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A thousand stars voyage into the dark
To Eleutheria.
Permalink Mark Unread

Months earlier-

Thorn's failure to secure any truly spectacular officers does not mean those they did eventually find are bad at their jobs. A splinter of the rat gang assisting a Tackety whose previous engine was blown up by pirates, a cook and quartermaster recruited from one of the dockside pubs, a respectable junior navigator with a nervous tic who figured her best shot at seeing Eleutheria and not dying was with the mysterious and staggeringly well-equipped new captain, a somewhat paranoid driver who is skilled enough to be worth it and should at least be good at avoiding hazards.

They are very well-equipped. Many aspects of the engine have been upgraded beyond the already high standard of her construction. Her hull is suffused with antimagic and shielding, equipped with mining and scanning equipment, one of the cabins transformed into a respectable medbay.

She's a beautiful locomotive and Lenora grins all the time about it. All she needs is a name.

 

The fungal riot of Hybras's surroundings is suffused with fetid light, distant starlight being diffused by clouds of floating spores. The purchased charts insist that this is the proper way to Hybras, and they are finally proven correct after the third time Lenora looses her gatling-cannon to clear away unpleasant quantities of fungus over an important passage. A wide space stands before them, a great fungal ring supporting towers of fungal flesh, some of it red and runny. And there is a small trainyard, with a few houses on the lower slope nearby. They have found Hybras.

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Thorn considers a few names for the new locomotive, including one she's been saving for herself - but it doesn't fit a locomotive. She discusses with Lenora, and they settle on "Morningstar." An appropriate name for a vessel supplied by Devils.

Hybras is a welcome sight, for all its fungal rot. Another new place to see, another place where fuel and supplies can be laid in. Thorn smiles.

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The Navigator seems relieved and continues annotating the charts in a much better mood. The driver might be muttering about what sort of dangers could exist on Hybras.

Lenora quietly tells her captain, "From what I've heard we'll want to bring ashore a supply of ka. I don't know the details but I heard a rumor that everyone on Hybras is old."

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She nods. "Stock from my backpack should suffice, but we have the stores if need be." 

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The approach to Hybras is uneventful. The positioning of the railyard means it's a long half hour of steaming until they've crossed the gap, turned around, and lined up for docking.

The Navigator suggests not allowing shore leave. This place makes her uneasy. She doubts the driver will be willing to leave the Morningstar at all.

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Thorn indeed forbids shore leave. She's familiar enough with the eccentric nature of the Reach's flora, and that goes quadruple for the fungi. She thinks her personal system can handle it, but otherwise? Everyone aboard stays aboard.

Lenora can come if she wishes to risk herself. After all, she has insurance.

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"I'm torn. One the one hand, people do manage to live here, apparently. On the second hand, fungus. On the third hand, having a 'native' around might be a useful perspective if weird things try to happen to you. On the fourth, I don't want to appear too, uh, favoristic."

She flips a Sovereign. Tails. "I'm staying here. I'll go look for you if you're not back by dark though."

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"Alright. Thank you." 

She goes and scouts the town. 

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Spores on the breeze smell about how you would expect. The residents come out to greet her, led by a Wizened Mayor. His back is bent, but his pace is steady. His assistant of slightly fewer years gently nudges them both around a mushroom sprouting up in the path and towards a park bench.

"Welcome, welcome. What brings you to our peaceful little hideaway?"

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"Mail, trade and the search for a certain relay." She fishes in her belt bag and pulls out a stack of letters. "Here. And then let's talk trade. I have antiaging magic for sale - twelve sovereigns a month, gift one month free for every month purchased - and I'm looking to buy Hours at a thousand times market rate."

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The assistant takes the letters and says she'll get them sorted. They don't have any return mail as far as she knows.

The mayor frowns. "Our best years were spent by others. We had a plan to address that," he gestures vaguely - maybe towards a particular fungus tower, maybe towards a sort of town hall, where an elderly carpenter is working on a stage(?). "But it won't come to fruition for a while. What's got you in such a tizzy to get a little extra spare time?"

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She runs a hand through her hair. "I have a way to apply time just when it's needed, to avoid a fatal accident or similar. With that technique, even a few spare moments can be precious."

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They look at each other.

"We'll see if we can rustle anything up. We're not in much of a hurry around here. There's a dispensary down the way if you'd like to pick up food and fuel, though."

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"I will, thank you."

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"Let us know if we can help you with anything else!"

The mayor then starts chatting with his assistant about Mr. Cochran's comment about fence height at the last town meeting. The fungus they steered around in the path suddenly bursts, revealing streamers of rust-brown flesh and loosing a cloud of spores. Neither pay it any mind.

