Dead Man's Gun pt II

The next day, when Compton climbs out of the fart sack he putters through his morning absolutions with more direction and urgency than usual. Avoiding most his collegiates, which isn't at all difficult as 20-something junkies are notoriusly night-hawkish, he starts to collect the odds and sods he takes on his road trips. Almost ritualistically after all these years. Such things as a bottle of Canadian Club, some charcoal, spray paint, rope, multi-tool, and some arcane choices from his library. Lastly he dons his ever present army coat and rolls some of the bodies laying around the Loft for some cash.

On his way out the door he leaves a note on the fridge as an afterthough, it reads:
Gone to get my gun. -C.

Out on the street, bright and early. The only thing stiring in the slums are the odd alley cat. Compton unpacks a can of spray paint and marks out a roughly rounded square on the sidewalk, and then puts an H in the middle. Next he digs out a piece of pink paper which he sets alight with a cheap BIC. Dropping it to the ground where it burns out on top of the rough depiction of a Honda symbol and looks at his watch, quietly counting down the seconds.

[Willpower] Compton spends a Willpower point.

Compton rolls intelligence+occult (8 dice) at a difficulty of 7:
<9> <7> <9> -1- <7> <10> <8> 4
Achieving 5 successes, resulting in a phenomenal success!

There is a quiet in the air. Like a collective holding of breath before something incredible is going to happen. A sense of anticipation fills the air. And it happens. There is a rushing sound, like that of air being displaced. You see some faint glow, almost like a short aurora borealis before its there. The ugly little Honda Element sitting there. The window is open. There is a bag of groceries on the passenger seat and the keys are still in the ignition. It would seem someone had just gotten home from shopping. In the back are several more bags of food.

"Sweet." is his simple appraisal of the situation and collects his stuff. Dropping it in the back amongst the sundries of suburban life he greets his rather homely travel companion, "Hey toots. Good to see ya again. Wanna go for a ride?"

Compton gets in without waiting for an answer. He's not crazy you know. Well, not that way.
Indeed, the car does not respond to your words. At least, not immediately. When you turn the key in the ignition, it comes to life. The engine makes that purring sound that a new foreign car makes. It has all the fixin's. Power steering, power windows, power seats, air conditioning, a CD player and a CD collection (Complete works of Billy Joel, Celine Dion and Barbra Streisand). The seats are leather and it still has that new car smell.

Compton slips on the Barbra as a guilty pleasure, safe in the knowledge that the kids are all near dead right now and it is safe to do so.

'Send in the Clowns' is on when COmpton hits the Highway heading in to the sunrise.

WEATHER REPORT: The clouds overhead begin to move off, leaving clear skies.

It takes about forty minutes to clear through all of the streets and mini-highways before hitting actual interstate highway. There's nothing quite as freeing as good music, windows open and a vehicle on cruise control to really make one appreciate a road trip. About two hours in to your trip, in the distance, you can see that there might be some fairly unpleasant weather as the clouds are gray looking and the wind blowing in to your window carries the taste of moisture on it, the threat of rain.

Of cource there is. This is fucking Oregon... Compton thinks. Suddenly missing the relativly temperatness of Ontario.

But his mind isn't just on these trivial things. He's on a mission afterall. In search of his lost Grail... fucking FedEx. As he thinks this he reaches over and rummages through his sachel for a clunky looking piece of equipment. From the looks of the black thermo-resin casing with fake chrome trim, dating it at least 30 years old it is some kind of primitive radio device. He plunks it on the spacious dash and fiddles with a tuning knob until a steady dull beep comes through clearly.

What Compton is doing is setting up a link with his Patron, Pa Bell. A Spirit Guide have you, residing in the burnt out shell of Telstar-1.


For the moment it's silent. Perhaps simply too far from the mark for you to get any kind of read for Pa Bell to work with. Fortunately for you that your ride through Oregon is mercifully short, just a small part of the trip. A rainy part of it. A fairly unimpressive part of it but it's done and over with as the I-82 takes you through to Idaho. Yes. Idaho. Home of the potato. Woop de shit. Look? There's a sign on the side of the road. Fifteen miles to the site of the World's Largest Potato!

Compton is sorely tempted. Having something of a weird compulsion to buy campy postcards... but no. That would be staged as he doesn't have to actually stop there, it'd be frivilous. Shame really.

Okay, so we're in Idaho. It's been a few hours and he's drank a quart of the Sunny D he's found in one of the bag. Weird stuff. Like new age Tang.

He decides it's time for a rest and pulls off at the first Gas n Gulp he finds.

Around noon, you just can't hold it any longer. You pause on the side of the road and contribute to the environment by providing liquid fertilizer for the plant life that grows along the highway. As for the food part, it would seem that the person who owned this car was most assuredly not on Atkins or any other diet. There are some frozen things in there that will surely be nastified relatively soon and are candidates for pitching. But this individual also has a collection of chips, cookies, two bags of premium blend coffees and a ton of soft drinks. There is also a pathetically small bottle of Sunny D.

Frozen goods, kindly opened and donated to the crawling/flapping wildlife in Idaho before Compton remounts and goes looking for a gas station before the appearance of the buggy starts to get on his nerves.

It only takes about twenty more minutes before you are able to find a gas station. Bob's Pump and Dump. Yes. That's the name. An honest to goodness, independant gas station. You pull in to the place and see the one lone pump sitting sourly in the middle of the lot. When you pull in, a fairly unsettling looking man in his mid fifties wearing overalls and a baseball cap approaches. It might be stereotypical but it's true. And he's there. Watching you with washed out blue eyes set in to the soft folds of his pig-like face.

"Fill 'er up." Compton says, not one to judge being washed out and wrinkly himself.

"Ya happen to see any kind of boxes falling from the sky of late?" He asks, figuring why the hell not? He must be getting close, and he really has nothing else going for him in this matter.

The man just stares at you for a moment when you ask the question before he walks around to the side of the vehicle. Flipping the gas tank cover off, he removes the pump and sticks it in the hole, holding the handle tightly. The old mechanical display shows the dollars and gallons rolling by. "Bahkses? I ain't seen any Bahkses fallin' from tha sky... sorry mister. You'll need to find crazy shit like that further south." Indeed, Provo, UT is about seven hours away yet.
:'aint from round ere' so to speak. Really, excpet for looking it up on Mapquest the night before, he hasn't looked at a map or asked directions once. Kinda going on blind fate here. %r%rComps pays up and get the Yuppie-mobile rolling. South it is.
Compton 'aint from round ere' so to speak. Really, excpet for looking it up on Mapquest the night before, he hasn't looked at a map or asked directions once. Kinda going on blind fate here.

Comps pays up and get the Yuppie-mobile rolling. South it is.

The stones grind under the tires and a small cloud of dust is all that remains of you at the station. The porky fellow just watches, shaking his head in disbelief. The highway eventually turns straight south for a while. The scenery changes, becoming a little less green. The sun begins to set as night falls over the country, leaving you with the remaining four hours of your trip to Provo to be done in the darkness of night.

Anyone else?

Hola. Anyone else having trouble connecting?

I get an invalid data type for the slayer.kyndig.com host. Does someone have a numerical address that works?

Danke.