Dysart, Lester- 'Fly-ing *through* the dangerzone!'

Who: Dysart, Lester and SNIDE
Where: Starbug, en route to the giant evil space ship
When: 1 minute after previous post
The ship was barely holding together.
As it turns out, those Hymenoptera back there in the launch bay
weren't adding a few coats of paint and tightening up a few screws.
They were busy tearing the hull to scrap.
Only in the vacuum of space did Dysart experience the decompression,
the cut fuel and power lines not to mention the cracks and scrapes on
the windows. At the moment Dysart was getting to feel more and more
that the most imminent threat to him wasn't the bugs outside but the
one he was flying.
Believe it or not the fight between the Space Corps and the
Hymenoptera was, shockingly enough, rather even-sided. While the
superior technology and blood-lust of the alien bugs was undeniable
the ingenuity of the human beings could not be denied.
Three words, Beer loaded 'firefighters'.
After the last time the Hymenopterans almost took over the solar
system they were more than prepared with slightly more... unorthodox
'biological warfare'.
"I don't know what you're so happy about," Lester mumbled to his palm.
There, cupped in his hand was SNIDE, shaking curled "fists" and
bleeping rudely at passing Hymenoptera ships.
A misfire of a few Beer-fighters splattered across the screen of the
starbug, with a horrible cracking click Tiny Tim's windshield cousin
dragged itself across in a pitiful fashion.
"This- THIS is why I usually leave the hero work to Dante or Phil.
They're the ones with the back up, they're the ones with the rank and
THEY'RE the ones with *#&$ing weapons training!!" Dysart ranted as he
wrenched the craft out of the way of a smoldering pile of very former
JMC debris.
"Who?" Lester asked, but if Dysart replied it was lost as the Starbug
pitched and lurched.
"I er... I think that's it," Lester's arm folded out and pointed at
the giant omnious vessel nestled between hundreds of alien and human
crafts.
"Huh..." SNIDE skittered up to Lester's shoulder as he crossed his
arms in thought.
"from this direction it looks like the fractal graphical
representation of a positronic field interface buffer," Lester tilted
his head, "or a whale with leprosy that's been chased by over a
thousand keen whalers with acid-filled harpoons. Or.."
"Yeah, I get, she's ugly. Got it." The Robot pilot punctuated with a
thumbs up.
"So what do we do?" Lester asked, tapping Dysart's shoulder only to
catch himself as his hand passed through his holographic form and slap
onto his actual metal joint. "Erm, sorry."
Dysart just spared him an annoyed glare. "In case you can't TELL-!!"
The pitch in the robot's voice hiked up a notch while he swerved out
of the way of a beer soaked Hymenopteran vessel. "I'm just trying to
stay alive so we can die over THERE rather than right here!!"
Lester, seemingly unfased by the angry AI fell back into his chair.
"Is there any way we can tell where they're keeping the Jays?"
"The what?"
"The Jays! The Hymenopterans are kidnapping Jays!"
"Why are they capturing birds?"
"No not birds, Chrysler's!"
"... Why are they stealing cars...?"
"JAY. CHRYSLER. *Dimensional twins*!"
"Ooooooooh.... sure. Here, catch." Dysart's hand dove into his own
body, giving the impression of him attempting to pull out his own
heart. With a small click a small metal object gave way and the AI
quickly tossed it over to Lester.
"A tracking device...?" Lester asked as he activated the PDA-like
device. It was pretty standard stuff but it was clear to him that at
least this tracker was top-notch at least. "Yup, side arm pistol,
tracking device. Defiantly not sounding pacifist."
SNIDE skittered down his arm and began to tap excitedly on the 'search
JMC
hiree' option.
Lester pulled up the option. He searched 'Chrysler' and immediately
received two results. "Jay and... Jayne...Chrysler? He has a sister?"
Pulling up the mini map of the local solar system he noticed two
entirely different locations. One being Blue Dwarf Prime and the other
being the Hive ship...
The girl was on the hive ship...
