At Sea

The wreck of the Toscana

Date: 21Dec2045

Zona was sitting in a chair in her room at the Row House. The lights were down, and she was getting ready to go to bed. The sounds of the burbs; gunshots, sirens, helicopters, all drowned out in the background over the strong silence in the room. She was holding my 2005 'Stang keys and Harmonica.

I'd snuck in as usual. I didn't like it when other people told her I was coming before I was. It really wasn't a suprise then, and I liked delivering suprises. Unconventional blood in me I guess.

She was sitting there staring at them in her hand. I was behind her, so all she had to do was look up. This is always sort of ackward. There just aren't books about what to do in these situations. There should be; maybe that's how I'll retire.

Then she turned. Her face, half hidden in the darkness of the room, didn't know if this was a trick or halucination. I'd been 'dead' eighteen days, so I understood her reluctance to believe. But I knelt down beside her, as she spun to face me. I loved everything about her, from her angelic face and long neck to the taste of her lip gloss.

Then we made up. We always do. She was mad as usual, but again like usual she always forgave me in the end. But what suprised her the most was that we had a church to be to tomorrow in Detroit. It was a small maritime church. The bell rang out twenty-nine times, for each man on the Toscana.

Date: 02Dec2045

I was on the bridge. We were feeling a north wind. The way the waves break over the whalers, and the wind in the wires told us the Witch of November was stirring with a vengence. On the water of this late, which doesn't give up her dead, the Captain looked over at me and I said push on for the Mill in Wisconsin.

The next day, dawn came late under a red sky and the breakfast had to wait. We faced off a hurricane westwind and spent the day fighting the biggest waves the lake had seen in a century. When supper time came the old cook came on deck and said it was too rough to serve us. At seven p.m. a main hatchway gave in, and the Captain just said, "It's been good to know ya." He then wired he had water comin' in, and called for SAR. Later that night the lights went out of sight and we were now the wreck of the Toscana. Maybe it capsized, or buckled under a wave, or had its back broken in two. But all that remains now is the faces of the wives, sons and daughters.

The five of us jumped before the wreck. They had SAR, but we weren't afforded that luxury. My insurace was in Zona's name, but now that I was in the water I wasn't worried. Lashed to the other five, and each of us in a life preserver and a survival suit, I figured I had a better chance than aboard ship. Heck, the water was almost my home. I'd spent ten years in the mid-twenty first century equivelant of the SEALs. We just stayed together, and the next day the storm broke up. It rained for the next three, but that was easy. The nice thing about this was that it was freshwater, so we could drink it. Lake Superior is big, but not that big, so we took turns swimming with the current and in another ten days we were on shore.

It turned out it was Wisconsin, which is close enough to civilization for me. That just left us a four day hike and stolen car to get home. Pretty good I think.

Date: 29Nov2045

Fredrick Lastrom. A greasy johnson, who I later overheard worked for Manson Industries. He contacted me to steal 64,000 tons of Pig Iron. Not your average run, but it started out far more simple, basically a simple recon. He wanted a Corps' steal plant checked out for "Stability and Profitiability". But when you ask a guy like me, who is about as far as you can get from a MBA, you're out for a different kind of answer. So I spent some time getting down with Zona, and learning about steel mills. She taught me about stuff like ores, crucibles, heats, slag, and hoop like that. I even read a book (not used) that didn't have all the dirty parts highlighted. But I digress.

The recon was easy. I work well alone. When I got back though, Lastrom didn't like the report. I guess it was too "Stable and Profitable". So he asked me about the old combo #5 'Hostile Takover'. I hate that line. I hate that cliche. But, I said "Sure, why not. Anything can succeed." It has been done to death.

Before he left though, our negotiations concluded that he would give me 150k nuyen, and 100k nuyen insurance on each of five me. I gave him a beer. So the next day I got word out to Langrotti, Michelle (a french diver), big Janne Dupree (a Belgian Bazookaman), and Steevie Wonder, and we set about planning to wrech shit.

From here though, it was basic: get gear, smuggle it to Duluth, ride fast in assault boats, form Voltron, draw Sword, win. Easy huh? Well, we did take a freighter up the Huron, and hitting the beach on the boats is always a good way to get the blood pounding. So is the brisk jog through the steel mill. Its such a tight environment that you have to keep moving, stopping = pinned down. Full cyclic firefights happen at under ten feet. It makes for interesting forensic evidence art.

Anyways. The "Monkey Hate Clean" gambit payed off. So while Stevie and Lang were doing that, me, Michelle, and Dupree took over the ore freighter and crew. We were out to sea in a storm for cover. We timed the assault to take advantage of some bad weather. Too bad it turned out worse than I thought. On the good side though, four hours into the trip I realized that it wasn't pig iron we were hauling, but titanium ore. When I contacted Tak, he said that Manson Industries was a wholly owned subsidiary of Araska Macrotechnology.

My inspiration:
Blackjack's Shadowrun Page

An excerpt from Blackjacks that is really damn funny. Hope you learn from it.

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