Crazy_Dragon

Grass hurts.

It hurts a lot.

It hurt like about three hells in one go. Something Patsy had been making quite the effort trying to ignore while she struggled to pull herself back onto the APC, not that it was easy, though. Getting a pancaked couch into the face wasn't exactly painless either.

But Patsy persevered. In spite of feeling the searing pain of countless blades of grass scraping against her midriff coupled with BRAND NEW! jaw-ache from the discarded and flattened furniture, the immortal pulled through, and in turn pulled herself up onto the APC, planting both feet firmly onto the vehicle's bumper.

The triumph was short-lived, though, as soon as the Carrier run over the land mine. At first she was lucky, the sudden shock of the explosion sending her swinging hip-first into the back of the vehicle with a thud, but her luck didn't last much longer either, as she found out all too well when the APC swung round and flung the poor girl off.

"OOF!"

Patsy rolled for a good bit ahead of the APC before finally stopping. Thankfully face up this time, but feeling another bout of dizziness instantly.

"That does it," Patsy grumbled as she slowly pulled herself upright. "When this is over, I'm askin' for double-pay!"

The immortal crawled toward the now-motionless APC and listened carefully to the ranting within. Russians, she thought to herself, recognising the language. However, as she crept up to the right-hand side of the vehicle and crouched down behind the rear wheel, she silently hoped they knew a decent amount of English as she waited for the door to open.

After all, as recognisable as the language was to Patsy, one's grasp of any foreign tongue can get rusty after a several decades of not having to speak it.

Entering F6...

"Fwu-!?"

Patsy's only words as the sudden quake knocked her off her feet while she jogged through the jungle. Rather than a straight trip and faceplant, Lady Luck, it seemed, chose to spit on the immortal rather than smile upon her, an theory she was starting to agree with as she plummeted to the bottom of the embankment she was approaching at the time.

Face first. Into more mud.

"Miss Crusher?" Wilf grunted through the earpiece. "Patsy, come in!"

The immortal lifted her mud-covered face from the ground and pressed the button on her device. "Tell me you have an idea what just pulled the rug from under me."

"I do. Mount Inconvenient just lived up to its name."

Patsy didn't answer at first, choosing to spend the next minute or so scraping mud off her face while Wilf's latest warning brought back a particularly unpleasant memory.

"Patsy?"

"I hear you, Wilf." she answered, pushing herself back to her feet with a free hand. "Was it natural or forced, do you know?"

"Carly would have probably been able to give you an answer on that one if she wasn't...

"...freakin' out, still, huh?"

"Sadly. That said, though, it does seem well-timed, what with it happening so soon after that sudden bout of darkness."

"Aye, it is, like." Patsy murmured to nobody in particular. "Right, sod Landborough for now, then. Headin' North to check out the mountain."

"Miss Crusher?" Wilf added before Patsy could take a step forward. "Do be careful over there. I'm sure you'd rather avoid a repeat of..."

"Don't have to tell me once!" the immortal finished off, releasing the button and jogging Northward.

****

It didn't take her long before she had to stop herself running straight into a burning tree. Make that a wall of burning trees.

Patsy glanced about for a moment, looking for a suitable vantage point to check out the carnage ahead. Out of luck. The fire - presumably caused by Inconvenient's lava - was spreading fast, by the looks of things. Any attempt to climb or even super-jump to the canopy would have required dragging herself though more flames than she was in the mood for enduring.

"For flip's sake," Patsy muttered. "Indonesia all over again."

Turning her attention to the wall of burning jungle ahead, she adjusted her fingerless gloves and pulled them back to her wrists. If she couldn't get up the trees for a good look...

CRUNCH!!

...she'd need to plough -through- them, starting with a swift boot to one directly ahead. Unfortunately, the tree wobbled only slightly and the worst she did to the trunk was a nice little footprint in the bark, and the kick she dealt served to add to her existing aches more than anything.

CRUNCH!!

Take two. The tree wobbled more this time. A good sign.

CRUNCH!!

Third time was the charm. The tree finally collasped forward and in time, took the next few ahead down with it like dominoes. Enough to open up a decent view of the mess outside. And boy, was it a mess.

