Fiction: Xmas With Exotroopers Demo!

Back for Christmas with a fiction post from way back. Here's the opening/ demo for Christmas With Exotroopers, part of my longest running and least read series. It featured an evil Slavic wind god, genocidal nutcrackers, an angel based on a snail, and this, fair warning, possibly the most gorey scene I've written.

Though the principles of the combat exoskeleton were well-known, there was a persistent belief that the angled-slab armor of the exotrooper corps of Serbia, known to the Serbs as hercegs. “lords of blood” to their enemies, and to the wider world as “finbacks”, did not cover human beings but robots, or at least some unwholesome combination of the two. And the most feared of the exotroopers, a neo-Nazi ex-convict known as Zaratustra or Zed, had discoursed that there might be some truth to it.  Yes, the exotroopers were men, wholly separate from their mechanized armor.  But on another level, the human and the armor were in symbiosis.  Each of them customized the armor to his personality and preferred tactics, in Zed's own case welding a crown of rebar rods to his helmet to mark his status as commander.  Over time, the exotroopers had spent more and more time in their armor.  And for Zed in particular, the armor was a part of him even in his dreams. 

Zed found himself standing in the frame of a door knocked halfway off its hinges, with a festive Christmas wreath still hanging askew upon it.  At his feet is a fat man with a long, white beard in an unmistakeable red suit, still feebly clutching at his spilled intestines.  Beyond a short hallway, he could see a living room, decorated for Christmas and now smeared with blood and semi-solid fecal matter.  A man's decapitated corpse slumped on the hearth, and what remained of a woman was mixed with crushed gifts and the splintered ruin of a Christmas tree.  From behind the counter of an adjoining kitchen came the steady crunching of bone.

Zaratustra crouched to look Santa Claus in the eye.  “Let me guess,” he said.  “A little girl wanted a hippopotamus for Christmas...”

He snapped the dying man's neck, and drew a 12-gauge sidearm as he stood up.  In the kitchen, a huge, half-seen shape splintered cabinets as it wheeled about.  An enormous head reared momentarily into view, tossing blood-stained shreds of a frilly pink dress into a bowl of egg nog. As Zed took aim, hindquarters the size of whole turkeys pushed into view, and then ejected a literally staggering spray of excrement straight at his helmet.  He fired twice, virtually blind, at the hulking yet low-slung shape that smashed through one corner of the counter as it burst out of the kitchen.  Then he kicked, and his lashing foot met the ivory and bone of the bull hippo's swinging jaw...

“Zed! Lieutenant Zed!” The voice that drew Zed out of sleep was Zotgjakt, aka the Albanak, the only Albanian in Serbia's exotrooper corps and the only finback whom Zed might consider a close friend. “The Lieutenant is here for a briefing!”  And Zed lowered his foot, which he used to prop himself up in the closet while he slept, and replaced his outer helmet, which was crowned with pieces of rebar.  Within seconds, he was battle-ready.

Retrobots Revisited: Tomy Rascal Robot and others

Because this is going to be a toy blog if it goes anywhere at all, here’s another toy related post. This one got started at the Y*utube channel That Junkman. In the course of unboxing a delivery from a fan, the eponymous Junkman showed a small windup robot included with several vintage Star Wars figures. I and several other commenters immediately recognized it as a moderately famous Tomy windup toy, sold as the Rascal Robot. It just happened I already have several specimens, including one I had played with as a kid at my grandparents’ house. Here are a few more photos of my mini collection:

In my prior research, the featured bot was made and sold in the late 70s and most likely into the early 80s by Tomy, a prolific manufacturer of windup toys and electronics. At least some were sold on action figure-style cards, which bear the name Rascal Robot. The design was clearly modelled on Robbie the Robot from Forbidden Planet, and closely resembled Tomy’s remote control Omnibot. The toy came in a range of colors, mainly in solid silver or gold bodies seen here. Somewhat rarer variants feature decals on the chest and in some cases painted eyes. In more recent years, the design was included in a line of Tomy toys re issued by Z Windups, resulting in the middle specimen featured here. As can be seen, the reissue is substantially larger than the original. The manufacturer also made the extra effort to make the arms spin.


