CLICK.

"Okay, so, er, Allen, my team has been listening to the audio of your story, and, well to put it bluntly, they love it!"

"Oh, well, I am very glad!"

"There is just one thing though, they are curious about something that you mentioned in the story, uh, hold about let me look for it-"

"Do you want me to-?"

"No, no, I can manage. Ah, here it is! You mentioned a place called 'Up River' during our last session, and they were very much curious as to whether or not you had anything to add on that."

"It's funny you mention that, David, because I was looking back over some of my notes. Not long after the incident with Sea Rogue and his uncle, there was a incident in the place that they called 'Up River' that I think would be very interesting to you."

"I am all ears, Allen."

"Well, first of all, you have to understand that our business, as I am sure you have gathered, was very territorial. Perhaps it would have been a great deal easier, not just for us, but for the ones in charge of handing out contracts to our firm, to stick with one fleet of tugs as compared to starting a vicious bidding war between myself and Zero, but they seemed to enjoy watching us squabble. But there are times, hard as it is to believe, that we were forced to collaborate together on projects of larger sizes that would make even a full fleet struggle on it's own. Now, this time in particular that I remember was when timber and tanning bark was needed to be brought down from the mythical place of Up River. To the tugs, it was a dreamy place. Not as crowded or as industrial as the Bigg City Port, the myths were that if you were a really good boat, you would go there after your time had passed and rest there for...well, forever, I assume. It's a different place now. I think they built a amusement park there not too long ago. Technology, am I right? But I'm getting off track."

...

"This year especially, it was important that we worked together. I told the tugs that much myself. They started laughing uncontrollably when I said that. I don't think they took me that seriously. In retrospect, it was perhaps a foolish attempt. After all, I got it on good authority that Zero's pep talk to his men was something along the line of "Job first, and then ye can have as much fun with the Star Flubs as ye want! Zak, for the love of god, don't set things on fire again, I had a right earful last time". But Zug was having a hard time of it, as he was towing a old hulk that was long past it's sell by date. And no, for once, he wasn't pulling Top Hat. He was rather late as he pulled it along with him. And the others didn't help."

Zip and Zak were busy making sure that their barges were properly tied to themselves, and were chatting. Or at least, Zip was chatting at a very fast speed and Zak interjected a few grunts and groans to make out that he was even remotely interested in the conversation. Deep done, he was turning over what it was that made Zorran so, for lack of a better term, indispensable to Captain Zero. And what he could do to get it.

"Hey, Zug! Yoo hoo! Coo-ee!"

"Zug! You lazy sod!"

"Rich coming from you, Zak" muttered Zug.

"Zorran's going mad waiting for you!"

"You mean he wasn't already!? Could have fooled me!"

...

LAST NIGHT, AT THE BRIDGE CAFE.

"TAKE IT OFF!"

"Zorran, please, you've had one too many-"

"TAKE IT ALL OFF, BABY!"

"Zorran, you're talking to a piano."

"You diving bell dimwit! I know that!" Zorran frowned "Why does the sky twirl around?"

"Oh, that's nice, that is!" said David the Diving Bell as Zorran promptly decided that he was going to be a submarine and turned upside down in the water.

...

"So, is that why Zebedee locked himself in his port and refused to come out for anything?"

"No. Actually that has more to do with the fact that Zorran believed him to be a 'Kraut in disguise' and insisted on slamming him several times into the nearest part of the cliffs." Zug shook his head. "Wait! Why am I even wasting my time with you sorry lot!? Captain Zero gave me the important mission of shoving this here old rustbucket to the breakers yard! Burke and Blair'll get some real usage out of that!"

"You tell Zorran that. And watch his reaction. He's not going to like it!" Zak laughed. Watching other tugs get hurt was always funny to Zak. It was probably the only thing that kept him going other than the idea that one day he'd get the chance to take Zorran's place.

"I'm only carrying out orders! And orders from 'im on top! Zorran can't blame me!"

"Have you met Zorran before?"

"A fair point, Zip."

"Don't you believe it!" And with that, both Zip and Zak departed back down the river, briefly becoming the best of friends as they mocked Zug relentlessly. And they say friendship is a thing of the past.

...

"Please tell me that's not who I think it is."

"It's who you think it is, boyo."

"THIS IS WHY NO ONE LIKES, OJ!" raged Top Hat, as he hurried away from the short, low in the water tug making his way forward, a cocky grin on his face to match his cocky mustache, and a large barge filled with barrels helpfully labelled TNT on it.

