Chapters 87 and 88 (Patreon)

Chapter 87

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The Nightmare Express Landing - Station 283
Time to Level Collapse: 6 days, 23 hours

I watched Donut train with the hole spell while we waited for the Nightmare Express to come for the second time. She’d gotten the spell up to level three. She was practicing with making the hole a smaller diameter. She’d figured out how to cast the spell, and with Mongo standing right there, she could cast Clockwork Triplicate, and the two extra Mongos would appear on the other side of the hole. We’d be able to clear rooms without having to open doors.

I spent the time trying to read the last Louis L’Amour book, but I couldn’t concentrate. I kept thinking of everything that had happened over the past several hours, plus Donut’s loud exclamations kept distracting me. 

I checked my timer. The train would return in a half hour. I still had ten minutes before we needed to get ready.

We’d kept our visit to the Desperado Club short. Imani and Elle sent a note that they couldn’t make it. Neither could Bautista, who was nearing the end of the line on his train. So we decided to make it a quick visit. 

While we walked through the club, The Sledge cast a magic protection spell on us, something he hadn’t done the last time. Our entire party glowed blue as we walked through the dancers. 

“He buy spell with own money,” Bomo said, the longest sentence I’d ever heard a cretin utter. “He buy for Princess protect.” 

“Ahh, thank you Sledgie,” Donut said, patting the rock monster on the head. She now rode on his shoulder when we entered the club. The Sledge made a grumbling, satisfied noise. 

The Dodge guild wouldn’t let me in, but they did allow The Sledge to accompany Donut inside. She went in and then sent me a message that she’d be in there for an hour.  

Donut: IT’S THE SAME THING AS OUR TRAINING ROOM, BUT IT’S EXPENSIVE. THE FIRST SESSION IS FREE THOUGH AND IT’LL RAISE IT A FULL LEVEL. IF I WANT TO RAISE IT UP TO NINE, IT’LL COST 20,000 GOLD. TEN IS 250,000! THAT’S OUTRAGEOUS!

Carl: Okay, I’ll be at the bar.  

I’d learned that my new-found ability to see through thresholds didn’t work on all doors. It only worked on portals, magical doorways that were really designed to teleport people from one place to the next, like the one in and out of our personal space. It didn’t work on the front entrance of the Desperado Club, but it did work on the doorway into the backroom vestibule, the one from the local bar to the little area where Clarabelle sat. 

The snap-a-photo feature, unfortunately, didn’t work if I wasn’t allowed access to the area, which was a major bummer. I still didn’t know how the hell this worked. It wasn’t magic. It wasn’t a skill. It was some sort of technology thing, a software upgrade that interacted with the dungeon. There was so much about this world and how it worked that I still didn’t understand. 

I’d sat at the bar for the hour, staring glumly at my drink. I was approached a half of a dozen times, but Bomo dutifully kept people back. When the hour was almost over, I had a thought, and I approached the dance floor. 

I waved at the crowd, motioning for everybody to form speech bubbles over their heads. There was about 20 other crawlers in the room, most of them human, most of them hovering around level 20. 

“Hey guys,” I said when I had everyone’s attention. “I want to get into everybody’s chat. I think we should all make a habit of getting the chat details of everybody we meet. If we do it enough, we can create a network where we can all pass information much more easily. It doesn’t let you make a chatroom unless everybody is connected with everybody else, which isn’t really feasible, but we need to start an information exchange so we can all trade intelligence. We think we have an idea on how to get off this floor, but I know there’s probably lots of different paths to success, and it’s important we all know how to do it.” 

Most of the people shrugged and then started fist bumping everybody else. I thought Bomo was going to have a heart attack, but I eventually fist bumped everyone in the room, adding an additional 22 names to my roster. When Donut appeared, I made her do the same. 

Now, as we waited for the Nightmare Express, I sat there distracted from my book, shuffling through messages. One guy, a human warrior from Japan named Koki, had discovered a way to mass-send messages to everyone on your list at once, and now my messages was a mess of people asking for help and looking to trade items. It was too much, and I created a special folder that would keep them from popping up on my interface. 

I was nervous about this plan. That’s because it’s a stupid fucking plan. But it’s all you got.  

The Nightmare Express had a loop of an hour and a half, and we’d been ready to jump on it during its previous pass, but I’d pulled us back at the last minute after I saw what we were required to do. If we’d gotten on, we’d have been screwed.  

The ground had rumbled as the Nightmare Express eased into the long station. The train hissed as brakes squealed. This was an old-school steam engine, painted jet black. This train ran on coal, or maybe magic, but that explained the lack of a third rail. A wedge-shaped cow catcher sat low on the front of the train. It pulled about forty cars, most of them freight cars designed to haul livestock. As it pulled up, I could hear and see movement from some of the slatted cars, one after another. These were massive creatures, all scrabbling against the walls of their containers to get out. A pair of tentacles rose from one of the cages, and I realized with horror that these cars didn’t have tops. There was about four feet from the top of the cars to the ceiling. Claws and fire burst from one cage. The next was a solid container, filled with water, with spikes sloshing out of the car, like it was filled with pissed-off narwhals. 

Not all of the train cars appeared to be filled with giant monsters. I quickly counted. Fourteen of the cars appeared to have monstrosities within. The majority of the other cars were rickety, empty freight cars. None of the freight cars had doors, at least not facing the platform.  

There were only two cars on the train where we could get on: a caboose at the very back and a passenger car at the front, right behind the engine car, which had pulled into the forward tunnel the same way the colored lined trains did. There was no other way to get on the train. We’d positioned ourselves near the front, and I moved to enter the front passenger car. I grasped onto the door, and a message popped up. 

This door is exit only. Enter at rear of the train.   

