Re: Goddamn Zombies on a Shuttle!

<snip>
The crash was spectacular. It lit up the Northern Mountain regions of
Mars like a Christmas Tree and left a crater a mile wide. A short
distance away, a charred escape pod was found with half a dozen
whiskey bottles, all empty and space suited footprints leading away.
Also, as was reported by one of the citizens in Mars-Dome, the
engines from the escape pod had sky written "EDDIE HAS A BIG DI…
<end snip>
Who: Eddie and a mysterious stranger
Where: Mars
When: After the shuttle crash
Eddie stood on a clifftop overlooking the disaster he had narrowly
averted. The ledge was dramatically lit, the flickering of the flames
before him casting pretty much the only light he had.
The flames cast long moving shadows all around him, one of the shadows
however was being cast by someone else, someone who had made his way
there as soon as he had heard about the shuttlecrash.
Eddie heard a twig cracking behind him. Wasting no time he swung
around his automatic H`n'K Scattamatic Minigun which he was still
clenching, and prepared to fire on what he thought were more zombies.
There was nothing behind him however.
The click of a laser pistol dangerously close to his head made Eddie
drop his gun. He felt the cold gun barrel touching his temple. Eddie
had been purposefully distracted.
It was a sloppy mistake to make on his part, one which he probably
wouldn't have made had his mind not been lingering about his narrow
escape.
"Drop the gun pardner!" Said the assailant in a rough voice.
Eddie rolled his eyes and did as he was asked. Eddie tried to turn
around and see his attacker, but all he got in return was a smack
across the back of the head. All he saw was a dirty cowboy hat, and
got a stench of whiskey and dirt.
"Of all the varmints I could have picked, ah thunk a priest would be
the least t'let me down!"
Eddie's body sagged as he realised who was talking to him. They had
only communicated over text messaging and email, never in person.
"Captain Jed." Said Eddie. "Jed Calvert."
Eddie now realised that Captain Jed's grammar in real life was just as
bad as his spelling.
On hearing his own name, Jed spin Eddie around and tripped him up. But
Eddie knew how to defend himself in a fair fight. He picked up a
bottle of whiskey as he fell and turned to smash it over Jed's head.
He then put his fists up and waited for Jed to make the next move.
Defending yourself in a fair fight however is hard to do with Jed
around. He pretended to punch high, instead he threw some dirt in
Eddie's eye and kicked him between the legs. He went down like a sack
of potatoes.
Then in fury grabbed Eddie's hair and forced him to look at the crash.
He didn't give the priest any more opportunity to defend himself.
"Look at that! I trusted you to make the delivery. A delivery I paid
for, but you screwed it up! Everything's been burned in the gorram crash!"
"Well with all respect, I didn't have much of a choice, there were zomb-"
Jed silenced Eddie by pushing him over. With all this bravado Eddie
assumed Jed hadn't had a happy childhood. He wasn't going to mention
it though.
"whut is ah a-gonna does now eh? Ah nuthin t'delivah t'mah customers.
An' believe me, these guys is a-gonna be mighty disappointed! I might
as well just kill ya now!"
Jed aimed his pistol at Eddie's head. "Say yer prayers priest!"
Instead of cowering, or getting on his knees to prey, like Jed would
have expected of a priest – Eddie didn't. Instead he stood up, to the
same height as Jed and looked him deep in the eye. Normally people
were scared of Jed, not because he was especially muscular, but
because he was wirey and unpredictable. He had the "nutter" factor.
He looked Jed in his bloodshot eyes and said "No. You can't kill me."
"Whut?" said Jed.
"You can't kill me because the merchandise ISN'T destroyed. It was
actually kept in a thick steel safe which only I know the combination."
Jed's eye twitched.
"…So if you want your merchandise back, we'll both make our way to the
crash site and we'll both open the safe. And then you'll pay me the
money we arranged. Deal?"
Jed twitched again. He didn't like paying money to anyone when he
didn't have to. That's why he preferred the idea of this guy dead.
Priest or not, he didn't want to share the profit.
Jed scowled and lowered his gun. He nodded towards Eddie's own gun and
motioned him to pick it up. "You'll need that where we're going."
"Yes of course, with so many zombies around." Eddie agreed.
Jed let Eddie lead, then said quietly "No, I mean for after you give
me the combination for the safe."
They headed off in the direction of the crash site to recover Jed's
`merchandise'.
