The weekly newsletter for Fed2 by ibgames

EARTHDATE: August 17, 2008

Event Reports page 1


METEOR SHOWER PARTY 

Sunday, August 10
by Catspaws

The cry went out all over the comms: "The sky is falling! The sky is falling!" It was party time in Fed, as we all donned our party clothes and headed to Mars to watch the Meteor Shower. Being the hostess of the party, I knew everyone would look to me to have the appropriate attire. So, what does the well-dressed kitten wear to a meteor shower party? Sparkly dress? Check! Dance slippers? Check! Crash helmet? Check! Finally I was ready and climbed into my shuttle to host the party of the year.

Arriving at Chez Diesel, I made my way up the stairs to the roof garden, managing not to trip in my dance slippers. I did a little pirouette at the top to show off my sparkly dress to advantage, and greeted the guests who had already arrived. I was still greeting the guests when Cloudbase arrived, carrying a recipe book: 1001 Ways to Cook a Cat. I made a mental note to thrash him later. People were already catching stars, and shooting off fireworks, and there were paper plates with ribs, steaks, burgers, and marsrats-on-a-stick scattered everywhere. The droids were having a hard time keeping up with the clutter, and the party hadn't even officially started yet!

I was explaining my crash helmet, and how I had intended to sell crash helmets for the party, but my supplier was late, when a meteor landed right atop a waitdroid, neatly knocking off its head! I ran for cover while Dalaquin, a kindred spirit, began to build a shelter in the corner.

I ordered champagne for all the party guests and welcomed everyone to the party. "Thank you everyone for coming. This is a special day for Fed as well. For those who haven't noticed, we have something new. If you haven't done so, catch a falling star. This is a brand new feature the magnificent Bella has been working on for simply ages, so, when you see her, be sure to thank her for all her hard work. We now have objects that will stay with you forever if you like. The stardust is our gift to you, to mark the occasion." We all toasted Bella and gave her a round of applause, even though she wasn't present.

Of course, at this point there were a lot of questions about the objects and how long they lasted, as well as if and when planet owners would be able to create similar objects. If you weren't present, you won't know the answer to those questions...

Freya then made a special presentation to Jezz, who had shown such initiative and imagination in Freya's weekly quiz. Jezz is now the proud owner of something no one else has, or will ever have: an Ultra Rare, which, as I understand it, is an object that has unlimited uses. The best way I can explain it is this: On Brass you can buy a carton of milk and, after talking two or three drinks, the carton is empty. This mug Jezz won constantly replenishes itself. It is never empty. She no longer has to worry about starving to death or hunting for a bar - she can simply take a sip from her personal mug. Congratulations, Jezz!

With the presentation out of the way, we toasted Bella, Hazed and Freya again and thanked them for all the hard work they have put in for us. Then we began to party in earnest. Another meteor fell, and Dalaquin's shelter became a fortified tent. With a cry of "Save the kitty!" I dove into the tent with him. Dalaquin asked, "Ack there is no litterbox in here are you housetrained??!??" Hmmph! As if he would need to ask! My stay was short-lived, however, when he realized I had stardust with me. But I wheedled my way back into the tent (by sitting outside and wailing pitifully) and invited Fancy inside as well. (I'm that good!)

Fireworks were flying everywhere, meteors were falling from the sky, and the fur was flying - well, when we weren't hunkered down in Dalaquin's tent. All through the afternoon people came and went, enjoying the food and fireworks, and complimenting Hazed on her hard work (I made sure everyone knew who was responsible). Even Occy showed up to pass out balloons to everyone, whether we wanted one or not. Nice balloons, Occy.

I was full of marsrat and steak, and ready to take a catnap, when the firemonkey, Monodefuego, arrived. Have you ever tried to sleep with a flaming monkey around? It can't be done, I'm convinced of that. First he tried to set out tent afire, but that didn't work. Then he spotted Freya. Monodefuego exclaims, "Sweet Mother of Pantsfires! Freya too! It's like a classics return party!" he exclaimed. Then he sidled over to snog Occy. To distract him, we toasted IB again (we did that a lot, because we were really excited about the party and the stardust and all).

This is where Dalaquin made his next mistake: he left me in charge of the tent while he went to sell a future. He wasn't even down the stairs before I'd invited the firemonkey inside. Dalaquin quickly returned to report that the Mars landing pad was a mess, with shuttle parts and limbs of various aliens all over the place. We were all a bit tipsy after so many toasts to Bella and friends, so we didn't really care much about the landing pad. Dalaquin says, "Ya know a massive ball of fire inside a big metallic tent is starting to bake me." He did the only thing he could do - he vacated the tent and erected himself a new one, leaving the kitty and the firemonkey in proud possession and a nice tent.

While all this was going on, the humanoids were doing odd things. Some had found a music source and were standing around shuffling their feet while holding each other. They called this 'dancing', and they seemed to pair up to do this, with a male and a female of the species comprising each pair. Dalaquin asked, "oh yes lets dance in the middle of exploding fireworks and falling meteors, where can i sign up for exploding death while holding someone??" This was interesting to the cat and the firemonkey, so we decided to study this odd behavior further. Monodefuego scratched his head and shrugged. "Can you tell the difference between one human and another?" I replied, "I really don't bother, as long as they're trained to operate a can opener."

Then Monodefuego dropped his zinger. If you weren't there, you don't get to hear about the zinger.

And this is when we started tagging the humans. I could go on for hours about the antics of the humans. Suffice to say that they partied, the animals watched them, the fireworks and meteors fell everywhere, and there were more dents in the barbecue than in a droid workshop after one of Hazed's temper tantrums. It was by far the most successful party I've attended, and I add my own personal thanks to Hazed, Bella, and Freya for everything they did to ensure that we had a great party.


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