Doogan here and I’m lucky to be alive.
It seemed an eternity that Lt. Merian Archer of the United
States Rocket Corp and I floundered through the dense tropical forest,
following a tributary of the Boo-Kong
River. At last fortune
smiled and we chanced upon a sampan. My expertise with South-Asian dialects
enabled me to negotiate passage with the grizzled farmer and his family who were
transporting their crop to market. (Note to Mr. Hearst-please forward on
account; one silver-plate Timeking wristwatch to my lodgings in China Station,
engraved with the following; ‘To my flying hero, love Becky Sue’.)
Storm clouds were not far away however. As the river began
to widen we saw in the distance a log boom chained across the water and baring
our way. From the agitation of our hosts I deduced that we had chanced into the
trap of a band of river pirates, a not-uncommon occurrence in this remote
district. The sampan family was for a return up river but Lt. Archer adamantly
argued for a bold scheme, which if successful would see us through the trap and
on our way east.
At this point a shot rang out, splintering our gunnel.
Emerging from the riverbank was as motley an assortment of villains this side
of Al Capone’s bachelor party. The gaggle of eye-patched and ragged brigands
waved at us with their weapons which included antique matchlocks, machineguns
and every stage of firearm development between. Boats pushed off from the shore
and I knew we were for it soon.
All this while Lt. Archer was fiddling with his damaged
rocket pack. As our host family cowered in the bottom of the sampan I prepared
to meet the pirates with my usual bravura. I realized however that I had little
time to disguise myself as a Chinese peasant’s grandmother. It was just as the bandits neared our vessel
that Lt. Archer’s rocket gave a truncated bark of smoke and then violently
roared to life. A column of fire exploded from the back of our craft, blew the
pirate dinghys top over bottom and we leapt forward toward the log boom. We
must have been nearly out of the water as we passed clean over the boom and
continued on down the river at what must have been eighty miles per hour.
Merian braced his rocket pack against the back of the boat while the rest of us
held on for dear life.
I am writing this dispatch in the market town of Chin Wey
where we have taken our leave of the farmer and his family who were so grateful
for their deliverance from the pirates (and a record setting travel time to
market) that they gave us a basket of mangoes and a live chicken.