Of course, this was all part of a longer journey for me. I have many memories of seeing or playing with Tomy windups in my childhood, including an unsettling sighting of what I eventually identified as their “Strolling Bowling” game. However, I never seemed to get any of them for myself, and all the windup toys I have that I know I didn’t acquire as a teen or adult are happy meal toys or more obscure brands. As for the “Rascal” bot I played with, it’s the silver one featured here, finally given to me by my grandmother around the time I started college. I loved the little thing, though I found the arms wouldn’t twist more than a few degrees (those of the gold bot a acquired much later twist 360 without difficulty) and I long believed it was entirely broken. In a possible minor “Mandela effect”, I tried winding it up while taking photos for this essay,  and was completely surprised to find it worked.

Along the way, I caught wind of a few more Tomy bots. I purchased one, pictured above with a couple more windups, that I knew had to be a Tomy creation at the long-vanished local comic book store. This one turned out to be known as the Acrobot, and I figured out that the arms were part of an action gimmick: If it is fallen or knocked down, the long arms will push it upright, as long as they are lined up with each other. Later still, I found online photos of a third bot, with an overall shape that suggests a cross between Robbie and the “Lost in Space” robot. Unfortunately, while there are enough recent pictures from collectors to indicate that it was sold in the US, my own intermittent research has failed to locate a specimen for sale, or even a report of one being purchased in ebay or other competitive markets. The only collector to give an account of acquiring one simply states that it was purchased for a few dollars at a local shop.


All in all, I don’t have much to add about these bots. Tomy windups may never have had the prominence of brand name action figures like Star Wars and Transformers, but they were a major part of the toy market for many years. The fact that many people still remember them is all the more impressive given that they were marketed for and to younger kids who had little or no idea who was making them. If you have any around, it will definitely be worth your while to hold onto them. And double check if you have a tall robot with long arms and a bubble on top, because it just might be a collector’s Holy Grail.


Links

That Junkman video featuring Rascal robot (ca 3:30)

Collectors’ Weekly review with pics of the 3rd bot

The Old Robots website, dedicated to 1980s robot toys by Tomy and others

Giant Robot Review: Anime-style robot/ space-jet???

One of the reasons I decided to try blogging again is that I have been taking and posting pictures of new and vintage toys I have collected, and gotten enough encouragement to consider trying to be a toy blogger. This flagship entry is for a specimen I acquired just today at the somewhat notorious discount store Tuesday Morning. It was the only one of its kind in sight, and priced $5.99. After determining that similar items were going for over $20 (but not a lot more) online, I bought it and took it home.

The item in question was sold with the name “Power Driven”, apparently for the figure only. Casual research failed to identify an English name for the toy line, but showed that the toy was made or at least marketed by a company called Polyfect, known for importing Transformers clones and knockoffs of moderate quality and general sturdiness. While unequivocally advertised as a transforming robot, the look of the specimen was rather different, more akin to Voltron or the now semi-obscure Shogun Warriors credited with introducing the giant/ transforming robot toy concept. I purchased it, brought it home, and then opened the package to assess the transformation, “alt mode” and overall quality.

It quickly became apparent that the ability to transform was a secondary consideration at best, in the tradition of the Shogun Warriors. The robot looked kinda cool, the alt mode looked like a kinda space-jet-thingy with clunky bits sticking out (though still marginally better than the Shogun Warriors). The more subtle details were all against it. A number of components are awkward in either mode, especially ludicrously oversized “shoulder pads” that provide the only concealment of the stumpy arms in the alt mode. Several of the steps are counterintuitive, and fiddly enough to break the thing if done wrong. Two red plastic pieces on the feet that look like stickers were cracked straight out of the package. Finally, the two halves of the space-jet simply do not fit. Still, the thing is solid enough that there is little risk of coming apart during casual handing, and the robot mode is interesting enough to make up the shortcomings of the alt mode.


