Iron Quill - Feast - The Great Soul Train Robbery

[admiralvorkraft]

The Great Soul Train Robbery

Words: 1750
Ingredients used: All

 

His ma had always said, “It’s those you love, what get you into trouble,” and damn but she was right. It was love that sent him dashing off into the quarantine zone when the moons were already rising, and love that led him to the back room of The Kicked Dag, and now he was staring down the barrel of a pistol held in the shaky hands of Mrs. Dag herself.

 

“Settle down,” he said, holding out his hands so that the slouch-eyed proprietor could see he meant no harm, “You’re gonna strain yourself.”

 

“Ha,” Dag said, she was an old woman - as much of antique as the Navy pistol she carried, “You tell me your name first, son, or I’ll blow you away.”

 

“Look,” he sighed, “You fire that hand cannon now you’re liable to break both your arms. That’s if the charge is any good which, judging from the fact you kept it under the bar where fine folks have been spilling their beer all night, it ain’t. Besides, I ain’t here for you or yours. I’m looking for something I lost.”

 

“Yeah?” Dag said, “Maybe you’re right, maybe you’re not. You a betting man?” Dag waited. The stranger said nothing. “No? Good. Now why don’t you sit yourself down on that crate and I’ll rest my gun on this here table, and you tell me real slow how you came to be breaking into my establishment.”

 

The man sat.

 

“And you can start with who you are,” Dag said, “I can’t keep thinking of you as ‘the man with no name.’”

 

“That depends on who you ask, don’t it?” The man said, “My ma called me Lucky, but everybody else, they just called me Blue. ‘Cause I came into the world all choked ‘round and before I came to Malifaux I was on path to leave it the same way. I had a knack for train jobs see, I was always the jumper -”

 

“I don’t care,” Dag said, “I’m not trying to run a train.”

 

“You want to hear why I’m here you’re gonna have to let me tell it my own way.” Blue said, “I was chasing something awful precious to me and if I tell you out front, you’re gonna laugh, and if you laugh at me I’m gonna have to try and kill you. Like you guessed, I’m no gambler. I’d rather not try anything while you’ve got me at pistol length.”

 

“Fine,” Dag said.

 

“Train work ain’t easy, and it ain’t consistent see. Most like a train job is either feast or famine depending on who is on board. Car full of bankers from out East? You’re in the money enough to lay low a spell, Guild transport? Hope you spot it before the shooting starts.

 

“Anyway, it was working one of my first jobs that I found her. I jumped down off the watering station, middle of Louisiana territory just as they was pulling in. There was a Frenchman engineer coming up top for the hook-up. I saw him, shot him. I was inside with my gun on the conductor before anyone could rightly say what was going on.

 

“I signaled, and the rest of the crew came in hard like they were supposed to, started going car by car for watches, cash, guns. Got about a hundred head of cattle off that one… Anyway, all them boys were looting and I felt a bit left out, so I start interrogating the conductor; does he got a watch? No, time piece is built into the train. Gun? It’d just get him shot. Knife, or anything?

 

“Well it turns out he had a hat. And it was a nice hat too, all black leather, brim out to here. So I said, ‘I want it,’ and he gives it to me, in its own box no less! It was clear he cared about it so I felt a bit bad and gave him the box back. Still took the hat of course, it weren’t like he was wearing it.”

 

Dag licked her lips, “You kicked in my back door on account of you were looking for a hat?” She spoke very slowly and very clearly because she was beginning to think she might be dealing with someone rather dumb.

 

“Don’t laugh..” Blue said.

 

“That hat?” Dag said, pointing at the battered leather number in his hand, “Keep going.”

 

“See, for a few months that hat was my good luck charm. I wore her, we feasted, that was up until the Trans-Pacific job.” Blue waited for a reaction, “Come on, you heard about that one didn’t you? Up jumped gang out of nowhere catches the Trans-Pacific La Grande on horseback? Rides off with half a million dollars and the monthly soulstone ration for the west coast?” He peered at Dag, “Aw, you heard about it, you just don’t wanna embarrass me by reacting. Much obliged.

 

“Anyway, we knock over the La Grande while it’s going around a curve, hit the back cars while the Guildies up front are none the wiser. I bail from the engine car straight onto the fastest horse we could find and I go tearing off across the badlands.

 

“Only, it turns out there was one fellow we hadn’t accounted for. Sharpshooter up pissing off the edge of a coal car when we hit. I guess he figured what we were about ‘cause he takes a shot at me as I’m riding away. Just had time for one before I’m long gone, and my hat…” Blue teared up a little, “She took the hit for me, went tumbling into the dirt. I didn’t even feel the shot, though it damn near creased my skull, and would’ve if she hadn’t…

 

“Things turned south after that. Long stretch of famine. One train after another was packed to bursting with blue coated Guardsmen, no way to make an honest living under those conditions… So we got dishonest, set up Gattling guns either side of the tracks to keep the Guildies heads down. Of course that made our costs go up so we had to start taking more valuables, not just insured goods. People started fighting back with their livelihoods on the line so we started shooting ‘em more. Vicious cycle, see?

