Warrens:
Everyones been provided a car, a few cans of paint and a few minutes to decorate them up to personal taste.
Mr. Smiley. That's the name of Blindsides car, with its lopsided big yellow smiley face painted on the hood of the black car. It's almost show-room new, and was infact stolen from Hartshiem Ford-Lincoln-Mazda two days ago. He grips the steering wheel, all excited. He cracks his neck as the honey in the thong and two-band-aids drops the flag. His little halfer foot hits the pedal and the pedal hits the metal.
He took a stick for this run, and its hard to find a stock stick Americar. He up shifts just as the Tach hits red-line and roars off the starting line!
The battered stolen Americar driven by Kassandra has had an assortment of blue paint artfully applied to it, with the words "Silky Smooth" scrawled across the hood, and a giant blue S across the roof. The woman guns the engine, leaving a smear of tire behind as she rips off the starting line, the vehicle jerking forward with a heavy application of foot. Music blasts from the radio, screaming out Shattered Dreams' "Highway Blues".
Tailpipe lets out a howl as she tries to stamp on the gas pedal…sadly, these cars were never built for someone her size, and she's only just able to get a toe onto it. The car sluggishly moves forward while her head sticks out of a large hole punched through the thin roof, the wind wipping the scraggly hair between her horns. "Is getting back here! No fair!" She yells at the passing drivers.
Annie hums happily to herself, remembering the old '76 bug she learned to drive in. Of course, that was a manual transmission and probably had more horses under the hood than this fargin' Americar. She somehow manages to grind the transmission anyway, and the car lurches forward and stalls out. She grinds the ignition for a few seconds and the car leaps forward as the agonized engine finally gives in to her entreaties. Amazingly she finds herself tied in last pace with the Troll. 'You are the dancing queen, young and sweet, only 17', the humming finally gives in to full blown lyrics as she carefully adjusts the rear-view mirror.
The bullseye dotted Americar jerks forward as the race begins, sputtering for a few moments and quickly losing the one second lead of being the first to accelerate. Potluck kicks the vehicle back into the proper gear, falling into a tie for third place. He glances over his shoulder at the cars behind him, trying to position himself so as to better block the competition from doing what the other two cars did.. And nearly runs into a lightpole. Its a crime against creation to put this man behind a wheel.
The bright pink car's tires squeel from having too much power going to them before the car shoots off the line, an aray of meaningless arcane sigils, purple, dotting the hood and sides. Seriously. Anyone who looks at the overall image rather than trying to interpret each one will notice it says 'Eat my Mana'.
It seems like the world's longest six seconds as Blindside swings his smiley-happy-shiney-people car in front of Kassandra, his taillights like twin beams of mocking glory! The Halfer runs up on the curb, a trash can full of papers exploding as the car punches through it, shattering a head light assembly. "I hope you got insurance!"
Tailpipe lets out another frustrated roar as the car simply won't go fast! She wants her bike back! The car is rocking side to side faster than it's moving forward at this rate as she beats at the innards of the car, glass flying out of windows and the hole in the roof growing into a full blown rent in the cheap material. "I get you soon!" She roars out, as if she could be heard from the cars already well outdistancing her.
The blue S car zips along, honking at Mr. Smiley as he cuts in front of her. The music blasts out the open window as Kassandra drives, the car roaring through the muck and debris that make up the streets of the Warrens.
Annie devolves back into just humming the tune since those were all the lyrics that she could recall. She checks the left mirror, then the right, then carefully activates her left turn blinker before smoothly merging into the left lane to avoid what appeared to be a dead cat splattered in her lane. "Safety first", she mutters to herself as she checks the rear view to assure herself that she missed the corpse.
Mana car edges out in front of the bullseye car, despite being neck and neck a few seconds ago… the pair trail far behind the leader, and trail not quite as far behind the second, but with still a large gap between them. The shaman glances out his window this 'potluck' and floods just enough mana out to give the man a greepy image of his shamanic-mask.
The bullseye marked puke green cars rolls along at a slow gain. Potluck looks around at the other drivers, not really driving competitively. That would require he know how to make the vehicle do more than go. He sticks his head out of his window, looking at the trog in the rear. "You've got to step on the gas! TRY it!"
Punching it, Blindside is dismayed! The car's engine roars, but he doesn't seem to be going much faster. The goddamn Trashcan is stuck under his car! He jinks from side to side, the car's tires squealing, before the can comes off and flips down the road, eventually hitting some poor stupid idiot who never has watched road rallies or 'AMAZING VIDEOS'.
