DEPLOYMENT 17: Speak Softly and Carry a Big Boomstick

[walking_nuke]

[Balin's been a really rare sight at the house ever since the Friday before last. He's spending almost all of his waking hours in town, even on Mother's Day. Outside of work, he's become a lot more focused on accomplishing something with his demolitions projects.]

[Though today, he gets a belated birthday present. As he heads out the door to work, he spies a package lying on the porch. Rather than taking it inside, Balin's curiosity gets the best of him and he opens it on the spot ...]

[... To reveal a shotgun. One big enough to have its own zip code and mean enough to come with its own postal worker. It looks suited to being a turret on a scale model battleship rather than in the hands of a human. Its ammo belt already has a few canisters pre-loaded into it. The sight of it makes Balin's eyes gleam.]

... Now we're talkin'.

[ACTION - A (Anywhere in Mayfield, Morning to Evening, OPEN TO ALL)]

[You might catch Balin on the streets while he's out running his personal errands. In place of the Remington 870 shotgun he'd been carrying around with him for months, he's going to be carrying the Series 3 Triple Incendiary Shotgun. It comes with its own back-mounted holster, so he doesn't have the shotgun sling on him either.]

[ACTION - B (John Doe Park, Morning, OPEN TO ALL)]

[Balin's taken a detour on his way to work in order to test out his latest piece of regained hardware. He's standing in a spot of open ground with a pail full of water from the nearby pond—just in case things get out of hand. Taking aim at the open sky, he pulls the trigger, and a flesh-searing armor-melting inferno that's twenty meters high at its most potent spews forth. Enjoy your wakeup call!]

[ACTION - C (Neutron Diner, Morning, Afternoon, or Evening, OPEN TO ALL)]

[Balin's also been frequenting the Diner for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, since it gives him a place to sit down, eat, and work on brainstorming and planning—and the drones don't seem to bother him at all, provided he sits down at a booth. You'll likely see him jotting down notes or making rough sketches in a journal while taking bites out of a hamburger or a pathetic imitation of a Philly cheesesteak.]

[ACTION - D (Jonathon's Tools, Early Afternoon, OPEN TO ALL)]

[Balin's taking a look around the hardware store, though he doesn't seem to be buying anything today. He's making note of construction materials and any items the store has pertaining to electronics or electric wiring, as well as checking up on the different kinds of paint for sale.]

[ACTION - E (339 Brady Lane, Afternoon, HOUSE RESIDENTS)]

[While Balin was able to rig up simple detonators from what he found at the construction yard, doing something on the level of what he had planned would require some help to get right. To that end, he's stopping by Quinn's house to see if the guy's home. If the garage is open he'll be taking a peek to see if the technomancer's hanging around. If not, he'll head over to the front porch and ring the doorbell.]

Yo, Quinn! You there?

[He really should have phoned ahead ...]

[ACTION - F (Mayfield Outskirts, Evening, OPEN TO ALL)]

[Like he's been doing for the past week, Balin continues to test and experiment with the C-4 he had created in the past week or two. By now, all the test detonations in that field have created some ready-made earthworks for future testing—a short trench five feet deep, beyond which are other shallow craters where more bricks of C-4 have gone off.]

[Balin can be found out here doing a final battery of experiments with what remains of his first few batches of C-4. Which means there'll be the occasional explosion coming from the outskirts of town—just mind the sign by the side of the road if you head out that way to investigate.]

Comments

A

[cuestickgenius]

[Droog's torn. It's both an impressive gun, but also a big and ugly one.]

That's quite the piece you have there.

[walking_nuke]

Thing'a beauty, ain't it? I've fried many a Crusty with'is baby.

[cuestickgenius]

Not so sure about beauty, but it sure is something.

Crusty?

[walking_nuke]

"Crusty's" what we call'a Thrax. They're this alien species'at's part of'a Bane. They got'is carapace ... exoskeleton kinda thing. An' a mouth like a lamprey.

[cuestickgenius]

[Somehow, "thrax" and the way this person speaks sounds vaguely familiar...]

I know what a carapace is; I used to have one.

[walking_nuke]

Huh.

[Balin's having that same feeling!]

Not one of'a Thrax, yeah? Some other race?

[Because this would be a whole ton of awkward and impending violence if this formerly carapaced guy really was a Bane soldier.]

[cuestickgenius]

A Carapacian. No ridiculous leech mouths.

[walking_nuke]

Oh, that's g—

[And that's when it hits him. He's heard someone say they were a Carapacian before.]

You, uh, know anybody in'is town who got body-switched with some green-haired girl a few weeks back?

[cuestickgenius]

...were you the guy in the bird-girl body?

[walking_nuke]

[All kinds of uncomfortable washes over Balin's face. Mainly from being reminded of being in Utsuho's body more than anything.]

Yeah, I was.

[cuestickgenius]

Yeah, well, that was me. Diamonds Droog. Don't remember if I caught your name.

[walking_nuke]

Nah, I think we were both kinda wigged out by'a body swap for'at.

[He'll offer to shake hands, at any rate.]

I'm Balin Wilbur. Sergeant First Class.

[cuestickgenius]

A military man, huh?

[He gives the hand a polite shake]

Guess that explains the firearms.

[walking_nuke]

Yep. I'm from'a Army of Allied Free Sentients, specifically.

[cuestickgenius]

["Allied" "Free"]

So some kind of resistance movement or somethin'? Glory and freedom and all that?

[walking_nuke]

Pretty much, just as an organized military. See ... Where I'm from, Earth's gone. The Bane rolled us pretty hard seven years ago. Now we're on other planets tryin'a take'a fight to them.

[cuestickgenius]

Well, where I'm from, Earth ain't a thing. Or humans for that matter. Bane and that neither.

[walking_nuke]

Oh—yeah, that's right, them trolls made'at other universe, the one'at has'a humans in it.

[Balin scratches his head in thought.]

'Least that's how'at one kid explained it to me. The one'at got turned into a crow by'a town.

[cuestickgenius]

What, you know those terrible little gray kids?

I don't know any of them that got turned into a bird.

[walking_nuke]

Sorta—nah, it wasn't one of'a trolls'at got turned into a crow. It's a human kid, said he's like ... from some failed future timeline or some such shit. You ever see an orange crow flyin' around town that can talk? That'd be him.

He was'a one who told me about'a trolls first, an'en I met one of 'em in person after Mayfield got nuked. Called herself Aradia.

[cuestickgenius]

Time shit. I hate time shit.

Aradia? Heh. She's a good girl. [Re: the kind not afraid to get her hands dirty.]

[walking_nuke]

Yeah. She don't act anything like'a way'at crow-kid described'a trolls as bein'.

[cuestickgenius]

How'd he describe them?

[walking_nuke]

Well—he was right about'em bein' gray-skinned, but personality wise? He said'ey're all assholes. Said'ey were all shit-talking him and his buddies months before they played'at—whatever'a fuck that thing is, that destroys'a player's homeworld an' makes universes.

[That part still throws him for a loop, even now.]

But Aradia didn't give me any trouble when I met her. She's like'a total opposite of how'a kid was sayin'ose trolls behave.

[cuestickgenius]

[Droog pauses and thinks about what he saw of the other trolls]

...She's kind of an exception to the bunch. The rest of them are idiots and brats half the time. They got their good points occasionally though.

[Namely when they are kicking the shit out of enemies/each other]