The Majestic 311

by Keith C. Blackmore

  Eli grabbed Nathan’s foot, jarring him back to the present.

  “Climb!” the gun runner roared, his rifle slung across his back. Gilbert was beside him.

  Nathan hauled himself onto the remaining roof and spread himself flat. The wind assaulted him from behind, wanting to hurry him along. He resisted as his coattails blew up over his legs and ass, waving madly about his chest. Nathan scowled and peered ahead.

  Fifty feet at least to the next car.

  He started crawling, keeping his mass spread out over the snow coated roof. Snow blew about his face, but he didn’t dare adjust his scarf. Hand over hand, elbows and knees, he slunk forward a few feet and checked over his shoulder.

  Eli was right there behind him. Gilbert was in the rear. The men’s hair flailed in the downwind. In the distance, the riders continued attacking the train. That was fine with Nathan. He turned back, a crust of icy snow slashing his chin, hard enough to wake him. Spread out as he was, however, it was far safer than being on two feet.

  Thirty feet, and he looked over his shoulder.

  The riders were still attacking the train. A couple of fireballs erupted some five cars back, spouting huge black clouds that rolled and billowed against the ever-expanding face of the sun. The blast caused Eli and Gilbert to stop and look back, and the sight of that monstrous cloud paralyzed them. Several of the riders blasted through those dismal thunderheads and disappeared.

  The clouds raced towards Nathan and the gun runners.

  “We got smoke coming!” he shouted.

  Gilbert pulled his scarf up, as did Eli. Nathan struggled to get his over his mouth just before the train charged through those rolling black curls. Nathan pressed his head against the freezing roof and dug his fingers into the icy crust, feeling his whole person tremble with the train’s passage.

  Five seconds, then he opened his eyes.

  They were behind the main cloud, but more smoke streamed from the forward cars, dimming the sky. Nathan looked back, assessing the damage, when the glowing sun lamps of those monstrous metal dragons veered off to the left and right of the train. He squinted, discerning the graceful arc of their turns, their lamps slowly brightening until they fixed back upon the remainder of the speeding locomotive.

  A handful of riders raced towards the train robbers.

  Nathan felt his stomach freeze when he realized they were coming straight towards them.

  “They’re coming back,” he roared.

  Eli and Gilbert glanced over their shoulders.

  “Crawl!” Nathan roared and doubled his efforts. Behind him, the men did the same, chuffing, clawing, kicking free ice and snow as they shimmied forward.

  Twenty feet, and Nathan glanced back.

  The sun, the almighty sun, impossibly huge in the sky, and the train a thread stretching out towards it.

  Five smaller suns twinkled and burned as they got closer.

  Nathan picked up the pace, risking a safe crossing, but he didn’t have a choice. On the roof, they couldn’t fire their guns. They needed both hands and legs to keep from falling into that endless abyss the train raced over.

  Ten feet, and Nathan checked again.

  Five riders, less than a quarter of a mile and gaining fast, their heads bent low over their metal handlebars.

  “They’re on us!” Gilbert shouted.

  “Keep crawling,” Eli roared back.

  “Keep crawling,” Nathan roared as well.

  Five feet.

  Above the dire locomotion of the train, the angry growl of the dragon riders filled Nathan’s ears. He glanced back in reflex, knowing he shouldn’t when he was so close, but he was unable to help himself.

  Just before the gunfire started up again.

  50

  Green beams of light blazed from the oncoming riders, splitting the smoky streamers marring the increasingly orange sky. Some of those flashing dashes missed the edges of the train entirely. Most, however, bit deep into the very roof of the train. Every impact blasted a hole through the metal in a burst of ice and snow, and every shot came closer to the three men crawling to safety.

  Or what they hoped was safety.

  Not taking kindly to being shot at any time, Gilbert—scraggly bearded, high-strung, mole-faced Gilbert—couldn’t keep his gun in his holster.