What is most interesting about an item like this is that such things are still being made. In a time when far too many “real” Transformers are too expensive and complicated to consider giving to kids, this has the right balance of durability and complexity to have value both for responsible older kids and the adult collector. And even at online prices it is no more expensive than many “name brand” items. If you can find it, you could certainly do worse than a quirky mid-sized giant robot like this.

Fiction: Trails Part 7, an Evil Possum adventure

A youngling calls out at the sound of scrabbling from beneath the floor of the ruined holy site: "Tio! Tio?" Then a hook lodges in the edge of the hole in the floor, and the youngling falls silent. A powerful hand follows, then the high brow and short snout of Archididelphis invicta rise into view. The creature hauls itself up, only to drop to all fours, or three. The youngling toddles over, almost level with the warrior's piercing eyes. "Tio?" it says. The warrior only shakes his head, and as he rises to his knees, the youngling begins to cry. Only then does No-Hands throw back his head and drop his jaw, and a bloodcurdling yet infinitely mournful scream rings up and down the eroded passages of the plateau.

It was the hook No-Hands bore in place of his right hand that saved his life. As his foe slammed into him, he snared the attacker's upper jaw like a fish, pulling a pair of long fangs back from his throat. It bought time enough to drop his empty broomhandle pistol and draw a revolver in its place. He fired twice, and the enemy that had left him with a boot and a sawed off shotgun in place of his right leg tore free with a backward leap and a spray of blood. He fired twice more at the creature as it bounded toward daylight, and in all likelihood a drop of several hundred meters. Then it was gone, leaving only a trail of blood behind.

No-Hands reloaded the chambers of his revolver as he approached the end of the pipe. A quick and cautious glance confirmed that it opened onto empty air. He raised the revolver and leaned forward. That was when his foe swung down from above and kicked him in the chest with both feet. The force was enough to knock the gun from his hand as he went sprawling back. He raised his head to see the silhouette of his foe drawing a crossbow as it dropped down. At the same moment, No-Hands' hook reached the drawstring that ran down to the shotgun. Two simultaneous blasts ripped through the sole of the boot, sending No-Hands sliding back, and the foe flipped from vertical to horizontal before slamming down on the surface of the pipe.

No-Hands had to use the hook for leverage to pull himself to his feet. He hobbled toward the body of the foe, certainly no longer a threat. A glance told him all he needed to know. . It had been not much more than a juvenile, undoubtedly the other reason No-Hands had survived. The teeth, the snout, the absent tail, and what remained of the brow... all a match for his own, even more than the skull in the crypt. The foe he hunted is another male Archididelphis invicta.

"While A. invicta is certainly long gone from any civilized lands, enough known and likely mentions of their race persist among the lore of the lower orders that it remains possible, even likely, that a few yet survive in the deepest wastes and wildernesses of the world. None can envy their fate, however, as despite their clearly considerable intellect, they are solitary by nature and hostile to intrusion under almost all circumstances, perhaps even more so to their own kind than to other races..."
No-Hands read the passage once more, written by the first learned creature to describe his race. He dropped it into the fire in the sanctum of the holy place, to join the rest of the sheaf of papers he saved from the wreck of his vehicle. The quarry remained in the chamber beneath the holy place, next to the bones of what was undoubtedly his mother.

It took the night and another day to make his way back to his basecamp, only slightly hindered by the tiny youngling he carried. Only one matter remained, and he waited until well after nightfall to do it. In two more days, he would be in the foothills of the mountains to the west, where a petty governor begged for help against a bandit chief that terrorized the villages under his charge from a mountain fortress that had once been a pillbox of the vanished Giants.

