Post by Warork on Jun 29, 2014 4:01:50 GMT
The Doomheads: Animals Uncaged
The previous night
Greathaul Station was one of North Cirset's local watering holes. It was a unique structure in that part of town mainly owing to its construction being made out of two great machines that were once used to haul ore in bulk out of the great mines several levels down. But those mines had dried up years ago and the need for such enormous wheeled vehicles with such specific uses dried up along with them. The two Greathaulers; gargantuan trucks with massive rear loading bays, had been parked in an empty lot beside a few other buildings and then left to rust away until someone in those days decided to buy them and take a gamble. And so, Greathaul Station was born. The inside of the enclosed cargo compartments had been converted into the main floor of the bar. The walls that separated the two parked vehicles had been cut through and converted with scrap to be turned into a makeshift building. Such was the innovation of those stuck in the lower parts of the hive. Like a feral world tribe making use of the carcass of one of their kills, the people who had first bought these vehicles had let nothing go to waste. The gas tanks for the titanic trucks had been scrubbed out and were now being used to hold large quantities of alcohol. The engines had been converted into stills. Windows had been cut out of the sides of the storage units and the glass panes from the front cabins of the vehicles were now being used to give the bar a source of light, however dim, from the outside. The large, flat hubcaps from the tires were now tabletops, the tires themselves being so large as to necessitate the trucks' loading ramps being left extended so that patrons could ascend up to the doors that had been built from scrap.
It was this bar that Mercer, a middle aged hiver who had never seen the world outside his level, owned and operated. Of course, he ran his insurance through the Reavers, who didn't? As long as he was on time with his payments it wasn't so bad. Grimm kept his boys in line and everything ran smoothly. Mercer even had a pretty decent profit for himself. He thought these things as the low cacophony of the night rush in his establishment was going on around him. Men and women were getting off from their grueling shifts at whatever jobs they had and had come to spend some of their hard earned thrones on a few drinks. There were maybe two dozen people spread around the tables and the main bar right now but Mercer was sure that the number would come out to several times that by the time he locked up for the night. Suddenly, Mercer's attention was caught by a young man he knew returning from the bar's cellar through a backroom off to one side of the bar, he was carrying a few boxes stacked upon one another as he set them down next to Mercer.
"You really ought to make room for these cups behind the bar so I dont have to haul them up from the cellar every night." The man complained.
"I don't pay you for lip Arvor, I pay you for work. Now take this mop into the bathroom, some bastard has managed to piss everywhere but the hole in the floor."
"Again?" Arvor moaned as he took the mop and bucket and wearily went off to earn his pay.
Mercer suppressed a chuckle as he watched his assistant march off and panned his gaze about the bar. Another patron came forward ordering a round of drinks for himself and his buddies at a table on the other side of the building and Mercer went to go fill it. It was as he was filling the tankards with brew that the door was rather violently flung open. Mercer turned just in time to see his door bouncer's body get flung through the open portal to stumble over a table and finally come to rest on the ground next to said table. The conversation and sound inside the bar died away within those first few moments as three figures walked into the bar with weapons held in their hands. Mercer marked them out at once as gangers...and ones he knew to boot. A grim looking fellow lead the pack, clad in a dusty trenchcoat and leather bandoleer and holding a shotgun leveled in his hands. The scarred man wordlessly strode up to the prostrate bouncer and aimed his weapon at him nonchalantly, ensuring that he stayed exactly where he was. The second man was less a man and more a behemoth of muscle. At his side was held the biggest gun Mercer had even seen, held with those tree trunk arms. The man came in to find Mercer's other bouncer rising from his seat at the front of the bar.
"Go ahead and give me a reason, bud." The monster man said as the bouncer half reached for the club on his belt. Seeing that he was hilariously outgunned and outnumbered, the man wisely sat back down.
"Have I ever told you how swank your little pad is here, Merc?" the last of the three said stepping out from behind the brute. Mercer shivered a bit as he was reacquainted with the man's stark white hair and those empty, animal eyes.
"What the hell do you call yourself doing, Karrus?" Mercer asked indignantly. "I told you I'd have the money when I have it!" He stopped at that as Karrus held up one finger as if to ask for a moment while he turned to the bar patrons still looking on in dumbfounded silence.
"Now children, why don't you give us a moment so the adults can talk?" He said aloud to everyone present. Nobody moved for several moments. Seeing this, Karrus racked the slide on the boltgun hanging on a strap on his shoulder.
