Mission Overview

"What the hell happened," demanded Oliver, facing the dark room with the soldiers gathered around an oaken table. Davis sat next to him, twiddling his thumbs, his eyes blank at the thought of suspension that loomed over him. The Intelligence for the operation was his operative, and worst yet, he had failed to recognize a new enemy. An enemy that was able to take out their own men hit them.

A suspension at Blizzard meant termination, but did not mean being fired. Of course, getting fired was a direct result of termination. After all, dead men can't do work.

Davis held back his tears with difficulty, and quietly exhaled. He stared up at the shaken people that sat in front of him. They would not be terminated.

"They knew we were coming. Plain as simple as that, they knew, and we walked, straight into whatever trap they had. If it comes to any consolation, Oliver, we did get the job done. We killed the bastards, too," Drefsab spoke. His eyes were tired, like his men. Around the table was the last place these men wanted to be at the moment.

"Armed, dangerous, and trained to kill, that's what they were, the fuckers," LimpBizkit shout out. "Like us, except we were the ones supposed to be shooting, not being shot at! Dammit, if only we hadn't split up in numbers, we could've met them face to face, and Dialtone…"

"Hey, squads is the only way to get things done," shot back Drefsab, taking the complaint as an insult to his competence to lead.

"We're going in with the wrong shit, that's what happening," exclaimed Hawk. "We have assault rifles. Fine, one of them rounds a corner, pull the trigger, they go dead. But what else do we have besides that? Bombs that blow up twenty damned square yards! All in all, we aren't prepared for close armed combat at all."

"For once, he's making sense," remarked Fox. "Our equipment is way too focused on solely the objectives. In addition to that, we lack the requirements to face a strong resistance. Anything right now could help us, whether that be detonation grenades, flash bombs, even close range handguns!"

A knock interrupted the conversation, and a tall man in a white medical uniform entered. His face was full of sweat, his hair frazzled, and his body showing the twenty-hour shift he was just about ending. Everyone focused his undivided attention at the man, as he cleared his throat and looked down at his notepad.

"Well, uh, you see, patient 'Dialtone' arrived at the hospital grounds and had sustained a bullet wound through his neck. Multiple blood vessels had burst, and we attempted recovery, but, he had lost massive amounts of blood during the period, which it took to bring him here, and…"

He's dead, they simultaneously thought.

"He was unable to be recovered," mumbled the Doctor. Breaking grim news like this was the most awful part of his job.

Nobody began to whisper a prayer, and the men hung their heads low, in anguish of their fallen teammate. The stillness was broken by Drefsab's raspy, but audible voice.

"How is Slings?"

"Patient 'Slings' suffered from a direct shot through his left lung. Luckily, we managed to remove the bullet, and he's being transferred from critical care as we speak. He'll survive, of course, but my insight from the medical field is that he not be allowed to perform in his line of duty for at least a month. He needs time to heal, recover, and maybe some psychiatric help."

"Christ…" was the collective feeling of the room. They had no idea that the rogue operation had gone so bad. One man down, one disabled for a month, what next?

"Ahem," Oliver cleared his throat, demanding attention. "Due to these extenuating circumstances, our training and objectives will have to change. Beginning immediately, you will all be trained in the arts of close-armed combat, sniping, and stealth. While you are adequate at those levels for heading into a civilian area, you are ill trained and ill-equipped for full-waged combat."

"Agreed," put in Drefsab, adding a bit of his "leadership" to convince them that he even had a choice in the matter. The higher-up's, who were not pleased that their second endeavor into industrial sabotage had gone disastrous, precariously handled their lives. This very idea screamed in some of their heads, and was a lingering horror in others.

"Training will begin, as usual, promptly at 4 AM," Oliver loudly announced.

"That's not usual," was the general idea of what the men said and was coupled with a few curses.

"From now it is. You are all dismissed. Get the hell out of this office."

Westwood Studios and Blue Byte Software Meets

Dozens of foreign cars were parked in the lot that day next to Westwood's Las Vegas office. Mercedes and Lexus' shone bright, and chauffeurs were walking about, chatting up with each other, occasionally flirting with the odd one or two female.

Inside, however, a more serious mood was present. Men of high position in million dollar companies were present, and voices were to be heard today. All were angry, worried, and most of all, eager for revenge. After all, hadn't their companies been struck with armed men? The state of their companies was poor, at the very least, for Public Relations, and even worse for stockholder meetings. Turnover rates had increased to a record-high 70%, even high for their kind of industry.

