Through the Gate to the Dunes

[Stephan Donnel]

With little to no resistance the shimmering field gave way and parted before the metal hand and Stephan almost tumbled forward, having put too much pressure behind it.

He was immediately assaulted by the blazing heat from all around and blindingly bright sun from on above. Eventually the eye adjusted to light and a scene of desolated town unfurled before the vision of the Captain. Despite some commotion and the usual traffic near the gates, sparse as it was, shuffling him to the sideways he could see that most of the buildings in the distance were worn, and definitely seen better days.

Well, seems like a good place to start anew… Who am I kidding, I have to get out of this dump and see if there is anything else here
Mused Donnel as he walked ahead past some chatting strangers, there seemed to be a lot of kids here.

What did they even forget here, not like this is a sandpit for them…

With all that heat around and blazing sun above being soaked in water suddenly seemed like a good thing, it probably gave him some time before he started suffering from overheating, with all that heavy clothes and whatnot... But judging by the amount of vapour floating upwards it didn’t seem like it would last long.
As the old man advanced away from the Gate the featureless nexus ground was rapidly covered and then completely replaced by the layer of sand. Not that far away from the portal there was a small post with a couple of tired looking soldiers in strange equipment, one of them stepped forward, raising his hand.

Hey, you, steamy person. What is your business here? Not like we care, but regulations are set.

Captain stopped, trying to find purchase in the treacherous sand that replaced the blank, but firm, plane that was underneath his feet before.

Well, I just wandered in. Looking for something to do, maybe run into some other business that I could make mine.

You are a troublemaker? The trooper was taken back a bit, reaching hand up to his helmet as if in preparation to call someone in.

No, no, just too tired by all this sudden shmuck that dropped on me after I dropped near that one fountain back there. The man waved backwards dismissingly.

Hell, you’re a new prime? This is above my paygrade, just go sounder over to “Rick’s” someone will fill you in over there, I am not payed enough to deal with you. No offense. Soldier pointed somewhere over to the town behind him, obviously wanting to finish the conversation as fast as he could. Barely throwing the words out of his mouth he hurried back to his comrades behind.

Some taken Stephan noted with a slight grumble walking past the soldiers in the noted direction. He could deal with them later.

"Above paygrade" my arse...

[Stephan Donnel]

I should have caught a ride...

Couple hours later just storming off angry into the savannah, while stomping the occasional bushes, didn't seem like such a good idea. Stephan had seen several vehicles and some horseback riders speed past him in the distance. One of them even went close enough that the cloud of dust it brought up covered the somewhat-clean uniform in a fine layer of dirt.

DAMN YOU! GET SOME SHUTTERS ON THOSE EYES, LIKE YOU ARE USING THEM YOU PSYCHOPATH!

Coughing fervently from all the dust Stephan broke his stride for a moment and actually thought of coming back and catching a ride, but both stubbornness and pride would not allow that, so he just pushed on, leaving deep imprints in the dry ground of the once blooming savannah underneath him.

SEVERAL HOURS LATER

The uniform has completely dried up by this point, water fleeing the clothes of the stubborn man just like the errant small animals fled underneath his feet. He was covered in dust and breathing heavily, but still pushed on, putting one leg ahead of another and then again. He could swear that he saw an silhouette of a town he was heading for on the horizon just moment ago but that might just been a mirage birthed by the descending sun.

Suddenly, for the first time in the last three or four hours, a roar of not one engine, but several pierced the calmness of the half-dead plains the Captain was traversing. Hoping for a quick ride out of here he stopped and turned around, only to see a group of low-to-ground motor-engines roaring like no noble steam-engine ever would, making a little dust-storm in the distance. Obviously noticing a lone figure just standing around between some shabby vegetation drivers picked up the pace and rushed towards him. What was surprising is not the rush, but that several of them were ramming into one another in hopes of gaining advantage, as if it was some sort of a race… and Stephan was the prize.

What the bloody… began Donnel as the feeling of unease crept onto him as he realized those might not, in fact, be other travellers. That was only confirmed when one of the vehicles, covered in now visible rusty spikes, barbed fire and proudly displaying numerous skulls on the hood, outran others with a roar of a tortured engine and a blast of fire from pipes protruding from the top.

