Chekhov’s Gun but the Gun is an Alien Kraken

yo listen up imabout to tell you a TRUE STORY. (☉_☉ ) happened on that ice planet Dagua. damn that place is a nightmare even under normal circumstances but this was NOT NORMAL. so there I was in the dark season, when the sea shivers and rolls and pulls its collar up and up and up with every peaking wave just to keep from freezing in place, watching a red streak tear a line in the sky. 

“oi get these sea muffs cleaned up!”

yammy yelled from the kitchen porch of the chalet. sea muffs those little frozen fucks. (ง ͠° / ^ \ °)-/̵͇̿̿/’̿’̿ ̿  frozen seafoam to be more exact, and the second they’re emancipated from the waves they ride up the mountain on the wind like little princes on safari.

“no laimei wants to see this trash!” 

“a laimei?” says I, “no laimei ever comes here in the dark season.” ಠ_ಠ

“well one’s coming now, so get rid of this foam fest!”

so here’s me, making my way across the chalet grounds, sure there’s no laimei on that approaching ship, tossing green sea muffs in a bin like a chump, when a BRAND NEW heliosceptur hums up to the docking pad. a WHITE heliosceptur. ok I don’t want to say it, but come on, we both know the only type to buy white helioscepturs….HOT LAIMEIS ☕

the door folds out, real dramatic like, and out pokes a red stiletto followed by a long, toned leg. this was a real laimei, and im not just saying that because i spend 90% of my year hunting kraken on an ice planet.

i dust the muff crust off my parka and start over to the pad thinking im gonna help this little miss into the chalet like a real gentleman, when I see this old man creepin off the helio after her!

“oi yammy, she gotta pomper with her.”

yammy had reemerged from the kitchen and was scratching under his chin with a spatula. “it’s her father, tiki. But that doesn’t mean you should be goin after the guests in any case.”

he went back inside. i went to get the luggage outta the ship.

             * * * 

later that evening I see her on the main floor, stilettos sinking into the plush carpet as she looked out the chalet’s glass wall over the landscape.

“everything you hoped for?” i asked

“Really I thought I’d just stop by for an egg wash at the spa, wasn’t expecting much in terms of the planet, but I have to say that this is truly beautiful.”

egg wash, the thought makes my stomach turn, makes me want to shake my cheeks and let out a brrrrr!  ( ′～‵)  these space ladies have it in their heads that the kraken eggs are some sort of gelatinous fountain of youth. the spa bot cuts a hole in an egg and adds a powder that turns the kraken fetus into some sort of soup, then these space sloots crawl inside and soak. Brrrrrrr! 

“it’s rare to have a night this clear in the grey season,” says i. now watch this dear reader >> “a night where the snow shimmers in starlit silver, and you can see all the way down to the dark kraken sea,” i saw a poetic guest get a reaction from the laimeis with that phrase once XD

she gave me a flirty smile. ¬‿¬  told you.

“And will I get a chance to see a kraken this trip?” 

<コ:彡  hooooo baby girl I can show you a kraken TONIGHT!  <コ:彡

“in the calm season you can see the adolescents dar-ting to and fro,” <<that’s me trying to match her posh accent “but in the grey season the sea is in fits. can't see five meters down even. just offshore here it’s only the adults now, guarding their eggs. they don’t get to frolicking so much.”

“Can they really climb up the mountain?”

“oh they see something they likes the look of on the slope and hup! hup! out they spring, arms a-flailing. the mountain falls straight down into the sea here, they like that deep water. that’s why the resort isn’t on the ice plains. oh but don’t worry, they don’t come this far up.”

“Well I must see one. They’re like the Chekhov’s gun of Planet Dagua.”

yo idk wtf she just said we looked out over the landscape in silence and you know it was kinda romantic 

“is that another ship?”

I followed the line of her polished finger out the window and saw it: another red-hot line tearing a hole in the sky.

“ya but...yammy didn’t say anything about any other guests...”

we watched the line tear toward the chalet

“it’s too low...” yo what the fuck is this ship doing?? I'm thinking. 

before we have time to say anything else BAM! this ship crashes right into the sea, but it doesn’t lose power. for a second it’s just floating on the water all like yo I meant to do this.

“are you going to do something?!” i look over and she’s got a hold of my arm, shaking it like she’s ringing a bell.

“yes!” those people are dead. like d-e-d dead. “i’ll get yammy and we are going to RESCUE THOSE PEOPLE!” i mean, why waste the opportunity to play hero? i save these people and she’ll want me, i come back with a tragic story and she’ll want me. seems a win-win, no dear reader? ok ok I was ACTUALLY concerned about the people too, happy now??