“Goddamnit,” I grumbled, looking upon the train. My eyes caught the thin gangway above the open-top freight cars. It was immediately clear what we had to do. My Protective Shell wasn’t going to help. We had to get on the caboose, where the back balcony had a ladder to the roof of the car. From there we’d have to proceed up the train on hands and knees on the goddamned roof of the cars while the ceiling whipped by at a hundred plus miles per hour, all the while traversing 38 open-top cars randomly filled with jumping, snarling monsters. And if there was a war mage in there somewhere, he was probably hiding in one of those cars, ready to ambush our asses when we least expected. 

Since it was from the back of the train to the front, my Protective Shell wasn’t going to work. Donut and Mongo could probably jump to the top of the train, reaching that railing atop of the third container car, allowing easy access to the passenger car. But Katia and I couldn’t. And I wouldn’t trust Donut’s Puddle Jumper spell, either, not when the target was so thin. It didn’t let us move through walls, and I wasn’t certain it’d work anyway if the target was moving.  

“Yeah, fuck this,” I said, backing away.

A minute later, and the train hissed, gathering speed. 

“That was our plan,” Donut said, watching the train leave. “What are we going to do now?” 

I started counting in my head how long it took the train to leave the station. It’d taken a full minute and a half. My Protective Shell only lasted 20 seconds. Shit. Too long. 

I looked at Donut and Katia and laughed nervously. “So, I have an idea.”

~     

“You know,” Katia said as I prepared to jump onto the track, “Hekla warned me that you were crazy. She told me to be careful because you’d likely get me killed.”

I grinned up at her and jumped down into the gravel between the railroad ties. “First off, you’ve told me this already. And this time the only one taking the risk is me. And Donut.” 

“I don’t like this, Carl,” Donut said. She jumped down and landed on my shoulder. Mongo was left in his carrier, leaving Katia alone on the landing.  

“It’ll be fine,” I said with much more bravado than I felt. I met eyes with Katia. “Be ready. But stay back in case we accidentally crash it.” I turned and started jogging my way up the track toward the oncoming train. It’d be in the station in about fifteen minutes. It’d take us five minutes of light running to reach the spot I’d mapped out.  

The tunnel was cold and dark. My feet crunched on the gravel, though I couldn’t feel the rocks thanks to my invulnerability. Donut hummed nervously as I ran. I told her not to put the Torch spell on. I didn’t want her warning the engineer, which might cause him to slow down. 

“I should have left Mongo on the platform with Katia so she doesn’t get lonely,” Donut said. We reached the spot. The station was now a distant speck of light. I could feel the vibration of the approaching train on the track. It was distant, but growing. 

“She’s a big girl. She can take care of herself.” 

“If she is, then why do you keep telling her what to do? You didn’t even ask her if she wanted to get giant. You just shoved the backpack at her and told her to do it.” 

“She likes it,” I said. 

“But what if she didn’t?” 

“Look who’s talking,” I said. “You with your boots and purple mohawk nonsense.” 

“That’s different. Fashion is different than making someone change. You keep telling her to be herself, but you’re the one making her change the most of all.” 

“I…” I paused. She was right. But in the words of the AI, this wasn’t Dr. Phil. We didn’t have the luxury of spending all day making sure we weren’t stepping on each other’s feelings. I didn’t want to be a jerk, but I also wanted to keep her alive. “You know what, you’re right, Donut. Next time I’ll ask her.” 

Donut patted me on the head. “Good boy, Carl.” 

The trembling of the track grew. I glanced at my clock. Right on time. “Okay, get ready. Go ahead and set up your spell now, and let me know when it’s ready.” 

“Uh, I think we went too far,” Donut said a moment later. “The closest I can get is about three or four hundred feet before the platform.” 

“What?” I said, horror rising. “You said it was line of sight.” 

“That’s what it says, Carl. It’s not my fault if it’s wrong.”

It was too late. She couldn’t cast her spell if we were running. “Okay, okay. We’ll be fine. Get ready to run your ass off after we teleport.” That motorcycle would be pretty useful right about now. 

The tunnel lightened. I could hear the train, barreling down the track. It was still moving quickly, though the engineer was starting to apply the brakes. The distinctive squeal echoed through the tight tunnel.  

A piercing whistle blasted. The distant light became an angry, round eye as the train barreled toward us. Even though it was slowing down, it still came at us at a terrifying speed.   

Donut’s Puddle Jumper had a three-second cooldown, so we had to time this perfectly. “Okay, cast in three, two…” The train loomed, the cow catcher approaching like a spear. “One!” 

I counted to two in my head and pressed down on Protective Shell. We blinked. 

Holy crap. I’d timed that a little too close. 

We jumped a quarter of a mile down the track. Notifications started pouring in. The train continued to barrel at us. The back of the train screamed. Sparks showered. It’s not slowing down. It’s speeding up. Why is it speeding up? 

“Fuck! Run! Run!” We turned toward the station, only three hundred and fifty feet away. So close. 

Donut bolted, running faster than me. “Hurry up, Carl,” she cried without looking back. 

It was like one of those dreams where you tried to run, but you were caught in something sticky. I knew I was running faster than any human had naturally run before, but I’d wasted a precious few seconds being disoriented and staring at the oncoming train. And then I’d spent another full second lamenting what a stupid idea this had been. The train seemed to have closed the quarter of a mile distance between us in mere seconds. How fast was this thing going? It’s a damn steam engine, not a bullet train. It’s out of control. It’s going to derail the moment it hits a curve. We must have killed the engineer. 

Ahead, Donut leaped, vaulting onto the platform. She’d been running so fast, she rolled the moment she hit the landing. I saw Katia standing there, eyes huge as I approached the station. 

I felt the train behind me. The ground rumbled as if in an earthquake. 

I’m not going to make it. 

I jumped.   

I didn’t make it. 

~

I crashed, I tumbled, and I broke. 

Part of me registered that if my body wasn’t enhanced by my supernatural Constitution of 34, I would’ve exploded like a blood-and-guts filled water balloon the moment the cow catcher caught me. The wedge was designed to throw whatever it caught aside, though in the tight tunnel, there was no aside except at the landings. 