In the midst of the on-going side arguments, two important men headed for opposite ends of the large oval table, both somewhat equally important. Brett Sperry, CEO of Westwood Studios, and Thomas Hertzler took their seats. All heads turned to the men with power.

Brett Sperry stood near his seat, not bothering to take it. He faced the men present, and cleared his throat. The room was dimly lit, and a light smoke cloud hung above their heads. The scene was a perfect excerpt out of a bad movie.

"Let's begin. We know that Blizzard's behind this. That's the base info we do know. What we found, unfortunately, was that they target their competitors and knock them out. Their competitors being us. Obviously, legally, we can shut them down. But after Thomas' somewhat harsh reaction towards their latest assault, such retaliation would have us on the same boat."

"You try to handle it, better, Brett. We knew that they were coming for us because of a leak in their intelligence. What would you do? Wait for them to blow up your building? Oh wait, you already did that."

"Fuck off, Tom."

"No, you fuck off Brett. I don't allow my employees to be killed. Not like you."

A deadly silence surrounded the room. Both men were now standing up, temples raging. The anxiety in the room was so thick that a knife could go through it. Worried glances were cast at opposing sides, and the men stared at each other, interrupted only at Westwood's VP.

"Now, now. We're all the victims of Blizzard's scheme to knock us off. Let's not fight amongst each other. What we need to do is find a way to combat Blizzard. Surely, they should have some sort of way to be infiltrated, shut down, something!"

Brett and Thomas stared a few seconds longer, but then stared down, at their underlings who were looking away from their bosses. Both of them blushed and took their seats.

"Well, Tom, we might as well face it. We've been royally screwed once again. First that horrible StarCraft that took up the market for about two years. Now, we're being tracked down like animals, killed, slaughtered."

Brett grunted and sighed. He took out a pack of cigarettes from his back pocket, and lit it up. Taking it to his mouth, he inhaled deeply, and stared up at Tom.

"What should we do," Tom asked, almost regretful of his question as soon as he asked it.

"Retaliate. Strike them back. Kill them. That's our answer. Hurt them. Murder the bitches."

"Yes, we get the point. How, though?"

"The same way they do it to us. Form some macho-men squads and kill 'em. I'll bring the idea up at the next E3 to the other RTS designers."

"Other companies?"

"Blizzard's bound to try it again. We might as well have enough resources that we can not only protect ourselves, but we can attack them too."

"Fine. Do it. I just don't want to wake up with the headlines reading about another of my companies being blown sky high."

"None of us do. That's exactly why we should shut down Blizzard now."

"Slings? Can you hear me, Slings?"

ColonelCollsy stared at her fallen hero. With tubes wrapped throughout his body, she felt unprotected, scared, afraid, and worst of all, angry. She had these fears when that letter that recruited them came through the mail, but Slings had persuaded her to put them behind her. Her eyes were bright red, sore with her recent tears, but she wept no more, for she no more tears to shed.

A crease began to fold on her forehead, and she slightly caressed Slings' arm. Moving her fingernails up and down, she reached his hand and held it for a second. Biting her lips, she lightly pecked Slings on cheek, and looked down at his reclining body. His chest rose and fell, with each deep unconscious breath of air. She moved her head down once again, giving Slings' a prolonged kiss on the lips. Moaning, she started to flick her tongue rapidly through Slings’ mouth, and reached down to the buttons of her shirt.

Ahem, since I wish for this report to stay on this site, I must stop at this point. Thank you, and please continue to read!

Drefsab walked down the hallway, and opened the door. He looked with remorse at Slings, and then stared at ColonelCollsy, who looked flustered and sat in the chair next to him. Her hair was ruffled, and when she noticed that he had entered the room, she blushed deeply.

"Hello, Dref. Come to check up on Slings," asked ColonelCollsy.

"Yeah, I was going to, uh, check up on him. But it looks like you've already taken care of that."

ColonelCollsy blushed even more, and started muttering about how overheated the room, and such. Drefsab didn't buy a word of it, and walked himself out of the room, knowing full well that any consolation he could offer to Slings wouldn't be enough to match ColonelCollsy's.

