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Message: <blockquote data-quote="skotothalamos" data-source="post: 6329828" data-attributes="member: 83398">The Day Hiram McDaniels Ate a TrainThe train left that morning and train guard Malia organized another safari. In the middle of this event, the train made a sudden stop; a barricade had been put across the tracks. Just as the engineers were unloading track-clearing supplies, the bandits struck, seizing control of the locomotive and ransacking the freight cars. At the same time, a gigantic multi-headed terror emerged from the swamp to the north of the train and began sticking its heads into the passenger cars. Alienor, James, Rock, and Cardiff shot their guns at the beast nonstop, while Olivert and Bree moved to protect the first-class car occupied by Luc and Ottavia. Summer and Cazara moved inside the train toward the passenger cars, hoping to limit the damage and maybe save some passengers. IronPeak had been searching the freight cars for Mister Mapple, and she was in the perfect position to chase off bandits. Unfortunately, they found Mapple before she did, and shot him dead just as she arrived. She was able to overpower the five men and chase their leader from the freight car before they could take anything. And then there was Coney. She transformed from her beggar’s rags into plate armor and dove out the window of the train. Once outside the train, she charged directly at the Malice Terror and was scooped up in one of its mouths. While being slowly chewed, she thought briefly about summoning her horse in its throat, but decided that traumatizing and killing her steed was probably not the best course of action. She struggled mightily as the beast began detaching its heads inside train cars (where they split into four separate creatures and started terrorizing and killing people). Eventually, she squirmed her way free of its mouth, and, hearing the cries of the innocents being slaughtered not a dozen feet from where she stood, she charged back into the mouth of the beast. It scooped her up and shook her around like a dog with a toy, occupying that one mouth while the other four heads did their violent business aboard the train. Inside the train, Cazara murdered the little malice beasts that had been spawned from the splitting heads and ushered the surviving passengers to the safety of the cars farther away from the monster. Despite her efforts, dozens of people died. After a while, the small beasts left the train, following after the large beast, which was slipping off back into the depths of the swamp, coincidentally at the exact moment the surviving bandits were making their escape. Almost as an afterthought, Summer cast a spell that pulled Coney out of the thing’s mouth, rescuing her from a slow digestion. IronPeak tried to administer first aid to Mapple, but he was unsuccessful. She rushed off to find Summer or James to try some healing on him, but by the time she returned, he was fine. His wounds had completely regenerated. She spent some time talking to him, and found out his real name was Andrei von Recklinghausen, and he had been traveling the rails for several months, seeing the world. His father was Doctor Wolfgang von Recklinghausen, who the constables had encountered while investigating the murder of Nilasa Hume over the summer. She inferred that he had been constructed like a flesh golem, and he shared with her the confusion he sometimes had when his brain and body didn’t agree on things. He also confided that he had violent flashbacks, but he did not think they were his own. She supposed that his brain had once belonged to a violent man. IronPeak was charmed by the man, and promised to bring him some pants in the future, along with more food.</blockquote>

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