Being tossed onto the landing would’ve been preferable to what actually happened. I’d jumped just as the train caught me. I felt things break and snap within. I was flying, and then I wasn’t. I slammed against hot metal. I’d instinctively bashed onto my Heal spell while I was still in midair, but my health continued to plummet, so I hit a heal potion. I looked up in time to see Donut and Katia’s horrified faces looking at me as we rocketed past the station and back into the tunnel, still picking up speed. 

I’d hit the cow catcher and flipped in midair, getting slammed by the front of the train. My constitution, forward momentum, that Heal spell, and the fact my invulnerable foot was what actually caught the front of the train all conspired together to make sure I clung to life. 

I lay prone on a small, flat section above the cow catcher, just before the train’s boiler. The light sat on a platform just above my head, shining into the featureless tunnel. The front of the train burned. The chug chug chug of the train was furious, louder and faster than it should be. In the shadow I could see 666 was emblazoned in red letters on the front of the black boiler. 

I took a second healing potion. 

A terrible screeching noise rose from the back of the train. Whatever it was, it wasn’t slowing the damn thing down. 

Donut: CARL! CARL! 

Carl: I’m okay. I need to stop the train. Stay there. 

Donut: THE TRAIN IS ALL BROKEN IN THE BACK. YOU GOTTA HURRY. 

A short ladder led to a thin gangplank that ran along the exterior port side of the engine. The plank did not run along the starboard side, which was the side facing the station platforms. The rocky, uneven wall of the tunnel was right there, whipping by at breakneck speed. My whole body ached. I could see points where the train had sheared the wall off on earlier passes. If I reached out, it’d probably rip my arm off. 

I gingerly moved to the ladder, and I pulled myself up, careful not to touch the massive boiler, which was getting hotter by the moment. A handrail ran the length of the boiler, leading to a square window where the driver could look out onto the track. A red light glowed inside the cab, but I didn’t see movement within.

Below, pistons spun and automatic steam release valves along the wheels opened at random intervals, screaming hot gas into the passageway. With nowhere to go, the steam swirled in the tunnel, giving the already-dark channel a humid, hazy appearance. Everything was wet and hot, like the interior of a sauna.   

I slid my way toward the cab, the wall occasionally catching the back of my cloak, causing it to whip up, threatening to pull me over. I slid down the boiler, reaching the window, which was about as wide as the platform, and only about three feet tall. 

I peered inside, swallowing hard at the mess of valves, levers, and gauges. My eyes caught a splatter of gore against the back of the interior. The driver must have been red-tagged. Whatever he was, he was very, very dead now. 

The train shuttered as it started to curve. Shit. Shit. 

I formed a fist, summoning my gauntlet. I punched the window. It was like punching through paper. I had to punch several times to clear the glass away. The train bumped ominously, the tracks stuttering. I squeezed myself into the narrow window, falling hard into the cab. 

Entering the Nightmare Express. 

Gore filled the chamber. It stank of oil and fire and blood. There was a second dead engineer against the wall on the other side. Great, I thought. Two drivers meant this shit was twice as complicated. 

I turned to the controls. There were even more spigots and gauges and handles now I could see the control panel full on. Pipes ran everywhere. At the bottom was a door like on a wood-burning stove. It had a little glass window showing fire raging within. This was where they tossed the coal in to heat the boiler. My eyes caught a row of pressure gauges along the top of the controls. There were five of them, and all of them were almost in the red. The train bucked as it rumbled over track. 

On the right side of the controls was a large, red lever that I assumed was the throttle. I squeezed the handle and eased it down. I felt the train slow. I relaxed, but then I saw the pressure gauges start to rise. One of them shot all the way up to the top.  

To my horror, a new tooltip popped up over the control station.    

Shattering Train Bomb

Type: A steam boiler made with a shocking disregard for safety. It’s almost like they want this thing to explode. 

Effect: It’s a train-sized grenade that is going to detonate from extreme pressure. What do you think the effect will be?

Status: Deteriorating. 75/1000

If you don’t figure this shit out in about two minutes, it’s going to be pretty damn spectacular.    

A chain hung from the ceiling. I pulled, and the whistle blew. I held it down to see if that alleviated the pressure. One of the gauges lowered. The others did not. I pulled another lever, easing it. The brakes. They only worked for a moment. I had to pump them back and forth, but it came with diminishing returns. There was another identical lever below it. I had no idea what the hell I was doing, and I feared I was doing more harm than good. It was already too late for me to run to the back of the train and jump off. 

I was about to message Imani and Elle to ask them if any of the Meadow Lark team knew how to drive a train when I saw the face staring back at me through the little fireplace window. Startled, I jumped back. Then I saw the dot appear on my minimap. A white dot. An NPC. Inside the fire. 

I didn’t allow myself enough time to think about it. I grasped onto the burning handle and turned, opening the door. Heat blasted into the chamber. A demonic, female head popped out of the hole. 

The red-skinned, black-haired woman was a 1950’s pinup vision of a red devil woman, at least from the neck up. Only her head fit through the little hole. She had her hair up in a rockabilly-style up-do, tied with a red bandana. Two black horns rose through her hair. Steam rose off of her, and her eyes were swirling, black orbs. The demon woman had heavy rings under her black eyes, making her look exhausted. 

Fire Brandy – Lesser Demon MILF. Level 75. 

Fire(wo)man of the Nightmare Express. 

This is a non-combatant NPC. 

A single mother’s gotta eat! 

Where one finds big ovens that need stoking, one will regularly find a Lesser Demon in control. But if it’s a fire that needs to be extra hot, the much-rarer Sheol MILFs are often employed to keep those fires sizzling.  

Once a pregnant Lesser Demon falls into labor, her delivery usually lasts about sixty days. During these two months, she has a litter of 15-18,000 babies, delivering one approximately every five minutes, non-stop.