The dispensary is unlocked and empty, with a pull-bell on one wall that says 'ring for service'. Open barrels of coal and sealed crates of food much like the ones sold in New Winchester are plainly visible, with a thin layer of dust. Though the expiration dates look a bit closer to the line.

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She pulls the cord after first examining it for fungus.

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The cord is fungus free. A thin, glasses-wearing old man emerges from a side door after a minute.

"Eh- Hello. Sorry for the wait. We don't get many customers, it doesn't quite make sense to be here all day, you know?"

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"It's no problem. I'd like to purchase fuel and supplies to restock my engine. Are you quite sure your supplies are fungus free?"

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"Oh, there might be a few spores on the coal but those will burn just fine. And the food is still factory-sealed, people being a lot more choosy about what goes into their mouths. Some varieties of fungus are quite edible, you know," he says in an annoyed tone of voice.

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"I see," she says. She silently thanks herself for stocking up beforehand, but... their supplies could use some bolstering. 

"I'll take two boxes of supplies and eight barrels of coal," she says. "Can you arrange men to load those onto my engine, or will I have to risk my crew?"

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"That'll be a hundred twenty Sovereigns. I can get it all down to your front step but you'll have to be the one to actually bring them aboard."

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"I can do that." 

She counts out the sovereigns for him.

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He busies himself with the barrels, separating the specified number from their kin, muttering.

"I'm not the one you have to look out for, you know. Some of the others are a lot more involved with Mother."

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She drops her voice. "Mother?"

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"You don't know? I shouldn't have said that. Forget I said that."

Clang.

"Some of the fungus is intelligent, or so rumors say."

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"I see," she says. 

She resolves to leave as soon as possible.

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After she pays, he says the supplies will be delivered within the hour.

The mayor is waiting outside the dispensary! Maybe he moves faster when you're not looking at him?

"I think we'd like a demonstration of your anti-aging magic! It seems like a better option than our other plan, and we've scrounged up a barrel of time Old Bill was saving for a rainy day - lucky sod! Do you happen to have anything for memory? That would be peachy, it would."

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She doesn't visibly startle, but she's taken aback for sure.

"I can demonstrate on someone, and as for memory I have a way to preserve and share it. Is that what you're looking for?"

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He looks serious and sad at this. "We'd like to recover ones faded by the passage of time, actually. Many of us would like to recall their youth."

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"That's more difficult, I'm afraid. The antiaging may help somewhat, but..."

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He's crestfallen. "Ah. It was just a thought. Shall we go see Old Bill? He has the Hours you want."

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"Please."

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Old Bill's barrel of hours proves to actually exist, though it's about three-quarters full, not completely topped off. He's smoking something that's not tobacco and seems to leave him not entirely present.

 

"No way I'd say no to that price, no matter how 'spicious it is," he comments after a bit. "Well, pay it back out in your youthening magic, won't you? Enough for everyone won't it be? Hours can do that too, but not enough. Not enough."

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"It will be," Thorn promises, and starts counting out ka from her belt pouch. She asks ages as she goes along, and passes out enough to restore everyone to their twenties.

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They don't actually know their ages for sure. The Workworlds rather confound calculations like that. But they're all youthened up after a while, and Old Bill wants his change in Sovereigns.

Nothing threatening happens, though the little village continues to be slightly... Off. They all seem a lot cheerier and a lot more avoidant of the worst of the fungus now that they're young again. Someone's playing drums and guitar, and a couple others are dancing.

Her crates and barrels of supplies are sitting by the dock.

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She counts out Old Bill's change from another bag, goes back to the ship, tells her sailors to begin loading. Then she looks around for Lenora.

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Right there, supervising the loading. A bit tensely.

"Any trouble?"

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"The place gives me the creeps but it could be worse. We just need to bring aboard some Hours and supplies and then we can be free of it."

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"Let's get it done. After seeing it, I have to say- No wonder Hybras is not exactly a prime destination."

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"I've got to agree." 

Thorn goes to oversee the loading personally.

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Loading goes without incident. The driver's paranoid nudging has gotten the chief engineer to deploy a cloth soaked in antiseptic on all the supplies, and she recommends that Thorn take a shower and get her current outfit washed in a bin of the same antiseptic, just in case.

Permalink Mark Unread

Only good sense. She will.

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Her first officer finds her after she's cleaned up. "I gathered you a report. The rat crew say the spores in the air are causing a bit of trouble with the engine, but they can stay on top of it. Just an increased maintenance schedule. Navigator has a proposal for a breadth-first search to find the Relay, the thinking is that we'll see signs of it before we actually find it. Sounds reasonable to me. I think we should set off again right away. The sooner we start the sooner we finish, and we're not far enough into things that everyone needs a break, yet."

