Grid Drive Blog 23/03/24 - Atomic Shenanigans.
Hi again everybody. Here I am again with details of another adventure I became involved in against my will the other day. It's a hard job keeping the world secure from the Penguin Menace.
The day started normally enough. I got a dodgy suggestion from DoSL;
Christi Charron: Tour the festival and see the awesome food truck displays
Starbright Wingtips: hmmm, a food truck tour, I am suspicious
Starbright Wingtips: it'll probably involve drugs, again.
Starbright Wingtips: mmm, ice creams, lets get some.
Starbright Wingtips: I was going to get a lemon ice, then I remembered the warnings about not eating yellow snow, who knows if it's really lemon.
Starbright Wingtips: anyway, lets have a look around.
We wandered around the food truck convention for a while, trying the various burgers and BBQ on offer. Overall it was a lovely area and we noticed some details thar show that our overlords are on top of things totally;
Starbright Wingtips: city newspaper is 4 years old, I am glad Linden are keeping things up to date.
But eventually our culinary experiments caught up with us and we headed over to the long line of portacabins to, err, powder our noses. This is where thins really went a bit mad, I am sure it had nothing at all to do with the coke. All of a siddent there was a bright flash and when I opened the portapotty door I saw a new landscape;
Starbright Wingtips: we got flushed out i guess
Starbright Wingtips: I must admit it's not where I expected to end up. I remember that sewage plant from the last drive. Unless it was all a bad dream, it's hard to remember.
Starbright Wingtips: anyway, it looks nice enough, lets explore
We wandered along downhill towards the outskirts of a strange town and came to a road. It appeared we might have a lot of walking to do, so I did what anyone in our situation would do, I stole a vehicle.
Starbright Wingtips: lets use this, hop in
Starbright Wingtips: oh, I don't mind cries of "omg we're going to die". I'll be screaming just as loud.
So we set out driving aimlessly across Belli, although I was sure something freaky was going on and I kept my eyes out for penguins at all times. The roads of Belli were as treacherous as ever and we did encounter a few more unfortunate travellers who had also been sucked into the portapotty pipes.
Starbright Wingtips: I f**king hate the lamposts of Belli
شهرزاده (dancingfireflys): yes
Aᴘᴘʏ (appaloosahorse) shouts: it sucks! that's the challenge
Starbright Wingtips: stupid road
Chris Camberley-Lionheart (chrisger): rolls eyes
Having found a stretch of road with some serious potholes I decided that it'd be a lot smoother ride if we just went offroad;
However, offroad Belli has just as many hazards as the street do;
Starbright Wingtips: i hate the trees too, lol
شهرزاده (dancingfireflys): lol
Despite all of these challanges we eventually found ourselves at a railway station and a little voice in the back of my head was telling me that the cops were probably out looking for the bike by now, so I decided we ought to swap to another mode of transport. Luckily there was an old tram at the station, so I, err, borrowed it for a while.
The coke from earlier was really kicking in at this point and so as we toured Belli a certain amount of confusion arose over which direction we should be going, which was good going considering we only had two choices, ahead or reverse.
شهرزاده (dancingfireflys): are we going the wrong way?
Starbright Wingtips: yes, lol
شهرزاده (dancingfireflys): the signal is red
Starbright Wingtips: where did we go wrong?
شهرزاده (dancingfireflys): this is confusing
Starbright Wingtips: lets have some more coke, it might clear things up.
We travelled through Belli observing the wonderful scenery with a kind of glassy eyed wonder, utter profound "wow" and "cool" comments and other conversational gems
شهرزاده (dancingfireflys): oops
شهرزاده (dancingfireflys): fixed it
Starbright Wingtips: yay
Starbright Wingtips: we're on linden turf, so keep an eye out for penguins
شهرزاده (dancingfireflys): lol
هرزاده (dancingfireflys): yes
Starbright Wingtips: I like the scenery here, even things like having a mix of trees
شهرزاده (dancingfireflys): I like the houses to, they give me a sense of enormous well-being.
We eventually reached the end of the line and were just pondering what we should do next when I got a call on my mobile. It was spooky, almost as if we were being watched;
Starbright Wingtips: Hello, who is this?
Christi Charron: If you lived here, you'd be home right now!
Christi Charron: You would also be my neighbor as my house is near here :)
Christi Charron: Let's head to the dock
Starbright Wingtips: err, ok I guess. We're doing this because ....?
Christi Charron: There's someone waiting there you need to talk to.
So we walk though the outskirts of the town and approach the shoreline where we see a small dock with some seaplanes parked next to it. We see a suspicious looking short person waiting on the dock wearing what looks like a trenchcoat and fedora. I walk up with a cheesy grin and wave
Starbright Wingtips: Wotcha matey. Have you lost your preciousssss?
Warship Waifu: Hey Starbright. I'm sure you're one of Christi's "Let's Go See Pretty Things" grid drives right now, but your help is needed in the gulf.
Starbright Wingtips: see, it's those bloody penguins again, I bet you!
Warship Waifu: We have a "Broken Arrow" situation we discovered recently while looking through old top secret military records.