Only one in 10,000 Lesser Demon babies are viable. The rest rarely live more than a few seconds. Their corpses shrivel and harden, becoming a valuable resource called Sheol Bricks. The 15th floor will be lousy with them. If exposed to fire, Sheol Bricks burn long and hot. Lesser Demon MILFs who also learn water magic can find lucrative work as steam boiler fire stokers. Once they seal themselves within the boiler, they create an almost self-sufficient system that keeps most larger boilers humming. Plus it’s a convenient method of disposing of their failed young. 

This train is running on dead babies. Holy crap that’s fucked up. 

“Child, you are just in time,” Fire Brandy said. She spoke loudly, over the roar of the train. She had an odd accent, almost German. It was a peculiar juxtaposition with her appearance. “Something happened to the engineer and that kotzbrocken war mage. They go splat. See that valve there on the top left? Will you turn it for me? The idiot didn’t release that valve, and I can’t control it from here.” 

“Uh, this one?” I said. 

“That’s right. Turn it left. Turn it all the way. Yes. Very gut.” One of the five gauges moved into the green. The train shuddered as if in pleasure.

New Achievement! Kept A Rollin’

You’re driving a train! Holy shit!    

Reward: I’m pretty sure the act of driving a train is a badass-enough award.    

From there, Fire Brandy taught me how to take control of the train using crisp, matter-of-fact language. After I turned one valve one way for ten seconds, and then the other for another five, the “This is a bomb” tooltip disappeared. I relaxed.          

I managed to stop the train completely while we went over the controls. Then I got it moving again at a slow clip, about thirty miles per hour. That was a fraction of its normal speed. She taught me the throttle and the two-control braking system. One was for the brakes on the engine itself, another was for the train cars. I’d nearly wrecked us when I’d been jacking with it earlier, and I hadn’t even realized. Three times she gave birth while we talked. She scrunched up her face, and I heard a quick scream that was almost immediately cut away. 

“Now you know how to run train,” she eventually said. “Do not go fast. Do not overpressurize, and we will have no problems, no? Now close my door and leave me be.” She pointed to a small box at the back of the chamber. “But if something happens to me, you have that box. You can’t use for long because you have no source of water or oil. So only use it to get back to the station and vent as much as you can. Now close the door.” She started to pull her head back in. 

“Wait,” I said. “How do I get to the station from here?” 

“Hit the switch. It is on the tracks just before the next stop. You have a few options. Choose ‘Station Repair’ and you’ll get to the station, and the train will be fixed.” She waved toward the starboard side of the train, the side I hadn’t entered through.

She pulled her head back in. Over the roar of the fire and train, I heard the cry of another baby, and then a second.  

She has two babies in there. Two viable babies already. 

I closed and sealed the door using the heavy rag she’d pointed out. Hit the switch? How would I do that? I examined the driver’s station on the right side. There was a handle there, leading to a pole attached to the side of the boiler. I realized it was like a lance. Using the handle I could swing the pole to the side, presumably to hit the switches on the tracks. If I tried it now, all I’d do was hit the wall and break it. I’d have to be moving very slow before I dared try it.  

I looked down at the small box she’d indicated. It sat in the back of the cab, near the exit. The box was covered in gore where the driver or the war mage had been pushed against it. I lifted the lid and pulled a black chunk out of it. 

Sheol Brick

If Santa gives coal to the regular naughty kids, he’d probably give this stuff to history’s greatest villains, like Hans Gruber and the guy who invented those shoes with the individual toes built in. It burns a lot hotter and a lot longer than regular coal. And when I say “a lot longer,” I mean until the end of your lifetime. So like a week or more. 

You don’t want to know where this comes from. 

I dropped it in revulsion, wiping my hand on my cloak. There were about fifty bricks in the chest. I took a deep breath and then I picked up the entire box, adding them all to my inventory. I shuddered. 

In the mess of gore I found two items. A small satchel containing 350 gold and a large, bronze key. I picked it up. 

Steam Engineer’s Key. I quickly examined it. 

Allows access to Iron Tangle employee-only areas and actions on all 400 steam-type trains of the Tangle. 

I was finally able to relax and look about my surroundings. I was alive. Not only was I alive, but I’d stolen a train. I had stolen a goddamned train. 

Only then did I notice my stats. “Holy fuckballs,” I said out loud.

I had risen three whole levels. I was now level 32. I had three new neighborhood boss boxes.  

Apparently, I’d killed every monster on the train. And three of them were neighborhood bosses. I looked at the map, and I didn’t see any X’s on the train at all. The last time I’d done this, I hadn’t even gone up a level. This time I’d hit the jackpot. It looked as if I’d also gotten a bunch of experience for taking control of the train. Despite all that, I only had one additional achievement I hadn’t yet opened. I pulled it up now. 

New achievement! Three Cheers for Slaughter!

You killed three boss monsters with the same attack! I’m starting to think your survival so far isn’t just a fluke. You’re either scary good at this, or you’re just one lucky mo-fo. Either way, holy shit. Good job.

Reward: You’ve received a Platinum Big Daddy Box! 

There was a small door out the back of the engine car. Stepping over the gore, I opened the hatch to gaze out over the back of the train as it chugged slowly down the track.

I laughed at the sheer amount of destruction I’d wrought with my shield spell. The passenger car just behind the engine appeared to be fully intact, though I spied blood inside. That was the only other car on the train that remained unscathed. The remaining cars, the ones that had been filled with the giant monsters, were still on the tracks and pulling behind the train, but the walls had all been peeled away and broken, turning the cars into a bunch of flatbeds. Several of the wall pieces still hung, attached to the cars. They sparked as they came into contact with the tunnel wall. A chunk of wood ripped off as I watched, bouncing and falling back onto the track behind the train. The caboose was still there, but the entire top of the structure was sheared off. 

