---

"WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON IN HERE!?" Taint yelled as he threw open the door to his father's garage. Inside he found his dad's buddies, all retired explorers, with various musical instruments, in various states of surprise and jamming.

As the sour notes evaporated from the air, all of the old men in the garage let out an uproarious "EEEYYY!" and raising of fists to their new visitors as the crew of the Air Grumpkin filed in behind Taint. Topaz and Valk showed minimal interest in the happenings in the garage, but Myen's mind was thuroughly blown.

"Haha! Who the hell are these people, kid?" A man asked. Anyone seeing both Taint and this man in the same spot, regardless of how poor their deductive skills may be, would instantly recognize them as father and son.

"Hah! I've got a crew now!" Taint answered as both men extended their arms for a hug and moved in for each other, but it quickly turned into a contest to see who could slap each other in the face first.

"What? Nobody's dumb enough to be your crew, how'd this work out?" Taint's dad asked as he landed a solid blow above Taint's ear, winning the contest, making the score 135 to 14 in his favor.

"We didn't have a choice." Topaz interrupted. "We were all assigned to his plane for an expedition, before the Designated Crew Act was put in to effect."

"When we finally got back two weeks later, Taint's plane was the only one without an assigned crew." Valk finished. The band tore open into a fit of old man laughter.

"Allright allright, come on." Taint said waving an arm at the retirees. He turned and pointed to his crew. "Allright, this tall fucker is Valk, the dude of harsh situations. The girl is Topaz, she mostly gets in the way when im about to kill us all. And the kid here is Myen, primary expedition asskicker."

The crew gave short greetings as they were intorduced and summarily backed up to find things to lean or sit on. "Okay, now, on drums we have Moody, on Gauss Guitar is Embar Phepps of the Phepps Twins, the guy standing there using the broomstick for a microphone is Walko Phepps of the Phepps Twins, the man with the Acoustic in his death grip is Ted the Gecko, and I dont know what the hell that guy is messing with but that's my dad Blues."

"It's a Pressure Harp, dipshit!" Blues snapped.

"What the fuck is a Pressure Harp?! This is new shit! This is information I do not have!" Taint yelled.

"It's a revolution, you little puke! This is awesome! This information is important to YOUR future, THEIR future, and the future of music as we know it!" He yelled as he flipped a switch with his foot, causing a hydraulic pedal to rise to shin-height from the bottom of the long curved pipe. He mashed on it with the ferocity of a man who was hell bent on avenging the murder of his entire family, twisted a small valve at the top lightly, and ran his fingers across the long silver strings extending from top to bottom on the inside of the curve. It produced a sound resembling a bass guitar having long, passionate sex with two hot bagpipes he picked up at the bar. The rest of the band joined in and performed for the four adventures a song titled "Soaring Knuckles". It ruled.

Afterwards, the band packed up and headed either home or to the bar, leaving the crew and Blues alone for the rest of the night.

"So what brings you down, kid?" Blues finally asked as he opened the door from the garage to the kitchen.

"We're wondering where Medusa is at." Taint said as he followed. He went straight for the cabinets and began to search for snacks.

"You're in luck, she's in town next week. Investingating some mess at the Arms refueling station down by the strips."

"REALLY!? Badass! I thought I was going to have to chase her ass all over the kingdom!" Taint said as he grabbed a few handfuls of bagged peanuts. He held one pack in his lips and threw the rest at his crew.

"BLUES, WHO'S THAT?" A voice from somewhere inside the house shrieked. To anyone that heard it, regardless of how poor their deductive skills may be, would instantly recognize the voice as belonging to someone who is monsterously overweight. With a few seconds to think about it, they could also deduct that it belonged to Taint's mother.

"IT'S ME, MA!" Taint hollered back while leaning towards the hallway.

"TAIIINT! COME HERE AND GIVE ME A HUG!" She yelled back. Taint moved towards the hallway, followed slowly by Topaz. Taint stopped her and pointed back to where she came from. Neither of them had any sort of telepathic powers, but Topaz very clearly heard Taint's voice in her head say "No. You do NOT want to see this blob of a woman". This was pretty much all she could think about for the rest of the night. Light conversation could be heard from the back room, but not clearly enough to understand what was being said.

"So what's it like flying around with my son?" Blues asked, breaking the silence in the kitchen.

"UH, oh, uh," Valk muttered.

"It's hectic." Topaz said. She began to wonder how long it would be before something blew up, but her thoughts quickly returned to just how hideous Ma Bigsby could be.

"I love it!" Myen said after it became clear that his crewmates weren't too interested in starting conversation. "I've gone on quite a few expeditions for my age, and king's ass, some of those guys are just PUSSIES."

"HA! Damn right! Fuckers just fly out to places guys like me have already picked over and try to shake the last two drops out of the mug!"

"Exactly! What's the point? It's been done! If you want to see something NEW you have to fly out longer than a day or two!"

"Half of those fuckers are afraid of hostile sasquatch tribes or some big fuckoff lizard eatin' planes right out of the sky! Fuck that! Drop dynamite on the bark cheweres, and ignore the lizard entirely! That's retarded superstition!"

"Fucking lizard!"

Yeah. Hey man you want a drink or something?"

"Whatcha got?"

"Mostly New Old Fister, uhhh," Blues opened the liqiour cabinet. "Oh, some home-made grime from the Phepps Twins, and some Slum Tulip for the old bag."

"Shot of Fister."

"Good man! What about you two?"

"Fister." Valk replied. Topaz didn't answer.

"Fister, and.... fuck it, Tulip?" Blues said, leaning into the cabinet and grabbing the fifth of Fister and some shot glasses. he set them on the table, reached back in, grabbed the handle of Tulip, and two bottles of Phepps grime. He set the handle and one bottle of grime down before hucking the remaining bottle down the hallway while yelling "CATCH!". the bottle bounced off the wall and crashed on the floor, spraying its foamy contents and glass shards all over.

"DAMNIT BLUES! WHAT WAS THAT?!" Ma screamed.

"Ohhhh noo!" Taint said in a let-down sort of voice as he left his parents bedroom. "Dad! Was that grime?!"

"Yeah." Blues answered.

"CLEAN IT UP!" Ma followed.

"Damnit dad, don't waste that stuff!" said Taint, as he came back to the kitchen. He grabbed the fifth of Fister, spun the cap, flicked it into the corner of the room, and took a pull straight from the bottle.

"So what do you need Medusa for?"

"Fake IDs, free entry into some tournament held by the Arms, where the tournament is at, and possibly some hints on how to bypass security and steal whatever the grand prize is."

"Awesome. Take Moody with you."

"The hell for?"

"Moody's good at that sort of thing. Infiltration."

"Whatever, sure". Taint took another big gulp of fister, and sat the bottle down. He reached in to the cabinet and pulled out a bottle of Grime, cracked it open on the edge of the counter and sat down at the table. He grabbed a nearby newspaper and began to read it, never once realizing it was the same issue he bought before leaving Grault.

They all sat around and drank for the rest of the night. Myen, Taint, and Blues each drank to the point of amazing stupor while Ma bitched about them drinking all her Slum Tulip. Valk had a few shots and began to scope for a place to sleep while Topaz nursed a single glass of Tulip for the next two hours. She parked herself on the couch in the living room, and smiled at the fact that meeting most of Taint's family hasn't been life threatening in the slightest. Her smile was killed by the sudden image of a gigantic, warty pile of blubber ontop a permanently compressed bed mattress screaming at Blues to bring her dinner popping into her head.

---