 

“Now, there started being some noise made in the gang that we had to start coming up with an exit strategy. One last job that sets us up for life. Well there was only one way to do that of course, knock over the Malifaux Special as it was coming out all loaded down with unmarked stones bound for sorting in Oxford.

 

“‘Course, Mississippi’s a bit in the bright light of civilization for our tastes, but we were getting a mite full of ourselves by that point… Anyway, there were plenty of voices against it at first, mine included. That was, until the posse caught up with us just a few hours ride out of Dodge City at a watering hole called The Wandering Eye.

 

“I was grabbing my forty winks when the shooting started so I crept downstairs in my boots and underthings and a repeating carbine. It wasn’t looking good when I got there, Dusty was already shot and bleeding out, Doc Collin had a soulstone in each hand powering a shield that looked like it might go down any second, his hair was all standing on end and he looked half-stroked just holding it together. The rest of the boys were firing from cover but the posse had proper mages, Oxford grads, and they were doing… I don’t know, but something big. So I shot the furthest one between the eyes and hightailed it back upstairs. Figured I’d jump down outside, get the other ones - but ‘fore I could the whole bar exploded. Magic gone wrong, see. When the dust settled it was just me, Doc, and some of the boys close enough under his shield to not get killed in the collapse.

 

“And there was the hat. Just sitting there. Patched now, a little dusty, but she was still my hat. So I took her up and we all rode off.

 

“After that we figured our days were numbered, may as well go out with a bang, and anyway I had my hat back so I was all in favor of hitting the Malifaux Special. We took about six months in the planning. I crossed into Malifaux ahead of time, got myself a Guild Guard contract and rode the train back on my first leave.

 

“Plan was for me to work my way forward and stop the train. The gang would derail the cargo cars with soulstone charges, strip ‘em and we’d ride. Only, when I came through the Breach the first time I started getting commentary from my hat. Warnings, mostly. She got me out of a few scrapes, earned me a bit of a reputation with the Guards as a scout and a survivor.

 

“And she told me to stay put.

 

“The gang was all in coffins before we reached the rendezvous point. They were ready for Guardsmen, not for Marshals. Those that weren’t shot were disappeared. All except Doc Collin, who was standing on the tracks surrounded by soulstones all rigged to blow, laughing his damn fool head off.

 

“Well the conductor saw him sure enough, or got a vox that some guy intended to blow us sky high. He got the train stopped in time, started reversing back through the Breach when Doc took his finger off the dead man switch. Blast damn near killed us all, but lucky me I was in the clear. Took my chance to fake my death ‘cause any of the gang the Marshals interrogated would have ratted on me faster than…

 

“So you see why I had to come looking for her don’t you?” Blue ended plaintively.

 

“Suppose I do,” Dag said, “By the sound of it though, I might just want to keep this thing for myself.”

 

“Well damn,” Blue said, and he flipped the table, knocking Dag back and the gun wide. The barrel belched, there was screaming from the bar and someone laughing. Blue shook a derringer from his coat sleeve, caught it, and planted it in Dag’s forehead.

 

“We’re leaving,” he said, and settled the hat on his head.

 

At the door, Blue turned and shot Dag through the table.

 

“That wasn’t very nice,” the hat scolded him.

 

“I’ve had a long day,” he said.

[The Grue]

I liked this story. I enjoyed how Blue told it in his own way and I could even see the flashback montage as he was telling it. Got sort of lost a few times and had to go back and re-read parts but over all a decent tale.

 

As always,

The Grue

 

[Gnomezilla]

I did not find any point to get lost at. It was all flowing together in a logical order.

It did in the beginning dance back and forth between the love of a person and the love of a thing, at least to me while I read it, but going back and re-reading you never actually made that mistake even when referring to the hat as 'her'. It is just baggage that this reader brings and attaches to the first mention of "those you love". Very well crafted.

[admiralvorkraft]

Thank you both for your feedback.

The Grue, could you be more specific where you got lost? I'm sure I can clean it up easily enough, unfortunately I know what I meant so it's hard to see where I went wrong.

Gnomezilla, I'm glad you liked it. I had fun writing the thing.

[The Grue]

Now that I have read it once I am having trouble finding the specific spots where I got lost. I have reread it numerous times and can't seem to pinpoint where it was. I am forced to recant my earlier objection, though it never changed how I liked the story, which I did. Jobs pulled on trains always are fun and I enjoy reading them.

 

As Always,
The Grue