If you have been eating S.P.A.M. or Smeat rations for a month, you might kill for some meat beetle.
They had been seen in the catacombs of Evangeline Island on Avalon, Zenobia's moon, the wettest place that is above sea level.
Yet meat beetles are very water use efficient, so they adapted very well to the deserts of Mu Draconis. Arilla Aeon, the former head of the UFS diplomatic mission to Mu Draconis briefly had a meat beetle ranch, but the beetles jumped the corral and they ran off into the desert wilderness.
That was a year ago.
The first sign of their return was the bats. They liked to circle high overhead in Deep Desert, but near the Al Raqis settlement, they preferred to flit about the lowport landing pads. Jade and I sat around watching them, blissfully unaware that they were the heralds of the coming infestation.
The new bugs were much different than the ones Arilla raised. They ranged further and they were less docile, these bugs fight back. They have been reported to attack armed soldiers and even some low flying aircraft. Acid, fire, electricity, reports are inconclusive.
Bambinator was the infestation's first victim, his words as he fell forward onto the sand as the sad victim of an arc beetle, "What the hell was that?" Bambinator was not down for long, called for reinforcements and gave the bugs hell and what for.
The bugs dominant habitat is Desert Basin East, although they have been sighted repeated near the UFS, USM compounds near the Splintered Rock Settlement and Clan Misrim Outpost near the sacred totem in Deep Desert.
I have made a few visits to Albert and Mocha out by their trading outpost, and we have traded a few odds and ends.
The desert has been a hopping place lately, not just bugs.
Vega and Gallagher came out for an important test of the cutting edge rocket propelled chainsaw and to discuss deputy Neelix's drinking and smoking problem.
Nova set up a telecomm dish which she says is not necessarily used to destroy spacecraft. The dead bodies hanging from the edge of the dish are for ballast.
Nova has been having a hard time of it lately. A few misunderstandings about salvage procedures, admiralty law, and whether a broad interpretation of a Good Samaritan Law requires her to wait for the occupants of a ship to be dead before she begins salvage. A lot of legal precedents are being set by the trial, so people are paying attention.
Also, how many innocent civilians are you allowed to kill to retrieve your personal property? Mu Draconis awaits breathlessly...
I testified about salvage procedures. Another fellow testified supposedly in rebuttal and all but agreed with me.
LilyBell testified, she was a witness to one of the salvage incidents in question.
It required a lot of effort on my part to keep LilyBell calm and focused. A lot of hair brushing, candy and shiny paper. Lily was so tired afterwards, she took a nap in one of the holding cells.
Lily has been staying as a guest of House Morloch, been hanging out with Lord Krakie and been looking for Ardra.
Albert and Mocha were witnesses too I think, but they don't get involved in outworlder drama.
Pepper came by, she is in town for the week I guess. I have not been briefed as to the purpose of her visit. Mr. Tevya left some books for some light reading for the Major.
It has been good to see Mr. Tevya and Trishy in town. I am not sure why they are here either. Has to be something more important that dropping off books and making a few tarot card readings.
It was good to see that Jo was still alive. She said that she was at some offworld party in her honor that involved electrodes and lots of trivia questions.
Cody was in the 'hood too. He said he took a break in one of our guest houses and he is house sitting for House Morloch. Some Orchid folks shot at him for some reason. He picked up some liquor from our favorite party girl and dropped it off in Colchester. He is also supposed to be picking up some sushi to be shipped in stasis. He is a bit overdue. That boy is always late with some excuse.
The last remnants of the Orchid pirates (?) asked us for an alliance. They asked Zeno and I separately. We are a bit coy about so-called alliances, most of them end badly. I imagine it ending especially badly with a desperate group that couldn't restrain themselves from angrily calling me names and has already fired on our people.
WHODAT!
The present Orchid rep said that McFoxx applied for membership with them. She has been staying at our guest house in Al Raqis.
McFoxx has a cute desert fox as a pet. Zeno and Tillery got to see it while visiting.
Zeno has been staying up in the Zenobian Long-Bow Frigate a lot lately. She says its satellite surveillance is actually very illuminating. Zene was a long time spacer, she probably finds the wide spaces comforting. A lot of traffic out by the Trojan meteors. One or more pirate groups, some terrorist group's blockade, Nova's short lived salvage sale station until the STC deorbited it, and even a ship belonging to Umbrella Corporation. They obviously hired the same decorator as Sir William Branson, they loooovvvveee logo placement.
/me sighs...."United Federation Starfleet (UFS) is not affiliated, associated or related to nor take any responsibility for the actions of Starfleet Torchwood Command. United Federation Starfleet (UFS) is also not affiliated, associated or related to nor take any responsibility for the actions of Galaxy Fleet Command, Section 9 or the United Federation Starfleet (UFS) Marines that blew up the Orion Space Station."
The presence of Umbrella might be why Pepper is here or why Gallagher gave me this Zombie Preparedness Poster.
I saw AuroraBlue around too while I was going over fusionable fuel inventories. It took a while to make it thru the mime act, but I think she meant something about the Spacing Guild Navigators giving her headaches and wanting her arms and legs. Kids these days.
I had some business in Zenobia. Zeno wanted me to move the Kirk's Brain AI from the Zenobian Polytechnical Institute to Al Raqis.
I think those dizzy bims from Sigma Draconis uploaded a copy of him somehow. He's a bit Denny Craned in my opinion, being decoporealized maybe doesn't agree with the good captain so well.
Doctor Qui was very late, so I took the down time to sit out on the causeway.
I ran into Kate in Hale, she says that Cody still doesn't believe she is his "Little Kate". Sure seems like she is. I showed her our new and improved Officebot AI with less spam. I mentioned the theory that x0x0 is a clone before I found out that x0x0 had adopted Kate as her heir. Clones are usually unstable you know.
Hale has been having snake issues. Mikie looked like she got a blanket party beatdown.
I did what I could with the salt and grain alcohol. I couldn't find my stun gun to cauterize the wounds.
Lily gave me the keys to the medicine cabinet so I could get the adrenaline syringes to plunge thru her ribcage and into her heart. I saw it in the old 20th century documentary "Pulp Fiction", it's my nanna's favorite movie along with Reservoir Dogs and Grindhouse.
Amazingly, Mikie regained consciousness before I could plunge the syringe thru her ribcage. Lily said she had to break Mikie's nose in order to fix it.
Posts