Stephan barely had time to turn his left, armoured, half towards danger as the machine hit home, throwing him violently sideways with the sound of tearing metal.

[Stephan Donnel]

Stephan was thrown violently through the air flying a couple of meters and landing hard on his back. From the looks of it the broken body was far too damaged to anything but bleed out slowly. The assaulting car stopped, bent metal in its front screeching loudly and some spikes falling off. The rest of the cars swiftly caught up with the leader, honking and shooting crude guns up in the air as they went.

“Jo-has! Jo-has!”

They chanted. The driver of the front, who just must have been that very “Johas” ,climbed out of his vehicle and raised his hands triumphantly. The driver was dressed in only in baggy pants and some leathery belts that looked suspiciously like suspenders. His sinewy, but imposing and strong frame was covered tattoos and scars, most of which looked like bullet wounds, far too many actually. He was obviously delighted, but then he twitched.

MOMMA WANTS TO EAT!

Johas dashed back into his car with a scream. The rest of the raiders met that turn of events with more honking and expectant screams. The cars, circling the scene up to this moment, formed a rough shape, stopping around the prone figure. That was twitching and smoking faintly at this point. Huh, when did he manage to catch fire? Anyway, the rest of the assailants climbed out of their cars and onto them, waiting for the coming show impatiently. Most of them were dressed similar to Johas, but some wore makeshift armor, made from scraps and an occasional tire, the more decent looking ones had some sort of a projectile weapon, from pistols and hand crossbows to shotguns and wait a second did that one actually have a blaster on him? Huh, damn stormtrooper deserters… The half-naked bandits mostly swung about with the clubs, axes and buzzsaws, small circular axe-like automated saws, those were the most unstable of the group, while their faces hid behind white-metal masks the sounds they were making were disconcerting at best. By the moment Johas jumped out of his car the other fifteen or so bandits made themselves comfortable on top of their cars, banging their fists on the hulls in a steadily growing rhythm.

FEED THE MOMMA! MEAT TO MOMMA! MOMMA TEAR MOMMA FEED MOMMA LOVE US!

The bandit champion was waving something above his head, yelling madly as the fists hit the metal. At one point he stopped, just as suddenly as everything else he did. That was the moment the thing became visible. A small scale industrial chainsaw, dangling wires and ripped metal parts it was once obviously a part of a bigger, likely stationary, machine before. But that wasn’t what caught the eye. A dried up head of a woman replacing the chassis was. Its mouth was open, as if screeching, or waiting to be fed, and the rusty, worn chain was going out right through the nose. The rest of the gang was ecstatic. They kept on banging and screaming words, as if stuck in some kind of a bloody trance, waiting for the show the “Momma” was about to put on.

[spoiler][/spoiler]

A prone figure finally moved, turning itself over. The hat fell off into the dirt and most of the uniform was a torn mess, caught on the spikes and then thrown around. The tiny rivulets of smoke floating upwards began gaining some actual form, as if the man was just barely put out after being set on fire. But instead of decreasing in volume and opacity they only became more and more apparent, now obvious to anyone who cared to look. As Stephan raised himself from the ground onto his elbows, still twitching periodically, he was yanked violently upwards by a free hand of the screaming madman above him, who wanted his “sacrifice” standing. Barely keeping his footing captain stumbled a bit forward.

SMOKEY MAN TOUGH, MOMMA LOVE WHEN THEY TOUGH, TOUGH BLEED BETTER, TOUGH BLEED MORE!

Johas just kept screaming.

TALK TO MOMMA SMOKEY!

Stephan twitched again, then again, and then he started laughing heartily.

Thank you, madman from the wasteland! Thank you!

The insane man was obviously not amused, and those from the “audience” who had the mental capacity to get concerned still didn’t go out of their trance.

SMOKEY TALKS TO MOMMA, MOMMA HUGS SMOKEY!

He swung his “mother” upwards in a wide arc and threw it down on the victim. Only for the whirling, rusty chain to be caught by the metal hand with an impotent screech and churn as the blade bent and electric motor malfunctioned, not used to being thrown against steel.

