suggests they all run towards, but they only make it a little ways off the road before realizing that Sir Oswald is staying in place, trying to draw the Dragon's ire to himself.
In a flash of cobalt blue, the Dragon both forcefully and gracefully lands on a nearby boulder still some 60' from them. With its bulk nearly the size of a large covered wagon, it puffs out the yellow plates of its underbelly and cocks its head as it stares down its snout and horn towards the group. In a deep, steady voice it speaks, "Greetings little travelers. Are you lost? From where have you come? To where do you travel?"
Not wanting to divulge too much information Creedun only mentions they're traveling to Yartar and they didn't mean to trespass on the Dragon's territory.
"I'm only here to talk, let's drop the spells and magic in the name of diplomacy; I know there's a 5th member of your group skulking around somewhere. Now, normally I'd demand some tribute for such a trespass," the Young Blue Dragon continues, "but today I'm interested only in information. Just last night I passed the strangest thing - what looked like a tower... that had fallen from the sky... just off the road? You wouldn't have happened to have noticed that too would have, traveling past there towards Yartar as you say."
Creedun asks the Dragon if they can just be on their way and that they mean no harm or disrespect. Sir Oswald musters as much Charisma as he can (which is quite a lot) and says they'd be willing to trade information for information). He asks the Blue Dragon what he found in the tower, what he thought of it, and why he wants to know more?
"I found a dead Giant in the tower, I found it rather odd, and it is my business to know what happens in my territory." The Dragon adds with a thin veil of forced patience, "I'm normally not so generous but you amuse me human; I've now answered 3 of your questions and you none of mine. What do you know of the tower?"
Otto chimes in saying the Cloud Giant Zephyros had been their friend once and he believes he'd been trying to get a message through to them.
The Dragon grins a cruel smile, "As I suspected. I will add you to the collection of the Queen of Statues - the Gathering Storm!" as it pumps its mighty wings to take flight.
Roll Initiative!
.
Creedun conjures two Giant Eagles which Grapple the Dragon before it takes off.
This is obviously a cunning foe as it completely ignores the beasts and unleashes a torrent of deadly lightning into the Dwarven Bard, shocking him so badly that it's impossible to maintain concentration. As the Eagles poof into nothingness, the Dragon flies up 40' above the ground and begins circling the group.
Otto is struggling to hit the dragon at this range with his Hand Crossbow and uses his new martial training to stow his shield and attack with his Shortbow at the same time.
Paxton appears next to Sir Oswald, and laying a hand on him casts a spell allowing the heavily armored Knight to fly!
Sir Oswald streaks towards the Dragon and positions himself above it, striking mightily into the Dragon's back twice.
Ransom makes a Spiritual Weapon appear next to Dragon to slash at him, while Creedun resummons his Giant Eagles, though this time the Dragon fends off their grapple.
The Blue Dragon mauls Sir Oswald several times then tries to fly away, knowing that even if the Eagle can keep up, the Knight can't. He's betting that his scales can fend off their attacks and is partly correct, both eagles fail to land even a scratch. Sir Oswald with a lucky swing strikes a critical weak spot behind the Dragon's shoulder and adds a charged-up Smite into the fleeing Dragon
Paxton takes advantage of the Dragon having left the cluster of his allies and centers a Fireball on the Dragon. As the dragon flies out of the bursting flame it is singed and starting to look quite hurt.
The resummoned Giant Eagles catch up and both successfully grapple the Dragon as the 3 of them tumble to the ground, WHAM! Still thrashing on the ground the Dragon bites and claws the injured Eagles, causing both of them to poof from existence.
The Dragon takes an expert shot from Otto's Short Bow and not only looks very hurt, but for the first time shows actual fear itself. It moves to retreat, but instead of flying away it begins to burrow into the soft boggy soil. The group only sees it burrow in 10' and then loose sight of it in the dark tunnel.
Paxton throws a fireball right at the opening of the tunnel, hoping the edges of the flaming blast will catch the Dragon. He hears no sound as to whether it hit or missed.
Even running at top speed Otto isn't quick enough to reach the hole before the Dragon can burrow further in and the tunnel turns at such an angle the Gnome can't blind-fire in. Then he remembers that he has one more "Ka-boomer" left from the merchant cart they encountered south of Calling Horns. He lights the fuse and tosses it into the tunnel. 4 seconds later
KABOOM!!! followed by a screeching roar of pain.
Sir Oswald flies down into the tunnel with no hesitation in hopes to finish off the Dragon but emerges a couple seconds later saying, "It's dead." The Kaboomer had blown open the side of its face as smoke poured up and viscera dripped down from its eye.
The group tries harvesting some scales and teeth, but damages their trophies in the process. Sir Oswald opens the Dragon's belly to find a couple human skulls and bones, along with a partially digested dagger. He also insists on spending more time to try to acquire the Dragon's snout horn. Paxton puts his Secure Hut spell over the tunnel while he works because spending several hours exposed in the wilderness doesn't seem like a safe plan.
The rest of the day and a half journey to Yartar is uneventful and everyone arrives fully rested.
.
They find a contingency of guards inspecting everyone who arrives to the city's outer gate. They make their way inside and get food recommendations from a cheery local man.
They're directed to the man's favorite joint - a "dive" dinner on the edge of the "bad part of town - called Karletta's Table.
There they find a one story flat-roofed building hemmed in by larger buildings that appear to have 3rd-story additions built atop older structures. Karletta's Table has crates stacked up outside that several young street kids are using to play and climb on, some have even climbed up onto the roof and are playing up there, another youngster in dirty clothes runs out from behind the diner with a fist-full of bread.