As the sun rose on the third day, the back door of the shack at the edge of the town opened slowly and carefully. There lay the youngling, curled up in sleep, and beside it, an untouched pot of 30 silver coins.

Fiction: Trails Part 6, an Evil Possum adventure

"...He killed them all," a voice says. Only then does he become aware of light, and the hazy silhouettes of figures looking down at him. "The P'ums killed the villagers, no question about that, but he got out and killed them. Damn if I know what he is, but he killed them all, with no hands..."

No-Hands blinked once and then shot bolt upright. He lay in a pool of light beneath the same hole in the ancient church floor he had fallen down. From above there came a youngling's squealing cry, interspersed with the plaintive call, "Tio? Tio!" He raised his broomhandle carbine, and found the detachable stock broken. He removed what remained, and rested the weapon on the stump of his right forearm to steady his aim.

As for where he lay, it was cylindrical and made of brick. It had probably begun as a cistern or septic tank (it momentarily amused him that even a holy place needed such things), but had long since been repurposed as a crypt for the far smaller races of rodents. Most of the remains had clearly piled up where they had dropped, in quantities great enough that it was no longer clear how much deeper the original bottom lay. He scrambled upright, on one bare foot and a boot that covered the muzzle of a shotgun where his right leg had been, untroubled by what he stood upon apart from the fact that it was shifting under his weight. But it was evident that some had been given a more dignified burial, mostly in openings in the walls where a brick had gone missing.

He quickly identified a dozen remains that were clearly recent, enough that their flesh and hides were sufficiently intact to judge the cause of death. At least four had been killed by crossbow projectiles, including the most recent, whose features matched a photograph of the explorer whose journal had led him here. But two more had the visible marks of a snake bite, and a third was frozen in spasms commonly induced by a particularly toxic berry. A fourth had a crushed skull and fractured spine that could only have been caused by a great fall. A fifth had been killed by a bullet from the back. His own weapon lay beside him, smashed beyond use or repair.

"It would have been better to leave them where they lay," No-Hands said, peering into deeper darkness ahead. "These creatures are just intelligent enough for curiosity, and a vanished man stirs them up more than a dead one. Taking the child here was entirely foolish."

He kept the gun trained on a particular patch of dark while he used the hook to reach inside another alcove. "And what is this?" With his hook, he held up a skull in the light, larger both in total size and evident brain volume. The high brow, short snout and serated teeth were all nearly identical to his own features, though noticeably more gracile- a perfect match for a female of the species Archididelphis invicta. A crossbow bolt still protruded from one eye socket.

A hiss came from the dark. then retreating footsteps from a pipe that stretched toward the end of the holy place. No-Hands followed, still holding his fire, not because he held the site in great regard but because it was undoubtedly the only thing that kept his foe from turning at bay immediately. He sped up at the sight of light ahead, only to freeze as he realised the pipe must emerge in the face of a cliff they had both climbed to reach the holy place. He dropped to a crouch and fired a volley down an intersecting passage, only to be struck in the shoulder by a crossbow bolt from the right. He swiveled at bay and emptied the magazine at a shape that came not running but flying straight into his chest.

Fiction: Trails Part 5, an Evil Possum Adventure

The building bears the symbol of a cross, known as a symbol of truce and sanctuary. It is clear that those who were here gave neither. A half dozen bodies litter the steps and entryway, and more can be seen within. Flames flicker from inside, but the blaze has not yet taken hold. A push of a foot opens the door. Two of the mouselike creatures lie on the very threshold, one large and one small, riddled by multiple projectiles and many more ragged wounds from edged weapons. Then something breaks the silence: speech, unmuted and growing nearer, and with it, laughter. There is a single low snarl, followed by a jingle of a chain as No-Hands leaps up to the roof.

