Hey, Has Anyone Seen Our Engine?
Posted on Sat May 27th, 2023 @ 11:01am by Danielle Loxley & Jonas Bailey & Whit
Mission:
Oh, Give Me a Home on The Range
Location: Ezra
Timeline: 18 November 2517 - Afternoon
A sky that went on forever on the good weather days and mustered up a lightning storm of epic proportions on the bad seemed to be feeling in a kind mood today. Blue with those little fluffy clouds that formed random shapes dependent on the observer's mood, clear and warm enough to just need light gloves and a jacket.
They'd back-tracked the trail of Echo's passage from landing to loss of engine housing, characterised the closer they got to the hills by the smaller bits and pieces of such. Elle and her two cowboy companions spread out ahead of the rambling Mule that carried Jonas and Whit, scouting ahead as Shepherd and First Mate proved their route and checked each bigger piece for evidence of attack. By the time they reached the edge of the plains they'd determined someone had used a launcher which had mostly missed, grazing rather than destroying their VTOL engine. Luck or deliberate thinking was impossible to tell without a conversation or two with the perpetrator.
"Up there!" Called Elle as she negotiated the tricky rocks at the base of a hillier section that led up to higher ground and dismounted. Red cliff yawned upwards sharp and unforgiving though there was the hint of the beginning of a thin trail - humans only - snaking up between the mix of unassailable rock. "They had to have set-up up there. But we'll have to leave the horses and the mule behind." She looked to one of her man. "Wes, you stand guard here, fire off a shot if you get a sniff of trouble."
"Yes ma'am," came the short reply, and the young dark-skinned man gathered the three horses to a defendable position with a view.
Elle looked to Whit and Jonas. "Ready for some climbing, boys?"
"Nice as it is, didn't come for the view, ma'am," Whit mused aloud. "Don't see recent tracks neither." He scanned the clouds in the sky as if divine revelation might come down from on high, though in reality his keen eyes were in search of something more banal and mechanical like. "Any neighbors or local flavor with aerial capabilities?"
"You best not be calling me, 'ma'am', Whit," stated Elle, clearly and for the record. Blue eyes shone with independence and fire, but no outright malice. "I work fer my living," she added, with a clear pride, then looked to Jonas as he spoke.
"I'm always ready for a good challenge; whether it's a climb or a fight," said Jonas. He looked up at the top and considered what the Shepherd said. "If them and their launcher flew off in a hang glider, they'd still have to get it up there. 'Less they got dropped off on the top. Still, maybe there's tracks on the top? Or something to give 'em away."
Whit shrugged. "Only one way to find out." He spat in his hands, rubbed his palms together, and took point on the climb up.
"Local colour," Elle explained as they all made their way slowly up the rocky route. "Is all well-known to me," she grinned and it transferred humour to her voice that likely reminded Jonas to echoes of many previous visits to Ezra over the years. "We're good and even for the moment, and they have no cause or reason to hurt me or mine. I've always been a part of it, when it comes to drinking in town and being neighbourly an' all. This is different. This don't feel like locals or him," her chin nudged upwards towards that ever present orbital skyplex. "If he gets to hating, folks don't usually walk away." That and Drake had history with Niska, there was no obvious reason for anything to be trouble for his family. "And he's never been a problem to momma or vice versa."
As they crested the steep slope and bobbed up on the relatively flat higher surface, Elle took a deep breath and stretched. She took a moment to fully appreciate the lack of any open immediate firing or threats from the landscape and watched Whit and Jonas take stock.
It would be obvious to both men and their accompanying rancher, that someone had landed a shuttle here recently. That someone had stayed a while - dead campfire, few crushed cans huddled in between the rocks at the edge of a clear space - and that whoever had been up here had enjoyed a good, easy view of Arca Loxley's land below. Had to have been either a sniper or a launcher of some kind to wound the Echo so, and with a little scouting around, Jonas would find the casing that proved it had been the latter.
"We're meant to think it's a fast burn shuttle," Elle noted, as she scoped the site and the marks in the sandy space where the small craft had come and gone. She knelt down and looked closer. "But it wasn't... see, here? They've made the scorch marks wider and longer here. Mebbe want us to think this was his nibs' lackies up there?"
