Hunter Or Huntress

Chapter 48: Pony Rides

“Guess who’s driving now?" Sapphire had shouted out with genuine glee in her voice as they rolled up on the keep. He was happy she was enjoying herself. She had even been rather good at driving. She was careful enough and hadn’t done anything stupid or reckless. Even if she had needed to learn to avoid soggy ground when pulling a heavy trailer uphill.

In hindsight letting Sapphire drive all the way up to the keep might have been a mistake though. On their return, they had quickly been surrounded by all those who had been working on the deers. They had nearly finished them all with only one not yet strung up. Jackalope in particular had come running over at a flat sprint as soon as Sapphire shouted out to them.

“I wanna try, I wanna try” Tom could see where this was going. At least he had Sapphire to hide behind for the moment.

“We all know what happened the last time you tried one of his toys, in fact, your hand still looks rather broken and you need both hands to drive it.” Tom would at best describe Sapphire’s disposition as one of smug superiority at the moment. Tom had suspected they had a bit of a rivalry going on, they were pretty much the same age after all. He would remember that.

Others had quickly come up to them as well, all wanting a go too.

“Can I try please?” Fengi had tried employing her best puppy dog eyes. Damn, she was alarmingly good at that. Sapphire had tried it once on him to some effect, but Fengi was next level, their eyes were larger than humans too and those ears they could just flop around at will. This was so not fair.

Tom just once again put his faith in Sapphire, leaning around to put her between him and Fengi, he would have a hard time saying no, that much was certain.

“What do you say, Tom, can she? I mean look at those eyes” Dammit Sapphire, here he let her drive all the way back and then she stabbed him in the back like that.

He just leaned to peer around Sapphire looking at the younger dragonette. How could he say no, she was so fucking adorable.

“Okay... disconnect trailer and only short runs. Fuel is valuable.”

“Yes!” Fengi went with a fist pump jumping into the air a bit.

“Ohh come on!” Jackalope just held out her arms, clearly not happy with this.

“Well what can I say Jackalope no stealing, you know that just as well as everyone here” Sapphire reprimanded her.

Tom wasn't gonna say anything to that, he didn’t really have the right to, after where he had gotten some of the ingredients for his experiments. That didn’t make it untrue though. Perhaps this was a fitting punishment for Jackalope after all.

Herron was there too by now and politely raised his hand. “Can I try too?"

“What about me, can I try?” Unkai added in.

Right then, this was a losing battle. Might as well admit defeat.

“Tell you what, tomorrow everyone gets to try okay? Day is running out." Might as well get it over with in one go after all and the sun would be setting soon and he didn’t want them riding around in the dark for their first try.

The resulting expression on Jackalope could best be described as total defeat as she went off to sulk somewhere. He did feel a little bad for her. She had already received a broken hand and a broken ego after all. Fengi’s ears drooped a bit though.

“Did you really see Kalestine?” Esmeralda asked as they went about unloading the logs.

“We did. Never seen a unicorn, that was amazing”

“Damn you are lucky”

“As in, it didn’t kill us, or we got to meet it?

“Kinda both I believe, was she pleased?” Right then perhaps Kullinger wasn't that overbearing after all. Also" she", good to know.

“Sort of, she didn’t like our hunting, or wood chopping, especially not my saw. You know, kinda noisy”

“Well judging by the fact you are still here it couldn't have been too bad”

“Nah she was happy we dealt with the darklings”

“She should be” Esmeralda’s voice went a little hard at that, a clear departure from her normally very warm and calm voice.

“I did wonder if you brought some kind of wonder saw. Did you at least beat Kullinger at something?”Fengi joined in.

“Yeah he beat the lot of us, Wiperne clarified.

“Show off” Esmeralda added. Yeah, that was probably true.

They were moving the logs into a building that apparently served as a joint sawmill and wood drying facility. He proceeded to park the quad bike in the shed he had been given for it. Being careful to take the key with him this time. He had a feeling someone might decide to ‘borrow’ it if he wasn’t careful.