"An alligator tug named Billy Shoepack worked up river. He was...for lack of a better term, completely nuts. He often was the one who had deliver essentials to the ones who worked up there from Midsville, such as gasoline, ropes, fuses and dynamite. Which wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for the fact that he constantly blew up whatever was in the way of him. He had formerly been a member of the Salvage Fleet along with Sunshine, though the two had never really interacted much, and Shoepack had been rapidly dropped by the Fleet once they worked out that his idea of salvage was to blow it all to hell and hope that nothing valuable was in there. Why an alligator tug? Well, as many people said, and you can see, he was just as low in the water. Also, because he had the dinner manners of one as well. And in Billy's case, he was just as dangerous and, on occasion, ethical as one at the same time."

"Look who's here! Shoepack, the alligator tug!"

"We. NOTICED." growled Big Mac. Last time he had met Shoepack, he had come away with a soot covered face and a seething hatred of dynamite.

Shoepack would have touched his cap, if he had hands. He spoke with a rather thick West Country accent (rumors that he would later tutor a green Pannier tank engine on how to speak like this have never been confirmed) "Hey, Star Tugs, ain't you ever wondering why you ain't carrying something more exciting than wood!?"

"No."

"Ah." Billy deflated "I...I was kind of hoping for more of a debate-"

"Get that stuff out of here, ye wee snake oil salesmen. Ye're welcome to it."

"Dynamite is exciting! There's lots of lovely sounds to be made from it! Boom! Bang! Crash!"

"No thank you, sonny." OJ shivered. "I was there in the last war. I've had it up to hear with booms, and bangs, and ESPECIALLY crashes."

"It's all fairly harmless if you know how to handle it, like I do! Good thing them up at Munitions knew that I was good at it, I was wasted in the Salvage fleet!"

"You're not unloading next to us, are you!?" said OJ, panic in his voice. His hat began to quiver somewhat nervously at the thought of Billy 'Vesuvius' Shoepack being close to him with any sort of explosive. Especially when he had that strange little grin on his face.

"Fraid so Otis!"

"OTIS?!" OJ was enraged. Despite the fact that the Bigg City was supposedly located around about America, he was very proud of his Welsh heritage. Calling him that American name was like waving a red flag to a very angry bull who would most likely belt out Land of My Father as he tried to murder you.

"Don't worry though! It goes up, we all go up!" Shoepack found this funny. He was the only one.

"EH?!" Big Mac looked as though he was on the verge of crushing the alligator tug right where he stood. Shoepack may have been a bit of a nutcase, but even he knew that arguing that it was a mere joke with the big tug was akin to committing suicide in a very painful way.

"Just a joke! Just a joke! It's all unlit!"

"It better be!" Big Mac growled. "Or there won't be enough of ye for yer former crew ta salvage!"

...

At Mittsville, the logging town, Zug tried very, very carefully to make his way in without being noticed at all.

Unfortunately, the massive rusting boat didn't seem to care as much as Zug did about trying not to make a scene and attract any unwanted attention towards him. It's all right for him, Zug groaned in his head, he's dead! What does he have to worry about? The old tramp steamer (No relationship to Izzy Gomez, unfortunately, despite the fact that the Bigg City had had several complaints from the Mexicans living in the area about how culturally insensitive he was) was making towing very hard for Zug.

He was also rather worried about meeting up with Zorran, but really, what were the odds of-

"What are you doing here?"

Zug froze both physically and mentally as the very familiar voice cut through the air. His mind went into overdrive trying to work out which excuse would work best.

"We're all on log duty! Or did you forget? What am I saying, you're you."

"Aheh! Heh! Uh! Um! Oh! Indeed, ah, yes, Zorran, I, um, seem to recall-" Zug was floundering, and he certainly knew it. The term RROD hadn't been invented yet, but it is perhaps an apt use of the term to describe what was happening to Zug's mind at this very moment "Captain Zero said for me to take it to the Breaker's yard, on my way! You know, to the super important thing with the logs and such, you know how it is!"

"On your way?!" Zorran frowned, even more so than usual "That's a mile further up river!"

"Well you wouldn't believe this, but a giant mermaid said that she would grant me three wishes or something along those lines, and I must have been so distracted that I went the wrong way!" Zug began to laugh, on the verge of hysteria, and grinned widely, in the vain hope that Zorran would let it go.

"Pull the other one, that was Zebedee's excuse for why he's not doing work! Some such claptrap about me getting drunk! ME! DRUNK!? I have been waiting here for you clod to get here for so long, I feel like I've anchored here and rusted away! You're killing me, Zug! All of you are slowly, painfully and violently killing me with your incompetence!"

"But, er, we have to do what the Captain says, Zorran! Isn't that kind of the point of why we follow him? And, well, not to put too fine a point on it, but if they don't get this now, they won't take it at all! And that'll piss him off and no mistake! There's so much breaking up to do, you see-"

"Including you, I shouldn't wonder, if you don't get that dirty rudder of yours moving!"