"I said," Karrus began as he aimed the weapon at a window and pulled the trigger, sending a bolt through the glass, shattering it as the echo of the weapon resounded inside the building's metal hull. "GET THE FUCK OUT!"
Everyone moved. Every patron as one body headed for the doors without a single man or woman saying a word. The floor resounded with the beats of many boots as they all made their way out. Karrus waited for the last man to leave before addressing Mercer.
"So, where were we?" He asked playfully asked as he sat at the bar in front of Mercer. The barkeep looked to be on the verge of an apoplectic fit.
"You've got a lot of nerve pulling a stunt like this. What's Grimm gonna think when he finds out you've been shaking down one of his businesses?!"
As a reply, Karrus chuckled and leaned over the bar, finding a half empty bottle of grog that someone left in their hurry out. He picked up the bottle and began to drink.
"Answer me you stupid cunt." Mercer growled.
"As you wish." Karrus said as he put the bottle back on the bar, he gripped it by the neck and with one violent swing smashed the glass bottle over Mercer's head. Grabbing the man by his apron lapels, Karrus hauled him over the bar and threw the man onto a table, hovering over him, holding him down with one hand and sinking a knife into the table beside Mercer's head with the other.
"This answer enough for ya?" Karrus asked with a skull's grin. "You've been hiding behind the Reavers for too long Merc. I own your ass."
"Go ahead and kill me." Mercer said as he put one hand to his gashed head. "Grimm will be skinning you alive within the week."
Karrus began to laugh. "Oh man." He said in between chortles. "If I had a throne for every time I heard that in the past week I wouldn't need to shake down your pathetic ass. Hey Beast, who was the last one to tell us that? Ol' Krast right?"
"Yeah. Called us the Doomed crew." The big man with the gigantic gun said.
"The Doomed crew. You know, I really do like that, I'll have to use it somehow."
Mercer stared at them both with a bewildered expression, obviously not knowing what they were talking about.
"You don't know, do you, ya dumb shit?" Karrus laughed again. "Grimm is dead. Put in the ground by his long time rival from the east which means I get to make good on your debts."
"No, I don't believe you, you're lying." Mercer said feebly.
"Oh no?" Karrus took the knife tip out of the table and shoved it a mere inch from Mercer's nose. "Maybe you'll believe me when I come back here and burn this shithole to the ground with you in it? This establishment is in Doomhead turf now, get it? You pay me and maybe in a few weeks I wont mount your head on the wall there. Understand?"
Mercer nodded slowly. A door opened on the other side of the bar and Mercer's assistant walked out of the bathroom, stopping suddenly as he saw three armed men holding up his boss' bar.
"Hey boy." Karrus said. "What's in that bottle there?" He nodded to the drink that he had broken over Mercer's head. The young man came forwards warily and picked up the broken bottle.
"Its uh, its something called Warpsbane. We make it from amasec and some sort of red fruit extract. I add some pepper stuff we have sitting around here for the extra kick."
"I like it." Karrus announced. "Put a dozen bottles in a box for me." He turned back to Mercer. "That's your first week's payment. Me or one of my friends here will be here in five days to pick up next week's. Get it?"
Mercer nodded again, his face contorted with pain and dizziness.
"Well then." Karrus said as he stood up and sheathed his knife. "This concludes our business."
A few minutes later the three were walking down the street back towards their base. Beast was carrying the large box full of booze in his big arms. His size made the box and the bottles inside look small in comparison.
"When we get back," Karrus started. "We're going to have to make a toast to Ol' Grimm. Him dyin was the best thing that ever happened to us."
Karrus and Beast laughed, the shotgun toter remained impassive as always and behind them, the Greathaul Station stood; its two bouncers hanging from one of the building's attached lamp posts by a rope, a sign that announced that the bar was "UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT" was draped around their shoulders. Their bodies swayed in the slight breeze as the lights along the street dimmed for the night cycle.