"Flamin' hell, Wilf." Patsy announced through the earpiece as she tip-toed along the fallen trunks to get as close to the lava flow as possible. Once she was close enough, she peered at the traces of purple among the molten rock's usual colours "Looks like I've just walked in on it and all. Some... hippie take on it, anyway."

"Can you see anything useful?" Wilf asked. "Any answer as to what caused the recent phenomena or a clue to Tomb's whereabouts?"

Patsy looked about and sighed. "Only thing I'm seein' right now is the jungle behind me, and unless I suddenly feel like usin' the wood to surf this goop for the three seconds I'd last before sinking into eternal pain, it's not the most usef-"

And that was when she saw the APC.

"Hold your horses, Wilf." Patsy added, peering at the speeding vehicle. "Found something better to surf. Back in a bit!"

"Patsy?"

She didn't answer. Instead, she hopped a number of steps back. Just enough, she figured, to build up a running jump to clear the lava stream and get herself perhaps a third of the way toward the APC. And she ran to the very end of the slowly disintegrating tree that sat halfway into the molten rock, her last step crushing the burning wood under her foot as she launched herself into the air, and over the stream.

She ached all over for her efforts, but it got her there. She didn't stop, either, ploughing as much strength as she could into another leap.

Third time's the charm. The APC was close. Painfully close. Patsy pushed herself into the air for the last time, aiming for the carrier's roof.

She made it. The problem was, 'it' was a slight error in her trajectory and a sloppy landing, both serving to send her slipping as soon as she set foot onto the vehicle, causing her to bash her chin off the back of the thing before she could manage to grab onto something.

"You flamin' buggerin' bugger!" The immortal ranted as she clung onto the vehicle as best she could.

G7...

Patsy's grip tightened on the now-agonised flockadile's jaw as she felt them break apart before she finished up with a swift boot into the thing's mouth, pulling her hands away as she did and sending it somewhat unwillingly airborne for a few seconds at the least. She hoped anyway, seeing as she had still been feeling dizzy something awful since bashing her own head off a nearby rock and achy all over after the whole ordeal she'd just been through.

Amid all that, she still kept as best an eye on the creatures around her, though she noticed their blurred forms were getting a lot smaller very fast and their screeching growing much more quiet with every second.

And then it all went quiet. Great, the immortal thought to herself. Now she could relax for a bit and clear her head. She gave herself a couple of minutes before dragging herself up, using the very rock she bounced off to support her. Looking around with a slightly diminished headache and clearer sight, Patsy confirmed that the abominations had well and truly...

"...buggered off." she muttered to herself.

Then the darkness came and went. Patsy shot a glance upward before reaching for her earpiece again. Hopefully it didn't take -too- much of a beating in the fight just now.

"Wilf?" Patsy uttered into the microphone.

"Yes, Miss Crusher," Wilf answered quickly. "I saw it too, as did Carly. And judging by the panic attack she seems to be having at the moment, she saw something else too."

"Any idea what it was?" the immortal sighed.

"Afraid not. Disregar-"

"WILF! I swear, if you're hidin' something from me about this job, I will come back over there and jam your flippin' face into the speedboat's rotors! Now do you have any flamin' idea what the flamin' flip that flippin' thing was? Be honest this time!"

"...No. We weren't even aware of anything like that until a minute ago."

Patsy sighed again. "Fine. Fine, whatever. Gonna check the area out before I head off again, alright?"

"Very well."

Releasing her finger from the button, Patsy looked down. Wonderful. She was feeling dizzy, aching all over, struggling to stand up straight and to top it all off... she was covered in mud.

"Flamin' hell..." the immortal groaned, pushing herself from the rock to stagger just a little futher North-West. "I swear, there'd better be a river or lake or somethin' somewhere around here."

She stopped for a moment to look up at the sky again through a gap offered by the canopy above.

"And it better not be full of pirahna-bunnies or summat stupid either!"

...G7, headed toward F6

Made sense long before Tech needed it explaining to him.

G7...

Patsy hissed a curse as her uppercut missed the leader and found her fist suddenly under the grip of its jaws. The creature then pulled up, dragging the immortal with it while the rest of them all rushed for a limb.

Not good.