"I can't!" Zug was keenly aware that Zorran would have no problems telling Zak to, er, deal with him. "It's the current! It's far too fast and strong for me! You can see that! Especially for a little old switcher like me!"

"Fine, you lazy bum. Let's get it there now, before we have to have our bloody smokestacks wrung by Captain Zero!" Zorran growled and snorted angrily, the hangover only making it worse as he joined Zup with the pulling. "Fast as we can!"

"Thanks, Zorro!"

"You call me that again, and I will make sure that Davy Jones's locker gets a new vacancy for a gormless twit! Never mind the thanks, get moving, I want to grab as much of the praise off the logging company as I can. Get full speed up! Come on, come on, you call that moving?! What the hell gave you that idea, a snail!? Move it, move it-" and like a demented drill sergeant, Zorran drove Zug up through the current with great force and sheer will of character alone.

"D-don't push so hard, Zorran, I can't keep ahead! Also, because that tramper really has a rusty front-"

"Faster! For god's sake, I want to go home at the end of the day and actually get some kip instead of having Captain Zero bawl me out for something that isn't even my fault, you bloody nancy!"

"I'm going as fast as I can-"

"PULL, YOU SON OF A COW! The tow's getting slack!"

"I can't hold it! Stop pushing!"

"HOLD IT TIGHT, YOU-" Zorran stared in bafflement as he promptly passed Zug, who was himself staring at the tramper in horror "-fool?"

"I'm trying!" wailed Zug, who looked as though his face was melting, so great was his shock.

"HOLD IT!" Zorran screamed in desperation. "HOLD IT! HOLD IT HOLD IT HOLD IT!" Unbeknowest to him, somehow despite the fact that he had seen that Zug had lost control of the tow rope, he was effectively pushing the tramper sideways, blocking the river completely. All the while, Zug was wailing and gnashing his teeth like some old time damsel who had been snared by a dastardly villain.

"It's got to go!"

CRUNCH.

So it did.

Zorran stared blankly for a moment at the very large dam that had now formed across the river. He was a tug of simple nature, behind all the bluster and scheming, and it took him a few seconds to work out what exactly had happened.

Naturally, he blamed Zug for this.

"It's blocked the river!" said Zug in complete shock, and also in what has to be one of the biggest and most obvious understatements ever recorded by man, boat, engine or otherwise. It's up there a bit with "Crikey, that iceberg looks a bit bad, don't it, Captain?" and "You know, this Hitler chappie is putting us all in a bit of a pickle, isn't he?" with great understatements of history.

"COURSE IT IS YOU GREAT STEAMING NIT!" bellowed Zorran, so angry that his cap promptly did a backflip out of sheer rage.

"I'm trapped! What should I do!?"

"Wait there until Salvage gets there!" Zorran cackled to himself, having gone slightly mad from a combination of the stress and the hangover.

"But they could be ages getting here! I don't wanna be on my own!" said Zug, throwing a Zip-esque tantrum.

"Oh don't worry! You've got all the Star Tugs on your side! Ha! You can have a jolly old time getting the crap kicked out of you! And since most of them are up there with you, and the only ones left are Warrior, who is a idiot like you, and Hercules, who is busy somewhere, no doubt flirting with something-"

...

"Hey baby! Are you a diving bell? Because I'd bet you'd look great going down!"

One slap to the face with a rudder later, and Hercules ruefully turned to Lillie. "So there you are. That's the worst of my pickup lines."

"So, would you like to see me go down?" Lillie asked, waggling her eyebrows. Hercules promptly choked on his seaweed and coconut ale.

...

"-that leaves the entire harbor to us Z-Stacks! Captain Zero will be pleased! He shall give me a medal, and I shall become his heir! That'll be one in the rudder for old Zak, now won't it?"

"Don't leave me here!" wailed Zug, wondering in the back of his mind if this was what Zip constantly felt like.

"Sorry Zug. We'll just have to manage without you. Not that they'll likely tell the difference!" And Zorran left, laughing at his own incredibly stupid joke.

"The old tramper was now a barrier across the river, and Zug was stuck on the wrong side. Especially considering that Big Mac was on that side, and Big Mac could likely kill a tug just by staring at it with great hatred. And then, of course, Top Hat arrived, which always made things ten times worse."

"I SAY!" said Top Hat, throwing as much upper class ham into his stammering of rage as he could "We can't get down river! You stinking great stinker, you!"

Zug began laughing, partly in an attempt to try and salvage as much as his pride as he could, partly because he was so incredibly stressed it felt rather cathartic to let it all out. "It's not my fault! I have no idea what this is! What even is a tramper?! What can I do?! I don't even know what I'm doing on this river! In fact, what even is a river?!"

"We'll never get that cleared on our own" Sunshine remarked. "Would have taken about five of usch schwitchers juscht to get it to schafety before!"

