Murder on the Victorian Express (IC)

[KnightDisciple]

Fenris had been right about the timing; it had taken only a couple more seconds, and the armor was fully up and running. And with his speeds, he was quickly outside of the train, albeit a bit further down its length. A short burst of speed solved that problem; he was in ideal sniping range for his weaponry.

So he started to cut loose, firing off several blasts from his Particle Projector Cannons. A few of the Thuggees fired back, one of them hitting him (which even with such antiquated weaponry, was no large challenge), but the bullet simply *spanged* off the armor. In the space of perhaps two minutes, he'd managed to drop a goodly number of them, while Jubatus seemed able to take care of the rest alongside the four policemen.

Then Jubatus zipped over and offered him "praise". The glowing eyes almost seemed to narrow, and Fenris leaned over a bit, arms crossed over his chest.

"For someone who seemed to know who I was at the start of all this, you shouldn't be shocked. It's easily found out that this "tin can", which took quite a bit of skill and knowledge to build, is more than just "decorative". What's the matter, Meme-cat? Scared someone else actually manages to contribute?"

It seemed clear he hadn't liked either the "dog-face" comment or the remark about whether his armor was decorative or not.

[Cubist]

"For someone who seemed to know who I was at the start of all this, you shouldn't be shocked. It's easily found out that this "tin can", which took quite a bit of skill and knowledge to build, is more than just "decorative". What's the matter, Meme-cat? Scared someone else actually manages to contribute?"

Jubatus winced at the "meme-cat" reference, but he stifled his annoyance nigh-instantly. Keeping his voice down so that only Fenris could hear, he said: "One: At the start of this, I didn't know you from Adam, just that you're an armor-wearer who's got some serious Old World manners. Two: You really need to loosen up, son. If a little friendly banter from an ally torques you off, you're gonna be easy meat for any black hat who's seriously trying to get under your skin. And if you don't like me calling you 'son', well, I was born in 1946 -- probably old enough to be your father, maybe even your grandfather. Three: I'm a speedster. 'Fast' is what I do. You want to kvetch about how I'm doing too much, fine by me; you want to take advantage, like maybe offer me suggestions on tasks to carry out, also fine. Entirely up to you." Jube shrugged. "If you're serious about wanting to contribute, I'm thinking we need all the intelligence we can gather, and you may not have noticed, but my 'people skills' kind of suck. Care to debrief the bobbies?" he asked, gesturing at the policemen.

[KnightDisciple]

"The fact that I'm wearing viable power armor should be a hint I'm not a schlub."

Then he leans in further and pokes Jube in the chest with one clawed finger, his other hand twitching.

"And you don't get to call me "son". You don't deserve to call me son. You call me that again, you regret it. I don't care how old you are. And if you even think about trying to joke about it, I make you regret it. Understood?"

He barreled on through the conversation without giving the speedster a chance to respond in normal time.

"And it's not about speed. It's about respecting the fact that before I helped you in the fight, I was actually working to gather more information from some of the suspects. I just had to move at normal person speed to do it. But yeah, I'll go talk to the local cops."

With that, he stalked down the length of the train, muttering a couple of unkind words in Swedish and Russian, stopping once within earshot of the police.

"Ah, gentlemen. Sorry we didn't help out sooner. Do you have anything in particular you need to know?"

[Supercape]

GM

"Ah, gentlemen. Sorry we didn't help out sooner. Do you have anything in particular you need to know?"

The four policemen seemed more proficient in Urdu than English, although all could speak it. The Seargent seemed to speak it quite proficiently and spoke on behalf of the group.

"Thanking you kindly, sir! A most wonderous invention you have there! We had heard that the Victorian Express was transporting some of the marvels of London engineering, but never would have we have guessed of the incredibleness of what we have been the witnessing!"

The three coppers nodded in agreement.

"The thugee, Sir! They wish to overthrow the glorious glory of the British Empire. Very bad. Steal the inventions! You see, they all attacked us, to get to the over there train!"

[Cubist]

Jubatus knew that Fenris was debriefing the local police. Unfortunately, the feline did not know that his two comrades on the train were being assaulted with lethal intent by men dressed as Sikhs...

Okay, you've torqued off the dude with the energy cannon. Great job, sonny-boy! Best if I stay the hell out of Baron Battlesuit's way while he's chatting 'em up; I'll be a major distraction to everyone, just not for the same reasons in all cases. In the meantime... don't like the thought of those Thugees running free. Let's see if I can catch up to 'em and bring 'em in.