I know just what to do now.

[Stephan Donnel]

The scene was silent for a moment. No one could really believe the blasphemy that just happened. Mother defiled, twisted, broken by a prey, a sacrifice no less! Silence kept up for a second or two… and then everyone erupted into screams.

“MOMMA!” – veiled Johas

“KILL HIM! KILL HIM AND FEED HIM TO THE EXHAUST!” – screamed the psychotic madmen jumping from their cars to get to Stephan.

“Shit, that’s a Prime!” - huh, this must have come from one of the sane ones.

While Johas was still trying to pull his weapon from the, literally, steely grip of his opponent almost 8 psychotic bastards rushed Stephan from left and behind. ‘Almost’ because one of them was barely a meter tall. Aaaaaand yes, he was just trampled over. Damn, is he still giggling? What it takes to kill the devil?! Ah, no, there he goes. Still smiling, Captain yanked on the ruined chainsaw, causing Johas to tumble over and let go, and hurled it in the direction of his enemies. While the first ones were nimble enough to dodge it the ones further back didn’t have a chance as they only saw it coming when it flew past their dodging companions. The spinning chunk of metal hit one of them square in the chest, crushing the ribs with a wet sound, the tumbling bandit caught one of the others on the arm, and a few more actually stumbled in their blind rage. Oblivious, the ‘frontmen’ were still charging with zero-to-no support, eager to tear the interloper apart with their crude weapons. First one swung an axe, that looked like it once had been a saw, overhead, but it only just clanged fruitlessly over still-stainless surface of Captains arm. That, and the bandit suddenly realized that the limb is covered by nickel-sized holes. With a vicious grin on his face Stephan engaged the minor vents on his forearm. The boiling-hot vapour caught the assaulter right in the middle, causing him to stumble backwards, flailing and screaming wildly. Donnel lost no time and pulled his sabre from its sheath with his living limb, swatting the strike of a second bandit aside with his metal one and instantly following up with a slash of his own. To his surprise, instead of simply leaving a gashing wound on the shoulder, the sword came all the way through, crushing the bone underneath the flesh and going deeper into the body, only to be yanked backwards to deflect another overhead strike from the recovered, scalded, bandit. Taking it on a hard block with a sword Stephan momentarily proceeded to reward the man for his tenacity with an iron uppercut. Just as the psycho was hitting the ground with a shattered jaw, Johas stirred up on the ground. He pulled a knife from somewhere and drove it deep into Stephans thigh. The Captain flinched and swung the sabre to the side, cutting the hand holding the knife clean off. But the damage was done. He was distracted for long enough for the rest of the bandits to reach him. There was total of six, counting Johas, alive at this point. Well, not counting the midget. He was still crawling somewhere in the back. With a wave of deranged babble the madmen flung at the wounded man, only half of their attacks hit home, as they were pushing each other, trying to reach the “Meat” first, but that was still enough to stagger Stephan and cause him to almost tumble over. Almost, but not quite. Used to the raging winds, and sometimes waves, trying to knock both him, and his ship, whether in the sky or on the sea, over the Captain stood his ground, only losing his footing for but a moment. The bludgeoning attacks came on, like an avalanche of frenzied half-naked men, those hitting him on the torso had little effect, but those landing on the head dazed. Luckily, most of those came from either left or forward, and thus, Stephans left hand was free to land a retaliating blow, swinging heavily from the side in an arc. Most bandits dodged, but two were caught in the blow, and again, Captain was surprised, as one was bisected and the over received a nasty gaping wound across his chest. This was just like when he was using his left arm, except this time that was not the case. Two others weren’t taken aback even a little bit and just jumped back-and-forth to avoid the strike. As they tried to continue their assault they were met with the same treatment as they were trying to give. Outright ignoring one of the incoming blows and swatting the other aside Donnel rushed his opponents. His sword was posed for a penetrating blow, and it went right through the chest of one of his enemies, causing him to stare in disbelief for a moment. Still oblivious to impending doom the last enemy standing regained his footing and smashed his weapon into the Captain, yet, once again, it uselessly clanged off the armoured arm. Which had grasped psycho’s neck and spent no time crushing it with a hiss of discharged steam instantly after.

