Excerpt: Rise, Kraken! Training Manual
As I’m sure most of you know (and several of you are sick of hearing), I’ve been working on a new comic with the insanely talented Jerzy Drozd, due out from Ape Entertainment late this year.
What most people don’t know is that I’m trying to make it a deeper experience than just a comic, with a lot of supplemental material available on the Web to world-build and make Rise, Kraken! something a bit more immersive* than standard comics fare.
One of these things is a training manual — something a bit broader than KRAKEN, and that can apply to new recruits to pretty much any Global Domination Organization from HYDRA to SPECTRE. At the moment, I’m working on raw content, with layout and illos (probably photographs) to come later; the whole thing will be bundled as a downloadable PDF and may be available for sale if demand warrants.
Excerpt after the fold. Long (1500 words). Probably not as funny as I’d like it to be.
*this is apparently not a word. So: “something one can immerse oneself in.”
STANDARD EQUIPMENT
Beyond your helmet and jumpsuit, we provide KRAKEN recruits with a number of technologically advanced pieces of gear designed to be useful in the base, in the field, or in some cases at social engagements. If you have any questions about your standard-issue equipment, please address them to your squad officer.
KRAKEN-APPROVED BELT
In your civilian life, you probably prescribed to the pathetic belief that the sole purpose of a belt was to hold your pants up. Fool! The belt can be many things, and KRAKEN belts are designed to suit an array of uses:
- Weapon: when removed, the belt can be swung around rapidly and used to strike foes with the belt buckle. It can even be hurled to strike foes who are far away, or to snarl helicopter rotors.
- Climbing aid: if you form a loop with the end of the belt, it can be used to snag outcroppings or low-lying branches to help you ascend cliffs and trees.
- Signal device: to convey messages to agents at a distant but visible distance, you can attach a piece of colored cloth to the buckle and wave it over your head. Useful for desert island rescues and on isolated mountain peaks.
- Small-animal snare: with some cunning, your belt can be part of a rabbit trap or groundhog snare, and may even be used as a tiny lariat if you are of high dexterity.
- Food source: the belt has in fact been made from a high grade of beef jerky, and in cases of dire necessity can be consumed as a foodstuff. Belts made from bonded vegetable protein are available at the commissary for vegetarians.The bacon belt was discontinued after a suspicious number of them went missing on a frequent basis.
KRAKEN-APPROVED UTENSILS
First invented in 876 AD in Naples, silverware has become one of the ubiquitous items in kitchens and households worldwide, except for those places where they use chopsticks a lot. KRAKEN, however, still prizes the gleaming knife, the pointed fork, the stalwart spoon – treat ye not your utensils lightly, and they shall serve you well!
Flatware is not only useful for eating, but also for close-quarters combat. Knives can be used for stabbing, forks for jabbing, and spoons for scooping, the most horrible of all utensil-based maimings. KRAKEN cutlery is made not just with mere steel, but stainless steel, so that the ichor of your enemies will not rust up your fork tines before your next hearty meal in the KRAKEN mess hall.
KRAKEN scientists have been working on a new utensil, a bold new development that blends the best attributes of spoon and fork to create a new, even more useful piece of cutlery. The code-name for this project is “floon,” and if all goes well you may expect to see a floon issued in a standard KRAKEN kit as early as 2012. Earlier attempts to combine either the fork or spoon with a knife ended invariably in disaster, as the razor-sharp handle caused considerable eating difficulties, often requiring stitches or even prosthetics.
KRAKEN-APPROVED SLEEPWEAR
One does not dominate the globe after a night of fitful discomfort! During your four-hour sleep cycle, KRAKEN wants to you to be as well-rested as possible, so that you may rise from your slumbers refreshed and ready to put your nose to the world-crushing grindstone! To this end, we provide every trooper with 100% hemp sleepwear, hand-sewn by KRAKEN agents on special duties due to insubordination or escape attempts. While you may have been mollycoddled by the outside world to expect things to come in weak-kneed “sizes” to accomodate your paltry frame, all KRAKEN sleepwear has been tailored to the ideal form of Supreme Commander Hermann Van Der Blitz. This ensures inspirational sleep and dreams of conquest, rather than sheep or whatnot. If you are smaller than our glorious leader, shame on you! Diet and exercise should help. In the interim, you may use the extra space in your sleepwear to hold extra items while you slumber, such as an a steroid drip, protein shakes, or weights.