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The three soon found themselves standing outside a tall chain link fence. The top pegs were ringed with razor wire, the entire edifice standing about ten feet tall and stretched its way around a series of hab blocks that had been built, like much of this level, years ago by pioneering underhivers. Inside the fence were yards where many low flat buildings had been built next to tall and narrow ones which stretched rather high into the smoggy sky. Each of these tall structures suddenly stopped about halfway up their actual construction and were replaced the rest of the way with metal skeletons that went up for another hundred meters. Karrus looked at the sign above the main gate that allowed entrance within the perimeter of the buildings dubbing them "The Derricks." True to their name, this hab block had been built around old promethium derricks that had dried up decades ago. The site was abandoned until housing in the area was needed. The hab blocks began with the derricks themselves, the builders taking advantage of the skeletal structures that had already been built for them. They clothed them in sheets of scrap metal and other material to form multi level habs which stretched from the level floor up until the structure became too narrow to be used anymore. The derricks themselves did not stop at ground level, they went much farther down into the underhive to where, nobody knew. All the inhabitants knew was that they were not being used anymore and hence were a good enough place to call home. The smaller, fatter patchwork of buildings had come later, making the hab block its own little town of sorts. The derricks' smaller brethren housed local markets and so forth and gave that section of the level a sort of semi autonomy.
This was why Karrus had chosen it as his seat of power...
He threw down a spent lho stick at the gate as he led his victorious party back into the "triangle" an appropriately shaped couryard between the central buildings of the Derricks. It was almost night now and most people had gone back into their habs for the night cycle, a few in small groups were leaving with lamp packs in order to catch their night shifts in whatever grubby jobs they had andshop owners were locking up for the night. As a rule, none of them looked at the gangers as they came through. Karrus smiled that skull like smile of his. They knew who ran things here.
At the entrance of the main derrick, dubbed "Kingpin," A woman with dark hair and ample tattoos stood leaning up against one of the open double doors.
"Back already? Wasn't sure you'd make it in before curfew."
"Old Merc had less guys than I thought." Karrus said as he dusted his street clothes and black stormcoat off. Dust and grit was a real problem in the wastes, most people owned leather clothing of some sort down here.
"Gonna be a cold one tonight." A figure said within the structure. The dim light within only gave the returning three the barest hint of his red mohawk and brawny chest. He was sitting in a lobby chair with some sort of device hauled onto a table in front of him and was cleaning it with a dingy cloth. "I can feel it in my bones."
"Good thing we brought firewood then." Beast said as he put down the box on another table and passed the mohawked ganger a bottle from within.
"Anything happen while we were gone?" Karrus asked the slender woman with the two autopistols holstered on her belt.
"Whats his face mister town elder came by to 'officially' welcome us to our new home. Asked us if there was anything we wanted or needed."
"Told that old man to find us dinner." Said a voice coming from the stairwell. Karrus turned to see two identical figures, one carrying a small sack which he placed on the table next to the box of booze.
"The old coot actually did it!" The other identical figure in the dim light of the building light said giddily.
"Course he did." Karrus said with a knowing nod. "He knows we're the only ones separating the people here from some other shithead group out there coming in and fucking everything up. The Doomheads are the only gangers left in North Cirset that can be trusted, lets keep it that way." He trailed off for a moment as the woman closed the doors behind them. "Speaking of which. Skorch, how's that thing I asked you to make coming?"
"Should be done tomorrow sometime." The mohawked man said, not taking his eyes from the device he was cleaning.
"Good." Karrus said as he sighed and threw himself on one of the lobby's sofas for a well deserved rest.
"Got any plans for tomorrow?" The woman said as she sauntered past Karrus.
"Got plans for right now, why don't you join me?" He said shooting her one of his cocky grins. The woman rolled her eyes and made an audible "pssh" noise with her mouth.
"Not even in your dreams, bossman."
"Your loss, bitch." Karrus snapped back with that same smile. "If you must know I'm taking the Skinners into Gelt town tomorrow."
"Gelt?" The woman asked. "Why?"
"Grimm's dead. What do you think all the groups that came from the Reavers like us are going to be doing? My bet's on trying to get a handle on the playing field. Mark my words, there'll be blood soon enough."
"Not tonight then?" The usually silent man sitting in a recliner with a shotgun in his lap asked.
"No storm, not tonight." Karrus answered, motioning for on the bottles to be passed to him as he turned over on the sofa to lay on his back. "Not yet."
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The next morning, Karrus was heading off towards Gelt town with the Skinner twins in tow. Behind him the Kingpin Derrick with its new headboard shrunk in the distance behind them. It was made from several pieces of scrap wood all bolted and nailed together and made flat. Skorch stood on a scaffolding putting the finishing touches on its design; a huge leering skull with red eyes and the wings of a bat, black as night stretched out on either side.
The Doomheads were in business...
GANGER ACTIONS
Karrus, Slayer and Flayer on their way to Gelt town by way of West Cirset.