So it was that the fastest cat on two worlds sped through the Indian jungle! Jubatus' targets had a few minutes' head start on him; he had to assume that his targets were much more familiar with the local terrain than he was; and Thugees being what they were, he suspected it was a good bet that they'd worked up some techniques to throw bloodhounds off their trail. Against that, Jube had raw, blistering speed and a predator's acute nose, plus human-level intelligence. He wasn't at all sure if he could track the Thugees to their hidey-holes... but he figured it was worth a shot regardless.

[Cubist]

As it happened, Jubatus had no real difficulty in capturing the Thugees who'd fled the field of battle and transporting them back to the police that Fenris was debriefing. It was a one-at-a-time deal; even with his physical strength augmented by the gravity-damping side effect of his Timeshift, Jube just didn't have the muscles to comfortably carry more than one adult human. Fortunately, physical strength was not a necessary prerequisite to 'handcuffing' a perp with duct tape...

When Jube deposited the first runaway before the native cops, they were greatly surprised -- but with each new Thugee the speedster brought in, it seemed more likely that their surprise was more due to his having seemingly popped up out of nowhere than to his inhuman appearance. Odd, but I've got other fish to fry right now. Jube made sure that each new Thugee was well-separated from all of the ones he's brought in before, the better to ensure that none of them would be able to help any other out of their duct-tape bonds. Since it was a one-at-a-time deal, Jubatus had ample opportunity to review his planned course of action, and decide to leave the interrogation to the natives. That way, there'd be no serious possibility of a language barrier; apart from that, the cops, unlike Jube, would presumably know what 'rules of engagement' they were bound by, hence know what they could do about the perps without risk of crippling any criminal case they'd otherwise be able to make against the perps.

When the 20th (and final) runaway was caught, Jubatus didn't want to interrupt the ongoing conversation, so he gave Fenris an expectant look, attempting to convey the notion, Done here. Got another job for me? in silence...

[Supercape]

GM

Back on the Victorian Express...

Ms. Wells was becoming a little fretful "I do hope there is no bloodshed..." she moaned "I can't abhor....AIEEEE!" she screamed.

The two Sihks in the passanger carriage had crept in, almost silently, and were carrying Kiphur knives. As Ms. Wells saw them, Carrie heard them. With a yell in Urdu, they both lunged forward - quick and deadly.

The men were both fast, and skilled - not your regular back street brawler. The knives snaked forward as both skilled men sought to impale Carrie - but she remained faster still, and neither man managed to gain the upper hand.

[Aoiroo]

The rather unsubtle arrival of the Sihks didn't surprise Carrie in the least. Thank god these weren't the brightest bulbs in the box, otherwise they might of actually gotten the jump on her, but as they lunged forward she sort of just snorted at the lack of difficulty it was to dodge slip under the blades of the knives. With both hands she used the confined space of the train to strike at both of them, nailing each assasin with each fist right into there guts. As the would be assasins crumpled she stretched a little bit before looking at Ms. Wells,

"I do believe, we have found a new lead on this case. Now, if one of those guys can get over here I won't have to carry these guys by myself in a long skirt."

[KnightDisciple]

GM/NPC

"Thank you for the compliment. It took hard work and no small amount of time."

That his invention was really Swedish wasn't something that needed discussed here and now.

"As for the Thugee...I saw the attack. Can't say I saw or heard why. I'd rather not speculate with no information."

He glanced over as Jubatus returned with the "escaped" Thugees. Seeing them just appear, one by one, with a multicolored blur moving around near the pile, was a bit odd, but one learned to keep in stride with odd things when you were a hero.

"I'm afraid I'm not well-versed in your native tongue. My comrade has apprehended the others; we'll allow you gentlemen to take care of the interrogation from here. Best of luck to you."

He gestured for the cat-man to follow. Once they were further out of earshot, he spoke softly.

"I'm going to speed around to the other side of the train and climb on-board. I'd rather avoid too many awkward questions. We need to get back to the others, maybe compare notes on what we know so far."

With that, he hunched forward a bit, and suddenly there was a rush of air, a flash of light, and he was out of immediate sight, and on the other side of the train.