As he turned the hallway, he caught Oliver walking with his back towards him. Calling out, he jogged up to him and gave his hello.

"Check up on your man, Dref?"

"I was, but one of my soldiers is already attending to that duty."

"Ha, oh yes, ColonelCollsy has been there ever since his arrival."

"I could see that."

The two men walked side by side for a few seconds, a calm silence accompanying them. Drefsab turned to Oliver and stopped his pace.

"Well, I hate to say this, but I have two men missing, Oliver. What are you going to do about that?"

"We already have it covered, Dref. Two new recruits were picked up today. I believe you met one a couple days ago in the cafeteria. His name is… well, his name doesn't matter, does it? No, you'll call him by his User Name, 'SqueakyMonkey.'"

"You have a profile on him?"

"Yes, I in fact do. Want to take a look at it?"

"Don't mind if I do."

"He seems competent, to say the least," commented Drefsab.

"Uh, did you even take a look at it?"

"No, indeed sir, I did not. What about the other one?"

"I'll introduce the team to him a bit later. This ones a bit on the crazy side, but he's fiercely loyal to our cause."

"Ah, any ways, I'm going outside for a bit of fresh air and do some good ol' laps before bed-in now."

"Whatever. Just form your team out by tomorrow morning sharp at 0400 hours."

"Christ, do I have to buy a freaking Swiss Army™ watch now? Just talk in normal hours, will you?"

"You know your orders, commander."

"Yeah, yeah. Oh, I also almost forgot. What happened to that Davis character?"

"Let's not talk about him."

"Uh, OK. Well, care to join me?"

"No thanks, I get my kicks out of watching you guys perform this crazy shit, not doing it myself."

Executing the perfect British accent, Drefsab elegantly put, "How bloody strange!"

Meanwhile…

A recent rise of anti-technology factions has become apparent in the new millenium. The Unabomber, for example, is one of these freaks. No dream would be more touching to them to see that the world's era of discovery slip back to the 1900's. Such fanatics are usually ignored, shunned from communities, and this treatment makes them develop hatred towards the people who already use the objects they hate. Their solution?

Kill the technology users and the technology.

Welcome to Battle.net!
There are currently 40,504 user online, in 18,065 games and 26,457 channels.
This server is hosted by Exodus...

Drefsab: Hello, everyone!"
Wangsonn: DREFFIE!!!!!!!
..(Myst)..: Sup, dref.
..(Fox)..: Funny to see you on, commander.
Mark4: How's it going, Dref?
Drefsab: Oh, hey, Fox.
Drefsab: Bad. Work sucks hardcore.
Mark4: Yeah, I hear ya. My boss is a jackass too.
Drefsab: Ah what the hell. Who wants to play some games?
..(Fox)..: You want to finish that rematch best outta 3, dref?
Drefsab: Yeah, sure.

Drefsab looked at the flowing text, rapidly going through the screen. Two new users joined the channel and said their hello to the channel.

This is what I’m fighting for. he thought. Not for some dirty power hungry CEO’s. I’m fighting for StarCraft, and its community.

That's what he always had to remember, even if the going went hard. This community, of thousands of online gamers, this is his world. With renewed resolution, he joined game "foxy1/1" and decided to play some StarCraft.

America Off Line

“I swear to God, if every computer here is still using AOL, I’m going to resign.”

The atmosphere was calm, if even a bit rowdy. The soldiers were pressuring themselves to forget their recent encounter with an unknown enemy, and instead, concentrate on some online activities. Fox seemed especially busy, interacting in a game, and participating on a flame war on a certain site that will be unmentioned. Nobody peered at the monitor above Fox’s head, busily providing his own comments to Fox’s online work.

DivvyO and LimpBizkit were playing a rather intense game of StarCraft via Network, and Hawk was an observer, although watching the game in fashion never done. He would stare at DivvyO’s screen, and then rapidly walk to LimpBizkit’s, returning to DivvyO’s when he grew bored of his. The players actually insisted upon this, to reduce any lag that could have been present.

SqueakyMonkey and the “new guy” were still chatting with each other in a corner, looking anxiously at the rest of the “veterans.”

The rest of the soldiers were shooting a game of pool, all but the SC couple, of course. SixtyWatz was losing horribly to GoZ, who took a bit of pride in his expert ability at all games, as it seemed.

The light, casual, gaming atmosphere was broken by a mutter of “what the fuck,” by Fox, followed by a similar puzzlement by Nobody.

