Mission 08: Spindrift

[81mm_Mortar_God]

Karnage gave a dark smile at J'Yan...

"Yep, and I guess it was a good thing your nose was along, I may have been in it before I smelled it."

[Crux]

The lightening streaked across the sky followed by the peel of thunder. The sound covered the approach of the group as Crux buried his aching head into his folded arms. His consciousness still drowning in confusion.

If he had looked up from his perch he may have seen just standing around the last bend Karny and J'Yan ... a few of his more sinister traps guarded the way to the base of the tree he hid in. The worst was yet to come!

[ntypical]

J'Yan smirks weakly and continues to lead the way, keeping his eyes pealed for more of Crux's surprises.

"Karnage, why is it that Crux always seems to be more trouble than good?"

[81mm_Mortar_God]

Karnage scowled and then grinned at J'Yans comment....

"Probably because he is a sawed off runt, who thinks he has something to prove!"

[ntypical]

J'Yan nods then growls. "That Ferengi has more issues than the Q."

[Crux]

A bolt of lightning struck deep in the gully, the tree exploding with a snapping pop only to topple onto the pathway in front of the small group, yanking a trigger vine with it! Held by leverage an immense load of debris akin to a mudslide crashed down into the pathway and creating a veritable mire. Had someone been in its unfortunate path they would have been swept under.

The fall of the large tree revealed the distant one that Crux remained perched in... between the wide leaves a glimpse of out-of-place orange appeared in the gust thrown foliage.

[ntypical]

When the lightning strikes, and the world comes crashing down in front of them, J'Yan jumps back, running into Karnage in the process.

[81mm_Mortar_God]

Karnage reached out to steady the massive Klingon as well as to hold himself upright...

He reached up with a hand to wipe away the mud that had splashed into his one good eye and as his vision cleared he saw a flash of orange in a tree several meters away, across the mess that had fallen into the gully...

He tightened his grip on J'Yans arm and pointed without saying a word, his mud covered finger zeroing in directly on the temporarily deranged Ferengi...

[ntypical]

J'Yan is about to say something. But Karnage's pointing finger silences him. Without moving his eyes from his Captain's position J'Yan nods and points in a safe direction for travel that will flank the unknowing Ferengi.

Quietly he shrugs off Karnage and starts to slowly and stealthily move through the underbrush in an attempt to flank his friend.

[Crux]

Crux is utterly drowning in the sonic torture. His eyes are even tearing from the pain in his sensitive lobes. The nearby explosion of the tree was enough to even shatter his vision. Truely, if ever Crux had lost his mind it was now.

[ntypical]

As the group close on Crux's position J'Yan notices the toll that the lightning and thunder are taking on Crux's senses. There will not be a better time to try to apprehend him. Though the pounding his ears have taken will likely make his fight back harder.

[Crux]

Up in the tree, Crux wedged himself deeper. He appeared like a rather large hairless orange squirrel battered by the raging storm. Fortunately for him his immune system was handling the injected antigen rather well and his fever was relatively low. Through the water welled in his eyes he started out at the patterns in the bark on the tree as the water washed over it and gleamed in the flashes if lightening. No words entered his mind, no language... only the instincts of primal survival.

[81mm_Mortar_God]

Karnage and the remaining Marine, stealthfully followed the Colonels lead around the obvious line of advance and hopefully clear of the Captains traps and tripwires.

Karnage knew that the sounds of the driving rain, howling wind and especially the crashing thunder would help hide their advance from even the Ferengis sensitive ears...

[ntypical]

As J'Yan snakes through the underbrush with his two Marines in tow he finds yet another of Crux's traps. This one is a particularly nasty one, and looks as if it is a partial cage made of sharpened sticks, and vines. By its construction it would probably skin a man clean as it sprung into the air.

 It is amasing what a deranged man with no semblance of thought can come up with when he has no tools or help.

Now finally at the base of the tree where Crux is hold up J'Yan growls quietly. "Now how do we get him down?"

[81mm_Mortar_God]

Karnage sized up the situation quickly as he was thinking to himself...

Then he reached around to his butt pack on the rear of his LBV and pulled out a coil of 550 Cord, which had been a mainstay of Marines necessities for hundreds of years and quickly cut a few lengths and fashioned them into slip nooses to use to quickly secure the Captains hands and feet and handed them off to the Marine with them and said quietly...

"You'll know what to do when we get him on the ground."

The Marine took them and nodded grimly.

Then Max took the left over length and fashioned another slip noose on one end and then secured the other end to his gear, securely, so that there was about a 6 foot length in between the noose and his gear....Hopefully, he could get the noose on a limb of the Captains and at least keep him from being able to run away into the darkness again...but he would be secured to the deranged Ferengi and only 6 feet away...

Hopefully the Captains weakened state would prevent a long fight and even if the Captain were at full strength, he would not be able to break the 550 cord.

With that done, Karnage motioned for J'Yan to boost him up the side of the tree behind the huddled Ferengi...