At that moment a roar of the engine and scratching of rubber on dry ground torn through the air. Jumping at the sound Stephan perked up, but could only watch as the vehicle, carrying the sane, and gun-wielding, bandits sped off into the distance.
The Captain turned to prone Johas, who was cradling the stump of his hand. The clockwork eye was glowing visibly.

“I guess we are all alone now, right?”

[Stephan Donnel]

Shadows lengthened as the sun set down and the people of Carrefore were finally enjoying some respite from the blazing heat. Stormtroopers on the Nexus-ward post on the side of the perimeter were making the most of it, lounging with their helmets off in the shade of a decrepit security turret. One of them was somewhat more composed, with chiseled face, it seemed like he was standing at attention even while resting, the other one was, let’s say, less than presentable, both his uniform and posture suggested a soldier who didn’t really care about either his post or uniform.

“Sarge, when are we shifting?”

“Damn, are you one of the new guys? Just shut up and watch the horizon.”

“Barely anyone ever comes here. The bandits still think those things”, - He banged on the side of a turret, - “Are still active. It is not like we cut power to them after the last generator died.”

“Shush. We will put them online as soon as the new shipment arrives. Until then, pray those madmen don’t find out about the power shortage.”

“I mean, why do we even sit here?”, - stormtrooper waved his hand around, - “Those shacks barely worth the wood they are made of! Who will come here, like… can’t we just put a blockade on the Gate?”

“Damn it, newbie, we do not question orders! We foll…” sergeant trailed off. There was a small cloud of dust coming their way, as if a vehicle or two were running around in the savannah.

“Get your gun and helmet. We might be getting some guests.” Stormtrooper jumped to his feet, as if he wasn’t resting just a minute ago, in a flash the dusty helmet was back on his head and he was readying his blaster for whatever could be coming their way. It took far longer for the second one to stand up and even longer to get himself to a proper condition, as he was fumbling with his gear and weapon. By the moment he finally looked at the small cloud of dust on the horizon it became bigger and his superior was already reporting “Suspicious activity, but no confirmation of threat, yet” over the comms.

Soon enough the unknown vehicle got close enough to actually see it. It was a beaten-up and devastated Runner, usual to bandits and other outlaws out in the Dunes. It had the usual ornamentation, spikes, some skulls, reddish hue that may or may not was blood at some point. What was unusual is that this one was severely beaten up, as if someone had repeatedly slammed it into every single tree between Carrefore and the Nexus Gate. Half of the spikes were gone, wires were dangling from underneath crashed plating and one of the tires was busted. As a result, speed of the runner was less than ideal, even before you looked at the fact that the driver constantly changed directions, seemingly yanking the steering wheel at random. The engine was straining and roaring as if the driver was still going on first gear, without switching it even once.

When it finally came close to the stormtroopers, who were scanning the horizon nervously, making an obvious assumption that this might be a distraction. Out of the battered vehicle came out a no-less battered man. Ignoring blasters pointed at him, he dived back into drivers compartment and after some fumbling pulled out something, that looked like the most gruesome trophy ever seen. It was a bent and ruined chainsaw, but that wasn’t the worst part. The worst was five heads jammed onto it. The newcomer dropped that in front of the soldiers.

Sarge took a step back, so he wouldn’t get splattered. Behind him the newbie made a gurgling sound, barely keeping his dinner safe and sound in his belly.

“Where can I get a drink?” – the newcomer asked – “These bastards made me break a sweat.”

Sarge stared at him for a moment, looking at dirty clothing, ruined hat and gleaming metal part of a man in front of him. Obviously a prime. He wasn’t dealing with this. Standing around in the desert wasn’t worth trying to stop an obviously dangerous individual. He also killed some bandits for all that is worth, so maybe it wouldn’t be as bad.

“Go to the central square, look for the neon sign that reads “Rick’s” tell them Sarge send you, they’ll pour you one on the house.” – veteran waved his hand somewhere towards the centre of the town – “You need this piece of junk?” – he asked, pointing at the car.

“Just scrap it, it barely holds together after I ran that midget over.” – the newcomer was limping somewhere in the direction he was pointed to, trying to not put too much pressure on his right foot. Behind him, the newbie finally came together.