I couldn’t believe we hadn’t wrecked the whole thing. That other train had been pretty easy to derail. I wondered if there was magic keeping this particular train on the tracks. Then again, I just almost blew the whole thing up. Maybe the cars themselves were built to break like this. Maybe they hoped we’d accidentally unleash the giant monsters onto the tracks, and they deliberately made the walls weak. 

Carl: Hey Donut, can you go back out on the tracks and see if any of the corpses out there are neighborhood bosses? I have no idea where the hell I am, and it’d be pretty useful if you could snag the route map off a boss corpse and then let me know when I’m approaching the stops. Make sure they’re dead before you approach.   

Donut: OKAY, BUT DON’T RUN ME OVER. 

It had only been about forty minutes, and I was now moving at a snail’s pace compared to its regular speed. If I’d even come to the next station, I’d missed it. I suspected I still had a bit before I got there. 

Carl: You have plenty of time. I’m going to try to eyeball what’s at station 436, and then I’ll loop around to pick you guys up.  

Hopefully the debris on the track wasn’t enough to stop the train. I’d find out when I got there. I had a thought, and I pulled up chat again. 

Carl: But if you’re worried, this might be a good time to field test riding Mongo. You can race down the track to see how fast you two go. 

Donut: CARL YOU ARE A GENIUS. 

Carl: You know it. 

Donut: CARL?

Carl: Yeah?

Donut: DON’T EVER DO THIS TO ME AGAIN. I THOUGHT YOU’D BEEN SQUISHED. 

Chapter 88

The Nightmare Express

Less than five minutes later, the train rolled through the switching station. The tunnel widened, leading to a large, well-lit cavern. Several other train tracks ran through here, but I didn’t see any other trains. There were dozens of entrances and exits. 

The first switch was a large, round target, painted red. It was a well-worn metal plate on a pole, sticking up from the ground like a stop sign. I was supposed to use the lance thing to hit the switch if I wanted the train to change tracks. This first one was labeled “Auxiliary Tracks. Warning.” The next was “Station Repair,” and after that was a third entitled “Recycle.” 

There were so many tracks on the ground, it was difficult to tell what led where. I followed the Recycle track with my eyes, which led to a massive archway at the far side of the cavern. 

A colossal, glowing portal dominated the center of the room. I tried to examine it using my new subspace portal skill, but it said I needed to be closer for it to work. This was the “Station Repair” portal. 

I tried to follow the course of the Auxiliary Track, but it got lost in the tangle of other tracks. I wasn’t certain, but it appeared to lead to another switching area with dozens of additional choices. If my brain was parsing it correctly, it looked as if I could possibly switch the Nightmare Express to one of several other train lines.   

A large train steamed through the room, belching smoke and chugging merrily away. This one came from the opposite direction. It didn’t slow as it passed. This was also a steam locomotive, but it had a more modern design, with a smaller cow catcher. It pulled ten cars. I caught a quick glance of the final car. It was a caboose similar to what this train once had. Two spears stuck up from the back balcony, and a pair of human-like heads were impaled on the sticks. The engineer tooted twice in greeting before disappearing into the tunnel.  

A minute later, I re-entered the tunnel.

Donut: I GOT THE MAP AND A LOT OF GOLD. YOU ARE ABOUT TO COME TO STATION 436. THERE ARE A LOT OF DEAD BODIES AND WOOD AND METAL ON THE TRACKS. ALSO MONGO CAN RUN REALLY, REALLY FAST.

Carl: Okay, thanks. I’ll loop around to pick you up. Hopefully the train can push through all the stuff on the tracks. But in case it won’t be able to, I’m going to stop and check out this station 436 now while I still can. 

Ahead, I could see the light of the platform. I slowed the train as I approached. It looked like any other platform from this angle. The sign above it read Abyss Station - 436. I eased the engine to a stop, set the brake, stuck the boiler to standby, and I stepped out of the cab. After a moment’s hesitation, I decided to close the door to the Engine car just in case. Someone could still climb in through the broken front window, but this would dissuade all but the most determined train-jackers. 

Entering Abyss Station. 

I searched the map for signs of life. I saw nothing. I felt the ground rumble, and I could hear a train rush by. It sounded as if it was directly above me. There was a distant whine of a different train and a muffled crash. A minute later came another crash. And then another. Another train whipped by. This one sounded below me. It reminded me of being in line for a roller coaster at an amusement park, with things whipping by from all directions. 

The station was bare. No sign. No bench. There was only a single set of metal, industrial-style stairs in the center of the platform. The stairs here were especially steep, like those on a fire escape. The stairs led upward and disappeared through a dark hatch in the ceiling. I hesitated, and then I pulled a torch from my inventory and ascended. I’m just going to look. That’s it.  

It took almost an hour to ascend the stairs. The entire time, the sounds of trains coming and going and crashing surrounded me. The walls continually shook. Donut and Katia both demanded I keep them constantly updated. Finally, just as Donut was regaling Katia with a story about how she pulled a last-minute win at some best-in-show cat pageant because her biggest competitor, a Singapura, was disqualified over some paperwork dispute, I saw a red light at the top of the stairs. Ten minutes later, I pulled myself up onto a circular, iron catwalk, overlooking a massive, flaming pit. The long walkway circled the interior of hole. Hot air blasted up at me. 

Entering the Abyss.  

“Oh wow,” I muttered.

Below me, above me, and all around the interior of the massive, burning pit was hundreds and hundreds, if not thousands, of giant, glowing portals. Catwalks like the one I was standing upon dotted the interior at non-regular intervals. Monstrous shapes haunted the walkways, but none were near me.  

I had a memory, of standing on the precipice of the Grand Canyon. It was just my mom and I standing on the edge, looking off in the chasm. This had been on the way back from Texas. My father was there in the car, waiting. His presence, patiently waiting behind us was even bigger than that of the canyon spread before us. I remembered that moment at the barrier, my mom clutching tightly onto my wrist. For a moment, she clasped so much it hurt. 