  “Goddamn sonsabitches!” he roared and pulled pig iron. Legs spread wide, and clutching at an unseen handhold with his other glove, Gilbert fired his Colt at the riders tearing through the orange sky towards them.

  “Quit it, Gilbert!” Eli shouted at the man.

  Two feet from the rear edge of the car. No more. Nathan clawed for it.

  “Gilbert!” Eli screamed.

  Gilbert continued firing.

  Nathan clutched at the edge, feeling its firmness and relieved to be able to hold on. He immediately glanced back. The train was charging forward, and the riders were coming in far too fast. Three of them blurred past, overshooting the stretched-out gang. One actually dove out of sight under the train, while the fifth…

  The fifth had slowed, anticipating the rushing locomotive.

  And fired the dreaded hand cannon their kind seemed to favor.

  The beam lanced through space and time and took the Colt out of Gilbert’s hand—no, that wasn’t right. The blast took Gilbert’s hand off at the wrist, sending the weapon and the hand still holding it tumbling over the edge of the train.

  Gilbert was screaming. He drew his arm in tight to his chest, grabbing at a charred stump with his good hand.

  And sliding sideways because of it.

  Until Eli grabbed his coat by the shoulder, and held on.

  Which was right about when the train inexplicably doubled its speed. The jolt caught them all off-guard, with Gilbert skidding towards the edge of the roof and an endless fall. The dragon rider whipped by Nathan, who reached out and clamped a hand onto Eli’s other hand—who was entirely occupied by Gilbert’s swinging weight.

  Gilbert kept on screaming.

  Eli’s head snapped back with the strain of his outstretched limbs.

  And Nathan felt himself sliding forward, his chin scraping ice as he slid towards the corner and the empty space beyond. He skittered at an angle, twisting, when his boot dropped and hooked into something solid, halting him. Nathan dug in and pulled back, and that jerked Eli’s head up.

  “Hold on,” Nathan got out through clenched teeth.

  Eli’s squinty eyes blinked back at him.

  Before the train, the goddamn train, increased its speed once more.

  The lurch in power again sucked Gilbert to the edge, skittering him along until he was practically stretched out alongside the other men. There he stopped with a pained scream. Feeling the tension from his hooked fingers all the way up to his shoulders and neck, Eli held on, flat on his back, and released what Nathan thought was a pure grunt of despair.

  But the gun runner held on.

  He held on with every goddamn thing he had.

  Gilbert’s legs went over the edge.

  Then his waist, where he buckled, bent over that curl of metal, where the balance of weight and awkwardness of the hold tipped the other way. He slid along the edge, until he came to one final stop, practically side-by-side with Eli. One more lurch in speed, and the luckless Gilbert would be dragged past the men, towards the rear. That very action would twist his companions off the roof, and take them both with him.

  Perched there like he was, with the wind raging in his beard and hair, Gilbert gazed up at his companion and friend for God only knew how long.

  Eli still didn’t let go.

  Even when a look of peace swept over the other gun runner’s scraggly, mole-dotted face. And a little smile split the man’s features.

  A second later, the force of the speeding train ripped Gilbert Butler from Eli Gallant’s grasp like a hangman’s noose bouncing a corpse, and he was gone from sight.

  Still on his back, his fingers hooked into a claw, Eli Gallant didn’t move an inch.
His frame trembled on the train’s roof, the ends of his coat furious in the wind. Nathan thought he would scream, but he did no such thing. He stayed that way for only a second, maybe two, before digging his heels in and pushing himself away from the edge, while pulling on Nathan’s arm.

  Eli turned himself over, grabbing Nathan with his now free arm. When the gun runner turned his head, the man’s stone-cold expression was a terrifying thing.

  The train sped up another notch, reaching speeds Nathan thought impossible.

  But this was the 311.

  The Majestic 311.

  For her, nothing was impossible.

  51

  The solid object Nathan’s boot had caught hold of was a short outcropping—a roof—to shield the platform below from the elements. It took strength and effort, but Eli used Nathan as a meaty ladder, climbing over him to reach safety. Once Eli was in better position, they both descended from the roof and swung themselves onto the platform below. There was ample railing, frost-covered yet solid, which they clung to for their very lives. There they stayed, absorbing the fact that only they remained of the original gang. They both stared at the thing just a few feet away.

