Honorable
Mention goes to Boddaker, certainly the most entertaining
of the entries:
THE
CASE OF THE MISSING CASE
It
was late on a cold, stormy night. I had been battling it out in
Ponyri for over 5 hours now with little to no success.
Our tattered flag had been stolen yet again as I advanced in my
Sherman tank ever closer to the enemy flag base.
Eliminating three Panzer tanks, I managed to get close enough
to jump out and make a mad dash towards the flag.
No sooner than I get into the factory, I hear my tank instantly
being reduced to shrapnel, thanks to an opponent
with a Panzerfaust hiding in the tree-line. I immediately scanned
for alternate methods of transportation to aid in
my hasty egress. Amazingly, the enemy flag was unguarded, making
my acquisition easier than expected. Fleeing out
the side door, I quickly spotted a Jeep and jumped in. Charging
up and over the hill with the flag, I belted out my
favorite line, “I’VE LOST THE FAT MAN AND I’M
RUNNIN’ LEAN!!”
It
was about this time when the storm chose to cause a power failure.
In a nano-instant one of my finest Call of Duty
achievements was reduced to a miniscule white dot in the center
of my monitor, fading into oblivion. As I sat
motionless in my chair trying to think of the appropriate string
of obscenities, a female voice emanated from behind me.
“Excuse
me, I need help,” she said. It had been a long time since
anyone needed the help of an out-of-work private
investigator specializing in computer parts… too long. Too
long, in fact, that I forgot what to do. I haphazardly spun my
chair
around spilling my half-eaten box of ranch flavored Bugles on
the floor (a tragedy in and of itself). I was about to blurt out
a new string of obscenities, but lost my train of thought upon
gazing up at her. She had long blonde hair flowing over her
tight camouflage t-shirt. It was tied up in front, revealing her
Half Life 2 tattoo just above her navel. She was wearing the
lowest cut cargo shorts I have ever seen, perilously dangling
from her hips. The vision of her butt crack very nearly took
my attention away from the present Bugle disaster.
“I
can’t seem to locate my computer case, and I need you to
find it.” Her voice was as rough as the calluses on her
mouse
hand, no doubt caused by all the HL2 gaming. I thought it strange
to have lost something as substantial as a computer case,
but I was in no position to question her.
“What
kind of case is it?” I asked, having changed my position.
“It’s
a Lian Li V1000,” She said as she handed me a copy of her
invoice. I knew that case well. Having dreamt of owning
this case for months, I had no need for a description. The extraordinary
amount of engineering that went into this case is
surpassed only by its beauty. Sleek aluminum design, 120mm intake
and exhaust fans, inverted style motherboard mounting,
and compartmentalized interior are all well thought-out features.
It boasts sturdy, aluminum locking wheels, none of those
feeble plastic Office Depot casters other cases use. The easy-access
multimedia ports in front make for no-hassle hookup
at LANs. The almost exclusive use of thumbscrews inside AND out
results in an excruciatingly easy install of components.
This must be the reason why she had chosen this case.
“I
ordered it from Voyeurmods.com and UPS lost it during shipping,”
she explained. With a newfound sense of motivation,
I went right to work. I looked up her UPS tracking number and
found that the package had somehow been re-routed to
GruntvillE, Alaska. This actually came as no surprise to me. GruntmaN,
the elusive little town’s mayor, had been known to
periodically check UPS’ lost and found for unclaimed packages
to offer as occasional giveaways on his website. The power
still out, I consulted the latest printed version of the Internet
and checked his site. My suspicions were correct.
“AHA!”
I exclaimed. “I have found your case! But… it’s
been… modified.”
“What
do you mean?” She asked.
I
described, “Someone has painted flames and skulls all over
it. And oh my God, it is quite amazing!”
Out
of nowhere she got hostile. “Listen! Are you going to get
my case back, or are you just going to sit there drooling all
over yourself?”
“I
can’t guarantee anything, lady. I will let you know next
week!”
|