Warship Waifu: Years ago two submarines were sent out, one carrying a large "tactical" nuclear warhead, the other sub was just a decoy.
Warship Waifu: The two subs never arrived, and they were eventually forgotten about over time, they likely collided shortly after leaving port.
Warship Waifu: Our plan is to find the two submarine wrecks using sonar from a boat, then search the wreckages using deep sea vehicles.
Warship Waifu: We need someone to retrieve the sonar and take it to the search team at the JGA marina, as our delivery driver had a bull-riding accident last weekend.
Warship Waifu: I contacted you because you're known for your reliability and speed, and we only have the budget for one more day of operation.
Starbright Wingtips: bull riding eh? nasty
Warship Waifu: Please go retrieve the sonar device from a warehouse in Tulagi, and take it to the search team at the JGA Marina
Starbright Wingtips: and this is all official, is it? hmmmmmm. Ok I guess the quickest way to get there is to "borrow" one of these planes. It goes against every instinct I have to break the law by taking someone else's vehicle, but this is an emergency, right?
So with no further ado we waved farewell to the totally not dodgy person giving us dodgy instrctions which may or may not be official and we began our flight south to the Jeoget Gulf. It was at this point we started to suffer from some electronic warfare interference with our GPS ((Navhud))
شهرزاده (dancingfireflys): i am so confused
Starbright Wingtips: why
شهرزاده (dancingfireflys): it is all showing up on screen in some strange language
Starbright Wingtips: penguin hacking
20240323 Nav HUD: オフロード車両に乗って続行します。しつこいですが、飛行機は削除しないでください
[11:47] Starbright Wingtips: it must be
[11:47] Starbright Wingtips: they want the nukes
We climbed out of the plane and began to look for a vahicle to take us to the warehouse on the docks where the sonar was apparently being stored. I could see we were in a military area so in order to blend in and not arouse any suspicion, we stole a military looking vehicle;
We drove past bunkers and tanks and guns galore, keeping our eyes peeled for odd stuff and eventually pulled up at the warehouse. There didn;t seem to be anyone around so we wandered inside;
As we were looking around for something that looked like a sonar we heard a voice from behind us and a large dark figure emerged from behind a rack of shelves and spoke to us;
Cpt. Street Brightflame Reaper (street.repine): Hi :) I am helping with the warhead salvage operation and saw you over there
Cpt. Street Brightflame Reaper (street.repine): If you're looking for the sonar device, it hasn't arrived yet
Cpt. Street Brightflame Reaper (street.repine): It is stuck in transit still
Starbright Wingtips: Typical, I blame penguins!
Cpt. Street Brightflame Reaper (street.repine): I'll locate the sonar device for you but it'll take a few minutes, then you can go pick it up as this operation is low on time and budget
Cpt. Street Brightflame Reaper (street.repine): Until then, you can wait in the lounge located in the building to your SE
So we wandered over the road to the bar, it was timely stop as we were on a Mandated Union Rest Break by then anyway, so we killed some time in the bar.
Starbright Wingtips: I guess we'll just have to wait here for Cpt. Brightflame Reaper
Starbright Wingtips: It's looks like drivers of SL encourages drink driving, hmmmmmmm.
Starbright Wingtips: but I guess it's ok, we'll mostly be in boats from here by the sounds of it
* A few Minutes Later *
Cpt. Street Brightflame Reaper (street.repine): Okay, I located the sonar shipment finally
Cpt. Street Brightflame Reaper (street.repine): The crated sonar is stuck in transit in a warehouse south of here in the town of Eifukucho
Cpt. Street Brightflame Reaper (street.repine): I'll send the location to your Nav HUD now so you can go retrieve it and deliver it to the search team, so they can use it to find the sunken submarines
Cpt. Street Brightflame Reaper (street.repine): Good luck! You should head back to your plane.
We headed back to the jeep and then drove back through the maze of field fortifications and equipment to the airfield. I was very glad to see that this region was prepared for the inevitable penguin attack once we managed to recover the nukes. Still musing on this threat we climbed back aboard the seaplane and took off heading south. Our navigation instruments took us dangerously close to a volcano but we managed to land without too much drama, apart from running over a pedestrian on the runway. oh well. We parked next to the terminal and as I stopped the engines I receoved a call on my mobile;
Cpt. Street Brightflame Reaper (street.repine): Hey Starbright. The shipping manager at the Eifukucho warehouse is Ramos Regent.
Starbright Wingtips: How did you get my number, wtf?
[15:16:56] Cpt. Street Brightflame Reaper (street.repine): Never mind that, Ramos will meet you at the warehouse and should be there when you arrive or shortly afterwards. Now you have to drive to Eifukucho to pick it up.
So we headed through the terminal and out to the car park where I spotted a likely looking vehicle with a notoriously easy to break ignition system;
We drove south, keeping our eye out for spies, penguins, air pirates and zombies. After an uneventful drive we reached our destination and parked carefully;
We walked into the warehouse where a surprisingly ordinary chipmunk approached us;
Ramos Regent: Hi! Capt. Street said you were on your way to pick up a crate in Eifukucho
Ramos Regent: Unfortunately the warehouse is locked as the normal warehouse manager was struck by a dirigible yesterday :/
Starbright Wingtips: Oh, another accident, it's not at all suspicious that everyone we need to speak to is injured or missing. I think there's something fishy going on.