* * *

ε＝（ ﾉﾟдﾟ）ﾉ  yammy and I each jump in a little bobber, i throw in some dive gear just in case, and off we go! bumpin full blast over the ice pack before shooting right off the mountain and splashing into the sea yoooooo it was kinda WILD. we fight the waves to get to a little island shaped like a gnome cap just offshore, pull the bobbers up on the frozen beach, and get out to regroup. 

“it looked like it sank right around here,” says I to yammy and we start shining our flashlights around, looking out across the water, up the little beach, all around, until I see something! a dude shivering on the beach, bare head, lookin blue all over. 

now this is when things start getting REALLY weird, dear reader.  ¬_¬  yammy and I go over to this dude and see that he’s in a guard’s uniform for...PLANET ZARIS. oh you don’t know what’s on planet Z? only the known universe’s most extensive prison system. interesting methinks as yammy picks this prison planet guard up like a sack of potatoes and tosses him in his bobber.

“i’ll take him back to the chalet. tiki, see if you can find anyone else, and maybe try to get the log from the ship!”

yammy takes off and i’m looking around but not finding anyone else. i crawl back in the bobber and get my dive gear on and then get back out on the beach, no light, just letting my eyes adjust to the dark. sure enough, I see a faint glow in the water not too far from shore. i swim out and dive down.

the airlock doors are open so I swim in all don’t mind if I do, make my way to the cockpit, pull the log tube from the console and clip it to my belt, and turn to swim back out WHEN I SEE A NAKED DEAD DUDE TIED UP JUST FLOATING IN THE BACK CORNER OF THE COCKPIT LIKE SERIOUSLY WTF IS GOING ON. >:O

i get outta there so fast i almost swallow my rebreather in the process, throw myself back into the bobber, and slam the door. ヘ(°￢°)ノ “yo what the fuck what the FUCK” seems to be the only words i can find for several minutes as the image of this dude, head lolling, hair drifting in the current, is the only thing I can focus on. was he a prisoner? like, why was he naked? 

i remember the log tube and jam it in the console of the bobber. a menu pops up on the bobber’s navigation screen and I select the option of “crew”

Crew: 1 – James Cleaven

i look at the picture in disbelief. there's no two ways around it, the dude in the crew photo, james cleaven, that guy is currently very dead and very naked down in that spaceship cockpit. 

i feel my guts go all jelly like a kraken fetus on discount spa day.

Main Menu 

Cargo

Prisoner: 1 – Barlowe Whitlock

i look at the pic. bare, shaved head and fucking mean ass looking mug. it’s the dude from the beach. his name is hyperlinked and my finger seemingly moves in slo mo up to the screen....

Barlowe Whitlock – cannibal 

ヽ(O_O )ﾉ

* * * 

now im racing back across the water as fast as this little bobber can go wondering wtf im going to get back to. how long had yammy been back? two hours? three? long enough for barlow whitlock to get warmed up and take a chomp outta my perfect little laimei?? 

so i'm pushing the bobber up the face of the cliff when it starts whirring like it’s giving up on life and I look down and see the low battery light is blinking! how long has this light been on?? you weren’t watching the controls either?? well you can’t blame either of us in a situation like this!

i crest the cliff and the bobber goes dark, crashing into the snowpack below. you know what we don’t need this bobber, we got our own two legs! now I'm running up this mountain slope, still in my diving suit, the wind’s howling, and here comes my baby girl laimei running down the mountain in a spa robe and boots and screaming like hornets are after her. Following right behind her: BARLOWE WHITLOCK ARMED WITH A STILETTO. 

she dives into my arms and I immediately THROW her out of the way as this dude comes right at us. he and I fall to the ground and we’re all punching and kicking and gnashing our teeth and i manage to give him kick that’d make a donkey proud, sending him a few meters down the mountain toward the cliff face. He stands up and from behind him I see a huge dark shadow moving like liquid over the snow. 

“i know what you are, and I can help you cook yammy. he's our chef, the one who brought you here. he's a big man and I'll help you make quick work of it all,” and I put my hands up like I don’t wanna fight any more.

you KNOW I'd never cook my yammy. 

barlowe pauses just long enough aaaaaand WHACK!! i dive outta the way just in time for a huge kraken tentacle to come crashing down where we had been standing. now I'm dodging flailing tentacles left and right and grab up this laimei and we just run as fast as we can for the chalet. 

hooooooooweeeeeeeeee what a NIGHT. we get back into the chalet and this little laimei throws her arms around me, “I LOVE YOU!!” but you know what? i love her too. 

been married 15 years now ¯\_(ツ)_/¯both yammy and her father went to the wedding, safe and sound.