So we take forever. Don't blame us, we play video games. Uh, wait. No. I mean it snowed, and all our movement was reduced to half speed. Right.

Now, let us introduce the fury of… Flak's Story.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

The day was cold and snowy all over northern Orange Star. The flakes drifted past the sign of one of the largest science firms in all of Wars World. The sign was a large rectangle with the name of the company and its essential catch phrase.

"Diagnostic Universal Mechanical Miracles - We may be DUMM, but we ain't stupid!"

This company was the proud employer of such scientists as Edward Newington, Richard Bossark, and a bunch of other people you've never heard of either. Oh, yeah, and it employed Flak too. No one's really sure why, but apparently some HR had too much orange juice, some people got fired afterwards, and no one is really willing to tell him to leave.

Hell, would you?

Anyway, that fateful day was Flak's twelfth day as a gainfully employed successful member of society. For some unknown reason, Flak felt this day to be one of celebration, so he came into work today in his favorite lab coat, which was more of a Kevlar jacket really, and his lucky rubber ducky necktie. As he stepped into the bright and sterile foyer through the shiny glass lobby doors, he wore a massive grin on his gorilla-like face. This was going to be yet another great day for work. He was ready to take on the science world head on.

He walked past his co-workers, who often hid from him. Flak always thought that they were shy, but none of the scientists really had the heart to tell the oversized CO that he had the body odor of a dead skunk. Well, maybe not so much the heart to tell him as the stupidity. Either way, Flak descended onto his workstation in the lab with the single minded tenacity of a rainbow trout. He quickly pulled out his toolset from underneath his desk and looked over everything.

"Let's see here…" He said, dumping the contents all over his desk. "Gravy ladle… check, five pound bag of lime… check, #2 pencil… check, football… check, the transmission out of Adder's car… check, wrench… check…" He continued, sorting through all of his… tools… carefully. "Looks like everything's here!" He laughed heartily, scaring the scientists at the workstations around him. Flak exchanged glances with each of them, seeing most of them with a nervous and frightful twitch.

"Man, you guys drink too much coffee. And I thought you guys were supposed to be… you know… not… dumb?"

Meanwhile, Sonja sat at the desk a few feet from Flak's lab table. Dressed in a standard business jacket with a green dress, she was armed with a computer, a clipboard, a telephone, and the general tools of the secretarial trade. Oh, and she was about as mad as a swarm of hornets living between a RAID factory and the Orkin Man Headquarters.

"This is ridiculous!" she muttered under her breath. Flak, unaware of her comments, turned and grinned broadly at her. She returned a halfhearted smile and turned back to typing. "Why am I secretary to a bumbling fool like him?" From a darkened behind her a stout, powerful, oriental voice bellowed out.

"All young girls must learn discipline! It is good for their training!" Kanbei emerged from the room, the true symbol of the proud leader of one of the most powerful nations in the world. Well…almost. Dressed in his full General's attire, he wore creamy yellow pants wrapped in an eastern fashion and large brown combat boots. The only problem was he was naked form the waist up. "Ah, Sonja? Have you seen my shirt?"

"It's probably in your travel bag, Father. And what's this about learning discipline! I've commanded an army in two wars! Two!"

"Don't be ridiculous. I'd remember something like that. Now now, get to work."

Sonja shot her father an indignant look, which he failed to notice as he left.

"Now then, miss… um… crazy seeing lady!" Flak called to her. "I needs your help figuring out the flux capacitor theory of this… thingamajig."

"Why would I know?" Sonja called back. "Apparently I'm just here to keep your appointments and somehow learn discipline from you. Never mind that your toolbox contains everything but a rubber chicken."

"Wait, you're right! My chicken is gone!" Flak cried out, distraught. "Miss seeing lady! You gotsta help me find my chicken! My next project won't work without it!" Flak promptly sat on the ground and started bawling like an enormous body-armor clad baby.

Sonja immediately questioned the value of something like a rubber chicken in a true scientific experiment, but in order to keep Flak from flooding the floor with his tears (which he was already doing markedly well), she decided to help him. "Okay, okay, Flak. Take it easy. When was the last time you remember having your rubber chicken?"