  Directly across from them, across a gulf with a set of iced-over couplings, was a door the color of hoary brass.

  The wind rustling their frames, Nathan and Eli exchanged looks.

  “We can’t stay here,” Nathan said.

  Eli unslung his rifle from his back. “I don’t want to stay here,” he said grimly. “I’m sick of this fucking train.”

  Nathan understood that. Taking a moment to study the gap below, he readied himself and jumped across. Seconds later, Eli joined him on the other platform. The glass in the window was grimy, smeared with filth, but light glowed from within.

  Nathan pulled out one of his Colts and cocked the hammer. Eli placed his shoulder against the other side of the door.

  “Ready?” Nathan asked, taking hold of the latch.

  “Ready.”

  Nathan slid open the door and rushed inside, gun first. Eli was a step behind him.

  They stopped just inside the threshold, framed in light, snow, and wind blowing past them.

  It wasn’t a passenger car. Nor was it a livestock car or a storage car. They stood inside a long chamber, a sizeable chamber, in fact, lit by flickering candles deeper inside. Hundreds of candles, of which the closest winked out from the sudden blast of air. The biggest of these candles was set within a curved piece of brass, held up by what appeared to be snakes. Light flowed from the overturned pot of that fixture, granting the men just enough to see what lay inside the chamber.

  Sitting on either side of the wide chamber, wider than any passenger car, was a series of statues. Feeble candlelight glinted against bulbous bellies the color of brass. Metal faces, their eyes closed over benign smiles, sat in meditative poses. The figures were large, twice the size of Nathan, yet radiated both warmth and peace.

  The door slammed shut behind the two men, spinning them around.

  “You do that?” Nathan asked.

  “Hell, no,” Eli blurted. He immediately checked the dark around the ends of the car. The interior was much more spacious that the exterior had them believe, but by this time, it didn’t surprise the men. Aboard the Majestic, physical dimensions meant very little.

  Searching and finding nothing, Nathan and Eli stood shoulder to shoulder and faced whatever waited for them. There, in the dark end of the car, an odd but pleasant smell reached out to them.

  “The hell’s that smell?” Nathan asked.

  “Hell if I know,” Eli remarked. “Smells like the powdered ass crack of a fancy city whore.”

  “No city whore I ever met.”

  “Like you would know.”

  Nathan scowled and didn’t think much of the man’s comparison. He started walking, his footfalls echoing in the vast room. Eli followed, his rifle up and seeking targets. It was warm, the pleasing heat one wanted when coming in from a bone-chilling cold, and while comfortable now, it would be unbearable soon. As they neared the candles, the light grew stronger and the statues more distinct. They were indeed made of brass, their metal skin polished and gleaming, all the way up to their smiling faces. Their bare bellies, fat and oversized to the point of caricature, drew the eye. Black paint topped off their fleshy heads, or what Nathan figured was paint. Some of the statues sat cross-legged, with their hands in their laps, while others had their fat arms folded or lifted in a stiff hello. Despite their strange appearance, they weren’t offensive to gaze upon. In fact, they were oddly calming with their little smiles.

  The two men passed five statues on either side. It was a good ten more to the glowing brazier ahead, and the light beyond revealed at least an equal number.

  “Place is big,” Nathan whispered, conscious of an echo.

  Eli didn’t reply, as if already aware of those very things.

  Underfoot, the train gently rocked, lulling the two men to sit and relax and forget about what had just happened outside.

  The brazier was the size of a wagon wheel, set upon with three thick legs of brass that had an almost fibrous quality, like that of tree roots, etched about upon their surface. Coals burned within, and Nathan swept his free hand over the heat, making a fist at the end. The candles burned stronger here, and that exotic scent was becoming more and more pleasing to Nathan with every passing second.