No-Hands held the carbine at ready as he entered the ruin through a half-fallen archway six times his height. He froze at the sound of a strange, almost buzzing voice behind him: "Leave 't b'hind or leave thiss plaze, creature of blude." He looked over his shoulder and beheld a large owl, perched in the shade of what remained of one corner. Its gaze was baleful yet disinterested. Beneath it, a group of quail foraged, wary but unhurried.

"If you would tell me what to do," the marsupial answered, "then tell me what you eat." As he turned away, there was a hooting that quickly rose to a crescendo of manic laughter. When he looked back, the bird had taken to the air, its silhouette briefly visible against a lowering sun as dull and red as the rocks of the plateau. No-Hands sneered, but slung the carbine over his shoulder as he approached the altar, carefully avoiding a spot where the dirt was far too fresh.

The far end of the ruin was almost intact, with not only the standing facade but portions of the walls and even a pair of supports for the long-vanished roof. Still, the original altar was long gone. In its place was a rough but carefully constructed sanctuary big enough for a small group. Soot and blackened rock marked where fires had been lit, though it was evident the last had been decades earlier at least. On the inside of the facade where the residue was thickest, a silhouette had been scraped away, of a profile much like No-Hands, with the mane bristling like a mohawk and the lower jaw dropped almost 90 degrees.

More creatures gathered around the altar, including another group of quail, a pair of boney rabbits, a handful of small rodents, and a single old and fattened snake. None had ventured into the sanctum. No-Hands stooped to peer inside. He drew back with an expression of consternation. Hanging from his hook by a pair of suspenders was a small child of the townfolk's kind, alive and seemingly unconcerned. His facial muscles contracted in a grimace as the youngling poked his nose in curiosity. "Tio," it said.

No-Hands set down the child and drew back at a sound from just beyond the sanctum. His own mane shot up in spiky bristles, and his jaw dropped as if unhinged as he roared. He tracked the motion more than the form of a creature that dropped down from above, crossing from one end of the facade almost halfway to the other with each terrific leap. A chorus of cries rose up when he raised his weapon, but he held his fire. Finally, he lined up his scope with the still indistinct shape, only to have his view blocked by a hurtling chunk of rubble. He lowered his weapon just as it struck him in the chest, knocking off his feet and into the patck of earth he had avoided before. It caved in immediately, and his roar echoed up as he dropped into the darkness below.

Fiction: Trails Part 4, an Evil Possum adventure

The creature in the doorway is unmistakably a possum, complete with the long tail and triangular snout of its kind, but this one walks upright and wields a rifle. It shows no concern at several smaller bodies on the floor, but locks on another creature in the deeper darkness. The possum raises the rifle and loads a round, but eases when it sees that the watcher looking back has only one arm, chained behind its back. It barks a command, and tenses again at the returning stare. It fires almost instinctively, but the figure has already dived to one side. There is a double click, and the possum briefly gapes at the sight of a lever-action rifle gripped in the two dexterous feet of the first specimen of Archididelphis invicta to appear in a hundred years.

No-Hands stirred and shook his head. Blood loss and dehydration had again pushed him to the brink of catatonia, one of the few qualities he shared with his ancestors. He scrambled upright and loped up the narrow path ahead of him, hobbling on a sawed off shotgun where his right leg had been. He looked about for any hint of food or water, and narrowed his gaze on a thorny vine. He recognized it as a plant known for storing water in its roots, and immediately began to tug and claw with his hand and hook. Only then did he pause to peer at a lesser vine wrapped around the first. He jumped aside just before the tripwire sent a boulder crashing down from above.

A short time later, he reached an opening that on his scale qualified as a low cave. He drew his broomhandle pistol as he approached the entrance. When no danger presented itself, he stepped inside. A moment later, his roar echoed from the cave. A moment after that, he landed on his back at the cave mouth with a large snake biting furiously at his improvised leg. The pistol went clattering away, to drop over the edge of the narrow path. It would have fallen a hundred meters and more, but before it had gone a quarter of the way, a hand shot out and caught it. There was a brief sniffing, then the gun was hurled with such force that it shattered against the far wall of the passage.

