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Sixteen days later, before leaving the Terror Drome to meet with a certain mercenary about an offer to temporarily be a decoy for her, the Baroness catches up to the Blue-shirt from earlier cleaning her sidearm. "You there, Trooper 2721. I vish to discuss something vith you."

"What can i do for you, ma'am?" The Blue-shirt asks.

"Nothing really, this has to do vith the ordeal from earlier." The Baroness tells her as she leads the trooper to a corridor.

"Did The Commander order another attempt?" The Blue-shirt asks next.

"He did send The Twins aftervards; but that is a different matter, the real point is of your conduct."

"It is?; Did i do something wrong back there?"

"I'll say you did, you conniving little whore!" The Baroness thinks before stopping to reply. "It vas merely that you seem to have been too... enthusiastic in your gratitude to Destro."

The Blue-shirt nods. "Oh that, it was just because i have the same problem most of the other's here have. The lack of chances to take and give it." She says to her.

"I see... I might know of a vay to help vith that." The Baroness replies while placing a hand on a door handle. "After you, please." She adds as she opens it.

"Gee thank yooo-oof, why did yo-" The Blue-shirt asks after being shoved and tripped. Before she can fully look back, she hears chuckling from in front of her, and looks to see Zartan's three underlings leering at her.

"Feelin' a wee bit lonely, you say, luv?" Ripper asks her as the other two pick her up and hand her sidearm to the Baroness.

""'ow about yer let us give yer a 'and or, um... 'ow many 'ands do the three o' us all 'ave?"/"...Six!"/"Right; a 'and or six wiv that, then, eh?" Torch asks suggestively before the Baroness shuts the door and walks off, grinning to herself at the Blue-shirt's pleas to be let out became sobs, screams, and the sound of fabric being torn.

"Lack of chances?; Bah, she must have forgotten how she spread her legs for 4 of the Joes back vhen i was the commander." The Baroness thought to herself before wondering how to get back at Destro when she saw Firefly walking a few yards infront of her.


While Lady-Jaye is a third of the way to Scotland, Gung-Ho is waiting in a dealership at Keystone when his name is called. He gets up and follows the accountant to his office. "Alright then Mr. LaF... er, how do you pronounce this?" The manager starts to say.

"Well, yawl gotta make thuh "I" sound lahk "eat", fursd." Gung-Ho tells him.

"I see, thank you. According to our records, Mr. LaFitte, this is the fifth time you've been behind on your payments." The employee replies after looking at his computer screen. "And what would be the reason for these delays, exactly?" Gung-Ho scratches his chin before asking to use the phone. "Certainly." The employee says, only to grimace at the following conversation.

"Colonel, Ah'd lahk tuh know hif ah can explain uh few thangs bout sum missions Ahv been on... Gist wonna make shore nuthin' Ah'd tell him will git us facin' uh firin' squad iz awl. None uh thuh super-dangerous stuff... naw problem, sir." Gung-Ho said into the phone before hanging up. As he turned to sit back down he noticed that the employee was nowhere to be seen. "Hey, whayer'd he go?"


Flint is pacing around his office. "You really believe this is some scheme to get back at you for the raid, don't you?" Duke asks him, having entered to complain about the noise.

"It's the only reason i can think of for Gung-Ho, Lady-Jaye, and Roadblock to all get letters asking them off base." Flint tells him.

Duke sighs and holds up three fingers. "There's a few holes in that; first, Gung-Ho has been behind on car payments since before he joined. Second, you didn't get one. Third, i already know what the purpose of this is."

"You did; what is it?" Flint asks.

"It's so all the gray hairs from worrying about your girlfriend end up growing on me instead." Duke replied, grinning as Flint balked.

"Mock me all you want, but I know something's not right and I'm going to find out what it is if i have to swim there."


At the same time, Destro is approaching the manor and flinches when the door opens before he could reach the handle and sees an unfamiliar portly woman facing him. "Ye mus' be laird MuCullen." She, the Baroness, says.

"That should be obvious. Where is my regular housekeeper, Madam?" He asks, too busy looking past her shoulder to notice her breathing a sigh of relief that her second disguise worked.

"I see no one told ye yet, me laird; Mr. Jernigan was killed in an automobile accident a few days ago." She lies while shaking her head. "One of ye cousins hired me tae take his place."

"Must have been that whelp Lamar, always leaving things half finished. A pity, Jernigan was an excellent worker and will be difficult to replace." Destro replies as he walks in, not noticing her gulp. "As for you; you seem to have done well enough, but i shall take a closer look."

"By all means. I will be attenden' tae the upper floor, me laird." She tells him.

"Very well, Ms... What is your name?"

"Call me Ms. Campbell*." She says before walking up the steps.