"Damn," said the big guy, "somebody went to a lot of trouble. And that don't bode well." He noticed the dead campfire and crushed cans. He walked around the campfire remains and kicked some rocks, uncovering a small hole. Jonas knelt down and picked up one of the many butts of a small cigar. "Looks like they were either nervous or spent a bit of time up here...waiting, watching." He got up and walked around the rocks to look more into the crags. "If I was up here and wanted to fake how long or what I'd been doing, I'd use whatever hiding spot I could."
Whit toed a metal fragment in the dirt. "See that? It's an arming pin for a shoulder-mounted rocket launcher. Single shot. Not cheap, expensive or hard to come by either, 'specially 'round these parts." He chewed his lip for a second before breaking into a smirk. "Yeah, these boys hit us with precision and went through a lot o' trouble to look run o' the mill." One of the cigars caught his eye, so he took it up and gave it a closer look. What he saw made him chuckle. "Or should I say gals?" The cigar butt was caked with lipstick. "Got some mighty odd neighbors there, Miss Elle."
Elle had been quietly taking in all the information while staring out across the rocky savannah below them, keeping half an eye out as if she could protect her homestead from all the way up here. "It really don't bode well, does it?" She said, finally, turning to look at both men present with a raised eyebrow. "And we ain't really had no trouble before, 'cept the occasional idjit trying to steal livestock every now and then. This," she levelled her gaze on Jonas. "Smells like something one of my brothers dragged up here."
Jonas chuckled, "Well, if'n we did...again...we didn't know about this time." He paused a second. "But I wouldn't put it past Drake."
Then with a monumental sigh, Elle regarded Whit's find. "I'm getting the feeling more 'n more that these ain't no neighbors of ours. These are more likely from outta town, long range," she suggested. "Further afield." Elle pointed to the stranded Firefly sat there on its lonesome all unhappy and unbalanced like a wounded critter. "They didn't seem to want to hurt you folks," she pointed out. "Just mebbe... I dunno... What's the point of bringing down your target and then bugging out?"
"Now while I don't mean to impugn the good name of your fine neighbors, but if life has taught me anything, it's that nothin' happens in a man's back-forty without him havin' some notion of it." Whit flicked the lipstick-laden cigar butt back to the ground where he found it. "Coincidentally, Alden Loxley's ma gets winged right before his ship gets winged. Mebbe it's not so coincidental though. Mebbe more wings are fixin' to get clipped before long." His smarmy face couldn't hide the probing look in his eyes. "You sure no bells get rung with such talk? Might not be a guilty face comin' to mind, but a feller' don't have to be guilty none for him to know a thing or two."
Elle regarded Whit in contemplative silence for a moment or two, considering this stranger's words and mulling their meaning. A frown furrowed her brow before she finally answered his words with some of her own, her tone easy-going now, and co-operative. "Yer right," she conceded. "Someone knows sumthin' for sure. I mean, I don't know nobody who'd wanna hurt mum, but yer right, seems a might suss them hitting both momma and Echo. Mebbe we oughta go rattle some cages..." Elle looked to Jonas. "Wanna go back and eat first or head into town and start asking questions? There's a coupla heads I could knock together... "
"Oh, I don't know that a Shepherd like myself belongs in a situation where heads get knocked together," Whit said dryly. "But if you're keen on asking some questions, I might could come along and poke around a bit."
There followed a wry smile to the preacher who had dragged his butt all the way up here not knowing if there were guns waiting or not, then Elle raised an eyebrow. She didn't know this fella, but she could sense the intelligence below the casual commentary and she wondered which way he might swing if it came down to a fist fight.
"Sounds fair to me, Whit," Elle conceded. "Jonas?" She asked, directly, seeking the big guy's opinion in the mix before they opted for one direction or the other. Her stomach rumbled, but Elle ignored it - that was nothing new or to be concerned about and hopefully quiet enough to not draw any attention. "I mean," she continued, skewing Jonas' potential opinion with her own. "Y'know they most likely won't be 'bout til later anyways," Elle suggested obliquely. "And mebbe we should go run what we just found by the others first too..."
"Maybe grab some grub while we're at it," Whit said. Whether he had heard Elle's grumbling stomach was left a mystery. "I could eat before taking a stroll into town."
"Sounds good to me," said Jonas. "Food and fightin'. Let's roll."
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