"Ow!" Patsy yelped as the flockadile swung her about, at one point knocking her against a nearby rock. That knocked her for six and left her just a little too dizzy to fight off the rest of them with her remaining free limbs. Anyone else would have been screaming in agony right now as they eventually found their limbs being torn from their sockets, as she would have been were it not her own impervious and unbreakable skin. The main drawback being was that she still felt pain, and boy was she feeling it right now. "Ow ow OOOOOWWWW, DAMMIT! I'm not a flamin' chew-toy, alright!"

Yep, it hurt. Like hell. Considering a bunch of hybrid avian monstrosities were trying their hardest to get their share of their new-found meal, you couldn't really blame her. If it kept up, she was bound to pass out in a matter of minutes. There was, after all, only so much punishment she could take before her own brain yelled "Stuff this!" and shut itself down temporarily.

Not a good thing at all. She needed to stay conscious and she needed to stay alert. Collaring and taking the world's most despicable little brat on the planet out of the picture before anyone else depended on it. And she needed to get the flockadiles out of her hair.

Thinking of how wasn't easy when throbbing pain along all four limbs dominated her own thoughts, but thankfully the first step of her next course of action didn't take much thought.

"I said," Patsy grunted, clenching both fists as she did. "I... am... not... a... CHEW TOY!"

The immortal pulled every last bit of strength she could muster from her aching arms into drawing them both together, one sudden and unexpected action that caught the arm-chompers off-guard somewhat. Before they could react, perhaps compensate by flapping a little harder, both flockadiles found themselves very swiftly crashing whatever-passed-for-a-beak-first into one another, followed by the rest of their bodies.

As soon as those to let go, Patsy fell backward, surprising the two flockadiles that clung onto her legs with their jaws and sending the lot of them tumbling to the ground. Once more, she struck another rock with the back of her own head in the fall, sending herself even dizzier with the exacerbated headache that joined her limbs on the list of things that she really didn't need to be hurting right now.

Thankfully the creatures released their grip on her legs before she tumbled from the rock and face-first into the mud, but that wasn't the end of the ordeal, as Patsy came to realise as she struggled to push herself back up, only to be shoved into the mud again by an unexpected beak-excuse to the back. She barely managed a roll to avoid being 'pecked' again as well as to get her face out of the damned mud before she found herself holding apart another set of jaws that almost managed to clamp around her head.

Now Patsy was getting just a little ticked off. Her limbs ached. Her head was pounding. And to top it all off, large teeth were contributing to her agony by digging into, or at least trying to dig into her palms.

Enough was enough.

"I hate to break it to you, hun, but..." Patsy grunted as her arms slackened a little against the hybrid's jaws. "...I've just gotten meself struck off the menu, so please forward all complaints to Hades, The Devil or whatever flippin' big boss of the afterlife you give a toss abOOOOOOOOOUUUUUUUUTTTTT!"

At that point she pushed against the jaws again, much harder this time.

...G7

****

Meanwhile, back at G8...

Wilf stood tall within the circle of runes he'd been spending his time scrawling out. He did not like the sounds coming from the West one bit.

"Miss Crusher," the mage called through the earpiece one more time. "Miss Crusher, please respond. I repeat, please respond!"

No answer.

"This isn't good," he muttered. "Carly?"

"Mmmmyyeeeeeah?" his partner groaned from the comfort of the speedboat's front passenger seat, still somewhat woozy from the force field effort.

"Could you see if we still have the grenade launcher in there?"

Carly remained silent for a moment while she looked about, then returned to holding her palm to her head. "Yyyou worrryyyy too much, uuuuuuuuuuuuh..."

"Really, now?"

"Yeeeeeaaaaaahhhhh. She'll be fiiiiine, now get on wi- wait, what was I saying again?"

"Carly," Wilf sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. "She might not be able to die. She might be able to throw street lights into Rikti dropships to kebab their pilots, but she is not unstoppable, far from it. Now, there could be the possibility right now, that whatever 'big and ugly' thing over there could have taken her down, which really does her mission no wonders at all, does it?"

"Wiiiiilf..." Carly grunted in lazy frustration "It's nooooot going to do uuus much gooooood... if... if... ifffffffffffffffffffffffffff- fudge it.... ifff the ooooonly guuuuuy that can get us oooouut of heeeeeere gets hissssss... errr..."