“Hey, shouldn’t we send him to processing? As per regulations?”

“Shut up and get this piece of crap to the scrapyard, we may use the generator and the fuel cell if they are still operational after what he did to it.”

“Oh, and what happened to ‘Following orders’, huh?”

“It’s my goddamn job to give you pep talk, get to work." - Sarge put his hand to the comm, - "Hey, Rick? Yeah, it's me. There is a prime going your way, pour him one on me, he dealt with... Ithink it is Johas, but I'm not sure, head is too fucked up. Yeah. Yup. I think he is new here, he didn't even summon a drive for himself. No, he took one of their cars. Damn just ask him yourself, he is limping your way."

[Stephan Donnel]

Still limping on his damaged leg Stephan walked away from the border and towards what he thought was the central “plaza”.

“Carreeeeforrre… name’s just as dead as the rest of the place” he mumbled as he walked past the ‘Welcome to Carrefore’ sign, the place was quite desolate to be honest. While there were no obvious ruins and gaping broken windows even a newcomer, like our old man, could see that almost half the buildings were either empty, hollowed out shells or long abandoned and left to slowly rot under the sun, at the mercy of neglect and wind.

“Bloody hell…” - Captain stopped momentarily, - “…I forgot to ask what ‘neon’ is. Eh, not going back now, I’ll catch someone there.” He uttered, limping on ahead.
Sure enough, after some more dusty streets behind him, he soon came to what really could only be the centre of the town of Carrefore, that was probably the local mayors’ office, and that over there could only be some kind of church, for whatever that was worth.

Secretly afraid there would be like 20 signs saying “Rick’s” Stephan was relieved when he only saw one. It was covered in some kind of noodle-like protrusions, but otherwise it seemed to be the place. Currently, it seemed, it wasn’t the time of the day, as no lamps were on, and there wasn’t even a single pump active at the moment, he wasn’t even seeing a single one out in the open.

“Either they are extremely rich and have them embedded in the walls or extremely poor and can’t afford even one ‘Happy times’ pump. I bet on second.” – Mused Donnel absent-mindedly as he stopped before the building to catch a better view before actually entering.

A classy wooden décor was what met him inside, decorative panelling covering the walls and floor, with a delicate wooden chairs and tables standing around the room. The insides of the “Café” were strikingly different form the town outside, and it gave Stephan a pause.

“Huh, I guess this place doesn’t need a pump.”

Looking around at the first piece of refined space he could set his eyes upon after arriving to this bizarre world, Donnel slowly walked past small tables and a piano towards a bar at the far end of “Rick’s”. There, beyond a worn, but solid surface stood an ageing man, who was cleaning glasses over and over again, probably a universe-transcending tradition for all barmen everywhere to pass time during sleepy hours at their work. Barmen barely threw a glance at the Captain, before returning to his meditative task.

“You're the one Sarge was talking about?” – inquired he without breaking concentration.

“I guess, unless there are several more people around here who just arrived after being run over.”, - Answered Stephan, as he sat down on one of the barstools, groaning. Once again surprised, he noticed that his leg wound gave him much less trouble than it should have, it barely even stung by now.

After those words barman set aside his glass, and took another one, strikingly similar. He then reached out into the depths of his domain, which was conveniently located just below the bar, and poured some murky liquid from an unmarked bottle. As the Captain unquestionably picked it up and swallowed it in one go the barkeep asked:

“So what the hell happened? You honestly look like shit.”

A glimpse of anger appeared in Stephan's eye for a moment, but it quickly vanished.

“Yeah, you’re right. I do. I kinda just appeared in the middle of empty white nothingness… when was it… the last day I guess? After that I just sat around for a couple of hours, and then chose a direction to go to, went through some gate, walked for a half-a-damn-day in between the bushes, got ran over, killed those who didn’t run, stole their engine and now I am here.”

The barkeep chuckled a little.

“Why didn’t you summon a buggy? Or, I don’t know, a horse? You really were asking for it, just strolling through the Dunes and whatnot.”
Stephan raised his right eyebrow questioningly.

