<meta name="LineWrap" content="true"><TITLE>SR_Bk1 0135</TITLE><A HREF="SR_Bk1-0136.txt">Next (Page 136)</A><BR> They could see he was inside a moving vehicle.<P><P>"V! Thank goodness it's you!" Bodoni said.<P><P>"Um..." V said. "Sorry about not calling and not waiting for the others at that rendezvous point, but, uh..."<P><P>Suddenly, the picture shook, and Nevrippa Den came into view. Looking back and forth from the road to the screen as she was driving.<P><P>"Hi guys! Yeah, sorry about all the confusion. We're just doing some advanced looting--got a lot of great stuff in the van, so--"<P><P>"Nevrippa--where are you? Vike and Treyess still haven't come back--and we have no way of calling them," Bodoni said.<P><P>"Sorry kid," Nevrippa said. "We just didn't want to waste the battery. And we're coming back anyway--to unload the van, so we can come back out and get more stuff."<P><P>"Nevrippa, uh... I mean, I don't know if, uh, looting is really the most important thing we need to be doing now, and, uh..." Bodoni said.<P><P>"Oh, don't worry Injy. Once you see what we got, you'll see why we've been doing it. Okay? So we'll be back in about twenty minutes, if all the roads we think still exist do. Okay? Don't want to waste the battery any more. Bye!" the crazy girl said, and the screen went blank.<P><P>"Damn!" Bodoni exclaimed. "Leave it to her! I could kill her!"<P><P>"So could we," Treyess Arcomany said from the doorway. They all turned to see her and Vike Varmabey coming in.<P><P>"Treyess!" Bodoni said. "Thank goodness you're back. I guess you just saw what happened to those two out there. Looting! Man!"<P><P>"Well," Treyess said, coming into the room, "we did a little looting too. A lot of good stuff out there, you know."<P><P>"Yeah," Vike said, "everything's shot to hell out there."<P><P>Vike Varmabey was old. At least, he stood out in the young population of Aconck, and especially Overwhelm Associates. It seemed Fife's Primate Algorithm chose young, attractive people more often than not. Vike, though, was a more real, more honest sort of person. Heavy set, grizzled, gruff, but with a twinkle in his eyes. He wore lots of plaid and usually had some kind of hunter's cap on. No one had yet figured out what was so special about him, but his presence was always a salve to the raw nerves of his fellow Primates.<P><P>Treyess Arcomany was an adventurer, full of life and charm. Her outfit was of soft silver, pleasing to the eye and not at all gaudy. She had simple straight blond hair and a look of supreme, yet humble, self confidence. Her full cloak, which she wore with grace, was where a bunch of faeries had stowed away as she returned to Overwhelm's Greatwall base a week earlier. The resulting faery infestation became such a fiasco that she came here to Timber Serious Earth to get away from it all--only to find herself in the middle of this dreadful reality collapse.<P><P>"Okay everybody," Ledrant Hate said, standing on top of a couch. "I know I don't have to stress the dire situation that we're in--but thus far we've been aimlessly wandering--getting nowhere. Now that Treyess and Vike are back, I have to propose that, in Il Zillionthi's absence, I take command and plan our course of action. If anyone has a problem with that, please say so now. I'm doing this because no one else has."<P><P>Everyone sort of looked in Injure Bodoni's direction, and he got the hint--he had been acting like the leader, but he wasn't doing such a good job.<P><P>"Hey, no problem," he said, smiling in minor defeat as he mulled over his lack of decisiveness.<P><P>The others nodded and mumbled their approval.<P><P>"Okay," Hate said. "Here's the situation--we know that getting rid of Office Complex at Gumhanshire is our best bet at bringing reality back--and that somehow dragging the ocean liner in Citydock down the frozen river and over the waterfall--where it will hopefully smash right into the Office Complex--is our best shot.<BR><A HREF="SR_Bk1-0136.txt">Next (Page 136)</A>