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The road in front of them passed quickly and soon they were flying through the front gate same as they had flown out the one outside Maddy's workshop. The outer gates of course, watched and fortified, but left open unless they need to be closed. The inner doors were however strangely open as well, and the warehouse contained within those was also open. Still she indicated Roger to drive past it to the parking area. It struck Maddy as odd that a vehicle depot had a visitor parking area. And then there was a jeep. Roger's side vision was ruined by the clamp system, he had little peripheral vision to begin with and he couldn't exactly turn his orb anymore. Maddy wrenched the joy stick and the rod in front of Roger turned to flash a red flag on the left side. All at once the craft jumped forward, stopped dead where it landed, and twisted so quickly that the leftover momentum jammed the back right corner through the wood plank fence. The whole maneuver was rather draining and blew all of Roger's stamina so he had to set down, unevenly with that corner imbedded in a wall. They had only been going around thirty so it wasn't too hard of a crash, the fence being the only casualty and they had managed to not come in contact with the jeep.

"Aaron, Roger, Smiffy, everybody all right?" The ditto chirped in an all together un-hat-like manner, Roger didn't even need to respond, he had already pulled several batteries onto himself and was buzzing quite loudly. His reserves would have put themselves back together after a few minutes, it hadn't been that much energy, just a lot to expend suddenly without preparation.

Maddy turned to the jeep "Sorry about that, we're not used to having to share the road." She said while unbuckling herself and stepping out to check the damage, confidant she would find little more than scratches.

((I hope I'm not taking too many liberties with this post.))

"Maddy, Ulysses, Elty" She began pointing then reached into one of the tool boxes "Aaron, Roger, Smiffy, Fence, hole, and this here is a very large crescent wrench. Now, I don't know about you but I prefer not to have aggravated people in my personal space." With her normal impetuous way she immediately turned away and moved over to the fence and jammed the oversized wrench under the the ELTPACH and pulled, using the lever to lift and pull it out of the hole before yanking it out and letting the thing drop, loudly.

"Aye... Seamus isn't going to be happy about that, probably cost those injector rails he's been eying" Maddy tossed the wrench back into the tool box, the shock caused it's lid to fall closed. A trick she'd been training since she opened up shop, really made people think she knew what she was doing.

"So, do you know where a guy named Ulysses lives?"

((Okay, I suppose I should post. It's only been two weeks, right? Hopefully I manage to include everyone in this update; if not, my most sincere apologies, and I will rectify the difficulty immediately. Also: I like the pace of this RP because it means there's some excellent writing happening, but we need to hurry things up just a little bit; I'd like to actually be in Glenville within the next week, two weeks at the longest. This means getting on the road as soon as possible, which means please do your best not to freeze anyone by taking too long to respond.

Finally, let us please welcome Jay Acumora, whose character Tsuki Kuro will be starting nearby Woodmount.

P.S. I love you all. This is some great writing, and I like the interaction that's happening. Great character development. Siber will update AP later today.))

Lexi's and Dirk's chosen method of evading the Woodmount guard and the awkwardness inherent of explaining, "We don't care what just happened; we need to GTFO kthxbai" to men with more rounds of ammo than active brain cells was perhaps not the most subtle, nor the most discrete, nor even the most efficient of all of their possible options, but despite all this, it was decidedly awesome and therefore worked wonders. Bullets followed them down the hill and into the nearby woods, but it didn't seem to be a matter to bring out snipers, as they had been recognized and honestly, the attack from the night before had not been enough of a sneak attack to warrant suspecting their own citizenry. Clearly this was just a man and a young girl out for a jaunt through the woods. Some bullets would remind them this was not always an okay thing to do without a permit.

As they finally approached the road that actually led out of Woodmount, the sounds of gunfire faded quickly. The woods were filled with birdsong and the occasional woodpecker; a long-dried kakuna husk or three adorned the various evergreens that surrounded them; given the warfare of the previous night, it was a very peaceful few minutes. After a while, Lexi picked up sounds of some sort of commotion ahead of them. A cautious approach yielded an odd sight, but not one that was wholly unexpected at this juncture in time. Two bodies lay on the ground. One was that of a rake-thin, human male of about age thirty-five, who was face-down with his arm at a strange, twisted angle and his chest drawing in shallow, slow breaths. The other was a round boulder with cracks spiderwebbing along its sides, having rolled to a rest at the foot of pine tree that looked as though a giant had taken a bite out of its side. It is difficult to tell at any given moment whether a graveler is alive or dead, so a final decision must be left to the future. Standing over these two bodies was a machoke with very familiar burn wounds flaring angrily across his chest, awkwardly cradling a teenage boy with a long, thick braid that tumbled almost to the ground. This boy, Tsuki, was immediately familiar to Lexi - she had seen him around town before, and that braid was unforgettable. He was unconscious at the moment, though he appeared to be coming to, and the reason for the machoke's awkwardness was clear: because of the number of guns leveled at him (five), he was unsure whether to offer the boy as a bargaining chip for his life, or to use him as a human shield.