The group walks through the swinging saloon-style doors and gets their bearings in the dim light inside. Most of the booths have privacy walls, but they see a few folk who look down on their luck, a few more working class people, and a couple women arm-wrestling.
Behind the bar is a window looking into the kitchen where clanging pots and pans and sizzling can be heard. A half-elf with dark blue dyed hair cropped short on one side, wearing leather armor with an apron over it comes into view yelling at some staff around the corner, "You don't have that ready yet? By the gods, what am I paying you for, eh?" She notices the party standing in the dinning area and immediately switches her demeaner to a sweet and welcoming smile. "Hey sorry nobody was there to welcome you, feel free to seat yourselves! Someone will be with you in a moment :) " She returns into the part of the kitchen out of view and continues commanding the kitchen staff in an authoritative tone.
Creedun suggests they sit where he can watch the women arm-wrestle and after a few rounds he approaches them with Otto and asks if he can challenge one of them for a round of drinks. There's some brief chit-chat and the women seem fond of taunting Creedun and Otto, mostly in good fun. They tell the adventurers that they work the docks in the fishing industry. Otto mentions that he's a fisher as well and that's how he lost his eye.
One of the women cranks her shoulder a bit as though it's stiff and says to the other, "What do you think Sally? You wanna take 'im?"
Sally, "Are you gunna need some books to sit on, guy?" alluding to the Dwarf's stoutness. "How 'bout instead a drinks though we wrestle for the story of your friend's lost eye. I win against short an stout 'ere - you tell us your tale, little guy?" Otto agrees.
After a particularly close match Sally pins Creedun and Otto launches into a captivating tale from his youth when their boats' nets caught a Kraken, and how he had to climb into the nets to free the beast. In the process he slipped and severed the end off one of the Kraken's tentacles, fell back into the boat and the knife "poked him in the eye."
There is a long pause. Eventually Sally says, "Pffffft, I call bullsh!t There's no way that was a Kraken. That's a mythical beast; even if one does exist there's been no claims of seeing one in a hundred years at least. Plus, it would have dragged your ship to the bottom before you had a chance to free it."
Otto insists he's not lying.
Sally adds, "look, I'm sure you were entangled with something big and tentacle-y, maybe a Giant Octopus, maybe a newborn Kraken, but if that were a real one you'd be a skeleton at the bottom of the ocean right now."
There's a little more benign chit-chat. Otto refers to the women as "madams" which they get a hoot out of. Then he uses his Thieves Cant to see if there's more to them than meets the eye and mentions being "a part of their guild" and "wondering if they could help him."
The women look at each other and Sally says, "Let's step outside for a chat little guy. Just us and and you; your friends can stay in here and order their meal." Otto assures his party that it'll be fine. Paxton keeps watch on the situation with his Owl Familiar waiting outside.
Sally calls to the kitchen, "Hey Karletta could we get some more bread" and they're given a basket of bread as they walk with Otto out a back door.
.
Outside Sally laughs and says he must be new in town and there's no way he's part of their guild. They ask what he wants and he mentions he's looking for someone. Sally scoffs, saying they don't point strangers to members of their guild. He explains - still in somewhat vague terms - he's looking for a Noble's son who's gone missing. He offers them 50gp if they can help. Sally leans to the other woman and whispers something.
Paxton, listening through his Owl's senses hears her ask her friend, "Do you think he's talking about Mel?"
Sally tells Otto to go back inside with his friends and they'll be back with their friend who can tell him more. Neither Otto nor Paxton (through his Familiar) can discern any fowl-play or malice so they wait.
In the meantime Karletta had come by to take the group's order and comments about how quiet Paxton is and asks why he's sitting upright with his eyes closed. Creedun tells her his friend is just really tired and asks for a bib to put on the wizard.
Otto comes back in just as Ransom is pinning Creedun in their own arm-wrestling match.
.
Paxton has his owl follow the two women. One sets the basket of bread down on a nearby crate but the owl follows them to a warehouse where they disappear inside for several minutes. When they reemerge they're accompanied by a young woman and an older halfling woman; they all head back towards the diner. Paxton tells his owl to check out the bread basket, but when he gets there there are barely even crumbs.
The four women reenter Karletta's Table. Without pause the Halfling woman jumps up onto the bench, eye-level with Ransom and the others "I hear you want to ask my friend Mel some questions. I'm just here to make sure it goes smoothly, okay?"
Mel pulls up a chair and sits at the end of the booth. Between asking questions to Mel and the Halfling, they learn:
- Mel and Harthol Zymorven ran to Yartar with some of his father's stolen property to start a new life.
- Harthol ended up "also stealing her heart before proving he was a snake." He got involved with another woman on a Riverboat gambling cruise. They were seen leaving the riverboat together, but he was never seen again after that.
- They must have gone back to his apartment because everyone of his that was of value was gone - including gold, platinum, gems, and a weapon stolen from his father's keep.
- The woman always wears a purple dress and is often seen entering and leaving the riverboat casino.
- Their Thieves Guild - The Hands of Yartar - want payback on the woman in the purple dress, but (a) can't gain access to the cruise (they suspect a traitor in their midst), and (b) has a strict code of no assassinations outside of a hired contract. By pointing the Adventurers in her direction the guild hopes the situation will escalate and revenge will unfold naturally.
- The casino cruise itself belongs to a rival of the Hands of Yartar, so any additional mischief or trouble caused for them is a bonus in the eyes of the guild.
- The gambling boat - called 'The Grand Dame' - is owned by a man named Khaspere Drylund, who lives aboard the vessel.
- The best way to gain access to the cruise would be to pose either as staff (rowers, chefs/servers, musicians, game table facilitators, escorts) or to attend as wealthy guests who come to network and to gamble in the casino.
.
Next time - All Aboard the Grand Dame!
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