"Well… I remember yesterday when I was working on the brand new engine turbines he was there to help clean up… and..." Flak paused. "I don't remember anything else. Ooh, except dinner! I had this huge porterhouse steak at Greasy's. That, and some of those cheese fries. Man, they were good! I want some." Flak's river of tears had stopped, but sadly for Sonja, it only gave way to a stream of saliva as he drooled thinking about his favorite food.

Disgusted, Sonja decided to bring up another possibility. "Did you talk to the project leader? He might know where your…vital… tool is."

"Someone say my name!" An all too familiar voice called out from the entrance. Sonja muttered a string of silent curses and put her head in her hands immediately. Why did it have to be him? Why did he have to lead the most advanced scientific facility in all of Orange Star when he couldn't even tie his own shoelaces without destroying half a city block? As she turned around, her worst fear, her worst nightmare, came true as the orange-clad scientist bounded up, oversized wrenches in hand. "Hey, dear! When did you start working here?"

"This morning. Father thought I lacked discipline, even after helping to fend off the Black Hole invasions twice."

"Well, that's ridiculous. You have more…'Ciplines' than anyone could ever disrespect. Whatever that means." Andy said, scratching the back of his head. "Wait, where am I again?" He suddenly turned and seemed to be looking at the wall past Sonja. His eyes began to grow wide in horror, and he pointed behind her and shouted, "Sonja! Look out behind you!" He quickly tackled her to the ground, sending her chair awry and causing a mess of the papers on her desk.

Aggravated, Sonja pushed the boy off of her and stood up. She turned to face this supposed threat from behind, but there was nothing to see.

"Andy there's nothing there but a wall!"

"I know! Those things are treacherous!"

Fuming, Sonja turned back to Andy who now looked more ridiculous then before. Each of his wrenches were resting behind his ears, a feat which seemed to defy most of the basic principles of…well any kind of science you can think of. He wore a more befuddled expression then usual. He turned to Sonja, his look completely perplexed.

"Sonja? Have you seen my wrenches, I think I lost them." Flak looked up at Andy from his salivating, not noticing the large metal tools lodged on the sides of his head.

"You lost your wrenches? I lost my chicken! We're doomed!" Sonja's face was beginning to get more and more livid as the seconds passed. Finally, she seemed to snap.

"ANDY! Your wrenches are on your head! They are behind your ears! Please, for the love of all that is holy and good, look behind your ears!"

"Sonja, you're silly. If they were there I would have noticed by now. And was your face always that shade of purple?" At this point Kanbei walked back in, his shirt on. It was backwards, but it was better then nothing.

"Sonja! What is this? I knew you had to learn some discipline, and this proves it! Your desk is in disarray, your boss is crying and/or salivating, and the R&D manager is missing his tools and you refuse to act responsibly and help him find them! I'm ashamed of you!"

"But…but…Father…and he…then…" abruptly she stopped talking and sat down, picking her notes back up and going back to work.

"Now then, Andy my boy," Kanbei began. "Let's find those wrenches of yours." The emperor of Yellow Comet quickly strolled past Andy and Flak to the test platform near Flak's desk. Atop it stood the prototype rocket Flak had been working on in his short stint at the company. The rocket, however, was little more than a series of metal trash cans stuck together with chewing gum, paper clips, and duct tape. On the side of the cans, Flak had made sure to paint proper markings:

"Teh Propertah of Orange 5tar. Falk pwnz!"

Okay, maybe the markings weren't proper. But they were markings, and boy, the pink paint really sold the message. And the incorrect spelling? And the use of the number five instead of an "s?" Purely poetic license on the part of the genius that was Flak.

"Say, what is this contraption, Dr. Flak?" Kanbei asked, pointing at the mess.

"I'm a doctor?" Flak asked, confused and bewildered. "Oh yeah! The thing! That's my volcano for the science fair! I'm going to win me a blue ribbon! Lash will be so proud of me!"

"A volcano, you say?" Kanbei inquired, looking closer. "It looks like one of Andy's wrenches landed in here." He quickly reached into one of the trashcans, and pulled out a large, oddly shaped and heavy object. "Nope, my bad. It's just a hobo." With a careless and fluid toss over his shoulder, he sent the rather lost hobo into the air, where he promptly landed on both Andy and Flak. The sudden concussion dislodged the wrenches from Andy's ears and knocked Flak's prized helmet clean off.

By this point, Sonja had stopped wanting to ask questions. She was much busier rifling through Flak's toolbox looking for anything that she might be able to commit suicide with. After the rather terrified hobo had ran screaming out of the lab, she turned to Flak, who was actually being chewed out by Andy.