As they neared, a Southern drawl belonging to one Jeb Donaldson from the Guardians drawled out, "Put 'im down, boy; we ain't gon' shootcha. Easy, now." Confused and frightened, the machoke looked ready to make a break for the tree line.

((+1 AP to each Shaula and Ω for their exit "LEROOOOYYYYYY" but -1 AP to each for surviving unscathed "JENNKIIIIINNNNSS" ))

---

Jonas nearly went apoplectic and Gladys fainted dead away on the spot from the almost-disaster. Seamus, the main auto-repair man, peaked his head out of his workshop on the opposite end of the warehouse from the group and waved to Maddy, but seemed too engrossed in something else to be bothered to investigate further.

---

Nothing stood in the way of Juno, Toby, and Ryan's journey towards Glenville, so they therefore finished collecting appropriate amounts of food, mounted vehicles (putting Tobias in a sidecar, of course, so that he wouldn't have as much of a chance of falling due to his slightly weakened state), said goodbyes to Juno's uncle if appropriate or possible, checked in with the Minutemen guarding the bridge that would take them over the Cyprus River, and got on the road. Aside from the occasional potholes and much rarer full breaks through the asphalt, the roads had remained decently easy to navigate. There was the occasional abandoned vehicle, more carrion than was immediately pleasant to behold, and not every sign was still legible, but on the whole, as they traversed the mostly-barren highway, there was nothing completely out of the ordinary for the era they had entered.

---

Also, there was nothing actively addressing Paul or Alyssa's concerns.

---

"That was cheating."

"Like hell it was!"

"Alex, you know very well that that was not in the rules."

"I didn't kill him! Mostly. Besides, how do you even know?"

The dark figure standing in front of Dr. Alex Terrian, who hung by his knees from a tree branch, merely arched an eyebrow. "I could ask you how you knew he'd be there."

"Humph! You have your secrets, and I have mine." He crossed his arms and pouted his lips, and then his shirt fell down to cover his face, revealing an ivory chest that had quite clearly never seen the light of day.

"Then that's settled. But it still stands that you cheated."

"I have yet to kill-!" He argued furiously with his shirt over which direction gravity was in.

He was cut short by an imperious snort and a voice that started low, but grew into a hollow bellow. "How in God's name you hit him that hard, I may never know, but that child was mine!"

Terrian gasped, finally freeing his face of his shirt. He had never heard the man actually shout before. The beanpole of a geezer quivered in front of him, brown eyes burning with the golden flecks in them as they reflected the morning sun.

The old man slowly calmed himself. Breathing deeply, he said, "You know the rules. One for one. There's no way I can reach the Cliffshirians by now."

With his face crumpled and downcast, Terrian hovered his way into a standing position in front of the Reverend. After a moment of seeming torn, his face cleared until the dangerous light of madness gleamed out of his sapphire eyes. "So you want me to do what, exactly? You never made it clear, and you know it would hardly be a fair fight, whatever the case." His voice was simultaneously soft and sharp - it was cookie dough perforated by razor blades.

The Reverend took a moment to look into those eyes, searching for... something. After a while, he frowned irritably, and explained what he wanted. Terrian clenched his jaws shut and squeezed his hands into fists until the knuckles turned white. His voice grated out, ugly and vicious. "And in what universe is that considered fair? Don't even answer," he snapped as the other man started to open his mouth. "I will play this as I see fit, because there is not a thing you can do to stop me."

The elderly man narrowed his eyes. "For now, no. But remember: one for one."

A hole opened in the ground and swallowed Terrian and his snarling countenance, leaving the Reverend to still doubt, and to still have no answer the question he could only whisper: "How?"

Alyssa stepped up to the dirt line and checked her mark, then unholstered the handgun. She took her stance, left foot forward a bit and a small tilt forward. Alyssa checked safety, turned it, looked at Paul, and decided not to c**k it.

He seemed like a man who would always keep a bullet in the chamber, whether the magazine was clear or not.

She held the gun primarily in her left hand (southpaw) and cocked her head to look down the sight accordingly.

Alyssa fired.

((I apologise for assuming that this is a 7 bullet magazine and there's one in the chamber, for a total of 8.))

The first shot hit the target a bit off her mark to the right, but within a good range of the center. The next three shots revolved around the first before she had to reassume her stance. The fifth hit high white (the outside border), the sixth hit dead center, the seventh wasn't so lucky, hitting opposite the second, and the eigth hit low.