Curious looks were exchanged around the room, and some of the men started to walk towards the computers.

“I just refreshed the page like ten times, and it still won’t show up,” cried out Fox, with a bit of irritation showing through his voice.

“Maybe it’s just an error, or something, JV will fix it,” put in Nobody, offering a valid and sensible alternative solution.

“Or maybe it’s just the fucked up cheap ass computer, Fox,” offered Hawk.

“Hey, it doesn’t load up on my computer, either,” shout out DivvyO, alt-tabbing out of the screen. LimpBizkit stared up and announced that he wasn’t getting anything, any site, at all. Fox checked that too, and he frustratingly added that he too was not getting online anywhere.

“What the hell…”

“Screwed up server, here, that’s what the problem is!”

Whatever suggestions the crowd gave, it did not comfort any of them. SqueakyMonkey suddenly appeared in the doorway with a laptop, and opened it up. Quickly snatching a modem line out of a drawer, he attempted to log on, but was unable to visit any URL’s.

“Funny, even if your network is down, this one shouldn’t be,” SqueakyMonkey voiced, a hint of disturbance showing through.

Simultaneously, all computers logged off of their internet account, and the ones with StarCraft up on them flashed the “Waiting for Players,” screen. Suddenly, the room erupted in angry protests, excited commentaries, and most of all, sheer amazement. Had someone just hacked through the AOL server and shut this region down? Or maybe they had shut everyone down!

Drefsab appeared, regaining his composure from his flat-out run from his lodge.

“What’s happening? I just got logged off.”

“Damn, Dref, don’t you use Internet Explorer in there,” asked Fox.

“Was using it. For some reason, I just logged off with no explanation. I tried re logging, but that’s a no-go. Is somebody fucking around with the server controls?”

Nobody answered. Uh, that is, nobody answered.

Hi, I’m here to make a little public announcement. From now on, character ::nobody:: will be referred to as “nobo.” Thank you for your understanding and patience, and continue your read!

We’re back to “Meanwhile…”

“Bastards, try to go on your fancy online communities now. This’ll show you all. Show you that it was wrong of you to do that to me. This’ll fuck you good and hard, little bastards. Make you think twice before screwing with James Lyle again.”

“Maybe the phone lines here are down. We’ll try later,” Drefsab thought out loud.

“Fine with me, I just think it’s pretty fucked up we risk our lives and Blizzard can’t even get us decent computers,” Fox angrily replied.

“Are they ready?”

“No, they need at least two more weeks of training. If we’re going to attack Blizzard, we have to do it with finesse.”

“You and your shampoo. You have one week.”

“That’s really not enough time…”

“I said you have one week. The next E3 convention is then, and as if I’m not busy enough right now, I have to entertain this crazy situation. Oh, are the PC Gamer editors coming to our booth as we asked them too?”

“They should be there. Market is really worried, they haven’t been given the funding, they say, to properly advertise our product line. We need that PC Gamer coverage.”

“Don’t worry, if PC Gamer shows up, designer squad assures me we’ll have something worthwhile to show them.”

“Anything else, sir?”

“Yes. Tell the idiots at engineering to check out this modem connection. I can’t get online for shit right now.”

“Yes, sir.”

“For Christ sakes, Josh, get your head out of my ass.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Slings? You’re going to be all right, Slings. Doctor said you’d be conscious any day now. Wake up, Slings. I’m waiting,” softly whispered ColonelCollsy, staring deeply into Slings’ face.

4 AM came with a fury, waking the sleepy soldiers out of their rooms. Rubbing the sleep out of their eyes, they groggily lumbered to prepare themselves for the exercise that would be forced upon them at this ungodly hour. Drefsab was especially tired, spending most of the night talking to Mr. Oliver about the downed network, and its effect on his men.

“If they can’t get online, and participate in the StarCraft community, then they’ll forget what they’re fighting for. If that happens, you’re going to have a lot more casualties. These people will break without their online friends.”

“Then make then stronger,” was the only advice Oliver offered. “Our tech guys are at work at the problem, but they don’t work till 9 AM.”

“Oh, how comfortable, I used to remember when I woke up at that time.”

“Yeah, wasn’t that the good ol’ days? When you were ignorant of industrial sabotage and the greed that powers the gaming industry?”

