Ryan Leeson, Samantha Duncan, Randall Jeffries, Larry Eastbrook, and Carrie Brierton entered the secondary lab, and were greeted with a strange sight.
Many people they recognized from the Research and Development department were there, either standing or sitting on chairs, but they were all changed. All different.
A few who were dressed in steampunk-style clothes were working on bizarre steam-powered devices not normally seen at McMillan Tech Industries. Obviously, they were under the influence of the Steampunk Gun.
There were three clowns, three Goths, and four Punks present, as well as some dressed in old-style pirate, whaler, or merchant seafarer clothes. One of those seafarers was Doug Sallow, the Department Head they were looking for.
"The Seafarer Gun..." Ryan whispered to Jeffries, as his mind flashed back to the day the group came up with it during one of their sessions in the break room.
McMillan Tech Industries basement lab complex, break room, four days ago
The group of six collaborators had been coming up with ideas for Transformation Guns for nearly a month at this point. There had been a few that had been rejected, and not written down into their catalog. Ryan wondered if they were running out of ideas, but Jeffries was still willing to keep the Transformation Guns 'homebrew RPG-like scenario' going for a bit longer.
"Okay, we had a few ideas here and there I'd like to combine into one." Jeffries said. "We rejected any Transformation Gun that automatically turned someone into a thief or an assassin or other lawbreaker, so no pirate, pickpocket, ninja, or other such things. But maybe we could combine the overall sea thing into one. Samantha, Ryan, and I had a few ideas, and I've refined them into the Seafarer Gun."
"The Seafarer Gun?" Mycroft Brewer asked.
"How is this different from the rejected pirate, buccaneer, whaler, or naval officer guns?" Rachel McLewis asked.
"I'm glad you asked." Jeffries said. "The Seafarer Gun not only automatically dresses people in whaler or pirate or other seafarer clothes from the golden age of sailing, but also fills their heads with all the nautical and piratical lingo, as well as knowledge of old sailing vessels and how to sail them that would make today's moden re-enactors jealous. The flexibility allows the zapped person to be whatever kind of seafarer THEY want to be - pirate, whaler, merchant sailor, naval officer, you name it. It's their choice entirely."
"So basically this is another subculture thing like the Goth, Punk, Geek, and Steampunk Guns." Samantha said.
"Exactly." Jeffries said. "These days, people emulating the look, style, and nautical terms and phrases are a subculture like those you just mentioned, and medieval re-enactors."
"A number of those subcultures also have different variations within them, so this works for me." Rachel said.
"Works for me, too." Ryan said. Most everyone agreed on this, and the Seafarer Gun was added to the catalog of Transformation Guns.
McMillan Tech Industries basement lab complex, secondary lab, present day
The Seafarer Gun, like the rest of the Transformation Guns, had somehow been made real at the start of this very long day. And now Ryan, Samantha, and Jeffries saw that their department head Doug Sallow was one of the ones zapped with it.
"Ahoy, there!" Sallow proclaimed. "What brings ye landlubbers to our gathering?"
"We've been looking for you." Ryan said.
"There's been an incident in the Board room involving the Random Gun." Samantha said. "Mr. McMillan and several of the others have been incapacitated due to transformation shock. This whole thing has spilled out into the rest of the world, and we need you to help us."
"Don't listen to them!" said tech Arnie Amspoker, who was zapped by the Punk Gun. "They're probably spies for McMillan!"
There were a number of grumblings and growlings. "Or worse, that Dankworth creep!" said Teresa Talton, who was now a Geek Goth.
"We're not spies for anybody!" Jeffries proclaimed. "We're here to help you!"
"Help us, ye say?" Sallow said. "And why should we believe any of ye? Give us some reason why we shouldn't clap ye in irons and stow ye in the cargo hold! If it turns out you're lying, we'll have ye keelhauled!"
Ryan turned to his friends. He realized this could get ugly. He knew they had to keep them talking. Just randomly zapping them with Restoration Guns would make the rest angry, and Ryan's group was outnumbered.
He hoped anyone zapped with the Seafarer Gun over at Lake Point High School wasn't causing nearly as much trouble.