Do you remember the circus? That was fun, wasn’t it? 

You’re hurting me. 

I know, honey. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.  

This wasn’t really as big as the Grand Canyon, but I was surprised at how shaken I was by the sudden memory. This hole was almost perfectly round, at least a mile across. It had to be thousands of feet deep.

As I watched, a train burst through a portal. The cars shot into the air and then tumbled into the pit. They twisted and turned as they fell and fell, landing in a heap at the bottom with a distant crash. 

I strained to peer at the bottom of the pit. The giant hole was filled with thousands of crashed train cars. Hundreds of fires burned. The tiny dots of figures crawled over the debris. I recognized their gait. Jikininki janitor ghouls. They swarmed like ants over the wreckage. Another train came from a different portal. Then another.  

There’s no engine cars. I remembered what the ManTauR guy had told us. He would go through the portal, and it was just his engine car on the other side. These were all the colored trains reaching the end of the line. The trains were driven through the portals. Only the engine car was teleported back to base. The rest of the cars were just thrown into this pit, like garbage. The conductors and the porters got off the train at the last stop. And when they returned, the train had been reformed. The train wasn’t looping through time. They were building new trains. All except the engine cars. 

“Holy shit!” I cried as a train burst from a portal directly over my head. I ducked as the catwalk shuddered. The train roared as it plummeted into the hole. The wheels spun uselessly as the driverless train nosedived.

It looked up at the portal.

Ultima Corp DungeonWerx Industrial Subspace Portal.  

Analyze? Yes/No. 

I clicked Yes, and the page of numbers that appeared was much longer than the last one. I scrolled down to the bottom. 

Warning: You are facing the incorrect side of this portal. Entering through this side will have no effect. You may pass safely through this side, but use caution not to backtrack while entering. 

Type: One-way portal. Gated by conveyance type and to key holders. 

Can you pass this portal? Yes* 

Warning: You must be on a gated conveyance and/or a key must be equipped or held outside of inventory, depending on type. Compatible keys have been marked in your inventory.    

Environment on other side of portal: Compatible. 

Visual Analysis? Yes/No. 

I clicked Yes. 

I was greeted with a screenshot of a massive train yard. Thousands of trains spread out in all directions. It was only the engine cars. They were all in a high-fenced yard. In the fenced-in area of the trainyard were what looked like thousands of ghoul-like creatures milling about. They looked like zombies, but from several different races and mobs. 

I moved to another portal down the gangway and took another screenshot. It was the same, but from a different angle. From this direction I could see just past the fence and saw what appeared to be a line of dwarves waiting for the train. The zombies were only in the trainyard. I couldn’t see how the trains were leaving the fenced-in area or how they were keeping the zombies within. 

My eyes did catch something interesting. There was a swirling portal in the corner of the trainyard, much too small for a train. I could only see half of it from this shot. But in that shot I could see the distinctive form of one of those rolling cages like the one I’d looted from the room with the robots. 

A distant roar made me look up. A large, lizard-like monster had spied me and was crawling up the wall to my gangway. Several other mobs also started to move in this direction. I still had several minutes before they’d get here.

I wanted to stay and fight, but I was worried that they’d do something to the walkway, causing me to lose access to the stairwell back to the Nightmare Express. I dropped a goblin smoke bomb, so they couldn’t see which direction I went, and I returned to the stairwell and started to quickly descend. 

Several minutes passed, but it didn’t look like they were following. As I descended, I moved to my inventory. I found a new sort-by option. I could sort out items that have been “marked.” I had three keys that would allow me passage through the portal: The Ochre Key, the Steam Train Key, and that stupid souvenir hat we’d received the moment this floor started.

Holy shit. That was it? All we needed to do was equip the stupid fucking train conductor hat?

Carl: So I’m sending this message out to everybody on my chat list. You guys aren’t going to believe this shit. 

~

Carl: In case you haven’t heard, the stairwells are all at stations 12, 24, 36, 48, and 72. The problem is we all started higher than station 80, and it doesn’t look like there’s a way to backtrack. Here’s what we have gathered. So far we know for sure of two ways to get to the early stations, and we’re pretty certain about two more. Spread the word.

One. If you equip that stupid hat and just ride a train to the end of the line, you’ll get through. Problem. The train car you’re riding in won’t get through, which means you’ll be teleported into a train station filled with literally thousands of zombies. 

Two. You can kill an engineer and get an engineer’s key. You will be transported to the same station, but you’ll be inside of a train car. Problem. You’ll have to manage to do that without crashing the train. You can possibly jump ahead using one of the named lines. But let me tell you, those named lines are a bitch. Also, we don’t know what you can do after you get to the station. If you have control of the train you can possibly drive it out of there, but we’re not sure. 

Possible Solution Three. Station 435 is where the employees get off. There’s supposedly a portal there that takes you to the headquarters. I believe the headquarters is on the other side of the zombie fence. Problem. It sounds like there’s a boss monster at these stops called The Kravyad. Also, it appears if you go through this portal you lose time and memories. Plus we’re not certain you can get through these portals. If someone tries this, let us know your experience. 

Possible Solution Four. If you get on a named line that has a stop at station 436, and you get control of the train, you can use the switching station to get back to the base. I’m not certain how that works yet, but we’re going to try to figure it out. 

I know there are other solutions. If you find them, please let me know. Stay safe out there everybody. 

Porter T: Thanks, mate. You’re not nearly as crazy as they make you look on the show. 

Mei W: We sold our hats. Everybody in the party sold them! They were offering 5,000 gold each for them.

