"Kraken? Seen one or two in th' skies over Nepal; fought one off o' th' Sultana once, but them 's was sideshow fights compared to rootin' out the Drineh Va in th' jungles o' Venus, or Chthuga in the tunnels of The Martian Temples or in the depths of Iceberg Station," Bailey said in response the romm's general remarks on kraken to the young woman. "Heard an auld crackpot of a natur'list say once the Old Ones're the ancestors of Air Kraken, but I'd say from having met, y' might say, one of the Auld Un's in the fiery flesh (not tae mention their half-human cousin), that th' tentacles're about all they 'ave in common."
Bailey rounded to Pratt, and said, "Ah, I thourt I recognized you, Mister Pratt. Well, we sent that german behemoth packing with severe damage. For a while, anyway. We were 'eavy-damaged ourselves in that fight too, though, and went to an Idependent's freehold for repairs. While we was there, we met yet two others of our 'travellin' ' kind," he winked at Pratt knowingly, "One, A fellow named Pulsifer. Mad Jack Pulsifer, that is, aboard his time-and-space-travellin armed blimp, the Beau Rosin, and things just got wilder and more weird from there, especially after we were rather forcibly joined by another fellow, traveller number Two, name of M.W. Brantley. Tha's the cousin of the Auld Ones that I spoke of, by the way -- and an agent o' some koind 'o inter-dimensi'nal regulatin' organization, corl'd A.U.N.T. S.A.L.L.Y., of all things. Never did foind out wha' the letters stood for; supposedly the answer, bein' partly from the lingo of the Auld Un's, Drives humans insane. Or so the feller said."
"Ended up back on Earth, back around the time that the Sultana (My billet back in the East Indian Air Security Service) was shot down, but even though all the events from that time still occurred, they did so in different places and in different ways, endin' up where Texas and her neighborin' states're now their own major world power, and bein' subverted by some space alien conspiracy."
"And that's where I got separated from my Kirza ('my Moondragon Partner')," he clarified for the others), got lost in a godforsaken hell of a wilderness what's called the 'Mojave Desert,' fell down a hole, and ended up 'ere..."