<Tag Grant!>
--- In JMC_Blue_Dwarf@yahoogroups.com, "Grant Smith"
<The-Bad-Wolf@...> wrote:
>
> Who: Eddie Monsoon (Priest for Hire)
> Where: A shuttle above Mars
> When: After Takeoff
>
> Eddie had never been an easy flyer. If the Lord had intended man to
> fly, he wouldn't have invented Richard Branson. So it was some small
> wonder that Eddie wasn't going psychotically crazy at the thought
> that absolutely anything could go wrong. The shields could fail and a
> rock could come smashing through the craft's walls and suck him and
> the rest of the passengers out into space. Or, even worse, they could
> run out of whiskey.
>
> Suddenly, there was a violent shake and the lights flickered. Eddie's
> nerves were now shot to hell and he had gone a pale shade of white.
>
> "This is the Captain speaking, we're experiencing some turbulence
> (how can you get turbulence in a vacuum? Eddie was buggered if he
> knew) and…." the intercom frazzled out, replaced by the crackle of
> static. There was some fumbled sounds coming from the cockpit. It
> sounded like a man having his head ripped apart and his organs being
> eaten by a zombie. It was, in fact, a man having his head ripped off
> and his organs being eaten by a zombie. Fortunately the plane
> switched to Auto-Pilot immediately, so they didn't go hurtling into a
> death-dive towards the red planet below, Mars had enough ugly
> blemishes as it is. The zombie used it's own weight to break down the
> cabin door and escape into the seating area.. Surprisingly, By the
> time the zombies had shuffled their way down the passageway, most of
> the passengers had moved into the escape pods in a calm, orderly
> fashion. All except for Eddie that is.
>
> Later, when the disaster was over, the Repair Crew would look on in
> wonder at the sheer amount of damage done to the interior of the
> craft. Aside from splatter marks of blood and gore, there were holes
> that were clearly bullet entry wounds. All they knew was that the
> only person aboard with a gun license, was one E.Monsoon, and he was
> unaccounted for.
>
> "Goddamn Zombies!" said Eddie, skilfully throwing an empty whiskey
> bottle at a Zombie's head. He reached into the overhead compartment
> and brought out the battered leather hold-all that he'd brought onto
> the plane with him. The rest of his luggage was safely sealed in the
> cargo hold, but luckily he knew one or two tricks to get things past
> airport security. He unzipped the bag and took out a slender black
> object as well as two smaller silver ones.
>
> "Well gentlemen" he said, loading cartridges into his three guns "say
> hello to my fully auto, under-and-over, read `em and weep H`n'K
> Scattamatic Minigun, and the Twins" Fully loaded, he turned to the
> nearest zombie and blew a fist sized hole through first his stomach,
> and then his head.
>
> "Eat this!" he cried, as one particularly clever Zombie tried to
> attack him from behind, the gun shooting at the creature at point-
> blanc range, sending it cart wheeling down the aisle. A few more
> shots rang out from the shotgun, cleanly, efficiently and safely
> (that one was the biggie) taking out a few zombies. Quickly stashing
> his shotgun, he whipped out the twins and shot out an approaching
> zombies kneecaps, resulting in the rather hilarious position of a
> zombie crawling after him using his arms to pull himself along. Eddie
> quickly disposed of a few more zombies, even going as far as using
> the empty clips to spring out and hit them in the face, which gave a
> Eddie a chuckle at their sheer stupidity.
>
> "Will all passengers please fasten their seatbelts, we are
> experiencing engine troubles. In the likely event of death please
> follow the following safety protocol: Put your head between your legs
> and kiss your arse goodbye. Thank You" chimed the auto-hostess
> system, dropping Eddie into further shit. Knowing that he would have
> to get off the ship pretty sharpish, he ducked into the last
> remaining escape pod and sealed the hatch behind him. Then he opened
> it, moved back into the cabin and picked out his hand luggage and
> duty-free. Screw his luggage, no way was he going to dump the tax
> free wine, tobacco & porn he'd bought.
>
> The crash was spectacular. It lit up the Northern Mountain regions of
> Mars like a Christmas Tree and left a crater a mile wide. A short
> distance away, a charred escape pod was found with half a dozen
> whiskey bottles, all empty and space suited footprints leading away.
> Also, as was reported by one of the citizens in Mars-Dome, the
> engines from the escape pod had sky written "EDDIE HAS A BIG DI…
>
> <To Be Contuified>
>