I continued down the stairs, answering a wave of messages. There were rumors of a hidden train that moved backward, down the line and not up it. But you had to break through a wall to get to it. I was half expecting to find my train gone, but it remained on the track, boiler chugging in standby mode. I got in, knocked on the fire door so Fire Brandy knew I was back, and I pulled out of the station. I slowly increased the train’s speed, getting it up to about 50 miles per hour. Behind, the cars still sparked and rumbled ominously, but they remained on the tracks. I should have unhooked them, but I didn’t have anywhere to put them. If we could figure out the switching station, maybe there’d be a way to ditch the extra cars.  

Donut: CARL, HURRY UP AND GET BACK. I GOT MY FIRST BENEFACTOR BOX AND IT’S THE GREATEST PRIZE IN THE HISTORY OF PRIZES. PRINCESS D’NADIA HAD IT MADE ESPECIALLY FOR ME. I WANT YOU TO SEE IT. IT’S A SURPRISE! 

Katia: It’s a surprise all right. 

Donut: DON’T RUIN IT, KATIA.

Carl: I can’t wait.

Donut: ALSO I FORGOT TO TELL YOU I WENT UP TWO LEVELS TO LEVEL 30. MY CHARISMA HIT 100, AND I HAVE A NEW SPECIAL ABILITY! 

Carl: That is good news. You can tell me all about it when I get back. 

Donut: IT’S CALLED LOVE VAMPIRE. IT’S AWESOME!

Carl: I’m going to make one more very quick stop before I get back. The train is moving a bit slower than usual, so it’ll still be a couple of hours. 

Donut: WHAT KIND OF STOP? 

Carl: I’m going to try to make a trade over at station 83. Let me know when I’m getting close. In the meantime, you should head over to the Purple or Mauve platform and grind on the monsters riding in from station 282. 

Katia: That’s what we’ve been doing, but the trains stopped coming on the Purple line. The Mauve line is still moving. Also, I spent some time clearing the track of debris. In my larger form, it’s a lot easier to pick up the big stuff. There’s still stuff strewn across the track, but I don’t think it’ll be a problem now.  

~

About two hours later, the Nightmare Express returned to station 283. Katia had cleaned the track pretty well. Most of the remaining debris I hit was caught by the cow catcher, and it eventually flew to the side of the narrow path or broke into narrow chunks. The train occasionally bucked, but we remained on the tracks. 

I stopped the engine about halfway down the platform. Katia stood there, leaning against a ceiling support. She was about half-full of transformation mass. She looked like a pink-skinned She Hulk, but with spikes on her back. She’d given herself a leather outfit and black boots. The purple mohawk had returned. 

Donut was also there, sitting upon the back of Mongo. I noticed the new addition to her outfit right away. 

“Sunglasses, huh?” I said as I stepped off the train. 

“Aren’t they just to die for!” Donut exclaimed, hopping off the back of Mongo, who was jumping up and down wildly at my return. I patted the dinosaur on the head as Donut leaped to my shoulder. “They’re not just couture. They’re super sunglasses.” 

They were large and round, making her look like a bug. They were similar to the movie star-style sunglasses Bea was wearing on her head in that picture Donut had received. They seemed to be magically affixed to her face. The frames had no arms, and her nose was too squished to properly hold them up, yet they remained firmly plastered to her face. I examined their properties:  

Prism Industries Capacitating and Focusing Goggles. Special High-Fashion Edition. “The Princess Donut.” 

This is a Unique Item.  

This one-of-a-kind item was a gift from Princess D’Nadia of the Prism Kingdom to Princess Donut of the Blood Sultanate. It was personally signed by Princess D’Nadia.  

Protects the eyes from a variety of environmental hazards, including magic-based attacks that render the user blind. Enhances all dark vision effects. Allows for heat vision and other visible-light viewing options. 

In addition, any energy-based spell that originates from the ocular region is caught and focused by these goggles, which allows for multiple combat and targeting options.

“Holy shit,” I said, reading it a second time. 

“It turns my Magic Missile into a laser!” she said. “I can shoot four at the same time! I’ve been standing on the back of the Mauve Platform, and when the doors open, I can shoot inside four doors at once. It can even hold onto the energy of one shot and add it to the next. Plus they’re beautiful. I look like Miss Beatrice. Don’t you just love them?” 

“Those are pretty good,” I agreed. I wondered how much it cost D’nadia to get the box to Donut. I glanced up to Katia. “Did you get anything?”  

“No,” she said. “None of the daughters have gotten anything yet, either.” 

I still didn’t know what Katia’s sponsor’s angle was. I wouldn’t be surprised if Katia never got a prize at all. “I am absolutely starving,” I said, trying to change the subject. “Let’s eat and take a nap and reset our buffs because I don’t know how long before we’ll find another safe room after this.” 

“We’re going through the portal?” Katia asked. 

“I just want to see if we can get through and then come back using the Nightmare Express train. If not, it’ll give us time to figure out what our next move will be. If we can set up near a stairwell and just grind for the remaining time, that’ll be ideal.” 

“And if we can come back?” Katia said. “We’ll return?” 

I held up my hand as I read the new message that just popped up. 

Elle: Hey Carl. We have found ourselves in a bit of a pickle. I wanted to give you a head’s up.

Carl: What’s wrong? 

Elle: We just cleared out stop 275 on the Camel Line. Killed one of those Krakaren bitches. It was easier than Imani thought it would be. Anyway, we cleared the area, and we went back to the station to catch the next train to 277, which is a transit station. But the train never came. We’re stuck here. We’re going to have to walk. 

Imani: I think it was that Quan Ch guy. There’s chatter in my inbox that people keep seeing him blowing up trains. He’s farming the train drivers, but he’s making it so everybody is getting stuck. If he keeps it up, all of the train lines will be stopped.

Carl: How far is it to station 277? 

Imani: Far. 276 is probably twenty or thirty miles, and by the time we get there, the monsters at that station will be starting to transform and will be on the tracks. It’s another thirty after that to 277. 

