EPISODE 23 – "Forget the Alamo"

It is night. The crescent of a rising Moon shines lazily through wispy clouds, the dim light only partially illuminating the countryside below, a mixture of scrubland and desert terrain. Off in the distance, bright streetlights criss-cross through a sleepy sprawling city.

A sudden thunderous crash breaks the silence of the night and the Moon is temporarily obscured by a large black shape hurtling through the sky, heading for the distant houses. As the object screams though the air, the sound it generates becomes more strained, before cutting out completely with a final shriek, and then silence. Flipping over onto its back, the shape waggles back and forth to achieve level flight the right way up. Now gliding, the black object struggles to maintain altitude as it wobbles to and fro, and then plummets to the ground, its pointed nose aimed for the centre of the city.

There is a massive explosion as the object hits the ground in an enormous ball of flame.

Several moments later, two parachutes glide gracefully back to earth and land in the middle of a school playing field. As the two figures hurriedly remove their parachutes and check their attached baggage, the distant sky is lit up with roaring flames from the crash as a plume of thick black smoke trails into the air for several miles…

General Menace: That was a close shave my Lord.

Doctor Sinister: You’re telling me, it’s a pity really, a few more minutes and I’m sure we’d have found a suitable filling station.

Supremacy, I’ve tried telling you before, the Aurora doesn’t exactly take regular gasoline. By rights, we should have thanked our lucky stars we had enough to get to Vegas, it was risky taking off from there again. I think it was only our phenomenal speed that allowed us to get as far as we did.

But my logic was sound General – if we can’t find a suitable fuel in Texas, we won’t find it anywhere. They have lots of oil here in Texas you know. (Inspects the briefcase in his hand) And we weren’t exactly short of cash to fill up the tank. (Looks around) Assuming we’ve made it as far as Texas.

(Pulls out a miniature GPS device from his tunic) Yes, we’ve definitely made it to Texas. And I don’t doubt that this is the right place to look for oil, but if I may say, I don’t think you’d have found an Aurora filling station anywhere outside Area 51.

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