Kage Ellery with is friend Lexington Hired 'Socket', 'Florida Man' and 'Butch' to go on an expedition to the Atlanta region in Dinosaur swamp with the goal of settling and creating a safari and requisition company called 'Dinotours Excursions LLC'. This was a good plan and everyone was preparing for it but then the call to take action on it came about 2 years early.
When Florida Man and Socket arrived from their respective places in the swamp, Kage, Butch, Lexington and a new comer with bright eyes and a pleasant, but seemingly dimwitted demeanor, Wraith (Ray) met them in the lobby of Kage's currently successful safari and requisitions company operating into the new west. Kage was finishing some kind of paper work and seemed a bit out of sorts.
After some brief introductions, the new crew was shown the two large shipping containers sitting on two just large enough anti-grav platforms that held all the gear to establish their new business/settlement and were instructed to 'push'.
Over the next few days they made their way through new Arkansas passing a disguised CS Military checkpoint and then making their way through Fort El Dorado before passing into the thicker forests of what used to Mississippi.
They found themselves at one point trudging through some sinking sand and had to improvise a rocket to move the floats along without the use of their own muscle. At one point Butch went off and hunted up some food and thereafter every morning was rewarded with a different large kill which continued to provide more food than they needed. Socket spent most nights in a 'wading pool' rigged out of a raft and water kept in a clever reservoir ont he side of one of the containers. While Florida Man just enjoyed life and Wraith tinkered with the grav platforms, fixing and cleaning things.
Socket observed the interior of the one shipping container and was surprised to see it was not nearly full enough to establish a settlement and became a bit suspicious that Lexington may have been deceiving Kage and the rest of the crew.
They had a run in with a small herd of Aurochs where Florida Man showed how not to load a laser rifle while Butch displayed why the mini-gun he carries around is not just for show.
When they reached the Golden Age Weapon smiths settlement Guntersville, everyone went off to rest and supply up. Butch found some ammo, Florida Man tried to get a butcher to dress the Bear they received that morning and was not willing to pay for the service thinking it crazy to be charged for such a thing, eventually going back to steal some of the meat and the coolers it was stored in. Wraith set out to do something in a junk yard but then when he was confronted by the townsfolk, he got distracted and ended up showing them how to make a still and cook meth. Meanwhile, Socket brokered a deal for two really attractive Cadillac car bodies.
Kage met back up with them and explained he had procured two large tree demolishing trucks to pull their new caravan in exchange for the bodies of the 5 Auroch that were attempting to assault their caravan that morning. Wraith informed everyone he had established an 'open' trade agreement with the owners of the junk yard they were in after showing them how to make some killer mood altering stuff. Socket immediately capitalized on this and acquired a large quantity of parts for the fan boats they wanted to make for the business.
With their new supplies, they headed into the wilderness and began the last leg of their trip. After about half a day they ran into a very peculiar stand of steel trees surrounding a crater. Florida man decided to be funny and create a 'Newton's Cradle' with the shipping platforms, before growing increasingly agitated while having to wait to get back on the move.
Butch proved a proper mini-gun can indeed sever the trunk of an immature steel tree before they decided it was best to avoid the place thanks to Socket determining that the crater was radioactive. They spent the rest of that day going around the crater and the trees and made camp.
The following morning they were surprised by a T-Rex and Butch again showed that the mini-gun was for more than just show. Eventually they passed through a Barbarian homestead where a Scamper bonded to Butch and then they only had a few hours left of travel before they reached the area that Kage had been preparing.
After Butch presented his kills - a pair of healthy buck deer, one of which Ray merrily wandered off with without explanation - not a morning on the trail didn't go by that he didn't wake up to something large, imposing and dead in front of his tent - a list of creatures that included (but was not limited to) a small dinosaur, a very surprised looking bear and a catfish of alarming size.
ReplyDeleteRays efforts with the engines mostly seemed to consist of painstakingly disassembling a section to access a single component which was carefully cleaned and tuned before reinstallation and the closing back up of the machine before he started again on the next component - even if it was situated right next to the first one. This seemed to keep him occupied and off the streets however, which since his first suggestion after the group got stuck was 'can we try a rocket' was generally agreed to be a good thing.
Rays main contribution at the junkyard was cleaning up an existing still and assisting with the construction of a new one, while explaining the process of making crystal meth - rather begging the question of what kind of parentage he had - in exchange for a couple of Cadillac shells and a set of four old but fully repairable aircraft jet engines.