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"I agree. Let's move before the spores start causing more problems."

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"Aye, aye."

Preparations for departure go smoothly. The crew grumble a bit at not getting any shore leave or time off, but then 'did you really want to go out in that?' passes around and they quiet.

For dinner Cook serves a lovely meat pie made of creatively reconstituted and processed salt jerky, fungal crackers, and other odds and ends. There is a quiet rattling in the walls down by the mining rig; The rats are too busy working on spore filters to investigate it right away. The driver secrets away a few wooden wedges used for damage control, some wire, and small metal parts from engineering into his cabin, and will tell anyone who asks he's 'fortifying'. Lenora has decided that propriety can hang and would like to sleep in her captain's cabin today, if her captain will have that.

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Her captain will certainly have that. 

Hopefully nothing important will happen at an inopportune time.

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Nothing important happens at an inopportune time!

During the next day, however, they come across a wide, open area. Visible far below is... A corpse of titanic size, covered in sigil-marked chitin. The navigator swears under her breath. "Faith's Fall."

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Well, fuck. That certainly puts the dangers of unknown universes into perspective. After all, if something that big died, what killed it?

She gives orders to steer well clear of the corpse, as best that can be done within the fungal tangle of this part of the reach. 

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There's a great, ragged hole where the vast Messenger fell, with two other major exit points beyond the one they just came from. The Navigator suspects one leads towards Scamp's Narrow, a notorious navigation hazard best passed through by small locomotives but which constitutes a shortcut north towards Titania. The other exit, aside from the one they came in, is about sixty degrees off to the right, not quite fully turning back the way they came. She thinks they should go for it, she suspects it doubles back to one of the side-passes near Hybras they haven't explored yet.

There appears to be some sort of expedition on the corpse's surface. Another locomotive without any particularly clear markings, resting on the surface, a vague crowd of men working around a - hole? "They're all gonna die," the driver comments after pointing it out.

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"Not our problem," Thorn says. "Make for the right-hand exit, the one that's not for Scamp's Narrow."

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"Aye, Captain."

The expedition on Faith's Fall - or maybe just the dead titan itself - unnerves everyone a fair bit, but they're beyond and into a passage away from it in a couple of hours.

And then in the late afternoon they see what looks like a Tackety scout-engine, with its running lights all doused.

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Oh, hell. Guests. In a narrow passageway.

"Combat stations! We're going to have to pass that ship to get where we're going."

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The Navigator shouts into the speaking tubes, relaying the message. "Wake the first officer!"

Meanwhile, the Driver had been tempted to turn back, but settles for angling towards one side of the pass in hope of avoiding them. No luck- The dark locomotive steers erratically towards them, clearly having spotted them.

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There is the sound of pounding feet and shouting behind them.

 

"Warming up the gun," comes a slightly bleary message through the turret's speaking tube, a bit later. "Will be ready to fire in... Twenty seconds."

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"Hold her steady and be ready to dodge!"

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The Driver's usual muttering has stopped entirely. He squeaks out an 'aye aye!'. The Navigator is scribbling furiously.

The Guest-ridden engine explodes in a spray of black goo, wriggling tendrils twice as long as a man excitedly sprouting from every opening. It's heading straight for them still, modulo a fair bit of wobbling and a list that leaves its front pointed fifteen degrees to the right.

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Through the speaking tube, Clunk. "Gun ready!"

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"Helm left twenty, line up a shot! Fire when ready!"

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The helm tracks the hostile engine's wavering course. Once it's lined up, there's a thunderous BANG and an orange dot of a tracer flies out ahead of them. A moment later it impacts the Guest-Ridden Scout and turns several tentacles into an expanding cloud of black fragments.

After a brief pause- BANG-cluBANG-cluBANG-cluBANG-cluBANG. The shots come one after another, a bit over one every second, panning right and up over the bridge's field of view as the curving turn continues. More of them hit and blast holes into or chunks off of the enemy, than not.

Then the turn has gone a little too far and the shooting stops, the Morningstar's angle wrong. What's more, roiling balls of black goop lance out towards them! But the Paranoid Driver swings right again and slams the steam-vent controls, knocking the whole engine violently to the side, taking them out of the projectiles' paths as the engine passes its foe.

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"Hold her steady, we're past! Ready to dodge!"

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The Driver steadies out. The foe turns alarmingly adroitly in the air behind them, with a loud wet groaning noise.

"S-Should we go full steam?"

Full Steam being the engine's maximum operation mode. Desperately hard to control, and quite hard on their coal reserves, but would absolutely get them away from this foe.

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"Full steam," confirms Thorn. "Let's not give any of those Guests a chance to find purchase."