No-Hands swung himself up onto a ledge where the upward path met another that descended from above. He dropped behind a rock that offered marginal cover, then he drew his second broomhandle, the long-barreled carbine. A holster was hastily affixed as a stock, followed by a scope. He took aim downhill, where the path behind him made a sharp turn in an ideal and almost unavoidable ambush. “Almost,” he said alone. He turned his gaze and his aim upward. He fired twice at a dark shape peering from behind a rock near the top of the path above. Almost simultaneously, a crossbow bolt tore a notch in his saucer-like left ear. He fired three more times, and the figure retreated, not before pushing the rock downhill. No-Hands vaulted on top of the rock that was his own cover, and jumped just high enough to catch hold of a vine with his hook. Beneath him, the rolling rock struck the stationary one, smashing both to bits.

The muzzle of the carbine poked into view over the edge of the cliff well before its owner, turned sideways. A spray of bullets erupted in full automatic, chewing a trail left to right. When the weapon clicked empty, No-Hands clambered up. Before him, the top of the plateau stretched out, even more barren than the landscape below. The only relief was a series of ruins, little more than piled rubble except for an intact façade of what had clearly been the largest structure. It reared far overhead, much too high not to be the work of a far larger race, up to a peaked top that still bore the shape of a cross.

Fiction: Trails Part 3, an Evil Possum adventure

The view is from the midst of a great forest, looking forward at an even greater mountain range. Among the foothills and cliffs lie dwellings of adobe and unmortared stone, long since fallen to ruin. Towering over them all is a colossus carved directly from the mountainside, easily 10 meters tall and far greater in proportion to the dwellings around it, portraying a greatly stylized figure seated on a throne. Its face and visible teeth suggest something like a possum, with a short snout and high brow that suggest the development of intellect. The throne it sits on is made entirely from the skulls of a kind of large rodent, all carved at a scale roughly life-sized. It is the Colossus of Far Maru, and the lore of the marginally sentient creatures dwelling in the forest tells that the purposefully defaced inscription beneath the figure’s feet once read THE UNCONQUERED KING.

No-Hands blinked at the sight of the drawing before his face as his consciousness returned. He had kept it with him since he had copied it from a scroll 500 years old in the greatest library of an empire across a great sea. It had been plain at a glance that it portrayed a member of his kind. A greatly corrupted copy of the same image, coupled with a few bones, had led a learned being to describe his species a half century before he himself had been found: Archididelphis invicta, or Unconquered King of the Possums. Now, he stuffed it hastily into his vest, and looked to the problem at hand.

His leg, that was more than trouble enough, pinned inside a vehicle that was itself pinned and crushed under a great boulder. He was lucky enough to have been hit by only the one. Many more tons of rock littered the landscape around him, all but blocking the path of the unseen killer he had followed to this place. Then again, he might have escaped wholly unscathed if he had not used a crucial moment to grab a sheaf of papers that included the drawing and an error-prone topographical map of the plateau and the surrounding wastes. He felt frustration but nothing like regret. In a hostile environment against a plainly deadly foe, it remained to be seen what would bring him victory. He had not yet conceded that other outcomes were possible.

As for the immediate problem, that was no problem at all, provided one admitted the only solution. He unscrewed two bolts that held the hook that replaced his right hand in place. In its place, he affixed a stout, forward-sweeping blade. Using his left foot as well as his single hand, he tightened his belt around his knee. Bare moments later, a roar sounded through the channels and canyons of the plateau.

A space between two boulders a dozen meters away gave shelter enough for No-Hands to finish the work. The trail of blood was sure to be followed, but he was confident that he would be on his way before that. A double-barreled shotgun he had carried with him was the best he had to work with, along  with a saw recovered from a tool box mounted on the back of the crushed Bug. He had to saw off most of the stock and a good part of the barrel. The belt plus length of rope was enough to put what remained in place, while his cast-off left boot proved adequate to shield the muzzle and mechanism in case it was needed for its original purpose. Almost as an afterthought, he tied more of the rope around his waist in place of the belt, and ran a length of twine down to the trigger.

