. . .

Primary excuse: Bad time management.

>

316 - Spill TEA onto the PINK ELEPHANT's GREEN SHORTS

The PINK ELEPHANT is nonplussed by this turn of events.

He regains his COMPOSURE and proffers you another CUP of TEA.

WILL THIS TORMENT NEVER CEASE???

>Reluctantly imbibe TEA

315 - Look at PIRATE on DOCK

You hop up onto a BARREL (on your third try) and check out the PIRATES on the DOCK. None of them appear to be CAPTAIN MANBEARD, the only previously-mentioned NAMED PIRATE you've yet to meet. Oh man. It was harder to get up here and run through your MENTAL PIRATE MUGSHOT DATABASE than you expected. It could be that you're drun--- buzzed. It could be that you're buzzed.

You try to remember the way of figuring out your STUFFING-ALCOHOL LEVEL.  It involves... something about... your WEIGHT and the amount of ALCOHOL you've drunk. You've drank. You've drunken?

Oh goodness. According to this... your STUFFING-ALCOHOL LEVEL is about... 227%. That can't be good.

That...

can't...

be...

goooooo---

---d.

>Spill TEA

314 - Explore PASSAGE

You troop blithely down the SECRET PASSAGE and down the SECRET STAIRS it contains. You may or may not have fallen down STAIRS several times due to your high degree of INEBRIATION and the accompanying INEBRIATED HAZE. No one can say....

You emerge into a LARGE UNDERGROUND CAVE. There are several BARRELS OF RUM on the LEDGE where you are, and a PATH leads down to a DOCK, where several PIRATES lurk. Their SHIP, adorned with their INSIGNIA (a SKULL on a CLOCK), is docked nearby.

There may or may not also be a PINK ELEPHANT offering you TEA. That... is probably just a hallucination. The TEA smells delicious, though.

>Look at PIRATE on DOCK

313 - Pick up the PACE

You don't find any PACES lying around, so you get on with your backlog of THINGS TO DO.

1. Check BISON ARMY FIELD MANUAL for TIPS on how to go about rescuing CAPTURED COMRADES.

2. Lament that it doesn't give any TIPS on the SUBJECT. Well, it is just a MANUAL, not a freaking DEUS EX MANUALA, after all.

3. Set up the TRAFFIC CONES outside so that nobody walks in on your INVESTIGATION.

4. Remain as focused as possible.

5. Wonder absently where the RED VELVET ROPE WENT.

6. Wonder absently what Corporal Walter Eugene "Radar" O'Reilly would do in this situation. This leads directly into

7. Wonder absently what Captain Benjamin Franklin Pierce would do.

8. Drink absinthely some ALCOHOL.

9. Oh, remember you made the RED VELVET ROPE into a RED VELVET BELT to hold your PISTOLS.

10. Wonder about that small RED THING that dropped when you KO'd the BUREAUCRAT.

11. Notice that it is a small red pressable BUTTON.

12. Press the BUTTON.

13. Recoil (briefly) in SHOCK as the RED FILING CABINET slides up the WALL to reveal a HIDDEN PASSAGEWAY!

14. Wonder what's down SAID PASSAGEWAY.

15. Drink some ALCOHOL.

16. Straighten some WIG.

17. Go back to wondering about that PASSAGEWAY....

(What is down the PASSAGEWAY?)

>Explore PASSAGE

Happy Easter 2011!

>

312 - Wear TRAFFIC CONE as HAT

This is a good start for the RESCUE.

>Pick up THE PACE

311 - Resolve not to fail JET

MICKEY! Mickey... oh, poor Mickey. It appears that during the FLASHBACK you've drowned a goodly number of your REGRETS in ALCOHOL, completely draining both the RUM and GROG. Why? Why is all the RUM gone?

You neither can not nor will not allow the same dire fate to befall JET*. She will not become another CASUALTY in this WAR, this WAR we call LIFE. With renewed VIGOR and DETERMINATION, you retake the CAUSE to find her and resolve (quite strongly) not to fail her, not to fail anyone ever again! You will make THOSE who took HER pay! Pay significant MONETARY (and possibly PHYSICAL) DAMAGES for PSYCHOLOGICAL (and possibly PHYSICAL) DAMAGES!