Tailpipe flips Selerik the finger, twice. "Eat death, fragger!" She yells as she reaches over to the passenger seat and pulls up her Grenade launcher, the bulkly weapon sliding through the newly wrent roof. Not the best of fireing positions, but that's never stopped her before as the *PHUT* of compressed air sends the mini-grenade soaring through the space between the cars, bouncing off the roof of that stupid looking car of his and then to the side where it explodes. "Take that!"
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzrrrrrrrrrrrrrrroom. Kassandra weaves back and forth, trying to follow Blindside. It is early enough in the race that she isn't overly concerned about trying to pass the little runt yet, but she doesn't want to be in the back of the pack. The woman downshifts, watching the dwarf jink and release the trashcan lid, revving up and punching it, trying to overtake him. She casually reaches over, flipping stations to find something better, coming up with a remake of The Sounds of Napalm's Overture in Death.
The puke green car is hit by a nearby explosion, popping a temporary wheelie as the blast nearly flips the poor quality vehicle. It slams back down to the earth far too hard, whatever pased for suspension making a crunching sound as one side of the vehicle begins riding much closer to the ground than the other.
Potluck adjusts the rearview mirror, watching the vehicle with the trogg. "Theres always one." He looks towards the vehicles further ahead, pulling even further by the second. "Decisions decisions.."
Annie takes one hand from the wheel for a second to adjust the fit on her safety harness. The humming stops as she finally seems to start taking this race somewhat seriously. She ignores the visible *pop* of a grenade as Tailpipe declares war on Selerik, her own eyes probing down the robe ahead of the lead car for something she can use. Meanwhile her own vehicle continues moving forward relentlessly.
Mana-car shifts gears annoyingly slow, burning some of the acceleration off of the pink car. As the engine's pitch changes, those useless sigils on the car change in brightness… and flare at the loud explosion behind him. "Frag me," he moans.
Kassandra bobs her head with the beat, the troll novarock blaring at near-deafening levels. The elf drums on the steering wheel before drawing the pistol that sits across her lap, counting her blessings for being left handed. The elf leans a bit, singing in time with the music as she sights towards Blindside's car. The combat computer makes a quick resolution, the rangefinder syncing with the math subprocessor, looking for a good spot. The woman smirks, giving the fire command. The gun barks once, the barrel flaring as she fires, singing "BOOM I shoot you BOOM you die BOOM our love BOOM our death cry……"
Blindside is just getting the car back up to speed when the rounds slam in to the car from the rear. Glass shatters and the trunk actually explodes off its hinges, flipping off in to the crowd. The vehicle skitters to the right, looking like it's bout to flip, but the little halfer jerks the wheel, downshifts and taps the gas, straightening out the vehicle. The gauges are PISSED off though, and the car just can't maintain its speed… "Vehicle damaged. Vehicle damaged. Critical damage to rear trans-axle. Reduce speed. Reduce speed." Screams the autonav of the car, not liking what just happened ONE BIT.
«Plot» Blindside says, " Blindsides Vehicle +3 TN to all rolls, -3 initiative mod, top speed cut by 50% New speed speed: 52/77.
Out there in front, barely, Blindside snarls, his hands jerking the wheel. He reaches in to the dash, yanking a wire and killing that annoying voice. He glances in the shattered rear view, seeing Kassandra roaring up his back door. Swerving to the right, then the left, throwing off smoke and bits of car, he slams on the brakes, intending to inversely ram the womans car.
Selerik continues to accelerate, leaning out of his window and shouting back at the trogg with the grenade launcher. "You found the pedal! Good job! I'm very proud of you!!!" He then ducks his head back inside the vehicle, like a sane person, and putters along a little faster, which serves to make the lean of his vehicle all the more pronounced. Up ahead, things are beginning to demand his attention. "Oh son of a biscuit.." Incoming traffic, not good.
"Wow, things are getting nasty.", Annie mutters to herself, "AV Ammo. Grenades." She narrows her eyes and the soft whirr of her optical magnification fills the cockpit, accompanied a moment later by the lyrical tones of Sperethiel. She concludes with a somewhat ill-timed gesture with her right hand of a rapid jerking motion. In the physical world there is not much of a visible effect, and most likely her magical competitors are not assensing due to the penalties associated with that action. "Oops. That's not good", she comments a moment later as the fellow goes careening down the road toward her.
Tailpipe seems a little happier now that she's had a chance to blow shit up, even if it didn't do much. But enough to get her to pay enough attention to try and go faster…and still at the ass end of the pack. This is no good! She thinks as she eyes the launcher again, pondering another shot or two to thin out the field.
Daniel is in the middle of the pack, his mana-mobile in a perfect place to notice all of the carnage around. He's managed to keep up a steady, if depressingly slow, acceleration streak to try to catch the leaders. The sigils on the car glow a steady purple now, remaining the color they were at when the grenade blast went off a few seconds ago.