“Why didn’t I what? I’m not some stage magician to just pull wheels out of my hat I’ll have you know.”

“Oh, don’t tell me you managed to ignore that little brief the Big O gives to all the Primes?”

“That insufferable white thing? I didn’t pay attention, so I forgot everything a couple of minutes later.”

The barmen actually let out a laugh over this one, and poured another drink to Stephan.

“Oh, you are just priceless. What will you do next? Go and kill off Protoman, or try to outsmart Dredd?”

“I have no idea who either of those are.”, - almost hissed Donnel.

“Yeah, right, you don’t. I guess you also have no idea how do people like you function here? Let me tell you that. For starters – you can make things appear out of thin air. How do you like the idea?”

Now it was Stephan’s turn to laugh.

“Now that is some high quality bovine-original fertilizer you are feeding me there.”

“I figured as much. Now, if you’d listened to the white kid, by the way, remember to always listen to him, you’d know that there is this stuff called ‘Omnillium’, actually let me show it to you”. The barkeep dived into his mysterious domain just below line of sight for those sitting on the stools and reappeared holding a glass jar with something that looked like a floating orb of smooth white matter. “Here it is. Now, us, secondaries, we can’t do much with it, hell, we can barely handle the stuff without it floating away, so we are just using it for money. But you guys, you can make wonders. You likely have some inside you even now. I don’t know how it happens, but those I asked told me that they just really-really-really wish for something to appear, and it appears.”

“And once again, you are calling me a stage magician. Such tomfoolery is just ridiculous.” Stephan waved his refilled glass dismayingly in the air.

“Why don’t you prove me wrong then? It won’t cost you anything to try.”

“Whatever. Just give me another shot. So, you just say I need to wish for stuff to appear and it will? Well then…”

Stephan placed his left hand on the wooden board next to his glass. Almost immediately dense, pure white smoke rose from underneath it, not unlike what happened when steam vented as usual, except that this seemed to stay in form of a 30x30cm rectangle and ever-so-slowly condensed enough to make the hand rise higher and higher. Corking brow questioningly at the barkeep, who nodded reassuringly, Donnel just kept doing whatever he was doing. Soon enough, after about 10 minutes of silence, the hand rose about 10cm into the air and the smoke dispersed, revealing a plain metal box with an engraving of two crossed smoking pipes on top.

“I am not legitimately unable to feel surprised any more. But if this is the real thing…” Stephan reached forward, quickly unclasping several locks on the front of the box and flipping the metal cover open, revealing a smaller, redwood, box that was sinking in something that looked like safety foam made out of corkwood.
“Now, this is going somewhere…”

The Captain flipped the second box open as well, this time revealing several smaller boxes as well as an extremely well-made pipe and a lighter. Hastily Stephan reached for the pipe, his right hand almost visibly shaking, and two of the smaller boxes next to it. Opening the first one revealed a set of small instruments, resembling those you could find next to a fireplace, and the second one contained a strong smelling tobacco, with an aroma that seemed to linger in the air like a fog. Not wasting any time Donnel procured a small stand for the pipe from the box and, after placing said pipe upright on it, began carefully administering the dried and crushed leaves with the help of a small pike and spade.





“Hey, stop gawking and give me a glass of water or something, or just a tin plate.” Stephan ushered to the barkeep, who was transfixed by the almost magical ritual happening before him, but snapped out of it at the sound of the rough voice of his patron.

While the barman dove down to procure required goods the ritual continued. Captain carefully placed tobacco around the insides of the pipe with precise, experienced movements and reached for a small shard of wood that was in the same little box with tobacco and positioned it in the middle of the pipe. Finally, after placing some more dry leaves on top and around the matchstick he reached for the lighter and a bigger set of splinters. At this moment the bartender finally rose with a glass of water and a small tin plate.

“Thanks” – hissed Stephan through the pipe he now held firmly with his teeth.