The rest of the gang guarding the base.
The previous night
Greathaul Station was one of North Cirset's local watering holes. It was a unique structure in that part of town mainly owing to its construction being made out of two great machines that were once used to haul ore in bulk out of the great mines several levels down. But those mines had dried up years ago and the need for such enormous wheeled vehicles with such specific uses dried up along with them. The two Greathaulers; gargantuan trucks with massive rear loading bays, had been parked in an empty lot beside a few other buildings and then left to rust away until someone in those days decided to buy them and take a gamble. And so, Greathaul Station was born. The inside of the enclosed cargo compartments had been converted into the main floor of the bar. The walls that separated the two parked vehicles had been cut through and converted with scrap to be turned into a makeshift building. Such was the innovation of those stuck in the lower parts of the hive. Like a feral world tribe making use of the carcass of one of their kills, the people who had first bought these vehicles had let nothing go to waste. The gas tanks for the titanic trucks had been scrubbed out and were now being used to hold large quantities of alcohol. The engines had been converted into stills. Windows had been cut out of the sides of the storage units and the glass panes from the front cabins of the vehicles were now being used to give the bar a source of light, however dim, from the outside. The large, flat hubcaps from the tires were now tabletops, the tires themselves being so large as to necessitate the trucks' loading ramps being left extended so that patrons could ascend up to the doors that had been built from scrap.
It was this bar that Mercer, a middle aged hiver who had never seen the world outside his level, owned and operated. Of course, he ran his insurance through the Reavers, who didn't? As long as he was on time with his payments it wasn't so bad. Grimm kept his boys in line and everything ran smoothly. Mercer even had a pretty decent profit for himself. He thought these things as the low cacophony of the night rush in his establishment was going on around him. Men and women were getting off from their grueling shifts at whatever jobs they had and had come to spend some of their hard earned thrones on a few drinks. There were maybe two dozen people spread around the tables and the main bar right now but Mercer was sure that the number would come out to several times that by the time he locked up for the night. Suddenly, Mercer's attention was caught by a young man he knew returning from the bar's cellar through a backroom off to one side of the bar, he was carrying a few boxes stacked upon one another as he set them down next to Mercer.
"You really ought to make room for these cups behind the bar so I dont have to haul them up from the cellar every night." The man complained.
"I don't pay you for lip Arvor, I pay you for work. Now take this mop into the bathroom, some bastard has managed to piss everywhere but the hole in the floor."
"Again?" Arvor moaned as he took the mop and bucket and wearily went off to earn his pay.
Mercer suppressed a chuckle as he watched his assistant march off and panned his gaze about the bar. Another patron came forward ordering a round of drinks for himself and his buddies at a table on the other side of the building and Mercer went to go fill it. It was as he was filling the tankards with brew that the door was rather violently flung open. Mercer turned just in time to see his door bouncer's body get flung through the open portal to stumble over a table and finally come to rest on the ground next to said table. The conversation and sound inside the bar died away within those first few moments as three figures walked into the bar with weapons held in their hands. Mercer marked them out at once as gangers...and ones he knew to boot. A grim looking fellow lead the pack, clad in a dusty trenchcoat and leather bandoleer and holding a shotgun leveled in his hands. The scarred man wordlessly strode up to the prostrate bouncer and aimed his weapon at him nonchalantly, ensuring that he stayed exactly where he was. The second man was less a man and more a behemoth of muscle. At his side was held the biggest gun Mercer had even seen, held with those tree trunk arms. The man came in to find Mercer's other bouncer rising from his seat at the front of the bar.
"Go ahead and give me a reason, bud." The monster man said as the bouncer half reached for the club on his belt. Seeing that he was hilariously outgunned and outnumbered, the man wisely sat back down.
"Have I ever told you how swank your little pad is here, Merc?" the last of the three said stepping out from behind the brute. Mercer shivered a bit as he was reacquainted with the man's stark white hair and those empty, animal eyes.
"What the hell do you call yourself doing, Karrus?" Mercer asked indignantly. "I told you I'd have the money when I have it!" He stopped at that as Karrus held up one finger as if to ask for a moment while he turned to the bar patrons still looking on in dumbfounded silence.
"Now children, why don't you give us a moment so the adults can talk?" He said aloud to everyone present. Nobody moved for several moments. Seeing this, Karrus racked the slide on the boltgun hanging on a strap on his shoulder.