While inspecting some of the furniture, Destro hears the phone going off and picks it up. "Hello?"

"Na smaoinich gu bheil thu sàbhailte am measg chàirdean, no gheibh thu sleaghan fhad 's a bhios an oidhche a' sileadh." He hears from the other end. (Don't think you're safe amongst kin, or you'll find spears as long as the night raining down.)

"Cò tha seo; Halò?" He asks despite the lack of response. He slams down the handset, and puts the riddle aside until two days later when he watches the only person who fits into it exiting her room, and swiftly "replaces" the portrait above the fireplace. (Who is this; Hello?)


Before the ceremony, the attendants are getting their masks. While watching his aunt get the bird head, the new initiate is given a different one. He raises a brow as he turns it right and left. "A pink warthog; what the hell?"

The hooded man walks over. "The faerst Destro had tae wear one o' iron while still aglow; ye will wear the same if ye dare say more, boy." He tells the young man. The initiate nods rapidly and shoves the mask on.


"She will make good food for the beast."

After locking eyes with... whatever it was, Lady-Jaye hears a voice in her head. "Again... again they offer me only the deflowered."

"Defl... This thing can talk?" She asks herself before she sees the shaft dissolve into a black void. As she notices the manacles are gone, the head of some yellowish reptilian creature** appears. "Who... what the hell are you?" She asks out loud. "And what do you know about my not being a... let's just stick to the first question."

"To those above, i am the wyrm of earth; before that, i can not recall." It replies. "What i do know is that which you know." It says again, before a circle of what seems to be the water from the shaft appears, showing a wheaten terrier going around.

Lady-Jaye blinks and leans forward. She starts to recognize it as the dog from when she was two. The scene then changes to more random events from her perspective of the next three years of her life, at a school playground, at church, a sunny field. She realizes these are her memories, and they are catching up to when she was six... when her mother was... "No! Not that... please stop it!" She screams, shutting her eyes and covering her ears as a woman is seen being shoved off a balcony.

While she is trying to force the image out, she hears what sounds like a crowd, and glances to see T.V. cameras. "My-My first audition." She says, and then sees a mirror on a locker showing her putting on a suit... Her first meeting Abernathy when he was still a Colonel... then Duke, Stalker, Gung-Ho, and Scarlett... until she sees Flint's face, and whispers his name before shutting her eyes again when she watches their first and nearly last mission in Albania. She then scowls and blushes as she looks away from the sight of herself and Flint during that night in his quarters. "You turn that off right now, you damn pervosaurus!"

"...I suppose i can show something else, spoiled one." It says, replacing the "puddle" with other faces of men and women.

"All of those... Destro... He helped you kill these people?" She asks as she looks at the hundreds, maybe thousands of long lost souls around her.

"Yes; aside from the occasional army thinking they could ever be a match for me, many Destros have served me well." It tells her.

"Many?, He's not the first?" She asked herself, noting to herself that she had no knowledge of, or reason to look into, his family tree before taking another look at the faces, and screams when she sees one in particular. "Haruna? You son of a bitch, you ate her!"

"Will you judge me for needing to feed as other living things do, mortal wench?" It asks her.

She bares her teeth and clenches her fists before walking toward it. "Judge you? Tha mi a' dol gad chuir air ais gu ifrinn ann an cnapan fuilteach!" She yelled, extending a hand, into which one of her javelins materializes before she leapt at the creature as it's eyes widen in surprise, but it managed to sever the mental connection, and she heard a loud voice from above. (I'm going to send you back to hell in bloody chunks!

"Sttttop!"

After hearing his demand, the hooded man and the others face the newcomer. "What reason have you to deny the beast, James?"

"I wish to know what she is doing here, Lamar; why here of all places." Destro demands cryptically.

"You speak as though you've seen her before." The deer masked one says aloud.

"Unfortunately; but she is soon to be one less thorn in the side of one of my best customers." Destro told him before he turned toward Lady-Jaye to question her. "How did you learn of our secret chamber?"


Onboard the Flagg, Duke shakes his head after hearing Flint's check-in. "Seems i owe him an apology."

"Nevermind that, Duke, you have to head out and make sure those two make it back." Col. Sharp tells him.

"Seconded; the cargo jet's ready and waiting for you fellas to board." Adm. Ledger adds.

Gung-Ho and the other Joes nod. "Thuh Colonel's raht, Duke; mah Grand-mere''ll raise all hell hif she finds i let another honorary clan member die."

And by the sound of it, we better find them fast. Snake-Eyes wrote.

"You said it, friend. Come on everybody... topside, double quick. Yo, Joe!"


Chapter twenty-two.

* Based on a nickname, means crooked mouth.

** The episode had it be an eyeball with tentacles. Here, I'm making it the monster from Sins of Our Fathers.