He lit up one of the splinters with a lighter, but instead of using it to light the pipe he placed the lighter back into the box and just waited for the half the split to burn, at which point he grabbed another one, and lit it from the first, promptly dropping the still-burning piece of wood on the tin plate. The second splinter was deemed worthy and it was slowly lowered in the pipe, at which point Stephan made several sharp inhales and careful exhales, with smoke coming out of the pipe with every one of them. Soon the match placed in the pipe burned out and the tobacco lit up. Bending backwards Donnel let out a contended sigh with a puff of smoke. When he straightened up he caught the bartender looking wide-eyed at him.

“What?”

“I don’t see people spending straight-up 5 minutes to light up a smoke every day. And how much this thing is even worth? You could summon a car in 10 minutes.”

“Well, the outer casing is made out of war-grade armour plating and coated with protective absorbent on the inside. And the box itself is legit redwood root from the floating islands of the Clouds. I got the original one as the reward for… hell, I don't remember.”

“I don’t know any of those, but that does sound expensive.”

“Positively. Now…” Stephan let out another puff of smoke and reached out for the boxes, quickly putting the stuff away inside his inner pockets, leaving only the outer and inner casing. “…you can keep the boxes, the big one can survive a point-blank blast and will actually keep the stuff inside safe, and the small one is likely worth half this house.”

“Eehh… Thanks, I guess.” Bartender was unsure of how to respond. Meanwhile Stephan continued.

“You know, I think I got a couple ideas of what to do, say, do you have a stash of actually good stuff I could trade off you?”

“You mean booze? I guess I do, but why you need that? You could just summon some for yourself.”

“Nah, I don’t need it that way. Also, it would feel wrong. I suspect there are other towns around here, and this one is the closest to whatever that gate was, right?”

“Actually, we have one of our own, but I catch your drift.”

“Even better. Say, if I were to go to the other town and get something they have, but you don’t, will I fetch a good price here? In whatever it is worth.”

“Huh, I don’t think anyone actually tried trading around the Dunes, with bandits and all we never really come out of the settlements. But, if you could reach New Babylon you could probably get something from the bazaar there that will fetch a nice price at Coruscant.”

“Well, it is something, I guess. I’ll figure from there on. Now, if you had any place I could change at…”

A couple of hours later a completely new man, followed by a small cloud of smoke above him, left “Rick’s”, donned in new clothes and, most importantly, with a new hat, he went on to the sands-ward side of the city with a spring in his step, despite a recent injury, which wasn’t really there anymore. Even several crates full of quite good liqueur didn’t seem to weight anything at all. Behind him the bartender was happily polishing his new coffeemaker and drink dispenser and tried not to think about what would happen if a drunkard found those pressure-cartridges under the counter and decided to open one.

“Wait, I didn’t even get his name… Eh, I guess it was Rick.”

Past another post of bored guards in dirty white gear Stephan could only see the sand. It was far worse than on the other side of the town, where there was at least a couple of bushes and trees dotting the landscape here and there. Here, there was just the endless sand, flowing like waves in the ocean. After a short stop to remember and then summon something fitting for the landscape Stephan shot off into the Dunes, not really looking back.

[Stephan Donnel]

Sun slowly rose in the cloudless sky over the Dunes, illuminating the endless sands, destroying the last little shadows and summoning an annoyed grunt from the old man sleeping behind the dusty window of a Cloudrunner-model airship between two sandy hills. Now, let me tell you, the main difference between this model and pretty much every other, is that unlike most of them – it can’t fly. Originally created by the pirates of the Clouds “Cloudrunner”, fittingly to its name, was designed to glide over the sky-high mounds of the Ocean. During some “incidents” later it was confirmed to work just as good on most other surfaces, including water, plains and, most fittingly to the current situation, sand. Pretty much as long as the “pillow” of the balloon located underneath the rest of the ship is not in danger of a rupture there, which would require more than just some blades, glass or splintered wood, we know how to weave our bloons damn it, it can run on along swiftly, pushed forwards by a couple of propellers located in the back.