Time to suit up for WAR!

And what else would your MISTRESS do? Well, she made that awe-inspiring "THE STYLIZER" weapon she always wields. You should make a WEAPON for yourself based solely on what's on HAND! Or on HOOF, even!

Here goes....

BEHOLD TEH THUNDERBUSS!

Good HEAVENS, how drunk are you? It's not very effective....

>Wear TRAFFIC CONE as HAT

*The dire fate is referencing Mickey's death by abandonment, not the lack of Rum. This may or may not be an important plot point; I don't know, I've kind of given up on keeping track of plot points. We're on... Pirate... Island now? Playing a stuffed bison? Oh man, even this footnote is getting off topic.

310 - ?

You are in a--- wait, what? No, this can't be right. This can't be right at all. Guys, what are you---

Surprise!!!

Hooray! A surprise party! With CAKE!

Thank you all for reading the comic and playing the game. Thank you very, very much! Here's to another year of Wicked Awesome Adventuring

(By the by, I'm taking Monday and Tuesday off, so the new Wicked Awesome Year will start back up on Wednesday night. Thanks again!)

>Awesomeness!

309 - Regret

Plans and plans and plans, all discovered, grappled with and discarded. Orders, honor, friendship, other intangible words with weight so far beyond their base letters. You return to Mickey's room, quiet. He waits on the bed, looking worse for wear.

"What's h-h-happening?"

"I---." He'd never make it out. "You---." Even if you carried him on your back, he'd bleed out too much stuffing. "They---." Your orders are to leave him. He just stares at you. He's always looked optimistic, but now, now he just looks sad. You can't tell him. He trusts you, he needs this. He's-going-to-die-soon-anyway-just-a-few-hours-and-its-not-your-fault-and-you-have-orders-just-do-it-JUST-DO-IT---

"It's going to be OK," you lie. You don't have the heart. You just don't have the stuffed heart to tell him the truth.

Mickey smiles weakly, he looks out a window and slowly shakes his head. "Good," he says.

"I have to go," you hear yourself say. "Someone will be back for you."

Mickey shrugs. "OK."

"It'll be OK," you repeat, "you'll be OK."

Mickey shrugs again, such a small gesture, but it takes so much of his energy. "I heard you and the general," he mutters absently, "out in the hall." You freeze. "It's OK," Mickey says. "I don't blame you."

There's really nothing for you to do. You turn to leave. Turn back into the room. One last look. "I could... have stayed," you say. And you walk out. A harmonica wails from one of the rooms, the very sound of sadness. Other patients look at you from their rooms, from the litters and cots propped up in the halls. Their marble eyes plead with you, begging for good news, begging for you to say it's going to be OK, that they'll get out, that it'll all be OK, that they won't die here, that they'll see their parents again, their girlfriends again, their kids again. But you keep walking, out into the street, listening to the artillery fall like rain and the boots pound the pavement in retreat, frenzied retreat as the last minutes before the city is fully lost tick away.

You hope Mickey isn't watching. But he's a ghost, even then, even as you can still see his window. He'll follow you for the rest of your life, just one more regret to pass from bottle to bottle, to try to drown in wine or work. And as you leave, you fall in with another group, bison who don't know you, just scared kids, and one of them asks your name. You tell him it's Mickey. Mickey Bison. And when those poor dumb bison are cut down around you by artillery and ambush, you run and you keep running. But you keep the name. And the regret.

And then you wake up.

>Resolve not to fail JET

308 - Go back inside

Many of the rooms are empty now, whether from death or retreat. It's quieter. Less screams, less sobbing, sounds which were always worse than the artillery that now falls like rain. There's only a few orderlies left, no doctors, though. Anyone the brass thought was useful was evacuated long ago. The patients still here... most are too injured to move. And they'd never survive the forced march back to the Alliance stronghold at Mt. Bison. The brass said they were working on a plan to get them out, though. Probably some sort of stand to defend the town while the wounded are taken. A last stand. You'd volunteer in a stuffed heartbeat.