Those of a more delicate persuasion may complain of chafing, or itching, or other minor irritations. Think nothing of it! The thick, rugged, crudely stitched seams of your sleepwear guarantee that it will last for decades; the burlap-like texture keeps you alert even in repose. The dyes used to colour the sleepwear have been tested on animals, and you may rest assured that those test results are being held under the strictest security conditions.
For your convenience, KRAKEN sleepwear comes in one large unit of clothing with buttons up the front, and even incorporates foot modules for maximum comfort. These “footies” are equipped with thick, heavy-tread rubber soles such that you may scramble from your bunk to defend your facility in the event of an attack, or scramble from your bunk to load up into a troop transport in the event of us attacking someone else.
KRAKEN-APPROVED MANUAL TOOTHBRUSH
To bite deep the apple of victory, one needs strong, healthy teeth! Your kit contains a KRAKEN toothbrush, made of quality plastics with only the finest synthetic bristles. The “electric” toothbrush under development was discontinued after KRAKEN scientists proved unable to resist the lure of adapted power sources such as radiation, or to investigating other ways to accelerate the brushing process that inevitably increased our dental surgery workload one thousandfold. It is a long-held belief of Supreme Commander Van Der Blitz that overreliance on technology is one of the things that has made the world weak and ripe for conquest, and that manual labour builds character and muscle. Applying this principle to toothbrushes, it is therefore a good thing that your KRAKEN-approved manual toothbrush is one that requires bone and sinew to operate. Brush with vigor! Brush with strength! For it is not your teeth that you are brushing, but the teeth of Empire!
KRAKEN-APPROVED ADHESIVE TAPE
One cannot say enough about the many uses of adhesive tape, particularly the “glutinobond” tape developed in our laboratories. Whether it is used to make field repairs of broken equipment, hold together gaping wounds sustained during battle, or to secure enemy operatives upon capture, KRAKEN-approved adhesive tape bonds at not a surface, but a molecular level, using a complicated system of proteins and acids to eat into the things it is applied to and bond to them 1 mil below the original surface. For obvious reasons, this means that KRAKEN-approved adhesive tape is highly inappropriate for practical jokes. The old “tape over the mouth” prank rapidly becomes the “oh my God he’s torn his own lips off” prank, for instance. I think we can all agree that pranks become less funny once a brother in arms has torn his own lips off.
KRAKEN-APPROVED BUMPER STICKER
While this sticker may not be applied to any actual bumpers, given our emphasis on secrecy in our surface operations, you may apply the KRAKEN-approved bumper sticker to your barracks bunk, your suitcase, your uniform, or anywhere else you deem appropriate. Some KRAKEN troopers think it is jolly good fun to wrap it around the stock of their rifle. Sporting the KRAKEN logo and a snappy slogan, it is guaranteed to bolster your spirits and those of the men around you.
Please do not apply the KRAKEN-approved bumper sticker to KRAKEN tanks, submarines, decopodiflyers, KRAKPOCALYPSE robots or other KRAKEN battle vehicles. It just doesn’t look classy.
KRAKEN-APPROVED T-SHIRT DECAL
It is only natural that you, a raw recruit, will want to show your KRAKEN pride not only when on-duty in your flashy red jumpsuit, but also off-duty when lounging, playing tennis, or generally relaxing with a KRAKEN-sanctioned leisure activity or reading KRAKEN-approved literature. And so we provide you with a KRAKEN-approved t-shirt transfer in your standard kit, with the KRAKEN symbol ready to be put on your favourite piece of clothing. T-shirts are of course not provided, but are available at the commissary for $19.92.
KRAKEN-APPROVED BUST OF SUPREME COMMANDER VAN DER BLITZ (PLASTIC)
And what better to decorate your barracks bunk than an inspirational bust of our glorious leader? The only appropriate answer to that question is “nothing.” In earlier days, the standard-issue bust of Van Der Blitz was made from plaster, but this proved surprisingly brittle during raids from enemy GDOs and COVERT troopers, and the clouds of plaster dust and sharp plaster shards littered across the floor hampered attempts to wage sensible battle across our glorious facilities. We have, therefore, made the sensible step of having all busts cast in lifelike plastic, which makes them effectively indestructible but also startingly lifelike. Several recruits have suffered minor tachycardia upon waking to find the glowering visage of our inspiration and our strength gazing down on them. This is, of course, a way of winnowing the weak from the strong.
If you wish to upgrade your plastic bust to one cast in solid iron, solid iron busts are available in the commissary for $392.99. Any correlation between promotion and the purchase of said bust, a definite sign of your commitment to the KRAKEN cause, is purely coincidental.