[Supercape]

GM

The two thugee assassins had proved no match for Carrie, and were just coming round when Jubatus and later Fenris arrived, although Ms. Wells had taken the precaution to bind them firmly with industrial wire from the engineering equipment that accompanied the Brit machine.

The two men stared at each other and then at the heroes, showing grim defiance and not uttering a word.

Ms. Wells crossed her arms.

"I daresay the thugee are behind this scullduggerry. No doubt wanting to do their bit for Indian independence, despite all the Empire provides for them. And no matter what the cost. Democracy be damned, murder is all these fellows know!"

[Aoiroo]

Carrie took her pointer finger and waved it a little,

"No, no, Ms. Wells we mustn't jump to conclusions. It's nice to state it as a theory, but if you convince yourself that this is the only answer, you leave yourself open to manipulation."

Bending over she looked at the dudes carefully,

"I honestly cannot think of a more perfect fall guys, after all, you don't think of them as people, you think of them as others. Outsiders, with different language and culture which may or may not condone practices that you yourself deem immoral."

She looked up and met her gaze,

"Stop, they aren't savages, they are people and you shouldn't classify them as anything less. People are assasins, people are violent, and people,"

She looked at the thugees and gave a sigh,

"Are imperfect, or in this case, incompedent if they couldn't handle two lone woman. I'm a bit disappointed honestly though I guess I should be thankful about how much the perpetrator underestimates us."

[KnightDisciple]

GM/NPC

Fenris paused for a moment at seeing the bound men, then continued into the compartment. He allowed Carrie to speak first before lending his own rumbling mechanical voice to the affair.

"She's got a point. Nothing says these men are "freedom fighters" as opposed to hired hands for someone.

As for the whole bit about wanting freedom...Well, not something I can condemn a people group for. For some, freedom is worth any personal price; the ones that are really dangerous are the ones who want others to pay that price for them. Your Empire's nowhere near perfect. Britain is not God's gift to Earth. Just keep that in mind.

That said..."

He suddenly whirls and picks one of the men up and slams his against the wall of the compartment one-handed. He lets out a mechanical snarl.

"Do you understand part of what I say here? I'd say you'd be better off talking. Now."

[Supercape]

GM

At that moment, Ramstein burst in looking somewhat flustered, brandishing a rather flamboyant and large brass pistol in one hand and a makeshift club in the other.

"Halt!" he shouted. "Thugee! Murderous scum!"

Spying the two tied up men, who looked genuinely frightened, the enraged Baron drew up his pistol and took aim at the helpless men...

[Cubist]

Jubatus hadn't said anything about Miss Steampunk's casual bigotry, because he strongly doubted that his sentiments would have been received well by their target. This wasn't his world, after all, and giving the natives a tongue-lashing would have been, at absolute best, a momentary pleasure whose lasting effects... if any... would not have been anywhere near what he might have wanted. As far as Jube was concerned, the sooner he got home, the better.

When Ramstein drew his pistol, however... well, that was different. Before the man's "murderous scum" had finished leaving his lips, the fastest cat on two worlds upshifted and yanked the weapon out of Ramstein's grip, being careful throughout to ensure that the business end of the gun was never aimed at anything that could bleed and die.

"I guess it's not 'murder' unless the victim is someone who, y' know, matters," Jube snarled. "Tell me, does the phrase 'presumption of innocence' have any meaning hereabouts? Or how about 'Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me' -- does that one ring any bells?" You [bg=black]xxxxixx[/bg] hypocrite, Jube did not say... but he surely wanted to.

[Supercape]

GM

Ramstein was clearly shocked at the Cats appearance, and his frightening speed. He looked at his empty hand in astonishment.

"Wha..."

"" he mumbled, astonished at the sights before him.

"What is going on here? These thugee are murderers! they have already clearly killed one of the passengers. We must defend ourselves! this is war!"

He looked slightly less enraged, but he still cut an imposing figure of a man.

[Cubist]

Jubatus turned the weapon over in his hands; it had been oddly difficult to pull it away from Ramstein, considering that he was upshifted to a tempo of 40. Maybe the man was just that strong? In any case, the deadly device struck Jube as being overly complex, and probably unusable by him, given the sharp anatomical differences between his forepaws and the human hands it was designed for... Jube downshifted to the normal tempo of 1.

"" Ramstein mumbled, obviously shocked. "What is going on here? These thugee are murderers! they have already clearly killed one of the passengers. We must defend ourselves! this is war!"