Elle: Yeah, so instead we’ll be taking the druggie portal back to station 272 and then we’ll hike down to 271. It’s still far, but not nearly as much. We’ll still have to walk on the tracks. That’s why I’m letting you know. We’ll be out of commission for a day at least. There’s a named train at 271, and if the Cobalt line is also out of commission, we’ll have to take that one. It’s called The Eviscerator. 

I’d seen that one listed a few times. I cursed that Quan asshole. He had to know what he was doing. What a selfish prick. 

Carl: What kind of monsters are at stop 272?

Imani: Gross Atomizers. Floating bags of gas. They’re easy to kill, but they have a poison cloud area attack. We can handle them. It’ll also give us a chance to look at these robots you’ve been talking about. 

Carl: Okay. Good luck. See if you can find a secret way out of that robot room. We’re going to try to take the Nightmare through the portal. I’ll let you know what happens. Keep me updated. Stay away from the third rail. 

Elle: Oh you know it. Kill, kill, kill! 

I laughed. 

~

“So tell me about your new vampire skill,” I asked as I ate a corndog. The saferoom was bigger than usual. It was a self-enclosed mall food court. Only one of the many restaurants was open. A Hotdog on a Stick. The bopca even wore the ridiculous hat the workers had to wear. Katia was scandalized by the restaurant’s normal menu. She’d instead talked the bopca into some sort of fish recipe from Iceland. 

Donut had also ordered the fish. She currently had a piece of broken mirror propped up on the table and was practicing her voguing. She looked up at me. The sour look was ridiculously enhanced by the sunglasses.  

“It’s not vampire, it’s Love Vampire. I had three choices, and I picked that one.” 

“Did you actually read the descriptions first?” 

“Of course I read them, Carl. Besides, it’s the one Mordecai told me to get when we talked about this before.” 

I relaxed. “That’s good. What does it do?” 

“It makes one enemy my level or lower give me his heart. That’s what it says. So if I get stabbed, they take the damage instead of me.” 

“Wait, really?” I said, intrigued. “How often can you do it? How long does it last?”

“It lasts until they’re dead. I can do it every couple of hours. Now let me do this, Carl. We’re going on the show later and I need to perfect my look.”

I sighed. Zev had said we’d only be doing voiceover stuff on the show, but I wasn’t going to point that out now. 

I moved to my loot boxes. The boss boxes were typical Neighborhood Boss items. The best prize was a Scroll of Upgrade, which had been good to me so far, but when I applied it, all it did was add +3 Dexterity to my Trollskin Shirt. That was a decent upgrade, especially since I’d been planning on throwing a couple of points into Dexterity, but it wasn’t a great one. 

The Platinum Big Daddy Box contained a regular, unenchanted toothbrush, plus a tiny, travel-sized tube of toothpaste. The tube was red with a black skull on it. It had “Carpe Diem” written on it in what appeared to be Comic Sans font. 

Seize the Day Toothpaste – Five Applications. 

You know that feeling you get when you walk out into the world with minty-fresh breath? It’s like you can take on any challenge that is thrown your way. It gives you confidence. It boosts your self-esteem. It makes you feel like you’re on top of the damn world. 

Well, this stuff does none of that. However, if you brush your teeth using this enchanted, cherry-flavored toothpaste, you are imbued with the following buffs for 30 hours: 

+Three Times Damage to all Boss Monsters.

or

+Four Times Damage to all Boss Monsters if the Boss is a Province, Country, or Floor Boss.

This buff may only be applied in a safe room. 

That was a fantastic prize, but it would only be useful if I knew I was going to face a boss that day. With only five applications, I’d need to be stingy with it. I added it to my stash. 

From there, I assigned my stat points, adding six to my strength and three to my constitution.

I needed to sleep, but I found myself spending too much time using the chat feature. I’d traded away all of my Louis L’Amour books, and I’d suddenly realized how much I’d gotten used to reading, even if it was only for a few minutes before I slept. So instead I moved to the chat feature. I was starting to see a reoccurring theme in my small chat group. The trains were going out of commission at an alarming rate. People were getting stranded. We still had six days left, but that wasn’t nearly enough time if people were going to have to hike dozens of miles a day. 

Mordecai’s long-ago advice echoed in my head. Look, kid. I want this to sink deep into your thick skull. You can’t save them all.

Taking that train through the portal seemed like I was abandoning them. I knew that was stupid. Everyone was spread out to the wind. I didn’t even know these people. I told them how to get free. That was all I could do. It had to be enough. 

But what if it wasn’t? I’d read something earlier that had stuck with me. It was from the back of the cookbook. It was written by a crawler named York, who’d written the 10th edition. He’d written pages and pages of rambling philosophical essays I could barely understand. But I couldn’t stop thinking about one passage in particular. I wasn’t certain I fully understood exactly what he was trying to say, but it stuck with me. It appeared to be his last entry before he died or lost the book: 

Reading the words of those who have come before me, I know them. You, reading this. I know you, too. You are me. That is who this book finds. 

I have been alone my whole life. I have been surrounded by my hive, yet I have been alone. That is okay, I now know. It is acceptable to have your own thoughts, your own mind, despite what they say. But it is also acceptable to be alone and want the strength of the hive. There is no shame in that. No contradiction. That is what this book attempts. To make a hive of those who will never cross paths, except in these pages.

Yet sometimes this book is not enough. You sometimes want more. You want to belong. Again, there is no shame. There is no shame in wanting to be alone yet also wanting the comfort and the strength of your brethren. But more importantly, there is no shame in wanting to protect those who are your hive, even if you never knew them. For they are yours, and they are being taken. It is us or it is them. There is consolation in dying in the pursuit of justice, no matter how small or big that death is.

I wasn’t sure I agreed with that last part, but by the time I closed my eyes, I felt resigned to the idea that there was something more to be done for those trapped on the tracks.   

But what was it? I had no fucking clue. 

~***

10,000 words! Thanks again everybody for reading and commenting. Six days left on this floor, but things are about to seriously kick off into high gear for our friends.