The approaching figure was all but silent, yet still cautious. The trail had been too clear for pursuit not to be expected. The improvised iron sight of a crossbow lined up with the space beneath two great boulders, only to be lowered again. In the near distance, the sound could still be heard of a single clopping boot and a lighter unshod foot retreating up a narrow path up the rock face to the plateau above.

Fiction: Trails Part 2, an Evil Possum adventure

“…I bury this journal in the event I do not return, so that others may follow. But I have no doubt I am close to my quarry’s lair, and if I strike soon I may surprise the creature. Then I will see what he, or it, or perhaps she, may be…”

No-Hands, also known as the Demon Without A Right Hand, or to the learned Archididelphis invicta, snapped the journal shut with a hiss. “He looked in the wrong place,” he said. His lips peeled back in something like a sneer or a silent snarl as he examined the jumble of charts and hand-drawn maps laid before him on the tailgate of a large and archaic truck with tracks in place of rear wheels. He rose to his feet and stared out at what the maps represented, a desolate and treacherous wasteland that led to the foot of a great plateau. He glanced once more at particularly inscrutable note whose most legible content was a single boldly scrawled word, “MARU”, meaningless except as the name of a land hundreds of miles distant, albeit on the far side of the mountains that bordered the same wastes.

Finally, he turned back to the largest chart, an official topographical map that already bore a dozen hand-drawn corrections. His expression softened as he traced the path of the journal’s vanished author backward. “He was on the right path, but he took a wrong turning, early enough to end up further off,” he murmured. “He would have figured it out, and perhaps he did before the end, but by then he would have become the quarry.” He traced a channel between the two divergent fissures with a red crayon on the point of a hook that replaced his right hand.

His preparations were finished in moments. He holstered or slung his weapons, chiefly a broomhandle pistol, a long-barreled carbine of the same design, and two shotguns, one pump action and one double. Then he pulled back a cover from a large object in the bed of the halftrack, revealing the Bug, a second Beetle with an top and wheels and shocks so large the original wheel wells had been carved away. Within half an hour, the vehicle was cruising the rocky wastes, kicking up more gravel and rocks than dust behind him.

The offroad Bug’s tires and shocks allowed the vehicle to run right over many obstacles, but there were many times he had to turn aside, particularly for the many strange rock columns that dotted the landscape, often five or even ten meters high, colossal next to No-Hands’ 45 cm height. He might have favored the halftrack for its sheer mass, except that he repeatedly had to wind through narrow gaps and passages, some so narrow that even the Bug’s stripped-down body scraped the walls. It took two hours and the better part of a third before he reached the foot of the plateau. He slowed as he approached the opening of the passage the ill-fated hunter had marked. He rolled back the top and stood up. He surveyed the terrain carefully. After a few moments, he called out.

“If you are a creature of reason, you know who I am and you know why I am here,” he said. “I was summoned by those who fear you, but I have accepted no payment. Leave this place, and I will not follow. If need be, I will say you fled by the time I reached your dwelling place.”

For a moment, his words continued to echo, but no answer came. Nor had he expected one. With a settlement in a day’s reach even here, there could be no other place for a dangerous and solitary creature to go. He gave a low growl and started the Bug’s engine. As he began to roll forward, he glanced behind, just as a tremendous roar resounded. What he beheld was one of the largest of the great columns toppling straight for the mouth of the fissure. He braked and swerved, and almost simultaneously threw open the door. As he poised to leap, he looked back and snatched for the great chart and a few scraps of paper bundled with it.