"Head blown off?" Wilf finished, realising that although Carly was groggier than a morbidly drunken pirate, she did have a point. His organisation could live with a failed mission just this once. It couldn't cope with the loss of its two best operatives. "Okay, fine. But..."

Wilf looked at his mindscrewed partner once more and allowed the smallest of smirks of form on his face.

"You can be the one to explain everything to Corman."

G7...

Patsy shot a look upward as soon as she heard the sudden noises above her, pressing the button on her earpiece once more.

"Found somethin'! They're big, they're ugly, and I don't think they're too chuffed to see me. Back in a bit!"

"Care to elaborate a little more?" Wilf enquired, oblivious to the threat due West of his own position.

"Maybe later!" Patsy barked. Keeping an eye on what she figured was the 'leader' of the flock - then again, they could all be in a mad dash to see who got to break their jaws on her - the immortal released her finger from the earpiece and planted her feet firmly into the ground, ready to bring her invincible fist into whatever passed for its chin.

She waited.

"Sorry, gulls!" Patsy mocked, faking a mockney accent blur the pronunciation of 'girls'. She thought it was funny at the time. Nevertheless, as soon as the 'leader' swooped down close enough she brought her fist flying upwards, returning to her normal accent - North-East English with a hint of Irish - to add: "I'm afraid you're gonna find me just a little too TOUGH FOR YOU!"

...G7

G8...

Patsy was the first to plant her feet on dry land, followed by Wilf who brandished a long rope as he disembarked.

"Once I get the boat tied up," Wilf called to the immortal. "I'll set up a rune gate around it. With any luck it'll get us clear of the island and give us a sharp exit if and when the need arises."

"Since when did you start muckin' about with portals, Wilf?" Patsy smirked.

"Since your smart little idea damn near gave Carly here an aneurysm." the mage answered bluntly. "Given the distance between us and the edge of those rocks back there, it shouldn't be too much of a drain on my power. Most gates are often used to travel between states, and rarely betwee-"

"Wilf!" Patsy barked. "If you can fart out a gate, fine, just soddin' well do it! If I wanted lectures on how you pillocks do that voodoo that you do I would have stayed in Newcastle for another decade or two, alright?"

"Pfft. Newcastle. Those jokers couldn't pull a rabbit out of their own a-!"

"Aye, whatever. Headin' for that ghost town anyway." Patsy said, storming off West before Wilf stopped her again.

"Aren't you forgetting something, Miss Crusher?" Wild asked. The mage then tossed a small device to her, something which resembled a Bluetooth earpiece for mobile phones. It had all the hallmarks of one. Small hole which could expose a microphone, small in-ear bud at the other end surrounded by a black plastic ear clip and a little black button with a red ring around it. Yep.

"Yeah, Wilf?" said Patsy, rolling the earpiece in her hand. "My phone's still from 2001. This isn't gonna work on it."

"It doesn't need to. I've enchanted it to provide a two-way link between that and one of my own. As long as there are no magic dampeners or blocks in place where you are, you'll get a clear signal, even if you're halfway to Hell. In a manner of speaking."

"In a manner of speaking..."

"Okay, I exaggerated a little. radius-wise, it could cover the entire Tri-State area around New York -in theory-. I'm not sure the halfway point to Hell will actually fall under that radius."

"So it'll cover the whole island, dampeners and other counter-magics notwithstanding?"

"Yes. Just hold the button within the red ring and talk. Easy as breathing!"

"Aye, try sayin' that when I grind your soddin' face into the sand, hun." Patsy muttered, clipping the device to her left ear and pressing the button. "TESTING! TESTING! ONE! TWO! FLAMIN' THREE!"

Wilf yelped and jumped, somewhat expectedly, and put his hand to his own ear. "Thank you, Miss Crusher, we've ascertained that it works! Now let's pray my hearing did NOT suffer any temporary impairment, shall we?"

Patsy laughed as she turned West again. "Get on with that gate, dipstick. I'll be back in a bit."

