Cruise Control

Mission Summary

The mission objectives involved not stopping for more than 15 earth minutes. Given that on shore leaves we normally take 10 minutes to get on our ships after a 2 minute warning, it seemed a difficult challenge. Added to that was that in these nomadic times, no one had flat bag. It was a daring undertaking, but with a few random spare tubes and a patch kit, we decided to attempt anyway.

The fleet launched from a new secret location on the outskirts of a known sandworm nest, in search of clear starways and cozy wormholes. Pastry Queen led the charge on a stellar route that took us to opposing ends of the star system. We started by heading on a newer wormhole away from our launchpad. The night was warm and we were ready for cruising as though it were a summer night. Skunk provided life support to keep us charged up.

While heading on a starpath through the Cambridge System, Wombat in attempt to not miss any cup crushing opportunity, decided to go after a cup that was still quite full of sticky sugary milk and iced coffee molecules. While he did crush it, he managed to get milky coffee sludge molecules all down his legs. As this was very early on in the mission, he was disgusted by the prospect of continuing for unknown hours in wet milky socks and dried on filth. We headed toward the Delany playground arena. Diva thought it may provide some artificial radiation sprayers for Wombat to clean up, but alas they were disarmed. At the arena, we took our first 15 minute shore leave, with an alarm set to ensure we would not fail this mission objective. With about 1 earth minute to spare we were off again.

Our next stop was for refueling and fuel dumping at Luna StarMarket. Fortunately there were multiple cash registers to make our 15 minute shore leave possible as pilots scouted the Luna in quick time, bought more fuel than necessary and launched with 2 earth minutes to spare.

Pilots then headed through the Somerville and Charlestown Systems, through empty arenas, ship-only starpaths, and wormholes. We eventually took the Harborwalk wormhole along the Boston Harbor Nebula and tested out some flight formations. After reminding ourselves what the flight formations were supposed to look like and were called, we managed to complete two formations with about the same level of competence as usual.

Pilots, getting tired stopped to consume some of the molecules that they had previously acquired from Luna Starmarket, but the shore leave was getting tight. We managed to take off with only 30 earth seconds to spare but decided not to journey too far and took a second shore leave overlooking the Harbor Nebula.

Pastry Queen led us past the Zakim hyperspace byway and back towards the Cambridge System. We took one final shore leave near Luna MIT where security was tighter than pilots remembered and made fuel dumping and our 15 minute shore leave a challenge. But we prevailed! Failure was not an option. We started to take a circuitous path back to the landing pad, passing near the Harvard Constellation. We noticed that Harvard had a makeshift cover set up for their graduation ceremony and Pastry Queen led us into it. We were thinking she set us up for a trap, but instead it was a cup crushing wonderland full of discarded plastic cups and cans of cheap beer. Pilots amped up their cup crushing game, racking up points before our return to the landing pad. Wombat even went after another filled coolata cup, this time remaining dry, with a very satisfying crunch.

Three pilots burned up during the extended reentry, but we made it back to the landing pad without a single mechanical or injury. Success!

Op Cruise Control - Life Support Playlist

SCUL Theme - SCUL
Cruising - Earth - Wind & Fire
Love Is In Control (Finger On The Trigger) - Donna Summer
Precious - Precious - Isaac Hayes
What'd I Say - Ray Charles
Atomic Dog - George Clinton
Smooth Operator - Sade
Rock And Roll Control - Rick James
The Pride (Part 1 & 2) - Isley Brothers
FUNK - Betty Davis
Chillin' - George Duke
Onze Homens e Um Segredo - David Holmes
Pendulus - Bola
Lovedub - Afterlife
Heaven - Moby
Boozer - John Scofield
On the Road Again - Canned Heat
Night Fever - Bee Gees
Melting Pot - Booker T. & The MG's
Jolene - Dolly Parton
Can't Stop Groovin' Now - Wanna Do It Some More - B.T. Express
This Time Baby [Extended Dance Mix] - Jackie Moore
Happiness - Tones On Tail
Time Is Tight - Booker T and the MG's
Work It Out - Earth - Wind & Fire
Holiday (Album Version) - Madonna
Planting the Seed - David Holmes
Pop Life - Prince & The Revolution
Stop On By - Chaka Khan
Fatbackin' - Fatback Band
I Didn't Mean To Turn You On - Robert Palmer
Expo2000 Kling Klang Mix 2002 - Kraftwerk
Forget Me Nots - Patrice Rushen
Mellow - Boris Blenn
Super Disco - Alex Gopher
Midnight Groove - Barry White
Come Fly With Me - Frank Sinatra
A Final Hit - Leftfield
Interstate 76 - Track 7 - Interstate 76
Glow - Satoshi Tomiie
Claire de Lune Samba - Laurindo Almeida
Hot Fun in the Summertime - Sly and the Family Stone
Pick Up the Pieces - Average White Band
Domino - Oxia
I Get Lifted - Orgone
Lions - Tones On Tail
Ladies Night - Kool & the Gang
Dawn Patrol - Nemobird
Billy Jean - Michael Jackson
Boom boom - John Lee Hooker
Son of a Preacher Man - Bobbie Gentry
Watermelon Man - Herbie Hancock
Get Up And Get Down - Dramatics
First Class Love - Teena Marie
Spoonful - Howlin' Wolf
Black Country Rock - David Bowie
I Wonder If I Take You Home - Lisa Lisa And Cult Jam With Full Force
Family Affair - Sly and the Family Stone
Shut Off The Light - Betty Davis
Little Fluffy Clouds (cumuloni) - The Orb
Let's Go - James Reese & The Progressions
Chic Mystique - Chic
I Remember - Deadmau5 & Kaskade