"I said," Karrus began as he aimed the weapon at a window and pulled the trigger, sending a bolt through the glass, shattering it as the echo of the weapon resounded inside the building's metal hull. "GET THE FUCK OUT!"
Everyone moved. Every patron as one body headed for the doors without a single man or woman saying a word. The floor resounded with the beats of many boots as they all made their way out. Karrus waited for the last man to leave before addressing Mercer.
"So, where were we?" He asked playfully asked as he sat at the bar in front of Mercer. The barkeep looked to be on the verge of an apoplectic fit.
"You've got a lot of nerve pulling a stunt like this. What's Grimm gonna think when he finds out you've been shaking down one of his businesses?!"
As a reply, Karrus chuckled and leaned over the bar, finding a half empty bottle of grog that someone left in their hurry out. He picked up the bottle and began to drink.
"Answer me you stupid cunt." Mercer growled.
"As you wish." Karrus said as he put the bottle back on the bar, he gripped it by the neck and with one violent swing smashed the glass bottle over Mercer's head. Grabbing the man by his apron lapels, Karrus hauled him over the bar and threw the man onto a table, hovering over him, holding him down with one hand and sinking a knife into the table beside Mercer's head with the other.
"This answer enough for ya?" Karrus asked with a skull's grin. "You've been hiding behind the Reavers for too long Merc. I own your ass."
"Go ahead and kill me." Mercer said as he put one hand to his gashed head. "Grimm will be skinning you alive within the week."
Karrus began to laugh. "Oh man." He said in between chortles. "If I had a throne for every time I heard that in the past week I wouldn't need to shake down your pathetic ass. Hey Beast, who was the last one to tell us that? Ol' Krast right?"
"Yeah. Called us the Doomed crew." The big man with the gigantic gun said.
"The Doomed crew. You know, I really do like that, I'll have to use it somehow."
Mercer stared at them both with a bewildered expression, obviously not knowing what they were talking about.
"You don't know, do you, ya dumb shit?" Karrus laughed again. "Grimm is dead. Put in the ground by his long time rival from the east which means I get to make good on your debts."
"No, I don't believe you, you're lying." Mercer said feebly.
"Oh no?" Karrus took the knife tip out of the table and shoved it a mere inch from Mercer's nose. "Maybe you'll believe me when I come back here and burn this shithole to the ground with you in it? This establishment is in Doomhead turf now, get it? You pay me and maybe in a few weeks I wont mount your head on the wall there. Understand?"
Mercer nodded slowly. A door opened on the other side of the bar and Mercer's assistant walked out of the bathroom, stopping suddenly as he saw three armed men holding up his boss' bar.
"Hey boy." Karrus said. "What's in that bottle there?" He nodded to the drink that he had broken over Mercer's head. The young man came forwards warily and picked up the broken bottle.
"Its uh, its something called Warpsbane. We make it from amasec and some sort of red fruit extract. I add some pepper stuff we have sitting around here for the extra kick."
"I like it." Karrus announced. "Put a dozen bottles in a box for me." He turned back to Mercer. "That's your first week's payment. Me or one of my friends here will be here in five days to pick up next week's. Get it?"
Mercer nodded again, his face contorted with pain and dizziness.
"Well then." Karrus said as he stood up and sheathed his knife. "This concludes our business."
A few minutes later the three were walking down the street back towards their base. Beast was carrying the large box full of booze in his big arms. His size made the box and the bottles inside look small in comparison.
"When we get back," Karrus started. "We're going to have to make a toast to Ol' Grimm. Him dyin was the best thing that ever happened to us."
Karrus and Beast laughed, the shotgun toter remained impassive as always and behind them, the Greathaul Station stood; its two bouncers hanging from one of the building's attached lamp posts by a rope, a sign that announced that the bar was "UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT" was draped around their shoulders. Their bodies swayed in the slight breeze as the lights along the street dimmed for the night cycle.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The three soon found themselves standing outside a tall chain link fence. The top pegs were ringed with razor wire, the entire edifice standing about ten feet tall and stretched its way around a series of hab blocks that had been built, like much of this level, years ago by pioneering underhivers. Inside the fence were yards where many low flat buildings had been built next to tall and narrow ones which stretched rather high into the smoggy sky. Each of these tall structures suddenly stopped about halfway up their actual construction and were replaced the rest of the way with metal skeletons that went up for another hundred meters. Karrus looked at the sign above the main gate that allowed entrance within the perimeter of the buildings dubbing them "The Derricks." True to their name, this hab block had been built around old promethium derricks that had dried up decades ago. The site was abandoned until housing in the area was needed. The hab blocks began with the derricks themselves, the builders taking advantage of the skeletal structures that had already been built for them. They clothed them in sheets of scrap metal and other material to form multi level habs which stretched from the level floor up until the structure became too narrow to be used anymore. The derricks themselves did not stop at ground level, they went much farther down into the underhive to where, nobody knew. All the inhabitants knew was that they were not being used anymore and hence were a good enough place to call home. The smaller, fatter patchwork of buildings had come later, making the hab block its own little town of sorts. The derricks' smaller brethren housed local markets and so forth and gave that section of the level a sort of semi autonomy.