"Who is dead, and how do you know who killed 'em?" Jubatus replied without hesitation. "Saw it happen, did you? If so, you really ought to talk to the police, because they'd appreciate an eyewitness report. But if you didn't see it happen... well, I guess the whole 'presumption of innocence' thing is Greek to you."

[Supercape]

(GM)

"These men... well, they may or may not be innocent. But in case you had not noticed, we were just under attack by the Thugee cult... who have a long history of terrorism and vile deeds..."

He looked around.

"It is war, Herr Cat!, I am not even British, but I know that!"

[Aoiroo]

Carrie looked the man up and down, he was a good bluff but he was definitely hiding something. Glancing at the thugee for a few seconds she looked at him,

"Yeah, no. This isn't war, heck this isn't even a battle. They were violent, sure, but they are hardly a threat. You are attacking two bound unarmed men without any justification, or evidence of their guilt."

Taking a step forward she looked the man dead in the eyes even though she was a good few inches shorter,

"Now, unless you have anything USEFUL to say on this matter, please go ahead and speak. But if you want to continue on this tangant for violence, well, these two guys took out that so called attack before the thugee's or the cops could blink. How long do you think you'll last?"

[KnightDisciple]

GM/NPC

Fenris sighed and shook his head. Showing barely any effort, he tossed the man he'd been trying to interrogate onto his comrade; it was gentle enough to leave nothing but bruises. Casually, he moved his massive armored form to stand between Ramstein and the prisoners. Looking down at the "gentleman", he crossed his impressive arms over his chest and spoke in a low, careful growl.

"Listen. I get that you're ticked, but like they said, these guys are bound and helpless. If you're really hot under the collar about the supposed danger they represent, I'll tase them unconscious, and *bam*, problem solved. That way, we make sure there's no risk, but we also make sure we can ask them questions about what's going on. Plus, you killing these guys like this just makes you a murderer too. So how about you walk out, nice and calm, go grab the police, and they can take these guys in or whatnot."

[Supercape]

GM

GM/NPC

"Listen. I get that you're ticked, but like they said, these guys are bound and helpless. If you're really hot under the collar about the supposed danger they represent, I'll tase them unconscious, and *bam*, problem solved. That way, we make sure there's no risk, but we also make sure we can ask them questions about what's going on. Plus, you killing these guys like this just makes you a murderer too. So how about you walk out, nice and calm, go grab the police, and they can take these guys in or whatnot."

"Hmph, very well..." replied Rammstein, somewhat put out, especially as he had been so soundly disarmed.

"...but I cannot say I trust these Thugee, not for one minute..."

He stormed out, muttering under his breadth.

As he left, one of the tied up assassins started a stream of Urdu, impossible to understand but quite emphatic in manner...

[Cubist]

Hearing the captives' burst of rapidfire whatever-language-it-was, Jubatus thought it was a good bet that questioning them might yield useful intelligence. Of course, that requires a common language. So... "Gonna try something," he remarked.

The feline moved over to a spot about four feet away from the prone captives -- beyond arm's reach -- and crounched down on his haunches, putting himself closer to their level. He raised his empty hands, palm forward and fingers pointing up, hoping they'd interpret the gesture as a sign that he had no hostile intentions towards them. Okay. Probably don't want to lead with English, because they're likely to associate it with jerkwads like Ramstein. Now, let's see how this works. Looking at one captive and then the other, Jube asked: «¿Habla usted español*?»

* "Do you speak Spanish?"

The captives looked at each other and spoke in their own tongue. Great -- a dud, Jube thought. Next, in the second of the three languages he understood, the cheetah asked, «Parlez-vous français*?»

* "Do you speak French?"

A few seconds of French-free response later, Jube tried his third and final language: "Do you speak English?"

Still no joy. "Oh, well," he said as he stood up. "Time to bring in a consultant." And with those words, the fastest cat on two worlds blurred his way off the train; within little more than a second, he reached the policemen he and Fenris had rescued from that Thugee attack.

After downshifting to their tempo, and waiting for them to recover from their shock and surprise, Jube said, "Pardon me for interrupting, but there's a couple of prisoners on the train who just might have useful information, and me and they don't have any common language. Could I borrow one of you for a translator?"

[Supercape]

GM

Fenris, Jubatus, and Carrie sat patiently as Sgt. Singh of the Mounted Indian Police started, in slightly broken English, translating the two Thugee assassins.