[spoiler][/spoiler]

Stephan stirred in the cabin, slowly pulling himself together, which began with affixing the hat back to the proper position on his head. That, in turn called for a
pained groan, since hangover is apparently a thing everywhere, no matter the universe. Taking a couple minutes to get a bag of ice and a glass of pickle, which is the best thing ever to help you with hangover, if you didn’t know. After that extremely necessary act was done Stephan mingled for a bit, just staring at the horizon, taking all that happened in. Well, yes, another world, pulling things out of thin air, alone, again, well, used to it, eh, I was done back home anyway. Putting his mind somewhat at ease with that Donnel got out of the cabin through the small hatch on the side, nearly tripping over the control levers in his still dizzy state. Standing upright on the springy matter of the balloon underneath his feet he looked around, slight elevation getting him high enough to see over the dunes around the vehicle. Sand. Sand. Oh, look! MORE sand!

“Why the hell did I even agree to this…”

He got down, sliding on the slightly sagging side of the balloon, and walked around the “ship”.

“Well, at least he didn’t lie about the ‘stuff out of air’ thing. And I didn’t run into a tree or something. Damn, why is there so much sand here, I don’t even feel a breeze, so it is not a beach, and even if it were, they are never this big.”
Stephan muttered to himself in discontent, his home lacking real deserts, so he never even heard about such places before.

The quick survey confirmed what he already knew. He did a damn good job with summoning, or whatever it was called. The balloon was solid, the tanks were good for a run across the whole Europa, and the boxes with ‘priceless’ cargo, mostly made consisting of “Imperial” brand of whiskey, with some clay bottles called “Royal Knight” snuck in-between, were securely tied down and covered with tarpaulin in the open compartment on top, right behind the cabin.

“Now I just need to know where the Jolly-Screaming-Rodgers I have to head in this blasted wasteland.”

Donnel sighed and got back into the cabin, with enough supplies he could probably just head somewhere until… His gaze fell onto the compass near the control levers, more specifically onto a small note attached to it. It said “Azimuth 129, several hours, do NOT trade for living cargo, wives or any form of weapons.”

“Huh, I gotta thank Rick… that was Rick, right?... Later for this, guy obviously knows how to deal with… the inebriated.”

Coughing out stray sand accumulated in the moving parts overnight and raising a small duststorm with the propulsion the “Cloudrunner” took off, practically swimming through the air from one dune to the other, limited lift the balloon did produce slowing down the fall to a slow glide.





Several hours later a strange vehicle caused a bit of commotion around the gate of Nippur, but it died down, as the guards began searching the “flying boat”, just as they would a suspicious carriage, after a couple dozen minutes and a few scalded hands when the guards refused to listen to warnings of the smirking old man, who told them not to touch the pipes. When the foreman gave an “all clear” sign with his hand the machine carefully twisted around, let out a small cloud of steam from the vents near the propellers in the back and slowly passed the gate. Much to the discomfort of some horsemen in the street the cloudrunner slowly glided towards the marketplace, eluding a nervous neighing from the horses as it went and doing a great job at dusting the road from gates to the market.
Once in place, the foreigner carefully positioned his “mobile trading stand”, as he referred it to the amused guards and set up shop. Apparently the only real alcohol produced in the desert came from spoiled milk of various mammals, and the “Good” stuff was in demand, especially the “Royal Knight”, since Camelot, apparently, was far enough to make it exceedingly rare here, and Primes had their own list stuff to worry about and getting someone drunk wasn’t their highest concern.

Half a day was spent refusing, following the advice of the barman, trades for livestock and, ridiculous as it were, several offers of women. The hottest hours were spent in the relative shadow of the cabin, where he summoned, assembled and tested, as much as he could without causing commotion, his favourite gun, as well as a holster and a pouch of ammunition for it. By the moment guards near the entrance to the palace, across from where Stephan had set up shop, dropped dead all of sudden our entrepreneur had a hefty bag of both golden and silver coins with him, although he couldn’t shake the feeling he was shod off at some point. The following commotion didn’t touch him much, but he still began disassembling and loading the “Steamliner”. He was barely done when the universe once again proved him right to be if not paranoid, then prepared, as after a small fireshow, with sparkles and cracks, two nimble men tumbled into the open, with one throwing another through the fisherman’s shack slowly after.

“Damn, is that a kid?”

Question lingered for a moment in the hot air as Stephan put the last part in place and locked the pressure mechanism.

“Yeah, that is definitely a kid, no respect for property whatsoever.”

He answered his own question, standing up from the box he occupied before.