Grimm III's Vampire Cat
LEGO creation by: Justin R. "Saber-Scorpion" Stebbins
Model Name: KI LRF-3A "Vampire Cat"
Weight Range: Light
Speed: Very Fast
Mobility: Full air and space flight, Interstellar Drive
Armaments: 2 Blazer "Stacker" cannon arrays, 2 missile tubes (payload: 6 warheads)
Capacity: 1 pilot

When a Lone Wolf Mercenary looks for a fighter, he looks for three things: mobility, versatility, and coolness. The Vampire Cat excels in all of these categories, so it became the choice method of transport for famed mercenary Eric Grimm III.

This LEGO creation is based on the ship Grimm III flies in my Nova Refuge webcomic, "Warbringer," which can be found at http://comics.saber-scorpion.com!

First, a bit more about the man himself. Grimm III was the second clone created by Eric Grimm I, leader and founder of Grimm's Mercenary Army. Grimm III, or "Three," as he prefers to be called, was originally trained to be a super-soldier for Grimm's Army. However, he was too perfect a clone of his "old man" to put up with such treatment for long. Soon, just like his "father," he set out on his own... and became a Lone Wolf Mercenary. Today, Grimm I still hunts him for his treachery.
NOTE: Trench coats with hoods are all the rage on Terra Nova these days.

Grimm III was engineered to age rapidly up to a certain point and then stop, and begin aging at a more normal rate. However, the "normal rate" part didn't quite work, and today Three finds himself still deteriorating at a more-rapid-than-normal rate. Currently only a few years old, he might not even reach twenty. This short life expectation only makes him, as Three himself likes to remark, all the meaner, and with nothing to lose.
These are the first two of Three's many armaments: an automatic blazer pistol and a small revolver that he keeps inside his trench coat sleeve, attached to a device that allows it to slide quickly out when needed.

Three's signature weapon, however, is the shotgun. He constantly carries a wide array of shotgun ammunition: blazers, buckshot, slugs, bean bags, firecrackers, dragon's breaths, gas rounds... you name it! The easiest weapon to fire these with is the classic double-barrel shotgun, so Three usually keeps one handy (although this LEGO version is far larger than the one he usually uses).

When Three finds himself in a really rough combat situation, however, he throws off his trench coat and whips out the big guns. He can't mess around with pistols and sawed-off double-barrels when he's mowing down small armies! So he also carries this: the ZygbariTech "Scatterstar" fully-automatic drum-loaded shotgun. The Scatterstar is the most advanced shotgun ever created, capable of firing at surprisingly long ranges, or at short ones, and with a feature that enables the user to load in custom ammo on the fly: exactly what Grimm III likes.

"Deep down inside every livin' man... is a little wad of scum. And the best way to blow it out of 'em is with a shotgun."

The final weapon in Three's formidable arsenal is his Victorian Bowie-2C Blazer Combat Knife. Protected by an energy shield that enables him to use it to deflect energy swords, and made with a special duranium alloy that is both lightweight and nearly indestructible, the Bowie-2C is also sharp and pointy, capable of cutting and stabbing things!

The most chaotic of Grimm's clones, Three can sometimes be extremely careless. That is to say, there just isn't much he really cares about. This typically means he doesn't even care enough to make decisions for himself, so he often uses a single trans-red gambling die to make the decisions for him. In the beginning of my "Warbringer" webcomics (of which Grimm III is the star), Three rolls this die across a starmap in order to decide where to fly next.

Fly in what, you ask? The Vampire Cat! When Grimm III decided he had to leave Terra Nova and look for work elsewhere, he spent his last remaining handful of Vics on the most fitting aerospace craft capable of interstellar travel that he could find. This vessel turned out to be the Vampire Cat.

The Vampire Cat is the smallest manned aerospace craft in existence that is capable of interstellar flight. It was designed by the now-defunct Kojoko Industries in Yavakaro, as their third attempt at making a solid interstellar-capable fighter craft. It was their most successful attempt yet, and was widely hailed as a marvel of engineering, but highly impractical. Civilians wanting to travel from place to place would rather fly in a spacious starship rather than a "coffin with wings" (as some called it), and the wealthy military factions of Terra Nova would rather ship fighter squadrons from system to system inside of larger vessels, as a less expensive and more practical alternative. So eventually Kojoko went out of business, and the Vampire Cat's price slowly dropped... to the point that Grimm III was able to afford one.

The Vampire Cat was named for its default blood-red color scheme and for the small pair of weapons mounts on either side of the core of the ship that looked slightly like an animal's ears. Grimm III customized his ship by mounting the weapon racks with a pair of "Stacker" cannons, which, much like his shotgun, could be loaded on the fly with a wide variety of ammunition types... and he also painted his signature emblem on the ship's wings: a blood red "III". In this case, he modified them slightly to look like cat-sctratches, to match the ship's name.

When I sat down to build the Vampire Cat, I knew the cockpit area would be one of the hardest parts. However, it actually turned out the best in LEGO form, I think. The construction technique I used enabled me to implement the strange windshield part I chose (from the "Scorpion Orb Launcher" Alpha Team Arctic set) with at least some degree of airtight-ness. Sure, there are still visible cracks, but that really can't be helped in this case...

Admit it, the Vampire Cat is a pretty sexy name. At least, Grimm III thinks so, and he loves his ship like many men love their woman... especially since Three doesn't have a woman. Certainly not a permanent one anyway...

Forget "Into the Blue," we're heading "Into the Black."

As previously mentioned, on the first page of Warbringer, Grimm III rolls his die across a starmap to see where to go. Here is that starmap. Sure, it's an awfully small starmap, and Three's die looks awfully big... but remember this is LEGO, so it's not even close to actual scale.

This may be one of my most detailed cockpit interiors ever. Looks awfully cramped to spend days flying from star to star in, doesn't it? Three doesn't complain. He can make the most of very little, and as he often says, he ain't afraid of nothin'. This may very well be true. He is a man without anything to lose, a man for whom death and the unknown hold no terror. The most dangerous kind of man there is.

A quick peek at the underside of the ship. Not all that pretty, but it gets the job done. Note: the simplistic landing gear, the VTOL boosters on the belly, and the small microthrusters on the wings for quick maneuvering in space.

The engines. Not the prettiest part of the ship, I'll admit, as they're a bit blocky... but I had to get in that unique triangular shape, and there was just no other satisfactory way to do it. Believe me, I tried... and I always came back to this as the best one.

The greebles shown here were added at the last minute, and overall the top of the ship might not match what you see in the Warbringer comics. In fact, many parts of the ship don't match the comics exactly. But guess what? It's MY ship, so I can change it all I want! Ha, I just pulled a George Lucas on you. Bet you didn't see that one coming.

Guess what? There's a "play feature" present in this part of the ship! Yeah, you know... for playing with? This is a TOY, remember? It's simple, but it's the sort of thing kids like. Yes, I know I'm twenty years old. So? Anyway... it goes like this: remove the panel as shown, and then hold the ship up to the light...

And it glows! Yeah, I know it's not much... but just look how fun it is to swoosh around! Swooshability is a prime factor in the coolness of any LEGO ship.

Well, it looks like Grimm III's off to another galaxy, looking for work; looking for war. And if there isn't a war where he flies... he brings one.