Ramos Regent: If you'll wait in my family's bar around the corner, I'll make sure your drinks are free!
Starbright Wingtips: Sure, I need to top up my booze levels a little, I have more driving to do yet.
Starbright Wingtips: what was that old song "have a drink, have a drive"
Miss Della (della.randt): lol, yes
* A few minutes later *
Ramos Regent: Hello, I have unlocked the shipping facility and you may now go retrieve your crate!
Ramos Regent: I apologize for the wait.
Ramos Regent: You can take the train to the shipping facility to pick up your crate, as parking there is limited.
So we staggered over to the elevated railway station and climbed up to the platform to await the train. It was only a minute before it arrived which may have been due to normal Japanese efficiency, or it might have been due to the strange feeling of being watched that we were all beginning to notice. Once it arrived we clambered aboard;
The train pulled out and it was only a couple of stops later that our stop came up, we exited the train and wandered about the town for a while until we located the warehouse with the sonar in;
We eventually found the warehouse, walked in and saw the sonar right away, sitting in a crate in the middle of the floor, not suspicious at all. Once we had managed to steal a dolly, we were able to wheel the crate back to the station and back onto the train. After an uneventful return journey on the train we go back to the car. Dealt with the other drivers who unjustly claimed that we blocked them in (pepper spray is a great invention) and then drove back to Jeogeot Gulf Airport.
** Sadly at this point the NavHud started to glitch and I got booted from sl before I could save my chatlog of the final part of the drive. So detail from this point will be a bit lacking. Sorry **
After arriving back at the airport we humped the crate out of the plane and down to the dock where we found a suitable boat for the next part of the mission which was to use the sonar to locate the two submarine wrecks;
It wasn't long before we realised that these submarine wrecks were located in an active combat zone so while we bravely dodged bombs, torpedoes and strafing runs by planes we searched hard for these subs. Eventually we spotted them both after a long and gruelling voyage and as we started to feel distinctly hungover we headed back to the port for the final stage of the mission.
We got back to the docks with our happy news of having located the two wrecks. We were then asked to take the explorer submarine, Oceangategate, to retrieve the lost nuke warhead from whichever wreck it was on. We climbed aboard full of confidence and I sat at the front of the boat trying not to notice the Home Depot stickers on everything as I used the playstation controller to move away from the dock and out into the deep water.
We headed down to the location of the first wreck, trying not to notice the creaking sounds coming from all around us. Next to the playstation was our radiation detector and I kept my eye on it as we got closer;
Radiation Detector: Stop moving so the radiation scanner can get an accurate reading
Radiation Detector: Remain stopped while radiation scanning is performed...
Radiation Detector: Scanning for radiation traces...
Radiation Detector: No high levels of radiation or warhead found. Continue to the second submarine wreckage.
So we did. I tried to get the sub to go faster because by now we were all starting to feel a bit, err, nervous about the whole situation. We aproached the second wreck and finally got some good news;
Radiation Detector: Stop moving so the radiation scanner can get an accurate reading
Radiation Detector: Remain stopped while radiation scanning is performed...
Radiation Detector: Scanning for radiation traces...
Radiation Detector: High radiation levels are present. The warhead must be nearby!
Radiation Detector: Locate the warhead and manoeuvre the sub next to it to pick it up with the grabber claw thing.
Radiation Detector: Warhead retrieved!
At this point we received a suspiciously timed text message;
Warship Waifu: You found it! I knew we picked the right person for the job! Deliver the warhead to Tulagi Seaport.
So, we set off at flank speed for Tulagi and despite the risk of warplanes we decided a run on the surface was probably safer since some of the seams inside were starting to get a little, err, damp. Once back at the dock we saw our suspicious looking contact waiting for us in some convenient shadows;
Warship Waifu: I see you over there! Welcome back.
Warship Waifu: The Bomb Disposal Unit isn't here yet as one of the lead technicians had a bungee-jumping accident while on vacation
Warship Waifu: Please deliver the warhead to an empty quonset hut, to be stored away from everyone for now
Warship Waifu: BE CAREFUL! Everyone I know seems to be having some sort of horrible accident lately >.>
Starbright WIndtips: Yes, we had noticed that. It's all highly suspicious. We'll take care.
So we loaded the bomb onto the jeep and drove it over to the storage hut. Once there I recived another suspiciously timed text message;
Warship Waifu: Rez the "Tactical Nuclear Warhead" in the rear of the barracks and the bomb disposal crew will come secure it
So we carried the warhead and just as I was about to put it down
[17:17] Warship Waifu: WAIT!!!
**BOOM**
[17:17] Starbright Wingtips: oops
[17:17] شهرزاده (dancingfireflys): lol
So, that was the end of our adventure. It was a lot of fun so a big thank you to |everyone who helped put this drive together. I am sorry I had technical problems and lost the last bit of our group chat. I hope you enjoyed reading this.
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