Mickey's room is on the second floor, and he looks up at you sheepishly as you enter.

"O-o-oh, hey, buddy. H-how's it going?"

"You shouldn't be out of bed," an obvious remark. "Your stuffing is getting out all over."

Mickey glanced down to the piles of fluff. "I-I'm OK. I'm ready to fight."

You sigh. Mickey's a good kid, brave. But like most of the Alliance fighters, he's never seen action before, and his training was woefully lacking. Given a gun and pointed to the front, just one more bison sent to charge the guns of the elite Republic forces. You tried to keep him safe, but with the way the war's going, he's lucky to be alive at all.

He motions weakly toward the window. "We retreating?"

You nod. "They're working on a plan to get you back to safety. All of you."

"G-good. Cause then I'll be ready to f-f-fight again. Free our p-people and all."

Your smile is meant to be comforting, but it comes out wrong. The pity that marks it is disheartening. "Sure. You'll be---"

A crash of artillery strikes somewhere nearby and the building shakes. Someone in the hall calls your name. You point firmly towards the bed. "Rest," you say. "That's an order."

As Mickey climbs back into bed, you head out into the hall. General Balrog awaits.

You snap off a sharp salute. "General, sir. Orders for the evacuation?"

He nods. "Indeed, Colonel. You're to join up with the column outside and head for the stronghold."

You glance back to Mickey's door. "What about the patients here?"

"We don't have the time or resources to get them out," he replies. "Tough stuffed crap, but that's war."

"Sir," you continue, "we have to do something! I volunteer to lead a defense while they're evac-ed. Two dozen men and I can---"

"We don't have two dozen men to spare! We don't even have ten, five or one." He turns to look out the window, surveying the fires and debris of what was once a great town. "You're a good man, Colonel, and your special operations experience has helped the Alliance to no end. But we can't risk anyone for the defense. Especially not you. Your orders are to move and you will follow them. Go outside, alone, and join the retreat. Dismissed."

Quietly, almost as a whisper: "You heartless monster."

Stiffly, as Balrog leaves. "You have your orders, Colonel."

And the artillery continues to fall outside.

>Regret

307 - Begin FLASHBACK to GREAT BISON CIVIL WAR

War. War never changes....

>Go back inside

. . .

Primary excuse: Power outage.

>:(

306 - Professionally hide BODY in CABINET

With a very professional DEMEANOR, you manage to cram the unconscious/dead BUREAUCRAT into a FILING CABINET DRAWER*. In order to do so, you had to pull out its original contents, and you happened to knock off his WIG, but aside from that, it went very professionally. You check what you pulled out and--- oh. Oh my.

LIQUID COURAGE. Steady, BISON, steady. You... you haven't touched the stuff... not since the WAR. There's RUM here, as well as GROG, ALE and IMPORTED HOOCH. Oh. Oh my. It would be quite unprofessional to succumb to their SIREN SONG and imbibe any LIQUID COURAGE. No. You have your own COURAGE, don't you? You don't need the DRINK. You have DISCIPLINE! You have PROFESSIONALISM!

So, time to professionally ignore the ALCOHOL and investigate other things that have been piling up around the ROOM. Because you don't need the DRINK. No. No you don't. Not even a SIP.

>Begin FLASHBACK to BISON CIVIL WAR

*Note from the Author: Since the Bureaucrat is not currently viewed (being inside the filing cabinet), neither M. Bison nor I can currently tell whether he is living or dead. Due to some special (unspecified) circumstances, we may consider him to be both simultaneously. His cat, however, is quite dead, having been hit by a car sometime last week.

305 - Be totally PROFESSIONAL

Time to return to MILITARY DISCIPLINE. You opt to track MISTRESS JET (the real one, not the REASONABLE FACSIMILE) by using the investigative techniques in your FIELD MANUAL. Good old FIELD MANUAL. So calming. So very---

NOISE AT SIX O'CLOCK!!!

SUPER CHEAP SLIDING ATTACK!

Oh dear! How very UNPROFESSIONAL!

>Professionally hide BODY in CABINET

304 - Adventure!

We now rejoin our story, already in progress...