Suddenly an unusual emotion swept up in Lester's heart. For the first
time in his life he was feeling rather knightly, brave, honourable...
fearless.
He quickly suspected it had something to do with how hot her ID
picture was and that's when normal fear clamped over him and he
snapped the image off hurriedly. But something lurked in the back of
his head, something that very, very faintly growled lustily.
"They're in the hive ship, Lower starboard bow!" Lester piped up in an
excited voice.
Dysart almost did a double-take at how happy he sounded. "Shit...
well, I *am* under orders to pull out officers. Lower starboard bow it
is then. Hang tight."
The hologrammatic human jerked his thumb at the toilet end of the
ship. "We still have one barrel of booze left, right?" He asked
uncertainly.
"Uhhh... sure, why?" Lester replied, unbuckling his belt.
"You." Dysart's index finger pointed out to SNIDE. "Think you can fly
this thing?"
If Lester ever heard his little spider-bot happier he certainly didn't
remember.
SNIDE careened across the cockpit, embraced Dysart happily then began
rummaging around the sides of the pilot seat.
"What's he doing?" Dysart asked.
"He's er, looking for the manual."
Dysart sighed and pointed at various levers: "fast, slower, left,
right, up, down. Clear?"
SNIDE saluted and began a balletic dance, moving between throttle and
steering controls, back and forth in an energetic frenzy.
*One loaded latrine later...*
"Alright, get off." The Australian accented mechanoid brushed SNIDE
off the controls. The tiny robot afforded him an irate hiss before it
scuttled off to the engineer's outstretched palms
"Woah SNIDE, that was amazing! How did you manage to do that many
varieties of acrobatics rolls? And with only your tiny arms!" Lester's
praise was quickly forgotten as Dysart fell back into seat, making the
same noise as a iron being thrown onto a cushion.
"Sit down. This will not be pretty." Dysart commanded simply.
Lester gave a single look back at the empty barrel. "Wait a second
Dysart... that was our last load of alcohol besides the bandoleers.
How are we going to stock back up?"
"We're not."
"Oh... *WHAT*?!"
Dysart immediately ignored his horrified surprise as he hacked into
the SC beer-fighter frequency.
"All fighters, this is JMC agent 'Dysart' Series 10 prototype. For the
sake of this confrontation I have the effective rank of..." Dysart
thought for a second then decided: "Commander. I request an alpha
strike on the hive mother ship co-ordinates, two, six, niner, one; over."
Silence as white noise filtered through.
"...Roger that, Dysart." A commanding officer replied. "All units,
fire at will."
Spears of booze-soaked death streaked past the Starbug in a star burst
formation. Globs of brown fluid splattered out into a circular radius
as the payload collided into the side of the Hive ship.
Not unlike saliva on a prawn cracker the ship's hull disintegrated
under the stress, the sudden vacuum tore out scores of Hymenoptera.
But even then the Hymenoptera vessel was regenerating...
"Dysart p-please tell me we're not doing what I think we're doing."
Lester asked in a small voice, clinging to the disabled access safety
rails in the Starbug's toilet.
"Now... punch it!!" Dysart yelled at Lester while he jammed on the
throttle.
Lester turned slammed the 'flush' lever down.
Dysart's suddenly nimble hands re-routed the ship's power to the right
engine, giving lop-sided thrust. The Starbug lurched into overdrive as
the ravaged engines gave out what was likely to be their last push.
The result was immediate.
With a burst of vacuum-fueled booze the Starbug pin-wheeled forward,
spraying hooch in all directions. The splattering liquid ate away at
the hull just enough to allow a small starbug sized whole in the side.
Of which the vessel just managed to squeeze through.
Inside the craft Dysart easily reversed the thrust on the starbug, the
once potent thrust of the Sauce now leaked meekly out of the side of
the tank- still eating a three-floor hole in the deck.
With a breath of relief the robot powered down the starbug. "There
that wasn't so bad, now was it?"
Lester only let out a meek 'erk' noise between his clenched teeth
before he collapsed to the floor.
<Tagging J!>