Of course, she didn't get -too- far before something caught her eye. The immortal crouched down to examine the tracks at her feet. Caterpillar tracks. Possibly something to do with the mining ops that went on here, she figured. Possibly not. Making a mental note, Patsy then pushed herself back to her feet and reached for the headset.

"Wilf?"

"Yes, Miss Crusher?" The irritatingly familiar voice sounded through the earbud.

"Spotted some tracks on the way West. Gonna have a little gander before I keep on toward Landborough. Could be nowt, could be summat."

"Good call, but don't waste too much time on it in case it turns out to be a dead end."

Patsy released her finger from the button and began following the tracks. A good look around soon made the green paint on the rocks around her as well as the gouges in the trees more than noticeable to her. The immortal kept looking, taking the opportunity to correct the buns in her hair and straighten her tank top.

"Either some pillock's been takin' these buggers on with a digger, or there's summat here I really need to start fussin' about..." Patsy muttered quietly to herself before pressing the button again. "Wilf, it's probably just part of the mining op that's been and long gone."

"Long gone, Miss Crusher?" Wilf responded. "If they were -that- long gone, wouldn't those tracks have been washed away by the decades since ops on this island were abandoned?"

"Hell if I know, Wilf." Patsy barked back. "It's not like it's easy to tell how much it's tried chuckin' it down or what other flippin' kind of storms nature's been throwin' at the place in the past half-century, is it? I'll look into it a little more before I start headin' west again, alright?"

With that, Patsy released the button and stormed further into the jungle.

...G7

I8...

In time, perhaps just a minute or two, and with a few extra gusts of wind cast by Wilf amid his struggle to keep the vessel straight, the forcefield rolled the speedboat over the rocks, and in turn over the sandbar, before finally splashing down into the still waters of the lagoon.

Just in time for Carly's concentration to snap.

The field flickered out almost as quickly as Carly dropped Wilf's necklace to clutch her forehead, sending the boat into a few final bounces before settling itself onto the lagoon. Patsy pulled a face as she unclipped her seatbelt.

"Well, that's something I don't want to be repeating again." the immortal muttered. "She gonna be alright, like?"

"She'll be fine." Wilf answered with unwavering certainty. As soon as he unclipped his own seatbelt, he shifted the speedboat back into gear, driving it gently up north toward the jungle. "She kept the field running too long, used too much power, put a little strain on her body, but she'll recover. It won't be immediate, though. Her headache, for example, will take more than a few aspirin to shift, believe me."

"Flamin' hell..." Patsy muttered. "Right, I'll bugger off ahead once we hit dry land, you look after her and sort us out an exit plan. Preferably something that doesn't emulate sittin' on a running washing machine on acid, crack and Dyne together, aye?"

"Very well. I recommend either heading for the mountain up ahead ir the ghost town to the East. Either could be a potential candidate for her lair?"

Patsy frowned. "You got anything to back that up or have you just been watching You Only Live Twice or summat?"

"Never seen it, actually." Wilf answered. Patsy could almost make out a smirk forming on his face as the boat reached the shore. "Here we are, then."

...G8

The southern edge of I8...

Patsy idly drummed her left fingers on her knee as she watched the approach toward the lagoon's mouth slow to a gradual halt.

"There a problem?" the immortal enquired.

"Yeah," Carly sighed her answer, her hands slowly slipping from the wheel. "Look up ahead. See those rocks out there?"

"Aye," Patsy answered, quirking a brow at woman. "I'm good, but I'm not -that- good. If I try even navigate that, this thing will be sitting at the bottom in no time, and I'm guessing you'd prefer not to swim all the way back home, am I right?"

"Fair enough, hun..." Patsy said as she slumped back into her seat. So much for that idea, then. For a brief while, the three of them sat in silence, looking out toward the large roadblock - or seablock, if you like - halting their advance.

Carly was the better driver out of the trio, she couldn't hope to navigate the rocks ahead, which meant either seeking an alternate entrance - a potential waste of time if there ever was one, Patsy thought to herself - or just sucking it up and taking the maniac's route into the port, and wasting time there fighting off whatever defenses they ha-

"Hang on a sec!" Patsy sat bolt upright to break the silence. "One of yous is packin' Force magic, right?"