Her hands vibrated and her ears pulsed but she felt the rush just fine. It had been quite a while since she had fired a gun.

"How did I do? I think it looks alright." She smiled at the target.

Tobias leaned back and streeetched, trying his best to keep his muscles from locking up in the sidecar he was riding in on the road to Glenville. At first he had been unsettled and therefore uncomfortable, the sidecar rattling at the connecting bolts and lurching precipitously with every pothole, his knuckles taut from gripping the sides. This passed in time, though, and made way for a sense of interest and wonder at what the world had become out here in the wilderness, beyond the guarded posts of his town's walls where nature had been allowed to equalize as best it could. Toby had a few provisions in the sidecar with him for easy access to pass to the driver, and he soon found out why - the group made an agreement early on not to make any unnecessary stops on the highway, both out of a sense of urgency to their unspoken mission and to minimize the risk of an ill encounter on the road. Thus it was that Toby's condition came full circle back to unpleasantness, as he had been stuck in that sidecar for a bit too long, the scenery lost its dark mystique and became monotonous, and he had no idea how far they still had to travel or what they were even going to do when they got to Glenville at all.

The mission might as well be unspoken, Toby thought to himself. He had intended to ask the others more about what was going on as they traveled (What better way to pass the time?, he reasoned), but soon found that between the noise of the engine and the wind blowing around that damn sidecar as it traveled, it really wasn't worth it when you had to shout and repeat your lines once or twice each. So I'll just play it by ear when I get there... shame too, I wanted to talk to Juno some more. I can't help but feel like things never really got off to as good a start as they should've. He stared at the side of the road as he thought... it was overgrown with tall, scraggly grass and the occasional arcing tree, stopping just shy of the road as if in a gesture of tacit respect for what used to be. Perhaps it's for the best we're not stopping, pretty much anything could be behind that brush... could jump out at any time. He shivered a bit, his memory of being dragged out of bed however-long-ago still vivid in his mind, and kept his eyes down the long road, and forced his mind to return to familiar thoughts.


(NOTE: Edited to correct a heinous typo that made half the post italic. No words were changed.)

It was shocking, unlikely, inconsiderable, suspicious even, that she would accidentally run into the man she was looking for the first placed she stopped to ask where he lived. Not really though, this was the closest depot to his house, and he was headed to Glenville too. So really it made perfect sense, still the timing was too perfect, it made the hair on Maddy's neck stand up. That all said there wasn't anything suspicious about Ulysses himself, he even seemed right out trustworthy.

"Them 'Oak boys' mentioned you'd be heading the same way, that I could drop of the boy, not that I need too. I figured they might'a mentioned us to you so I thought it best I stop by, though I had intended a far less action packed introduction. Me and" she paused to look at Aaron, saw the puke "ew..." and quickly turned back "are heading the far north side of the Grove to meet up with a buddy of mine, also roped into all this. You're free to come along... once he gets up"

Ulysses nodded to this. "Sounds good. We'll follow you, then." Then his gaze fell to what little he could see of Aaron's form around the Eltpach. "Is he alright?"

Lexi snickered as Dirk ribbed Troble about running through every thorn bush between Woodmount and Glenville. There were a few things that were very handy about being small…She didn’t care if it was the fastest way or not, riding the arcanine was easily the best form of transportation she’d had the pleasure of experiencing since the Cataclysm. Flying might beat it, but air travel wasn’t exactly happening anymore…The way they stuffed people into planes like sardines in a can and trapped them there for hours, it was all too easy to put too much ether in one place…funny how even before the Cataclysm the overcharged space resulted in headaches…

Now that they were getting further away from Woodmount, the natural world was beginning to dominate, and Lexi relaxed, listening to the pokémon and mundane animals whose calls made it to her ears above the breeze from Trouble’s movement. Eventually though, she became aware of a noise that wasn’t so natural….things that sounded more like yelling, and a loud crunch… Dirk slowed Trouble down, but apparently wasn’t worried enough to avoid whatever it was going on. A fight had broken out between a graveler, a human, and a machoke, with the former two coming out obviously worse for it. Apparently, the human wasn’t the only one in the area though, as there was a veritable crowd in the clearing. One seemed to be trying to talk the machoke into putting something down…That was when the familiar faces began clicking into place. The guy speaking was one of the town’s Guardians, though his name was escaping her. Even odder was that the machoke was the same one from last night. But the most odd thing was what, or rather who, the machoke was carrying. “Tsuki, what are you doing out here? And how’d you end up with that machoke?” She blurted out as she slid off Trouble’s back.