What would this whole unicorn business lead to? Most of them had clearly either never seen one or if they had it was very very rare. They were supposed to be magical as fuck right? The telepathy and teleportation shenanigans backed that up for sure. He would have to ask Apuma for a full rundown at some point.

That evening he started taking inventory. He had started out with 138 liters of petrol by his estimates after the trip yesterday he had around 90 left. The two trips to the woods had cost around 5 liters each. So he could do that quite a few times. Still, he needed to think about fuel production rather soon. If he could get that up and running he might even be able to let the dragonettes use it when they went hunting or gathering.

Making a still wouldn’t be too hard. They had strong alcohol even if it was rare, so stills were a thing here. He just needed one capable of making very pure alcohol. He had brought plans for some, he had been counting on making his own fuel from the start after all. Maybe that would be their next little project now the bow was complete. Not to mention it could make something more potent for the next time they were having a drinking game. He wondered what would happen if he tried to drink Shiva or Jackalope under the table with homemade moonshine or vodka.

As for ammunition he still had a lot left. Even if he had been going through his supply faster than he had been expecting, especially revolver cartridges. He would need to test the flash powder stuff he had made in a gun at some point. He had taken to calling it boom powder. He just hoped it wouldn't live up to its new name too much. He really didn’t want to blow up a precious gun. If he could get away with it he wouldn’t be trying that until he had a locally produced weapon to test on.

There had been a lot of talking at the evening meal. The kids of course also wanted a go. Tom had to put an end to their hopes on that one. Though he might give them rides at some point. Again it would be hard to just give Kiran a ride and not the others. Thinking about it, it was rather hard to figure out why they were this keen on trying something that could drive along on the ground kinda slowly. They could fly for Pete’s sake. He guessed it was just a new thing or maybe vehicles were just appealing in general.

There had been a lot of talk about the encounter with Kalestine though, some were amazed they had met her when basically destroying her forest. Some seemed a bit mad Tom had dared to shout at her, others mad she hadn’t been more grateful for what they had done. It was a bit of a mixed bag, to be honest. Still, the end result had been mostly amenable to all, so hey that was good.

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Tom had agreed to let everyone try to ride the quad bike. While Sapphire was a bit annoyed that meant she was no longer the only one who had done it, she was still the first and the one who has driven the most. That would have to do. Jackalope was still not allowed to try on account of her hand, so there was that.

During breakfast she could see people glancing at their table regularly, they were clearly excited. Tom hadn't let them use any of his equipment to start with, now he had let them use both his chainsaw and quad bike. For most though, this would be the first taste of the wonders he had brought, outside of some of the food of course.

When Jackalope found out Tom had a screaming saw which ate trees and that they had all been allowed to try it, her mood got even dourer. She was really down on her luck as of late. Sapphire knew it would be short-lived though, Jacky always seemed to spring back from just about anything. Still, she had stolen a weapon and hurt herself in the process. They really needed to get her to stop doing things like that. So it wouldn't do to take pity on her now.

Tom for his part had come over to sit with them rather than the children. He wanted to discuss brewing alcohol with them for some reason. She had let him know that was Raulf and Wiperna’s department. They had been toying with brewing ale for years after all. The result wasn’t that good, but it did the job alright.

“Why do you need to make beer anyway? Haven't you got more important things planned?” She had questioned

“I’m not going to be making beer. I wanna make fuel and maybe some strong spirits, to sell… or drink”

“You are gonna teach us to make liquor?” Jackalope had perked up at this it seemed. Sapphire didn’t know much about brewing, but she had figured out the strong stuff was rather expensive especially if it was any good.

“If we want to. For fuel, I need pure alcohol, but lesser strength would be possible. I was kinda hoping to get you all to make the equipment I have much to do. I’ll help of course”

Okay then you could brew fuel, that did help lift Sapphire's spirits a bit, she did feel a little guilty for encouraging Tom to waste his precious fuel after all. Also, his quad bike, that miracle of, technology as he called it, ran on alcohol? The stuff he put in it didn’t smell like any alcohol she knew, but why would he lie? Maybe it could run on many things, but what did he mean pure alcohol? Their beer wasn’t tainted in any way, she was sure of that.