This time, there was ample dust, which took some time to clear. Even through the murk, it was plain that the passage was choked with rock. As the dust settled, a gleam became visible, which resolved itself into the shape of the Bug, its front and cab crushed by a boulder as big as the car. Beside it was No-Hands, seemingly intact and perhaps even unharmed, with the chart still in his single hand. But as the cloud fully dissipated, it was plain that something was wrong, and anyone looking from the right angle would have immediately seen the reason: The lower part of his right leg was still inside the car, hopelessly pinned among the twisted metal.

Fiction: Trails Part 1, an Evil Possum adventure

Welcome, everyone! This is my latest return to blogging, starting fresh with a new adventure of my character and original avatar, the Evil Possum!

The land can be called a desert, but it is if anything even more barren. It lies between a range of low mountains and a plateau in the medium distance, all the same deep yet dull red. In between is a mainly level lowland, heavily crisscrossed by river channels, deeper ravines and any number of outcroppings, with an occasional oddly angled column of rock rising like a non-Euclidean obelisk of an alien god-king. Throughout, the bare rock boasts more vegetation than the bleached and sandy soil, mostly thorny shrubs and cacti with occasional skeletal tree. Yet, here and there, for those who might look with care, animal life reveals itself: a scuttling scorpion, a darting lizard, a brazen snake, a furtive quail, and overhead, a drifting vulture.

Through the midst of it all runs what can be called a road, if only because it runs uphill too often to be a purely natural feature. Only one traveler is to be seen, following the slender ribbon of hardpacked dirt in the nearly perfect likeness of a VW Beetle about two-thirds of a meter long. Barely a puff of dust is left behind as it swings back and forth on a tightly wound uphill path to a lesser tableland. Ahead lies a cluster of crudely built adobe houses that could just qualify as a town, built on the right scale for creatures a little over a foot tall.

As the Beetle approached the settlement, an obstacle suddenly blocked the way, a gigantic piece of cactus ribbing laid with clearly considerable effort. Its mass and oversized tires could have allowed it to roll over the obstacle, but the driver chose tact and backed up to a building he had just passed, a haphazard wood structure that looked more like an outhouse than a functional building. As the vehicle pulled to a stop, the driver finally emerged: a creature 18 inches tall but proportioned like an 8-foot linebacker, with a massively muscled left arm and a hook in place of a right hand. A mane of dark fur bristled on a high forehead, and thin lips peeled back on a short, tapered snout, revealing saw-edged teeth that a biologist would have recognized as akin to a possum. And indeed the creature was not unlike a possum, to the same degree that a man is not unlike a monkey.

As the creature approached, a curtain rustled behind a slit of a window. “I am called No-Hands, El Diablo Sin Mano Derecho, the Unconquered King,” he called out in a nasal but commanding voice. “I am a great warrior, and I have come from far away because it was told the people of this place have asked for my help against a dangerous foe that none have seen and lived. I will fight for those whose need is great enough pay my price: a tenth of your wealth, however great or small.” As he spoke, his hand slipped toward a 4 mm revolver holstered inside his snakeskin vest. He eased back at the sound of a door opening and closing at the rear of the building. He circled around and found a small pot of indifferently stamped silver coins, with a yellowed, rolled-up chart on top.

He glanced at the chart, and shook his head. “If I am to aid you, I must have information,” No-Hands said impatiently. “The reports that reached me spoke of 3 men found killed by an unknown man or beast, and many more who vanished without a trace in the wastes, including a child. I need to speak to at least one who can show me the places where the dead were found, and the known or likely routes of those who did not return.” He made a pointed glance down at the pot of silver. “And I do not collect payment before my work is done.”

After a moment of silence, there was a rustle of movement, and something was tossed through a half-open window. No-Hands caught it in midair. It proved to be a dogeared journal, tied shut with twine, with many notes, drawings and additional charts sticking out. It was clear from the encrusted dirt that it had been buried and dug up again. “I see,” he said. His lips peeled back, but he made no sound as he went back to his car.