A veteran of many BISON VS. NON-BISON CONFLICTS (as well as the GREAT BISON CIVIL WAR), you quickly fall back onto your EXTENSIVE SPECIAL OPERATIONS TRAINING.

First things first: Lacking your COMMANDING OFFICER, you create a REASONABLE FACSIMILE by commandeering part of your BRIEFING PRESENTATION from earlier. You quickly suppress your UNPROFESSIONAL FEELINGS towards your MASTER. They are quite unbecoming of a future general of the BISON ARMY!

You slip the COMMANDING PICTURE into your INVENTORY and look what else you have stashed in there. It is remarkably comforting.

Currently in your possession, you have your trusty BISON ARMY SPECIAL FORCES MANUAL, two PROSTHETIC FISTS, a PIRATE EYE (from an unlucky PIRATE you KO'd earlier), a DOILY you swiped from on top of the FILING CABINETS, a RUBBER STOPPER (RED) and, of course, your beloved PICTURE of your beloved MASTER.

Raising one of your FISTS into the AIR, you shake it with nigh-reckless abandon. Whoever kidnapped your MASTER while you were unprofessionally unconcious will rue--- RUE the DAY they perpetrated such a heinous--- HEINOUS ACT!

Better get started on tracking them down with your BISON TRACKING SKILLS which, thankfully, also function for tracking down NON-BISON.

>

303 - Do STUFF

Things you do, abridged:

• Use STUN GUN on the BUREAUCRAT in the DOORWAY.
• Briefly discuss MISSION OBJECTIVES.
• Briefly DANCE.
• Kidnap JET.
• Kidnap BENNIE, THE BUREAUCRAT'S SON.
• Kidnap a BOTTLE OF MEDIOCRE SHERRY. You can't be too choosy.
• Make a PUN about a person you once knew named SHERRY.
• Force a LAUGH.
• Destroy the IRRATIONAL MAP to the RIGHT.
• Kidnap the REMOTE CONTROL.
• Reserve RIGHT TO RETURN JET TO TIMELINE.
• Check RESERVATIONS.
• Leave in the POLICE BOX.
• vworp vworp vworp vworp vworp

Some time later...

You recover from your COMA--- but your MASTER is gone! You hop around in a STATE OF SOME CONFUSION.

>Be TOTALLY PROFESSIONAL

302 - Cue inter-dimensional TIME INTERFERENCE from ALAN and RHYS

Exiting your INTER-DIMENSIONAL TIME-TRAVELING POLICE BOX, you both survey the ROOM. A JET is here.

RHYS: Is this one dead, too?

ALAN: Negative. It appears that in this universe's timeline she has not yet died. She is merely comatose.

RHYS: Will she suit our needs?

ALAN: Possibly. But it would mean interfering in her native timeline. Do we need to take that risk?

RHYS: All of existence depends on---

ALAN: The device is reading a recent presence of the enemy.

RHYS: Then there's no time!

What do you do?

>Do STUFF

301 - Examine MAP

You send LT. M BISON to investigate the small REMOTE CONTROL on top of the CABINETS and move to examine the MAP. It is... monumentally detailed.

From the talk of "SOUTH" and "CORSAIR ISLAND" you can locate yourself fairly easily despite how... magnificently precise the map is.

Your ISLAND appears to be the CAPITAL of the SOUTH, but is only one of... 372.8 ISLANDS. Each of them have a NAME, not only for the ISLAND itself, but also for SETTLEMENTS thereupon, and for BUILDINGS withinupon, and ROAD NAMES, and LANDMARKS and WATERMARKS and...

So many DETAILS.

Too. Many. DETAILS.

But no CANADA.

You fail to look away in time.

You cannot stop starring at the IRRATIONALLY DETAILED MAP. It is hypnotic.

At least M. BISON is fine, he should--- wait. He was going to look at the MAP with you after investigating the REMOTE CONTROL, wasn't he?

Well, CRUD.

>Look away! LOOK AWAY!!!

301 - Alan? WTF?

You find yourself in a PURPLE ROOM on APRIL FIRST. You do not find this amusing.

>I said, "Examine MAP"