“When you say pure alcohol, what do you mean?”

“As close as I can get. Do you remember percentages?”

“Yeah, how could I forget you have numbers for bits of numbers. What was wrong with parts I say.” Tom chuckled a bit at that.

“Oh just you wait, it gets worse. Beer is usually around 4-7% Whisky might be 40-50%. I want 96%”

Jackalope poked Sapphire on the shoulder with her good hand. “That sounds like a lot, but what does it mean”

“Around double the strength I think?”

“You can make liquor twice as strong as your whiskey!?” Jackalope had exclaimed, looking back to Tom before getting up onto the bench, Sapphire didn't even try to stop her “Mom, Tom can make something twice the strength of his whiskey!”

“What! That liquor he brought?” Shiva had shouted back across the dining hall. This got the attention of Raulf as well.

“What does he mean? How do you make this whiskey anyway?”

Tom looked around a bit bewildered, before looking back to Jackalope shaking his head.

“We need to make a distiller, don’t worry it’s not that bad, but will use most of our copper, we might not even have enough in fact. If we do so we are not able to make lathe yet. we need copper for bearings.”

“I have no clue what those are but they sound important?" Jackalope questioned.

“Guns and more boom, or fuel and alcohol” Tom clarified.

Sapphire could see the existential crisis in Jackalope’s eyes as she tried to work out what was best. In the end, she just sat down, clearly in deep thought head resting on both hands.

“I’ll figure it out” Tom went. While the lathe was clearly very important to him. The thought of being able to use the quad bike to help haul things seemed like a worthy trade-off.

“What would you need to make the fuel?” Sapphire questioned.

“Anything with starch or sugar in it.”

“I don’t know what starch is but we don’t have sugar yet you know that.”

“I know, starch is found in grains like what use for making your beer”

Jackalope perked up at this again “Mom he can make it out of hog feed too!”

“He’s not getting any of my hops if it’s not going to be drunk” Raulf added to the shouting match. This should be interesting, Sapphire concluded no matter how he went about it.

She had only tried something like that a few times. Mostly back in the capitol, so she had likely tried it more than most of the people here. During the feast held following Vulzan's arrival, she had gotten a few small sips from Tom’s little flask. It warmed all the way down, that was such a pleasant experience. If that was going to become normal around here she was so ready.

The promise of trying to drive had soon overruled the excitement of getting locally made liquor. As soon as Tom got up announcing he was going down to get ready Fengi picked him up and ran out the door with him. Likely eager to be the first to try.

“What the. Hey, I can walk you know!”

The look on Tom’s face had been one to savor as he was carried off. It was a damn shame she didn’t have a camera so she could return the favor from yesterday. Sapphire had gotten up to follow even if she apparently needed to take the stairs alone this time. She couldn’t wait till she was allowed to use her wings properly again. Then Esmeralda had poked her shoulder.

“Wanna trade a lift for some tips?”

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Tom had gotten them all gathered around the bike to begin teaching them all at once. He reckoned that would be a lot easier as he had more than 15 eager dragonettes standing before him. He felt like an employee at a county fair or something. It sent back horrid memories of working in customer service back when he was a kid. At least he wasn’t expected to scam everyone present today.

Fengi had been a bit disappointed her kind gesture hadn’t resulted in an immediate ride. Tom had promised she would be going first though, to try and make up for it. The feeling of being carried off and then being told to hold on tight didn’t sit well with him. He felt like a princess being carried off. They were dragon-like after all... Perhaps he was a girl around here after all?

Anyway as his demonstration drew to a close he set about getting them through the dragonette quad bike experience he had gotten going here. Fengi had of course been first up. She took to it well if perhaps even more cautious than Sapphire, he had set up an easy course around some of the buildings with a few obstacles for them to avoid. They would each get three laps, he didn’t want to waste all day doing this and fuel was a valuable resource after all. Still, this should only cost a few liters.