“It’s too early for an intelligent conversation. I get my men, you get that breakfast.”

Grumbling, Drefsab asked him the question he wished to put back further than any other.

“Who replaces… SlipKnot?”

“Well, we have a fiercely loyal person to the StarCraft community here. He puts in his profile that he frequents a site called, ‘BattleReports.com.’ I trust you know it?”

“Yeah, you can say that. How’d you know?”

“Well, when we mentioned that you, Drefsab, would be commander of the team, he was awed and amazed, and started talking like a crazed man about how ‘great’ you were.”

“How odd.”

“His User Name is ‘WarLeaderJustin,’ but he lists that he likes to be called ‘WLJ.’”

“WarLeaderJustin? What the hell…?”

“He’s your new man, Dref. He’s a bit under-aged, but we didn’t have much of a selection, here. We can only choose from the guys who register StarCraft. That’s about 1/1000.”

“Ah, I see. Well, cheers.”

“What?”

“Nothing. I’ll see you after practice.”

Even More Advanced Training

“All right, men. This is the building outline of the office room that we’re rushing. I will lead my squad through the roof, via fire escape. From there, on Code Alpha, we will break entry and proceed to Objective 1. Numerous subjects are patrolling throughout the hallway, so take caution. Remember, if any paint goes on you at any time, I want you to drop to the floor,” commanded Drefsab.

A mock paintball battle was in the makings, and ColonelCollsy was forced to attend. She muttered something intelligible about how much Slings would enjoy this, and half-heartedly followed through as the squad leader.

“ColonelCollsy, you take your men down through the side door, and break through on Code Alpha as well. And, uh, DivvyO, talk your team and teach them the basics. You’ll be heading in later at Code Bata, via front door. By then, the subjects should be alerted of our movements, and you’ll have free reign to move about.”

“OK, squads, proceed to respective positions, now!”

“This is Team Command, I repeat, Team Command, requesting status report, over.” “Copy that, Dref. This is Team 2, prepped for entry through the side door, over.”

“Uh, yeah, Drefsab, we are go for entry on Code Bata, over.”

“We are go for Code Alpha, I repeat, Code Alpha has been initiated! Set in all squads, weapons are free, over.”

“Roger that, Dref.”

ColonelCollsy placed a door breach bomb on the door, and stood back. A couple seconds later, the wood frame exploded in a magnificent shower of splinters, and the soldiers entered the room rapidly. One of the subjects, Blizzard Interns that were selected due to their vitality and vigor, turned around and almost shout out to his teammates. But, abiding by the rules, he remained quiet when a splatter of paint smacked him across the chest.

“Boom, you’re dead,” LimpBizkit smirked, and pulled his gun down closer to his chest, reloading the pellet quickly.

“Home, this is Team 2, we have eliminated one subject and are approaching Objective 1 at the current time. When do we expect to meet with you? Over.”

“Hold fire at stairway descent, we’re coming down any minute. Eliminated target copied, ColonelCollsy, we have two boogies we brought down, over.”

“Roger that, wait, we have a possible subject closely watching the stairway, his back is turned. Disarm, or eliminate? Over.”

“Disarm, if possible, eliminate, if necessary, over.”

“I read you,” quoted ColonelCollsy. She marched out boldly through the hallway, and shouted aloud.

“Drop the fucking gun, now!”

The intern turned around, shocked at the seriousness of the situation. He thought that the paintball activity was just a little team exercise to make the worker moral better. Boy, was he wrong. Through almost sheer reaction to being told to drop a gun, he raised it, and was promptly shot by three clear pellet rounds. Crimson paint smeared across his face, and trickled down his nostrils.

“Uh, Dref, interrogation didn’t go as well as I thought it would. Subject has been eliminated, over.”

“Damn it, Home copies that, ColonelCollsy. On one of these missions, we’re going to have to bring one of these bastards back with us. I don’t want you to shoot him up when he’s in the back seat in cuffs, understand me?” “Yes, sir.” “Code Bata, initiated now! DivvyO, get your ass in gear and clear Room 1 and Room 2.”

“We copy, over.”

DivvyO moved like liquid, and took the butt of his paintball rifle and slammed it against the door handle. The cheap, plastic knob flew, and in its place, DivvyO tore through the door with his foot. One of the interns, who had been so concerned to what all the noise was upstairs, was busy away from his post at the doorway, peering past the hallway.

