Eddie Monsoon and the Hangover of Doom

Who: Eddie Monsoon
Where: His quarters aboard `Blue Dwarf'
When: During Mk. 10's rampage of death and carnage
Eddie Monsoon lay asleep in his bunk. In his stay on `Blue Dwarf' he
had, like many other crewmembers, decorated his bunk with photos and
posters. His bunk contained a variety of beer mats he had collected
from a hundred bars on a hundred planets, Playboy centrefold pin-ups,
and even a Wanted poster for an `Ed Munson' - an alias he had used in
a heist a few years back.
The digital alarm clock on the floor next to his bed beeped into
life, displaying the time of 3:45pm in the afternoon. Eddie's snoring
choked away into consciousness and the criminal turned security
officer rolled over and hit the alarm with a half-hearted thump.
He sat up from his bunk - feeling a bit hung over - and stretched,
yawned and let out a rumbling fart. Eddie had always lived by the
motto that in the morning, nothing beats a good fart. He got up and
moved over to the wall mounted sink and called for the toilet. The
sink and it's base swivelled around into the wall and revealed the
chemical toilet that came standard in each cabin.
"Good Morning Sir" answered the toilet in a posh, cultured tone. Like
many other people aboard the ship, he had changed the toilet's
default voice from a gruff, guttural voice to one that was based on
Seymour Niples, the ship's ambassador, restaurant owner and all
around prat. Eddie grunted a reply and spent the next few minutes -
metaphorically - taking a crap on Seymour.
Finished with his morning business, Eddie showered, shaved and
brushed his teeth - just leaving him a little bit `delicate' from his
hangover. Deciding that he might as well turn up to work - perhaps he
could bust a few heads who're making trouble in the promenade he
thought to himself - and left in his quarters and walked off in the
direction of the Security Office, stopping only to pick up his
hangover cure from one of the food dispensers - a strawberry, banana
and liquorice milkshake with a dollop of coffee ice cream.
The corridors of the ship were extremely quiet for once. There was no
technicians or engineers running about, fixing stuff and going on
about clever-clever boffin stuff. After about ten minutes, he came
across a severed head.
He recognized the head - it was Jim Munro's. Jim Munro was an
American scientist who'd been seconded into the Space Corps on a two
year research program from the Dennis McBean Institute. Eddie only
knew him because he had an illegal moonshine distillery hidden in one
of the cargo bays. Eddie took a blind eye to the moonshine in
exchange for a couple of bottles each month. Eddie was upset - now
where was he going to get his moonshine?
Seconds later, a dark red laser bolt scorched over Eddie's head and
hit the wall in front of him. He dropped quickly to his knees, turned
around and whipped out his gun. He couldn't believe his eyes.
It was a Skutter.
A Skutter that was covered in blood and had a rather deadly looking
laser pistol clutched in its claws.
"What th-" said the puzzled Eddie, but was cut off as the Skutter
took another shot at him, shooting the gun out Eddie's hands.
The Skutter moved slowly towards him, aiming the gun carefully at
Eddie's head, preparing to fire the killing shot.
At this point, the following conversation went through Eddie's
subconscious
"A Skutter?"
"Yeah"
"A bloody Skutter!"
"Yeah, a Skutter"
"I'm going to be killed by a Skutter? I've survived fights with some
of the toughest bastards this side of Pluto - the hell I'm going to
go down against a Skutter!"
"It's aiming a SR-200K semi-automatic death ray at your head, what
have you got?"
At this point Eddie realised what he did have - his milkshake! With
the perfect aim and skill that a mixture of adrenaline and alcohol
can only bring, Eddie chucked his milkshake it the direction of the
Skutter, landing with a loud plop on the Skutter's head. Whilst the
Skutter was blinded, Eddie gave the miniature robot a swift kick and
sent it flying down the corridor, bouncing along the deck and coming
to a scraping halt a few yards away. Eddie picked up his gun and
moved off again in the direction of the Skutter. Seeing it was
clearly broken beyond repair, he gave it another kick just to be
sure. He picked up the Skutter's gun and quickly left the scene.
It wasn't until he reached Level 441 that he saw a Skutter again -
he'd come across various engineers, scientists and technicians hiding
from the insane robots. From what he could gather from one group of
survivors was that Mk. 10 had gone a bit crazy and was leading a
group of Skutter's and Peewee's in a ship-wide mutiny of sorts.
Now, Eddie wasn't usually one to play the hero. Far from it, he'd
usually be the first into the escape pod along with the beer and porn
supplies. But seeing as the Skutter's had already aggravated his
already kicking hangover and spilt his milkshake, he was a man on a
mission. A Rambo with breath so bad it could melt lead. Eddie made
his way down to the weapons room and signed out the weapons on
the `For complete and total bad-asses only' shelf. Jeff, the clerk on
the door, gave a look at the grease stained, Hawaiian shirt wearing
Irishman, shoved a form his way, and returned to his Ian Rankin
novel. If Eddie wasn't such a thieving, lying criminal himself he
would have been almost annoyed that Jeff had given him a load of
probably illegal weapons. However, he just took some small smug
satisfaction in swiping the guys watch.
The next Skutter he came across -this one with it's head replaced
with a deadly looking mace - didn't stand a chance. Eddie whipped out
a heavy laser rifle and shot point blank at the tiny blue droid.
"That's for the milkshake as swipe" said Eddie, in his best Clint
Eastwood impression. Realising no one was around to hear his witty
remark, or understand the reference, Eddie quickly moved off - a bit
embarrassed - and looked for more skutters to kill, some fair maidens
to rescue and seduce (or, most likely, one of the hookers onboard for
a quick fumble) and most importantly - some bloody good Nurofen.
<To be Continued>