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John Swift

John sits down on a bar stool proceeds to tell his story. "Alright you young whippersnappers I was seventeen when I joined the military. I was one year too young, but I lied on my enlistment form in order to join. My father was the weapon builder Joseph Wenal he died a few months before I joined the military in a weapon experiment that went terribly wrong. I only found out later through my contacts in the military that the weapon was sabotaged by Admiral Jonathan Vild. Three months after I joined I was assigned as a gunners mate to the Hircien. I quickly rose in rank in a matter of two years they wanted to make me the Chief gunning officer aboard the Zibren. I accepted and treated my men with respect and taught them things their instructors in basic couldn't. Then came the accident. We were on a top secret mission to drop assault troops into position behind enemy positions and drop bombs on them. I remember what happened all too clearly the enemy was waiting for us. They had their guns turned skyward. They fired until they ran out of ammunition and all of those round ended up hitting the Zibren. She went up like a fireball I ordered my men to get into their maneuver gear. We managed to make it off the ship. Right before the ship hit the dirt and exploded into a huge fireball of steam and explosives my men and I jumped. We launched our grapple cables to try and hold us steady as the detonation happened. I was the first one up onto the cliff and what I saw chilled my blood to this very day. I saw Admiral Vild shooting every man that he saw alive on the ground. He turned and saw me and aimed, but before he could shoot I fell backwards off the cliff and yelled to my men to release their cables until they reached the bottom. I fell all the way down and at the bottom of the cliff was the enemies base. We managed to infiltrate the base. I sent my men to go board the airship that was there. It was the Hircien apparently Vild had defected and given his crew up as hostages. So while my men boarded the Hircien I set about releasing the crew and sabotaging the enemy. I managed to get the crew to the Hircien and found the hull laden down with explosives. So what I did was I told the crew to set clock timers to them and move them to points in the base. I meanwhile went grabbed base commander almost got caught by guards a few times. When I reached the base commander I knocked him out and managed to carry him back to the airship."

John reaches down and takes a sip of water whetting his throat. After he drinks some he begins again. "After the base commander and I made it back to the ship I told the crew to tie him up. The crew tied him up and I orders the mooring lines cut so we could escape. As they cut the mooring lines we rose into the air. Then the first of the explosives went off.

(more to come writers block kicking in)