As the trips carried on, that was more than worth it, everyone who came down to try seemed to have enjoyed themselves. There had been a few mishaps of course. Kokashi had hit a bucket, panicked, and jammed the throttle. Tom only just managed to get his hand on the gas before they slammed into the chicken coop. There had been some panicked yelps of surprise at that one, followed by laughs at the guard’s expense.

Esmeralda had done very well, judging by the fact she knew about the four-wheel-drive button, Tom guessed Sapphire had been helpful. Dakota had seemingly tried to overcompensate for something going a bit too fast at the beginning. He didn’t go too hard on her, for it, even if he had to tell her to back off the throttle a bit. He suspected she was always trying to prove something since she didn’t strike him as reckless otherwise.

Rachuck had seemingly not gotten quite surprised at just how good the brakes were managing to lock up the front wheels during a turn, so when he let go of the brake the quad bike shot sharply left throwing him off. That one too had scored some laughter from the crowd.

The winner of quad bike driving mishaps went to Shiva though. She had gotten off to a very good start. as the laps went by she actually started getting some good speed, she was doing well. Until she learned what oversteer was when she got on the gas on the way out of a corner and spun it flipping over. That had sort of been Tom’s fault she had been doing so well, he didn’t consider that wouldn’t continue to be the case.

No injuries were had though, so no harm done. A few others had come over to help get the bike back on four wheels, and they had carried on trucking. Jackalope sat looking on from the stairs but wandered off again after a while. That was just a sad sight. Tom thought. If there was anyone who would have enjoyed this it was her after all.

That just wouldn’t do she didn’t deserve it I Tom's mind all she was guilty of was being a bit too curious for her own god. when everyone had their turn. He pulled up to Shiva and asked her to fetch her daughter. She pulled a bit of a sly smile.

“Oh, you big softy.” She hit him on the shoulder surprisingly firmly “Fine, I’ll go get her.”

It wasn’t long before he spotted a dragonette running off the platform further up diving down at a rather alarming rate. The only thing preventing her from doing a proper superhero landing was the wounded hand and extra joints in her legs. As Tom looked at her he suspected she might actually have been crying a little bit. Oh now he felt like a right arsehole, still, it would make this even sweeter.

“Now, you can't ride because of your hand, so next best thing then, Get on” He had been going around this course at a snail's pace for far too long now. Besides, he felt the need to show off a little too. “Arms around my waist and hold on tight, you lean with me as we turn or this is going to hurt”

She jumped on using her wings to propel her up onto the seat, Tom was once again glad he had his goggles on as a wing claw came past his face missing only by a matter of centimeters. She landed with a thunk behind him.

“Ready?” He felt Jackalope hunker down, her arms squeezing around his waist, this should be fun. Not to mention it might give Jackalope a point in her little rivalry with Sapphire. That was just a bonus though.

He locked the front wheels and pinned the throttle kicking up dirt and stones into the faces of those dumb enough to stand behind the bike. He had learned during his last bout of showing off that the lower gravity actually helped a lot with balancing work, you sort of had more time to react.

As he came off the brake he leaned back, Jackalope mimicking the motion and the front wheels came off the ground as he pulled a wheelie down the front straight.

It was an easy little course but that just made it easier to go fast. Most of the surface was gravel and dirt with a bit of grass here and there, so he managed to get some very good slides going. He didn’t feel like going for two wheel’s in the corners with an inexperienced passenger onboard so this would have to do.

The exclamation of “Wuuu!” followed by cackling laughter from behind him confirmed that even if she wasn’t driving, she was enjoying it regardless. Over the little hill, there was, they managed to get some air landing with a thunk. Resulting in yet another cheer from his passenger. She would only be getting three laps just like the others, so on the last one, he went for speed rather than showing off. He knew the simple course by now and went from slide to slide like a ballet of speed, the many years of practice when he was younger paying dividends. Even if this thing was a lot heavier and slower than his old racing machine. Having a passenger didn’t help either obviously, but it was still a very respectable effort, he felt as he slid to a stop back at the start line.

“When my hand is fixed I’m so beating you as at this”

“Sure you are,” Tom replied, sounding very convinced by her statement. thinking to himself ‘Not in a million years girl. I might look like a gay knight but I still got this.’