"Flak, don't you know it's DUMM policy to empty all trashcans before bringing them into the lab! Do you know how many weeks we've been set back due to severe hobo contamination! The HAZMAT teams will spend weeks trying to get the stains out of the floor."

Sonja walked over, and placed a calming hand on Andy's shoulder, doing her best not to grind her teeth. "Andy, dear… the company has no such policy and you know it."

"I do? Well, apparently I don't." He said with a confused grin. "Either way, you know better. You see things." Suddenly, a sudden shine caught the corner of his eye. He turned his head to see his wrenches, sitting in pristine condition on the ground nearby. "My wrenches!" He cried out, lunging for them. He quickly swept them up into his arms and hugged them tightly.

Meanwhile, Flak soon noticed his helmet was missing in action. Thinking quickly, he scooped it back up into his hands, only to discover his missing chicken sitting in it. "Fernandez! We found you!" He cried out, pulling the rubber chicken from his helmet. He held up the chicken high into the air and cried out, "You've come home! At last!"

Sonja sighed. "Flak, he was only gone for two hours. At the most." By this point, Flak had already started dancing around the lab, swinging the rubber chicken around in the air. With yet another sigh of frustration, she simply shrugged, and turned back to her own desk.

"Fernandez! Get on your pilot's outfit and prepare for the launch!" Flak's gleeful grin shone brilliantly as he assembled the last pieces of his "volcano."

Sonja suffered a moment of confusion as she began to comprehend exactly what Flak was going to do. She then began to consider if she should try to stop him or just let him blow up the facility as he surely would. If he didn't do it now he probably would later. After a few moments of consideration, she decided that the human race should, perhaps, be given another day anyway.

"Flak! Flak, what is that thing! I thought it was a volca-! Wait! Why are you pouring gasoline in there? Stop that!"

"What're you talking about, seeing lady? I gotsta launch my ship and talk to the Marvins."

"Do you mean Martians?"

"Marshas?"

"Martians!"

"Right, right, Lithuanians."

Sonja just shook her head and turned back to her desk. "…never mind. You know you're going to kill all of us, right?"

"You don't have to worry about that good seeing person – Fernandez is piloting! Everything's going to be just fine – you'll see."

"That's what I'm afraid of"

- - - - - - - - - - - -

"Hey, nice launch pad, Flak!" Andy exclaimed, looking at what once resembled an old playground. The jungle gym was completely misshapen and bent into a launch platform, with the slide and swing set providing support to the pad itself. Truth be told, the entire assembly looked shoddy, like it was constructed by a seven year old.

"I haven't seen construction of this quality since the missile silos in my homeland were finished!" The emperor cried, amazed at the whole debacle. "Who on earth designed this magnificent platform?"

"Well, Lash drew up the blueprint things… and I followed them the best I could, but I couldn't find this 'industrial adhesive' she kept talking about, so I just used chewing gum and paper clips. It's all the same stuff, anyway." Flak replied.

"I think it turned out great, Flak!" Andy laughed.

"Yeah, you're freaking Leonardo DaVinci, Flak." Sonja grumbled, putting her face in her hands.

"No way… I'm not some stupid turtle."

"I… what?" Sonja asked. Flak opened his gaping maw to reply, but Sonja cut him off immediately. "No. I'm better off not knowing. Just… just start up the launch protocols so I can get home and pretend that none of this ever happened."

"But Sonja, we have a date tonight, don't we?" Andy asked, looking confused.

"Don't remind me, dear." She said, doing her best to push back a migraine from forming in her head. "Just get to work, okay!"

Flak's grin spread as he began his final preparations. "OK good seeing lady! To…place!"

Sonja scratched her head and looked up at Flak. "Flak, where precisely are you sending this rocket?"

"I dunno. That's your job lady."

Kanbei turned to look at his daughter, a scowl forming across his face. "What? Sonja! How could you forget to choose a destination…place…thingy! That's the most important thing ever…other then finding my socks, of course. Oh, and Chef Boy-ar-dee!"

Sonja looked at her father, her face flushing slightly in frustration. She decided to steer the conversation to what she thought would be "safer ground."

"Father, I thought you liked Spaghetti-os." For a moment, the entire world was still. Slowly, Kanbei turned his head to face his daughter, his face tormented with anger and disappointment.