The first to shoot was an excited SqueakyMonkey, who missed by a long shot, spraying his pellet to the opposite wall. After the resounding thud of the shot, the intern looked up, and pulled up his rifle to his shoulder. At about the same time, four mechanical shots sounded at the same time, three on the same path.

If not the sheer amount of paint, but the substantial force, the man fell like a bundle of very weak sticks. With him, SqueakyMonkey took a rookie mistake and received the pellet through his leg. In the course of real life, that would still make him functional, but for practice, he was to be put out of the game. Walking out, with a glum look in his face, he trudged to the infirmary.

“Too bad,” offered WarLeaderJustin, the lone soldier that had failed to make a significant hit on the man. In his eagerness, he had shot him in the foot, and turned as red as the paint at the fact, when DivvyO quickly examined who shot where.

“Yeah, too bad,” agreed SixtyWatz.

“Home, this is DivvyO, we have one man down.”

“Dammit. Just hold your position there, then. Try and clear the rooms if possible, but nothing to bring the scores down.”

“Copy that.”

DivvyO and the remainder of his team proceeded to a small room over by the hallway. Placed to the left was an intern who was busily updating the time on his watch. A shot took him out of the game easily, but at first, he was furious that his watch had gotten paint splattered on it. Another shot silenced him, splashing the paint on his mouth.

DivvyO quickly secured the room, and moved onto the next one over. This one was empty, but the intelligence that was provided to Drefsab said that there should be one more subjects on the floor. The stairs!

“Dref, there may be a possible subject on the stairway, proceed with caution.”

“We’ll flank him. I think I can see him from on top of here, too. Objective 1 must be in the room behind the stairway. On the count of three, we go.”

“1… 2… 3!”

DivvyO and his forced turned the corner, at the same time, they saw and heard four men rapidly descend the stairs. The intern was surprised beyond belief at what he was witnessing, and was shot with approximately seven pellets. Drefsab turned from the staircase, and entered through the doorway under the staircase with caution. Seeing nothing but a large box labeled, “Objective 1,” he radioed all teams.

“Mission accomplished, head in, men!”

After the training period which differed drastically from ones in the past, the soldiers felt confident, proud, and more over, ravenous. Devouring their meals, they were left alone from the staff to enjoy the few minutes they had in the morning. Until, that is, Mr. Oliver walked with a jittery pace through to the cafeteria.

“All present, follow me, please. I regret it’s rather disturbing news.”

Curious, the soldiers picked up their tidbits of food, and followed Oliver back to the mess hall. Four large televisions were tuned to different stations, all displaying the same “breaking news.” Blizzard representatives were scurrying about, an alarmed look pasted on all their faces.

“Hi, I’m Michelle Gibson, and welcome to the morning news. Reports from all over the nation are coming in that all major internet networking companies are in massive confusion over the largest internet collapse ever reported. All of these companies suffer from mysterious downed servers, and experts are clueless as to how this happened, and more distressingly, why.

“This bizarre collapse triggered an immediate reaction on Wall Street, as the NASDAQ composite dropped over 70% on this morning’s opening, making it the largest drop ever in NASDAQ history. AOL, opening at $12.50 a share, Yahoo at $32.75, and many other companies, have suffered a record-breaking loss. “We’ll keep tuned to this situation throughout the day. Tony, tell us our weather for the day.”

Somewhere between hazy clouds on Monday, and bright sun on Thursday, the room erupted in a ruckus of absolute chaos. Fox, Drefsab, and Nobo were especially enraged, for practical reasons. They were contributors to a website; they had to be online! And the rest! They had signed up to protect the community they held so dear to them online. No community meant no loyalties.

Mr. Oliver watched with a growing look of anticipation on his face. If this was a joke, it was some sick one. This was a joke that would probably end in many casualties.

Yeah, baby, Part 2 is done! Thank Goodness! Uh, I mean, I’m so excited to get to work on Part 3! That’ll come out later, however, much later. I figure if you even read Part 2 of this, you must be semi-curious, and will click on that Part 3 link in the future. Distant future…

Ahem, if you excuse me now, I’m going to go and read some more battle reports. Maybe some HOF. As always, COMMENT, COMMENT, COMMENT!

I hope you've all had, at the very least, a decent read.

Oh, and check out my bad ass signature!