It wasn't long before the truth (or at least, the Thugee's version of the truth) came spilling out...

Ramstein!

The German aristocrat had hired the Thugee to assasinate, and to wreck the Brit Machine and all its associated components. Of course, the ferocious cult of freedom fighters were only to happy to oblige.

Ramstein!!!

As the truth sunk in, the train jolted, and started moving, rapidly picking up speed.

"I say!" said Ms. Wells. "I thought we were staying put! and, isn't this going a little fast for a winding mountain track???"

[Aoiroo]

Carrie's stomach nearly lurched as the train did. She had to grab onto a window ledge to keep upright as grabbed her head,

"This is not good."

Taking a few steps she felt herself get woozy but pushed it down as she grabbed Ms. Wells hands and started to pull her forward in a hurried pace not really looking back as she spoke.

"Rammie's dumping the evidence, Ms. Wells and I will go to the front and try and stop the train there. Fenris can you take your metal suit and do what you can to slow it from the outside?"

[Cubist]

"I say! I thought we were staying put! and, isn't this going a little fast for a winding mountain track???"

Even before Miss Steampunk finished noting that the train's motion was an unwanted anomaly, Jubatus had upshifted and blurred on up towards the engine which pulled the train, the obvious place to look for signs of whatever was making the train accelerate. Ramstein was there! He'd clearly made efficient use of his time after leaving the cheetah's company; not only were all three of the train's engineers unconscious (doubtless by Ramstein's own hand), but he'd gimmicked the controls so that the engine's throttle was stuck wide open!

"Hermes and Savitar!" the cheetah swore. Well, the highest priority was to stop the train before it was well and truly a runaway; Ramstein himself could wait until after that first task was finished. Not bothering to downshift even a little bit, the fastest cat alive searched the engine compartment... and quickly located a few oversized socket wrenches. He grabbed them all and went outside, running alongside the drive wheels on the left side of the engine.

Okay, Jubatus thought to himself. Here's the wheels... here's the linkages... looks like that could be a drive shaft... The train's forward motion was eminently ignorable; at his current tempo of 40, a realtime velocity of 120 miles per clock-hour would appear to be a mere three MPH, as seen from Jube's point of view. And the train was nowhere near 120 mph. Yet.

The bolts which held the driveshaft linkages together were all fairly obvious, so Jubatus tried out his borrowed socket wrenches... success! Some people might have been surprised to see the that the inhumanly-slim feline was actually able to undo these bolts. Of course, none of these people would have considered that Jube's musculature could generate sufficient effort to propel his hundred-pound body at a speed of 70 MPH, a feat which required more than 18 horsepower worth of force... After undoing each bolt, the cheetah made sure to put the newly-loose bits into convenient vest-pockets. And within mere seconds, as measured by the clock, the engine's left-side driveshaft was completely decoupled from its wheels. Decoupling the right-side driveshaft was the work of only a few more clock-seconds.

Now to put the brakes on this beast, Jubatus thought. Hopefully without any unpleasant side-effects -- like, say, derailing the engine or any of the cars. Stepping up to a position in front of the engine, Jube got down on all fours (which he did not enjoy, but Saving Lives trumped his distaste for 'animal-like' posture)... butted his left shoulder up against the engine proper... and used all four of his limbs to push against the train's forward motion.

Under ordinary circumstances, Jube's 18-horsepower muscles would never have been able to even make a dent in the train's speed. But here and now, the cheetah's Timeshift was a literal force multiplier, which boosted his force up to more than 700 horsepower. Even that much force wasn't really enough for the job, but it was what Jube had to work with, so he used it. Was the train's forward motion slowing at all? Not that the feline could tell, but he had faith in his physical capabilities, and in the math which led him to believe that this crazy stunt was even doable in the first place...

[KnightDisciple]

GM/NPC

If the suit could have frowned, it would have.

"My actuators aren't strong enough to be much help slowing it down. But I'll reach the engine compartment before you can; I should be able to undue what damage he's done there. Catch up when you can."

And then he was gone in a flash of light and a small rush of wind. It took him perhaps 30 seconds of getting onto the top of the train, and then dashing forward, to reach the front of the train; thankfully, it wasn't moving too fast yet. He could see the vague hints of a blur that was Jubatus as he seemed to work on slowing the train.

He had different plans. Instead, Fenris dropped down between the front-most car and the engine. He then tore the door open and took stock of the situation inside.