  “Ain’t nothing in here,” Eli said, his rifle held at his hips.

  Nathan didn’t reply. He pointed with his gun.

  There, at the very edge of the light, seated upon the floor like the statutes, was a figure. A man figure, sitting back-on to them, dressed in fine robes of red and dimmed gold.

  A long tail of hair hung from the nape of his neck.

  The sight of him stopped Nathan. He recognized the man.

  It was the same figure who, so long ago, under the light of a full moon, had entered a dark tunnel at the base of a mountain, and was never seen again.

  Until now.

  *

  The five metal dragons—single-engine cybernetic flight cycles—circled back.

  The train’s unexpected burst of speed had thrown the riders off, but that was a minor thing. They increased their own speed, racing along the cars, until they reached their target. The damage to the car was notable, but it was the three lifeforms, now two, that interested them the most. They were of a race very much valued.

  Carefully matching the speed of the train, the riders settled down and magnetically coupled with the damaged locomotive. Two landed below while the others landed on the roof itself. They dismounted, their own boots magnetic to secure their footing. The wind whipped about their frames, but their stylish coats of black leather and personalized pieces of armor didn’t budge. Weapons were unsheathed, a collection of heavy hand blasters and energy blades, and smiles erupted from underneath black sunglasses and spiked helmets. Their pointed teeth and scaled features marked them as one of the Reptiloid order, a largely omnivorous race that would, quite frankly, devour anything they couldn’t breed with.

  They exchanged a few words and turned towards the end of the train car.

  Weapons in hand, they started forward.

  *

  Eli raised his Winchester and took aim at the seated figure. Nathan did the same without hesitation.

  “That the one who went into the tunnel?” Eli asked.

  “Looks like him.”

  “Little bastard,” Eli said with venom.

  “Hey, you,” Nathan directed at the man. “Get up and turn around.”

  The man in the fancy robes did nothing of the sort.

  “I’m warning you,” Nathan stressed in a dangerous voice.

  Eli moved to flank the seated man, casting an equally dangerous and very much impatient glance in Nathan’s direction.

  Nathan’s anger swelled inside him at being ignored and he marched forward. “Get the hell—”

  Up, he was going to say, but a hand—a three-fi
ngered hand—reached out from the shadows and clamped down on Nathan’s gun wrist.

  And twisted.

  Nathan flew over his heels and landed flat on his back, all the wind in his lungs escaping him. He rolled over, gasping, stunned, desperately trying to claw air back into his chest and failing miserably.

  Eli whipped the Winchester around until it was pointed at the masked man’s head—the same masked man with the same weird pajamas they’d met in the saloon.

  Eli fired, the shot flaring in the dark.

  The man in black ducked, swept aside the rifle, and punched Eli twice to the body—two blazingly fast strikes that crumpled the gun runner. Eli dropped to his knees, his rifle falling with a clatter, and slowly bent over as if in worship.

  Nathan still had a hold of his Colt, and he lifted the weapon.

  The man in black whirled so very fast, kicking the gun out of his hand. It skittered along the floor before disappearing in the dark.

  The three-fingered hand grabbed Nathan by the coat collar and dragged him into the light. He dumped the train robber on the floor and then fetched Eli, dragging him forward by the boot. The man in black released the gun runner when he was next to Nathan.

  Nathan got in a good lungful of air and that settled him down, but he still felt physically rattled, no matter how much he wanted to fight. The interior felt warmer now, and sweat started to ooze from him.

  The man in black stood between the two robbers, those odd fists clenched and ready to inflict punishment if needed.

  Nathan got down a second and third lungful, the shock leaving him. He painfully regarded his guard and squinted in confusion. He thought for an instant that the attacker was the same individual from the saloon. The same one who had given him the silver locket. The eye slit in this man’s mask, however, changed that.

  The eyes were black, but the flesh surrounding them looked to be gold.

  A subtle stirring turned Nathan’s head, and he realized the man in the fine robes of red and gold was facing them, though he remained seated, his face draped in shadow.