Re: Anirune Forest - CHAPTER 3
He was driving his car. He didn't know why though. He shifted into second gear and opened up the throttle, redlining the RPMs. The engine coughed and spluttered out a suffocating fume of exhaust as it rolled down hill... then he was standing outside in the grass. The sun was shining, and he could hear birds. A giant butterfly landed in front of him, and spoke sonorously...
"I had to kill a man. He tried to screw me on a... transaction. I didn't like that much. So I'm trying to buy weapons, Captain."
Tain stared. He didn't know how to respond for some reason. Normally he would have given a contact he knew, but he couldn't find his tongue now. He came to find out that he didn't have one.
"Captain? ... Captain, are you alright?"
That wasn't the Butterfly's voice...
"Captain... CAPTAIN!!"
Tain shot awake in his bed, barely suppressing a gasp for air. He really needed to talk to a doctor about these dreams. He rolled to his right and tried not to look like a bewildered man who just got caught in the middle of a lewd fantasy. The heart shaped face of his First Officer, Lieutenant Weber, was gazing back at him with an annoyed-but-unsurprised expression from his desk terminal. The untouched RFID tracker information also stared at him from a lesser corner of the screen. He had really fallen asleep...
"Working hard, sir?" She asked with a hint of irony.
"Yeah? I'm good. What's going on?" He didn't know it, but he had apparently been wrangling with his hair while asleep. It was currently springing outward in all directions.
"I have something I thought you'd want to see, sir. We're coming up on what looks like a battlefield... you should probably come out here." Tain rolled out of the bed. "I'm on my way, Ell-Tee."
Despite the urgency in his voice before, he glanced at himself in the mirror on his way out. Thankfully he had gone to sleep fully dressed, but he quickly decided to take the time to comb his hair. He then passed through the foyer of his quarters into the bridge, his coat trailing behind him from the length and pace of his stride. He still sounded commanding when he raised his voice, despite knowing full well that his Lieutenant Weber had caught him sleeping on the job. "So what's tactical got to say about this?"
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The crewman tensed a little when Tain walked up behind him to look at his console, quickly clicking away some of the windows that had been open a moment before. "Uh, looks as though some sort of battle occurred here, sir. I'm picking up faint traces of sporadic small arms fire. But have a look at these readings. They're--"
"What the fuck is that... any hostiles?" Tain murmured under his breath, leaning forward to read the tactical console now.
"That's what I said, sir... and no, they appear to have vacated the area."
Tain studied the readings for a moment, his lack of understanding for what he was looking at clear on his features as he did so. Finally, he turned to his First Officer. "How are we doing on our timeline?"
"We made good time riding the crosswind on our way out of AFTA. We're up by three hours."
Tain gave a nod and turned away from tactical. "Alright then. Helm, make a heading for the coordinates that tactical is relaying to you ri~ght... now. Give me full propulsion and begin our descent; I want to make it there and have ample time to get to Iwaku city." He strode over to his chair and hit a quick sequence into the keypad on the armrest. "All hands, this is the Captain speaking. Battlestations. I repeat, battlestations. This is not a drill, this is not a drill."
The whole ship came alive to the sound of barking klaxons. The ship trembled slightly as the fusion reactor compensated for the increasing demand for energy that the pulsejets were placing upon it. The crew whispered softly amongst themselves, unsure of how the vessel would take to her refit on her maiden voyage... they had not had time for a shake down. The sound died down, and the trembling ceased as the massive vessel reached cruising speed. Minutes passed by like hours with the deafening silence. The Captain's expression was grim when he finally spoke over the hushed whispering on the bridge.
"We're close enough. Cut the cruise engines and deploy airbrakes. Down trim fifteen degrees, flare on my mark."
All at once, the vessel lurched as she was enveloped with tremors and the violent noise of wind rushing by the flaps that had deployed around her base. She careened in on the clearing, filling the surrounding area with the violent whine-roar of her cruise engines powering down and the air she displaced with her sheer size. "Gravity repulsion field on maximum! Tone back the power once we level out and maintain 35 meters altitude. I want our ground gun crews on standby, and put the Phalanx on full alert. ECCM's to full power."
It sounded impressive, but in the grand scheme of things it was really only enough to keep them alive long enough to run away. The Red Raccoon Dog was not a full on military vessel, even though she could be handled in such a way. Tain prized her too much to put her in serious risk. However, when there was substantial profit involved...
The Red Raccoon Dog nosed up off of the clearing and thrummed deeply as the repulsion field took effect. The trees swayed and bent from the air that swam off of her hull. The massive ship gradually leveled off and came to a relative halt, straying slightly for a moment as she steadied herself. She was surprisingly agile for a vessel of her size.
Inside, the First Officer gave her Captain a look. "That was a little over dramatic, wasn't it?"
"Yeah, well. You know. Make a snazzy entrance and all that. Alright, scanners on full! Let's find some battlefield salvage that looks like it'll be worth some good cash!"
"ALL THIS WAS TO SCROUNGE FOR JUNK TO SELL?!" The First Officer snarled.
The Captain betrayed no outward shame as he looked back at her, speaking very quietly in a strange 'midget' voice. "Yis."
From the clearing below, the Red Raccoon Dog loomed overhead. Turrets and spotlights arranged on the belly of the vessel swept over the landscape, searching for signs of life and hostility. Up top, spotters gazed outward from the observation deck of the ship with telescopes and binoculars. After a moment, a hatch opened in the mid-belly, and a heavy duty elevator slowly began lowering. On it was a contingent of crew members armed with rifles, including Tain, who was gazing down at the battlefield and pointing at a particular tank wreckage that suffered relatively minor damage.
"There it is. Call up to the bridge and tell them to make ready with the Claw. We're taking that tank corpse with us, for certain. Ignore small arms, keep a look out for crew served weapons and ammunition crates. Let's try and make this quick, but keep your wits about you. No telling what's still out there, much less what's going to cook off when we're not looking. Basically: be safe."
With that he hopped off the elevator just before it touched the ground. In truth, there was no telling what this tank would sell for to budding militias or mercenaries. But his true goal was to survey the site for himself. He gazed down at the scorched earth surrounding one of the less fortunate tank hulls. He hoped that whatever did this was on their side. Nagging pessimism told him that it surely wasn't.
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Summary: The grand entrance of the Red Raccoon Dog and her (somewhat) faceless crew. Tain detects the remnants of the battle with the Elders and investigates. The Red Raccoon Dog moves to and is currently hovering over the clearing, and Tain is exploring the battlefield below with armed members of his crew.