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The startup sequence for Full Steam takes a nerve-rattling twenty seconds, from the shouted command to the engine room until the clunk of the Big Lever, and the whole engine surging forward, something in the walls shaking, sounding like distant thunder. In this relatively narrow pass, the slow and cautious turns the Driver dares make make the whole engine strain and several plates on the bridge develop narrow visible gaps as the twisting strain affects them. They were designed to stretch just so, admittedly, but still! With this surge of speed, surely they are home free, yes?

Problem is...

The lookout announces, "They're not falling behind! They're, uh, not getting closer, but not getting any further either! Fuck, Guests are fast-"

"Deploy mines?" Lenora asks from her post in the gun room.

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"Deploy mines!" Thorn confirms.

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Mines are deployed.

 

What follows is a tense chase as, even battered by mines, the Guest-ridden engine attempts to pursue them through. Eventually something important breaks and the Guests careen into a wall and break apart. A cheer goes up throughout the engine.

"Maybe we should go back and pulverize them," the Driver comments. "Just in case."

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"Best not to risk letting any Guests aboard. Hold her steady!"

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The Driver continues careening through the relatively narrow fungal passage. Lookouts watch for any sign of further hostiles; There are none.

 

"Could we please slow down?" Her Navigator asks. "I'm having trouble keeping up and will have to start guessing soon."

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"Slow," orders Thorn. "We've lost the Guests." She trusts in her chief engineer to bleed pressure appropriately.

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The engine settles down into a more sedate pace. Her engineer is swearing but in a pleased sort of way. Nothing broke except her blood pressure going up, and it was almost a religious experience to have all that beautiful machinery running so hot and smooth.

Lenora lets the gun cool, then unloads it and tells another crewman to clean it. She pops her head into the bridge. "Captain. Glad we escaped. Need anything else, 'cause I want to go back to sleep?"

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"I think we're good, Lenora. Good shooting."

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"Glad to hear it, Captain."

Off she goes.

The Navigator mutters something as she continues to work.

Eventually, they come out of this narrow back-passage into an already-traversed area, closer to Hybras. The crew is getting somewhat tense, but there's more searching yet to be done.

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She selects another passageway, and directs the navigator to proceed.

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Nothing horrible happens to them for the rest of the next day. Then in the middle of her sleep there's pounding on her door.

"Captain! There's a... Fuck, I don't know. A thing!"

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She gets up, bleary-eyed but functional. "On the ship or off it?"

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"Up ahead! We've stopped! Some kind of fungus monster. Lenora sent us to get you instead of just blowing it up since it's holding still."

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"Alright, I'll consult with her. Thank you." She stomps off towards the bridge.

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The bridge is occupied by Driver, the navigator's assistant (as she's off shift), and Lenora.

Hanging ahead of them in space is... A giant blob of fungus? With bits and pieces of structures and other creatures, especially Cantankeri, stick to it.

It's fairly gruesome. They could probably go around at the same distance they're at now.

"I want to blow it up, but it's not attacking us or anything now. I've never seen something quite like this before. Maybe we should just go around."

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"If it gets aggressive while we're between it and the tunnel wall we could be in a very bad position," Thorn notes. "I'm inclined to stand off and blast it to pieces before proceeding."

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"Precisely the sort of order I like to hear... We are going through ammo relatively quickly, something to note, captain. Depending on how tough this is, I'd estimate we have six more engagements' worth of munitions stored."

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"Noted. Proceed." She grins. "See, I can do official."

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"Aye aye, captain!"

 

 

When they start shooting at the mass of fungus, it shivers violently, groans, and starts spitting out globules of toxic-looking spores in all directions, wobbling slowly towards the engine.

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"Slow reverse, hold it steady, be ready to dodge!"

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Lenora keeps the fire up steadily. The mass is beginning to break up on the leading edge, a bit.

The globs of pus are approaching, one straight on, and coming densely enough that dodging too far will just result in hitting two more.

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"Reverse right, keep firing!" Maybe they can deke sideways a bit.

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The Paranoid Driver loudly complains that the engine isn't designed to do that, and then does it anyway!

As damage accumulates, the gobbets of foulness start coming even faster. The Driver can't avoid them all, each hit shudders faintly through the engine. But something inside the mass is burbling, like pressure building...

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"Keep up the fire and keep well clear!"

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The fire is forced to take breaks as the Paranoid Driver maneuvers the engine in increasingly careen-like ways to avoid most of the projectiles.

And then- It explodes. Thankfully, it's rather unspectacular as explosions go.

"Continue bombardment, Captain?"

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"Hold, let's let it settle a bit."

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Everyone watches and waits fairly tensely.

The fungus does not do anything else.

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"Set a course around the remains, if you would."