Troll Rock music shatters the night air as Kassandra blazes down the road, trying to take the lead. She taps on the steering wheel with hands and pistol, jamming out. The elf narrows her eyes as the dwarf ahead slams on his breaks. "Oh you little shit!" The woman grits her teeth and braces, the shock of the collision bringing tears to her eyes, her left knee banging into the door. The woman grips the wheel in a deathgrip, the encoded reactions taking control, breaking and turning to try to ameliorate the damage. The car loses a hubcap, a light, and parts of the grill. Something snares in the engine as well, a yellow caution light flashing on the dash.
Selerik's puke green target of a car once again tilts into the air on two wheels, and slams down. Strangely, this makes the two wheels that were still working properly crunch their shocks as well. Now he looks like he has a custom lowrider americar, very sleep, very stylish, very green.
On the inside of the car, the entire vehicle is rattling every time he goes over a rock, let alone hits a pothole or a tin can. Selerik is starting to turn a little green from the experience, maybe the interior of the car will match the exterior by the end of the race.
Tailpipe grumbles and slams her fist against the dash of the puny car, letting out another roar of frustration as she slowly falls further and further behind. "Screw dis. If I not win, no one wins!" She pulls out the MGL once more, this time taking an extra second to aim before the *PHUT* of the grenade again fills the air. The grenades traces a graceful arc, this time landing almost directly under Seleriks car. Sadly, it slows down while he speeds up, putting it just past his bumper when it blows. "Son of a …"
"OH HELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLZ NO!" Says Blindside, jerking his pistol up in to his hand. The targeting reticule blinks once, then twice as Kassandra sideslips to get around him. He grits his teeth, one hand on the wheel as his car struggles to stay on the road. By shear strength of will is this poor Ford still moving forward. She starts to slide past him on the drivers side. THe black car with the smiley face shudders with every meter gained, warning lights going off like no ones business.
He traces the targeting reticule over Kass's front end as it slides up next to him, in the moment she goes to pass.
"CRACK!"
It's such a small gun, it doesn't even get a 'boom'.
In an odd display of ignoring /everything/ happening around him in this chaotic race, the Shaman continues to drive along, slowly but surely increasing the car's speed. Whoever used to own this car didn't love it, apparently, cause it's not speeding up quickly. But it's going along.
Annie places both hands firmly on the wheel, making sure to use her turn signals before switching lanes, then carefully passes Bob. She tosses a heart-felt 'Sorry' out the window as he careens by, barely missing her left front bumper. She barely manages to avoid the pothole left by yet another of Tailpipes grenades.
The blue painted car tries to maneuver around the dwarf's Mr. Smiley. The elf waves to Blindside as she moves to pass him, the car steadily accelerating, working hard to pass the shuddering wreck that Blindside is driving.
"CRACK!"
The round may not have made much noise, but whatever it hit in Kassandra's engine apparently didn't care for it. Oil sprays across the windshield as the whole system locks up, the diagnostics board flaring to life with a myriad of problems before going dark completely. The woman grabs the wheel, unable to see from the smoke and oil, the car veering sharply off to one side, away from Blindside.
The blue painted vehicle clips a parked and burned out wreck of a car, sending her into a spin that will end with her impacting with a ruined apartment complex.
One halfer middle finger, in the air. Oh yeah.
«Plot» Blindside says, Kassandra's car ELIMINATED
The car shudders around Blindside as he watches the rear view and the road, gripping the steering wheel. He's got 8 more rounds in the gun, the nearest competitor is a hundred meters back. Man. He really wants that Americar. An Americar's a good car. He checks the mirrors again, then debates what's for dinner tonight. "Milla could make me some mac and cheese… or maybe some spagetti ohs… yeah… that sounds good."
Behind him, a wake of small car-fragments and smoke is left.
Smoke pours out of the wrecked vehicle. Kassandra coughs, waving a hand and trying to clear her vision. The woman crawls across the seats, getting out on the passenger side, casting a dour look at the destroyed car. The elf sighs, shaking her head.
*BOOOM* Another grenade and a much more direct hit. "Yah! Frag yah!" The troll yells, pumping the MGL in the air as she continues serenly along at the rear of the pack.
The Shaman's knuckles turn a bit whte as the hird explosion sounds. True, they are getting further and futher away… but that also means that soon he'll be the target. He casts a wary glance ino the rearview mirror, watching the explosions behind him. Meanwhie, the sigils on the pink car have started to flux with the engine's pitch again. Good times.
