Here is the second part of the campaign log from our first Deadlands session. My GM comments are in [italics and brackets.]
Note: Part of this session used elements of “Journey o’ the Nightingale” from the Saddle Sore collection of short adventures.
John Clum
Editor of The Tombstome Epitaph
Dear Sir,
I recently arrived in Chicago and will be boarding the Hellstromme Express as planned. I should have a great story for you on the scientists and the symposium real soon. However, I believe I have found a new story that will keep the readers in suspense and the Epitaph doubling its sales. The story could be a series for the Epitaph or, if you were so inclined, you could expand your publication business to Dime Novels.
I have some great ideas for the first story; we could call it “The Fear of the Worm.”
Due to the nature of these stories and the particular relationship that some of the characters have with the law, we would, of course, need to change their names for these original publications. Perhaps, after they’ve passed from this world we could present their real names in a collection of the stories as a memoir. For now I’ll just refer to my two companions as Mira and Dusty.
Below is a tantalizing teaser that I hope illustrates the potential for these new stories. Sadly, my camera had recently broken and I was unable to get any pictures.
My pen is at your service,
Pierre Bascou
~
Sometimes, my dear readers, one’s life can take a strange turn. Sometimes that turn is for the worse and sometimes it is for the better. I still haven’t decided which direction my recent turn has taken me. I’m getting ahead of myself. Let me start at the beginning of my little tale.
I had recently received an assignment from the Epitaph to travel to Chicago and write a story on this year’s Hellstromme Express. My travels from Tombstone to Topeka had gone smoothly and without incident, a rather boring trip actually. In Topeka, my camera slipped from my bag and crashed against the ground. I would have been quite remiss in my reporting if I was not able to provide visual documentation of the scientific wonders that would be on display during the Express. Given that I still had plenty of time to reach Chicago and plenty of coin in my pocket, I determined that heading back to Dodge City would be the wisest choice for getting a new camera. I had hopes of finding an investor to provide the capital I would need to purchase a new camera, one which shares a namesake of the paper which you are now reading.
I purchased new tickets on the Union Blue line and began to retrace my recent journey. As I was enjoying dinner on the first night of my trip, sadly alone, I thought I heard shots ring out, possibly from the adjacent car. Fearing not for my own safety but only for missing a story to share with you, I hastened in that direction but only made it a short distance. Just as I exited the dining car, a woman and man were fleeing the adjacent lounge car.
It took but a moment for me to assess the situation. It was clear that the woman, despite the blood and gore upon her and the Peacemaker in her hand, was quite attractive as well as quite assertive. She screamed, “Jump!” and pushed me with her free hand. I tumbled backwards off of the train. As I fell I noticed that she and the man with her shared a familial resemblance, though his features did not have the same quality as, I assumed given their relative ages, his sister.
Quickly recovering my feet and my dignity from being pushed from a moving train, I hustled over to check on the health of my fellow “jumpers.” As I did, the train was wracked by two separate explosions, one in the engine and one in a middle car, that sent all of the cars careening off of the tracks. I reached my hand out to assist the lady from the ground, which she graciously accepted, and introduced myself, “Pierre Bascou at your service, my dear.”
She simply responded, “Mirabelle.” Of course, how could a dusky beauty such as herself not have a name to match and one, in the romantic tongue of my beloved New Orleans, that means great beauty. Mira’s manners had deserted her, perhaps it was the shock of the abrupt departure from the train and its subsequent explosion, and she failed to provide her surname. Her companion stood and cheerfully introduced himself as Dusty. As I started to inquire about their surname, so I could properly address Mira as Miss, Dusty started to point off in the direction from which the train had recently come. He said something about spotting what “that woman” had thrown from the train’s window. Mira’s attention was fully focused in that direction and the slight furrowing of her brow did little to diminish her features.
As she and her brother focused on that direction, I looked around to get a better sense of our situation. I could not imagine that anyone had survived the explosions and subsequent crash. Looking the other way, I saw two riders heading our way. Assuming that they had been attracted by the explosions and were coming to lend aid, I waved my arms to attract their attention. Dusty joined me. Miss Mira, however, simply yelled, “Run!” Given that she seemed so distressed by the appearance of these riders, I quickly complied with her urgent request.
As we ran, the riders spurred their horses to a gallop. Perhaps Miss Mira had something to hide and I had thrown in with the wrong side here. Such doubts were quickly abolished as the earth shook beneath our feet and a massive worm like creature burst forth from the ground! Long, snaky tentacles shot forth from the thing’s fearsome maw and wrapped about one rider and her horse, dragging both into its gullet. Yes, dear readers, the two riders coming in our direction were both women and one had just been consumed by this worm. Miss Mira screamed for all of us, remaining rider included, to hurry and I needed no additional encouragement.
All of us fled for a small rocky outcropping not far from the rails but, sadly, the rider never made it. The creature consumed her before she was even close. As we climbed up into the rocks, Dusty whiningly and wheezingly asked what the creature was. “That, my dear fellow,” I responded, “is a mojave rattler!” Yes, a mojave rattler. Regular readers of this fine newspaper will have seen pictures of such creatures but they do it little justice. Reading about such a thing and looking at its picture is a far cry from seeing one in the flesh and fleeing from such a monstrosity.
Taking stock of our situation upon the rocks, we realized that we had no food, no water, not even any blankets with which to stay warm in the fast approaching night. Resigned to our situation, there seemed to be little to do at the moment other than ferret out some additional information about my fellow strandees.
Rather than relate the long and emotional conversation we shared, I shall provide you some summary information.