"That'll be me." Carly answered, turning to the immortal with a curious look on her face. "Why, what are planning?"

"Can you wrap a field around this thing?"

"She could," Wilf confirmed. He too glanced at Patsy with the most worried of expressions. "But she'd need to plough a lot of power into it. Dare I ask what you're thinking?"

"I'm thinkin' she wraps that field around the boat and we roll over those stones."

"You've clearly not thought this one through, Miss Crusher." Wilf said as he pinched his nose out of mild frustration. "We'd need a means to propel the boat or this plan of yours is going to sink fast."

"We could give ourselves a little momentum before I cast a field, maybe?" Carly suggested. "We put some distance between here and about half a minute back the other way, then we charge at the mouth at full throttle. Once we're back here, I cast it and we're laughing. Almost."

"Almost." Wilf repeated. "We'd need something else to push us along,"

Both Patsy and Carly glared at Wilf, knowing full well that he could easily cast a gust of wind behind them if mere momentum failed them.

"...Fine, fine!"

"Great, so it's all settled then!" Carly chimed. "Take the wheel, Wilf. I can't hold a large field and drive at the same time."

Patsy sat back again and watched the two mages switch seats. Then remembered to fasten her belt. While Wilf wasn't too hot with a speedboat, the ability to keep it in a straight line for longer than five seconds was more than enough to help get the boat charging at the mouth at top speed.

Before Carly even had a chance to sit down, she was almost thrown overboard by her partner's semi-sloppy driving as he swung the boat around as best he could before accelerating away from the island. After a few minutes the boat again slowed and swung round in an imperfect 180, facing the mouth once more.

"Give me your necklace, Wilf." Carly requested, to which Wilf promptly complied. "The more I can focus into this, the better."

Patsy looked on while Carly closed her eyes, clutching Wilf's chain tightly as if willing something into or out of it. Were it not for the sound of the waves splashing against the boat's hull, she probably could have heard whatever she was muttering.

Not that she cared, anyway.

"Okay," Carly muttered. "Floor it!"

And floor it Wilf did. The speedboat slowly initially pushed itself across the waves, Wilf struggling to keep the thing straight, but managing for now. Eventually the bumpy ride began to smooth out a little as the boat picked up a little speed and the whole time, Carly remained hunched into her seat, gripping the chain necklace and muttering in near-silence.

When the rocks ahead became visible again, Patsy started to worry. Now was probably a good time to cast that forcefield right about now, something she was kind enough to consider reminding the murmuring mage in the front.

Her worries were unfounded, it seemed. Before the immortal could even speak, the early signs of a bubble began forming about the edge of the boat. The bubble was then quick to expand, wrapping around the vessel completely within seconds and lifting the boat from the water just as it finally about to hit the rocks ahead.

A second later, the bubble was rolling happily along the jagged rocks, moving on the speedboat's momentum alone. There was cause for cheer, but the trio chose to keep quiet, for one good reason.

"M-m-m-m-a-a-a-y-y-y-b-b-b-e-e..." Patsy stammered, her speech hampered constantly by the now rather uncomfortably bumpy ride. "S-s-s-t-o-r-m-i-i-i-n-n-g th-e-e-e p-o-o-o-o-r-r-r-t w-a-a-a-a-s-s-s-n't-t-t-t s-s-s-u-u-u-ch-ch-ch a-a-a b-a-a-a-a-d i-i-i-d-d-d-d-d-e-e-e-e-a-a-a a-a-a-a-f-f-f-t-t-e-e-e-r-r a-a-a-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l!!"*


((* = "Maybe storming the port wasn't such a bad idea after all!!"))

No problem. Just I've been piecing together a Bash script to make generating a number a bit less painless (for me anyway), is all, and just wondered if the File Number had an ideal format to take into account while I was writing it.

It's clear that all-numerical File Numbers are all fine, but in the case of letters, should they just be restricted to the final digits of each half of the number for the sake of not looking silly?

As if he's not already done so?

This I can live with.

(Maybe it'll convince Tech to get his own damn photobucket account instead of using the Handbook to hold his bug/griefer shots. )

(O_O)

*HAPPYSPLOSION!!*

(This is getting added to Unionverse too, right? Right!? *begbegbegbegbeg*)