Selerik watches as the grenade flies straight over his car and bounces across the hood to land against the windshield wiper. Well crap. He ducks down across the passenger seat in time to avoid the spray of glass and shrapnel, the wounded hood of the car flipping into the air and doing a slow spin, coming back down to impale the passenger side of Selerik's americar just as he gets his hands back on the wheel. His visibility to the right side is completely shot, and now he has wind in his face. He seems to find the situation more humorous than alarming, fishing one hand through his jacket in search of his shades. "Well.. Not bad for third place."
Annie winces as Selerik takes a direct hit from the grenade, "Ouch. That hurt." With her left hand she reaches across the seat to her duffle bag and pulls her own MGL-6 out and rests it beside her after checking which round was primed. This race is probably already lost, but she knew coming into it that it was just to kill a friday nights boredom. And hell…she got to see explosions and cars getting shot. That's worth the ticket price.
«Plot» Blindside says, " Selerik's car at M. -25% speed. +2 to TN's, -2 to init. New speed is 78/118"
Annie leans her head out the window and hollers to Tailpipe, "If you thought that was a big bang, watch this closely hon!"
Annie pointedly aims away from tailpipe so as not to worry the troll, her own MGL-6 in her hand. *Whump*. The grenade zips ahead of the vehicles and airbursts over the highway. The visor on her own helment blacks out since she knows what is coming as the flarecomp circuitry kicks in.
Annie grimaces as Danthrall's car head-on's with another vehicle. "What the fu…", she mutters angrily, "That is usually my luck." She tosses the grenade launcher to the seat next to her and resolves not to kill anyone else tonight. It's bad for her karma, especially when she is not trying.
Daniel is looking in the rear-view mirror when he sees the small burst of light from anies car… a grenade launch, and he's wondering who she could be aiming-the world goes away. Well, that's not accurate. When the world vanishes, everything goes black. Here, everything is blinding-white. Painfully. Outside, the sigils vanish, as the car swerves drunkily through the oncomming traffic. Heroicly, it doges the first, then the second, then the… whops, not the third. The cars sandwich. The rear ends lifting, trying to collapse in on each other… but only coming to about a meter off the ground. Fortunately, no rigger tampered with the car's safety systems to get more room for a sound system… so the drivers are ok. Just… fucked up.
Selerik doesn't actually see who fired the grenade into the distance, but he knows of at least one person who has a grenade launcher they've been firing willy-nilly. The resulting impact is so loud that he doesn't even have to see it to know someone probably just died. Nope, he can't be having that.
Selerik hits the autonav with the hand he had on the wheel, just as he fishes the shades out of his pocket with his other hand. He puts one hand back on the wheel as the autonav starts to decelerate, just in case it decides a safe route involved careening into a wall, and slips on the shades. Ah, the comfort of polarized lenses.
Tailpipe onces more slams her foot down on the gas, for what good it does, trying to catch up to the few remaining people in the fight.
"GO GO GO GO YOU FUCKING PIECE OF CRAP! YOU WERNT EVEN BUILT IN DETROIT! YOUR JAPANESE! YOU SUCK! COME ON.. eh?" Comes the sound of Blindside as his backside is bathed in the glow of a grenade that is like unto a sun in its own. He catches in the side mirror, the destruction of Danthral's car, sandwitching with another car. "Fuck… me…" He murmurs, trying to keep the car at even -this- low speed of nearly 60 miles an hour.
Kassandra steps out of the ruined apartment complex, frowning and looking around. Damnit, now she has to walk back to the finish line. The elf tosses the keys for the car, or what is left of it, to a squatter that has peeked in to see what happened, "Merry Christmas, omae." The elf starts to head back towards the finish line when the superflash goes off. She staggers, covering her eyes and muttering a string of profanity in several languages. The elf ducks into an alcove to try and let the effects pass.
«Plot» Blindside says, Danthrall's car ELIMINATED
With the removal of Danthrall, forceful though it was, Blindside focuses on the road in front of him and keeping the car at its current top speed. The engine is screaming, the axle is about to fall off, but he's able to nurse it over the finish line well ahead of the others. He steps out of the car, looking over the massive amount of damage the car has taken, just sort of -staring- at it. The rear end is gone, the windows are shot out, the bodies a joke… He looks then down the lenght of the simple half mile field.Two cars never made it. One almost didn't. "Slot -me- this is a violent town!"
Annie sighs and pulls her own vehicle over, getting out and moving over to the wreckage. She quickly triages the situation and begins tossing heal spells, centering for successes as she goes. Once that is complete, she wheels her still pristine vehicle over the finish line.
Selerik hops out of his car as it gets to a reasonable speed, skipping a few steps alongside of it - he can run pretty fast apparently, and his brakes are sneakers. He turns and waits for Tailpipe's vehicle, standing in the middle of the road.. And wagging his finger at them admonishingly. Its almost like he wants them to try running him over.