Miss Mira is a member of the bloodthirsty Wichita Witches! A gang of female desperados, the Witches have visited destruction upon the Union Blue, and other, lines for quite some time now. Tragedy and misfortune had thrown Miss Mira in with this dreadful lot. It had not been that long ago that she was happily married to a practitioner of the new sciences, a “mad scientist” as some call them, and expecting a child. Her husband, however, sought pleasure of the most intimate kind in the arms of another woman. Any man that would spurn a beauty such as Mira must truly be mad or a cad beyond redemption. Given that Mira had consented to marry him, he must have been of good character and I can only assume he had been afflicted with some fever of the brain.
When Mira had simply been taking some dinner to her husband’s lab, she caught him in his dalliances with this other woman. He grew quite enraged upon this discovery and became violent. As Miss Mira’s husband leapt from the tables in the back of his lab towards the shocked Mira, he knocked over a lit lantern. This was his undoing and Mira’s strange turn that took her life in an unimagined direction. I’m sure that you can imagine the potential for the danger associated with an open flame in a mad scientists lab.
The lab exploded! Miss Mira was thrown from the entrance and survived; her husband did not. Given her delicate situation, this trauma turned into an even greater tragedy…her unborn child miscarried! Yes, dear reader, in one swift moment, Mira lost her husband and her child. How she then became a member of the Witches is a story for another time…look for The Making of a Wichita Witch soon! Suffice to say that I can only imagine how muddled Miss Mira’s thoughts must have been after this tragedy and how easily she must have been manipulated into believing what the Witches told her.
It is fortunate and timely for me that she came to her senses and had shaken off whatever hold the Witches had upon her.
Her brother Dusty is but a minor character in this story, perhaps even a footnote. As you’ll learn later, however, initial looks can sometimes be deceiving. Dusty had left home to come visit his sister and her husband, unaware of the tragedy that had befallen them. A gambler, it appears that part of his motivation for the visit was his father’s disapproval of his chosen profession. A rather typical story and, as I mentioned a moment ago, a minor character in this story.
But back to our more pressing situation: how to get off of this rock without being eaten by the rattler!
Dusty exclaimed that he had an idea and started throwing smaller rocks out on the ground. I believe he may have been hoping to distract the rattler rather than trying to hit it. It turned out that his plan was successful; just not quite how he wanted it to work. Instead of distracting the rattler, it distracted us from it. It may be surprpising to you but these predators are devilishly clever.
As we all focused upon where Dusty was tossing his rocks, the rattler had snuck up behind us! One of its tentacles slithered right for Dusty! Fortunately, I caught sight of this and shouted out. Dusty jumped out of the way and threw a playing card in the same motion. I don’t know why he threw a card instead of rock but, of course, the card did nothing. Perhaps not the wisest choice of weapon but he is certainly quick. A few moments later, he shuffled his cards, pulled one out of the deck, and stuck it to Mira’s forehead. I believe that the stress of the recent events may have taken their toll on the poor boy.
In the last rays of that day’s sun, we could see some small movement near the train wreckage: a survivor! Miss Mira made to go in that direction but I stopped her. Her face showing a trail of tears from guilt and remorse, she asked, “Is there nothing we can do for them?” Sadly, I informed her, there was nothing we could do with the mojave rattler prowling beneath the ground; we’d only perish ourselves. As if to confirm that, I saw no movement when I looked back to the survivor: just some disturbed earth.
I don’t know how long we sat there in the dark, consumed by our own thoughts and huddling together for warmth. I can only guess at the demons that gnawed at Miss Mira. My own thoughts turned to you, dear readers. On my first assignment for The Epitaph and I had fallen, quite literally, into an amazing story. However, as you might guess, one cannot submit a story from within the belly of mojave abomination.
We were each broken from our private reveries by the sound of a train whistle! We rose and frantically scanned the darkness for a train’s light. There! Coming from the direction of Salina was a train! Yes, astute reader, our train had been traveling in the direction of Topeka and now, on this same single track, a train was coming from the other direction, just hours later. I thought it strange as well and, as we’ll see soon enough, was justified in such thoughts. Miss Mira suggested that we could make a run for it if the train stopped. If, I thought. Even if it did stop, it would most likely stop near the wreckage instead and that was at least a hundred yards away from current haven. If the rattler was still lurking, we would never make it.
When the train pulled past the wreckage and stopped right by us, you can imagine both my surprise and my relief! The engineer leaned out of the engine and called out, “You folks need some help?” He had no idea! We decided to make a run for it. The train was about fifty feet away and, if we were lucky, the rattler might not catch us. One…two…three…we ran!
Lady Luck, unlike the moon, did not smile down upon us. Halfway to the train, the rattler rumbled beneath us and reared its hideous head right behind Dusty! As it rose up to swallow him whole, Mira shoved her brother out of the way of danger and placed herself in the most immediate. Drawing her gun as the monster’s tentacles reached out at her, Mira angrily screamed, “No one eats my little brother!”
As Dusty and I reached the train, the night’s stillness was rent asunder. Blam! Blam! We turned to look at our guardian angel; her arm practically in the beast’s mouth, Miss Mira had fired off two quick shots. Fearing the worst, we both started to go back but she turned and ran for the train. The monster did not follow. As the train pulled off into the night, we could see the beast fall and cease moving. Miss Mira had saved us with that daring shooting. I have read of but have never personally witnessed such bravery in man or woman; to face such a creature in such a manner would require nerves of steel, or the awakening of a motherly protectiveness for a child so cruelly taken and redirecting it towards others around said mother.
Relieved and feeling safe, we settled on the train and that, my friends, is when things began to get weird…
(To be continued)