"What blasphemy is this! No daughter of mine shall disrespect the might of Chef Boy-ar-dee in my presence! I angers! For the honor of my family and my daughter, I challenge you to a duel!"

"Father, I'm your daughter; and you're a Samurai – they don't 'duel.'"

"Lies! Oh…wait…nope, you're right." Kanbei replied, opening a can of Spaghetti-os and consuming the entire container in one fell swoop. "So where are you sending the rocket?"

"Well, according to this report that I received from the higher-ups…" Sonja replied, looking at her ever-present clipboard, "We are supposed to send the rocket to Alpha Centauri."

"Does that mean we win the game?" Andy inquisitively asked.

"No, dear. Life isn't a video game, okay? Flak, ready the co-ordinates to launch for Alpha Centauri!"

"What?" Flak asked, leaning on the big red launch button. "Too late! My way's more fun!" The rocket's engines fired off, sending plumes of curling smoke skyward, propelling the man made… wonder… into space, to the deep reaches beyond. "Good luck, Fernendez! I'm counting on you! And don't forget to bring me some take out! And a moon rock!"

Andy, Kanbei, and Flak waved powerfully into the air at the quickly disappearing rocket, genuinely happy to see the brave rubber chicken begin his space odyssey. He would make Orange Star proud, they were sure of it. Sonja, on the other hand, merely did her best to resist the urge to impale Flak on her clipboard for wasting the precious resources of Orange Star. Instead, she simply decided to count to ten, walk away, and go get a Slushie from a conveniently placed gas station.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

He sat in his house, reading his newspaper glumly. The last war on Wars World had cost his forces dearly, and he was the laughingstock of his whole planet when he returned. Never mind that he was the overlord of that planet, the people still laughed at him in mechanical voices and such. He even was made fun of on TV, which was broadcasted all over the universe, including the planet Omicron Persei 8. His defeat would not look good among all the other evil overlords in the universe.

Sturm was even tempted to open a web blog about all of his troubles, but then he remembered that the internet was already too filled with people complaining and spreading misinformation. Okay, it wasn't quite that so much as that he had a crappy 56K connection. He really needed to get his imperial palace broadband.

But that was all for the future. Today was a day for rest, relaxation, and absolutely nothing about Wars World. Sturm sat back in his easy chair and let the newspaper set down in his lap as he began to doze off into a peaceful sleep.

But after a few moments of blissful rest Sturm was slowly awakened by what appeared to be a loud shrieking noise coming from above. Sturm, confused, stared up towards to ceiling of his palace as the noise appeared to grow in volume. Just as he began to consider hiding in the basement for safety, a volcano shaped rocket came crashing through the ceiling, leaving a big hole in the roof of his palace. It bounced twice, knocked over a precious lamp, and landed at his feet, a rubber chicken spilling on to the floor. Slowly, fearfully, Sturm turned over the rocket to reveal the crude writing sketched into the side. Seeing it, his face contorted into fear and hatred.

The only words on it were scribbled in a pink sharpie - "Falk Pwns!" it read, filling Sturm with spite he had not felt since that traveling salesman compared him to a vacuum cleaner. Slowly Sturm stood, and stared at the sky, unleashing himself into the most primordial scream to be heard in hundreds of years –

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" The echoing screech resonated through the palace and into the yard beyond.

Beckoned by the rancor of noise, Hawke walked into the room and examined the scene around him. Chaos would be a flattering term at best to describe the shock of anarchy which the scene portrayed. Sturm stood near the center of the room with his arms thrown back, his head tilted towards the sky as he continued his ridiculous scream. At his feet sat something that was either a volcano, a rocket, or Lash's latest project gone awry.

And next to that stood the most disturbing thing of all.

A rubber chicken sat a few feet to Sturm's left lying innocently on the floor. And next to him sat a bright orange flag on a small pole. And upon that flag there was an orange star embedded right in the middle. And upon that star was a bunch of scribbling which could be made out into things like "Falk pwns!" "Andy 4tw!" and "I am Kanbei!"

Hawke shook his head, muttering something about cliché's and possible copyright infringement as he walked away. Just another day on this forsaken planet, it seemed.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Author's Note: Yeah. Snow. That's our excuse and we're sticking to it. Darn Olaf and his CO Powers. We'll update sooner next time. Maybe.