This was why Karrus had chosen it as his seat of power...
He threw down a spent lho stick at the gate as he led his victorious party back into the "triangle" an appropriately shaped couryard between the central buildings of the Derricks. It was almost night now and most people had gone back into their habs for the night cycle, a few in small groups were leaving with lamp packs in order to catch their night shifts in whatever grubby jobs they had andshop owners were locking up for the night. As a rule, none of them looked at the gangers as they came through. Karrus smiled that skull like smile of his. They knew who ran things here.
At the entrance of the main derrick, dubbed "Kingpin," A woman with dark hair and ample tattoos stood leaning up against one of the open double doors.
"Back already? Wasn't sure you'd make it in before curfew."
"Old Merc had less guys than I thought." Karrus said as he dusted his street clothes and black stormcoat off. Dust and grit was a real problem in the wastes, most people owned leather clothing of some sort down here.
"Gonna be a cold one tonight." A figure said within the structure. The dim light within only gave the returning three the barest hint of his red mohawk and brawny chest. He was sitting in a lobby chair with some sort of device hauled onto a table in front of him and was cleaning it with a dingy cloth. "I can feel it in my bones."
"Good thing we brought firewood then." Beast said as he put down the box on another table and passed the mohawked ganger a bottle from within.
"Anything happen while we were gone?" Karrus asked the slender woman with the two autopistols holstered on her belt.
"Whats his face mister town elder came by to 'officially' welcome us to our new home. Asked us if there was anything we wanted or needed."
"Told that old man to find us dinner." Said a voice coming from the stairwell. Karrus turned to see two identical figures, one carrying a small sack which he placed on the table next to the box of booze.
"The old coot actually did it!" The other identical figure in the dim light of the building light said giddily.
"Course he did." Karrus said with a knowing nod. "He knows we're the only ones separating the people here from some other shithead group out there coming in and fucking everything up. The Doomheads are the only gangers left in North Cirset that can be trusted, lets keep it that way." He trailed off for a moment as the woman closed the doors behind them. "Speaking of which. Skorch, how's that thing I asked you to make coming?"
"Should be done tomorrow sometime." The mohawked man said, not taking his eyes from the device he was cleaning.
"Good." Karrus said as he sighed and threw himself on one of the lobby's sofas for a well deserved rest.
"Got any plans for tomorrow?" The woman said as she sauntered past Karrus.
"Got plans for right now, why don't you join me?" He said shooting her one of his cocky grins. The woman rolled her eyes and made an audible "pssh" noise with her mouth.
"Not even in your dreams, bossman."
"Your loss, bitch." Karrus snapped back with that same smile. "If you must know I'm taking the Skinners into Gelt town tomorrow."
"Gelt?" The woman asked. "Why?"
"Grimm's dead. What do you think all the groups that came from the Reavers like us are going to be doing? My bet's on trying to get a handle on the playing field. Mark my words, there'll be blood soon enough."
"Not tonight then?" The usually silent man sitting in a recliner with a shotgun in his lap asked.
"No storm, not tonight." Karrus answered, motioning for on the bottles to be passed to him as he turned over on the sofa to lay on his back. "Not yet."
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The next morning, Karrus was heading off towards Gelt town with the Skinner twins in tow. Behind him the Kingpin Derrick with its new headboard shrunk in the distance behind them. It was made from several pieces of scrap wood all bolted and nailed together and made flat. Skorch stood on a scaffolding putting the finishing touches on its design; a huge leering skull with red eyes and the wings of a bat, black as night stretched out on either side.
The Doomheads were in business...
GANGER ACTIONS
Karrus, Slayer and Flayer on their way to Gelt town by way of West Cirset.
The rest of the gang guarding the base.