"That means we're stuck up here! Dash and blow!" Top Hat was so outraged by this, his monocle shuddered in sympathy.

"Aye, probably. So, you all right, Zug?" Sunshine was rather calm about the situation. He saw it thus: There is no point in getting worked up until we know that there is no way past this. Top Hat subscribed to a different school of thought which was: Panic, panic, at all costs, damn the trade unions.

"We were taking it up river, and, er, well the tide sort of threw it across and jammed it!"

"Aye, well, it'sch not your fault. Once it schtarts to go, you cannae stop it." Sunshine's Big Mac impersonation needed work. He was in a reflective mood on this fine sunny day. It wasn't like they were going anywhere, so they might as well have a nice chat and a nice view of all of the lovely fauna while he thought of a way to get past the blockade.

Top Hat, of course, had to spoil it by ranting about the lower class and how they were clearly biased against such loving and kind upper class tugs such as he. Sunshine had quickly learnt to tune him out, mostly thanks to some help from Ten Cents on the matter.

"Yes, we found that out!"

"But, dash it all, Sunshine! It's put the blinkers on getting back to Bigg City in time!" Top Hat was rather on edge, he had never really been late on one of the log deliveries before, a fact in which he took pride in despite the fact that this Jobi Wood gave him allergies if he got too close to it. The idea of losing, and all because of a Z-Stack, was not a thought that made him happy. Or as happy as Top Hat ever gets in these situations.

"And it's going to hold up delivery! Yes, I know, schorry, started thinking, won't ever do that again. Right then." Sunshine looked the tramper over, carefully, as if to see if there was a weak point that he could attack so as to get through. There wasn't, to his eyes. "So I'll head back up river for help, I'll get, er, cranes...or schomething!"

"Be as quick as you can! I dislike having to talk to the workers for longer than a minute, and I'm already beginning to think that this jobi wood is giving me rashes!"

...

"At Mittsvile, down river, away from the blockage, Zorran was quietly cackling to himself maniacally and enjoying the idea that he had bested the Star-Fleet, when he was surprised suddenly by a familiar toot. He quickly saw that Ten Cents was heading his way, and realized with some distress that he hadn't quite trapped all of the Star Tugs up that way."

Zorran's mind was rapidly beginning to fill with images of Captain Zero reporting him to the courts, the news about his rather rowdy last night hitting the papers, all the laughing. He quickly approached Ten Cents, stammering out "Ah, it's, er, it's you. Morning Ten Cents!"

"Zorran." Ten Cents looked around, but there was no sign of any of the other Z-Stacks. Nor of the Star-Fleet, which was worrying, as by now production should have been going a lot faster, and therefore the transportation of the timber should have been going along at a great rate. "Ere, what's going on?"

"I thought you were at the logging camp!"

"Yeah, wrong again, Zorran. Nice submarine impression last night." And so saying, Ten Cents moved off, leaving Zorran to stew furiously. "Got pulled out, didn't I? Special delivery for Mittsville, machinery for timber cutting!"

"Huh. I thought all the Stars were up river." Not for the first time in his long life, Zorran began to wonder if perhaps his cunning plan was neither that cunning, or really much of a plan in the long run.

"So, what's going on?"

"Er...well, you'll laugh when you hear this, but there's been some sort of accident up river. Tramper's gone haywire and is blocking the river...probably not that big a deal."

"WHAT!? You mean that no one will get through?! How is that not a big deal?! None of us are going to get paid!"

This had evidently not occurred to Zorran, who immediately began to panic and sweat. If there was one thing Zero hated above all other things, it was the trade unions. But after that was the idea of losing more money. "Yeah, you got it in one, Ten Cents! My, you are a little smartie, aren't you? So quick on the mark, eh?! Hahahahahaha!" Anyone paying attention could hear the distinct note of nervousness behind Zorran's words. The drink had really rattled him, turning the usually on top of everything tug into...well, whatever the hell Zorran was at the moment.

"We'll be behind schedule, and all me mates are trapped up river! What are the odds!?"

"And Zug, the bloody fool!" Zorran affected a look of grief on his face, but Ten Cents wasn't fooled for a minute.

"I'll tie my barge off, and then I'll head on up there! Ten Cents to the rescue, again! I am the only competent person in this entire harbor! Where are you off? Back to port to get help?"

"Oh, of course!" fawned Zorran "Off to tell Captain Zero, you know, stuff like that! Don't fret!"

"Tell Captain Star, won't you?"

"Who? Oh, er, yeah, of course!"

The second Ten Cents was out of ear shot, Zorran muttered "What a idiot." and headed for the nearest pub to steady his nerves a little. "Captain Star, Captain Zero and the salvage team! Leave it all to me, Ten Cents! And here I thought he was the smart one."