(Sigma Mercenaries, Story 0001 REVISED: Initial Public Offering)

-x-x-x- REVISION Story notes -x-x-x-

Okay, for any of you who have read the first run of Sigma Mercenaries 0001, you know that it was a solid start to what could be a massive world-building run / bring order to chaos scenario, but the first chapter was polarizing for how badly I borked it. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I will admit I screwed the pooch on round one. Anyone who was around for the first run of Legend of the Jokers Wild, you will know that I did roughly the same there; I had to completely redo it to unscrew that pooch.

Same story here, effectively. If I want to un-pooch it, I need to redo it. And, given the nature of the Sigma nightmare, that means a new deck, new cut, new shuffle, and new deal. Same dealer, same players, same location, new game.

That said, there will be some common elements; some of the same cast will show up, some of the other cast will not show up. It is the nature of the beast. Also, unlike the first run, I will not be blitzing this story for five or six chapters, this will be rotated in and out with my other works as normal. Anything else is up for negotiation at this time.

Also, you'll notice a big change right from the word 'go'.

Primarily, I would like to thank Winblades for giving me a good ration of flak for the opening chapter, and Devil Dog / Terrace4 for a review on Chapter 5 that pointed out there isn't a huge amount of tie-in here to anything else (on the train side, that is deliberate, but it can be corrected). As always, good, hard criticism is welcomed by this author, even if I disagree with some of the motivation behind those criticisms. Still and all, any criticism is better than none, and criticism WILL be used to improve the matter.

NON-STANDARD CROSSOVER WARNING: This story is not a nominal crossover or setting fusion. It is an interdimensional jump storyline with bits and pieces of other material added in for good measure. DO NOT EXPECT AN ABUNDANCE OF CROSSOVER ELEMENTS TO BE READILY OBVIOUS. This story will go places, lots of places, but it will not initially start out that way. Crossover elements, persons, concepts will be added in bit by bit as the story advances and as RNG requires.

So, here on to the actual notes!

-x-x-x- ORIGINAL Story notes-x-x-x-

Over the years, I have drawn in a lot of disparate elements into my fanfic writing. Not unexpected, of course, given the nature of my writing being dimension hopping multi-crossover. It can make for some confusing plotlines and elements, but I try to keep everything cohesive. Of course, I can always kick everything up a notch. Crossovers, random results, the whole nine yards. Given enough time and effort, I can even mash things into a cohesive storyline.

Enter the Sigma Mercenaries. Or, technically, what shall become the Sigma Mercenaries.

This storyline started for me back in 2000, as part of a weird-ass dream of mine. It involved a guy, on a train, with all manner of weird shit going on around the train. The major details of that dream came to be the core of what I would design as an open ended role playing game that I constantly ran against myself to see how far I could go before things collapsed of their own inertia. It started with some dice, a couple handwritten results tables, and a database I wrote in Microsoft Works 6.5 DB. After enough refining and campaigning, the game became too cumbersome to run in an effective fashion when the amount of real-world time to complete a game day's action exceeded 24 man-hours. Some of this I cut down with the use of prodigious VB6 programming skills, but that only extended the length a campaign would run before it hit the holy grail of 1:1 time expenditure.

After about 2008, I buried the Sigma campaign mainly because I could no longer expend the time to try to master it and/or code it into a completely automated user interface. Around 2010, I resurrected my old campaign notes for a brief cameo in The Inferno That Is Chicago, mainly because I needed some extra mercs to throw in as ride-alongs for the Jokers Wild group. With that small foray, I knew it was time to put some solid numbers and history to the merc unit that has existed in several dozen iterations of an old RPG that I just threw shit into willy-nilly and still somehow managed to make sense of it all.

It would not be until this year, 2014, that I knew time was ready to begin writing about the backwater American enigma that would shake the world of interdimensional mercenaries. With everything finalized that I want included, it is time for the shit and the fan to collide gloriously. It will be messy. Trust me.

This is the ultimate expression of my random results systems: everything you see here, every event that happens, every nuance I write in, is all randomly generated with a combination of programs I have written myself or tasked to the purpose at hand. The only thing I directly control in this work is the Main Character; everything else is written on the results of dice at one level or the next. This is full-bore realism meeting every bit of science fiction, fantasy, and kitchen sink fantasy I feel like throwing in. It stars a regular guy whose name is famous from other stories yet to be written, just trying to do the right thing. And make a buck while he's at it.

Brace yourselves, ye who read past this content warning below. In this story, I shall pull no punches whatsoever.

-x-x-x- CONTENT WARNINGS -x-x-x-

This story will contain a lot of original concepts and interpretations of my other works, as well as historical or established fictional material. This is a multicrossover as well as a setting fusion and even has Alternate Universe tendencies depending on the flow of story. Expect things can and will change from one dimensional parallel iteration to the next.

The primary governments in this story are either historical (ancient civilizations), extant (United States, Russia, similar), or hail from my other stories (Lunar Star League / House Serenity). Matters will be covered in story or explained as necessary in footnotes or special data sections.

Events, encounters, people, and locations will be randomized in this story, excepting where established by fiction or history. Terrain on the homeworld will be randomized to certain degrees, as will population centers, extant 'governments' (term is used loosely in most cases) and military facilities (What survived the dissolution of organized control). All contract offerings are generated from random selection tables fed into a custom-written program for the purpose. No kittens were or shall be harmed in the preparation of such random events. SUGGESTIONS ARE WELCOMED, ESPECIALLY FOR CAMPAIGN CONTRACTS.

GENERAL DISCLAIMER: I own no rights to any included material from any other stories. I intend no offense in such use.

VIOLENCE WARNING: It is the root of all warfare, for without violence there is no war. Otherwise, it is called 'negotiations', follow? And even I cannot imagine a good military drama with only negotiating, such would be less entertaining than watching paint dry.

OC WARNING: This story is OC-centric, and not in the typical fashion. The story is driven mostly by random-generated persons, but you will see a lot of historical and fictional characters come and go during the works to come.

BAAAAAD LANGUAGE WARNING: This story revolves around a Kentucky hardass and the various people he meets in a really crapsack world. Expect foul language; there shall be militia, slaves, soldiers, and general dregs, after all. Also expect a shit-ton of suggestiveness, crazy situations, interpretiveness, analysis, and lots and lots of violence. You have been warned.

DICE WARNING: Events in this story will be controlled by the dice, and are concrete, true-random results provided by number generation services. These results will change events dynamically and/or modify established plans. After all, there is no mistress more cruel than fate.

POLITICAL WARNING: Political concepts and methods may be presented in this story that may conflict with established 'norms'. This is deliberate on the part of the author, to show different and rather sharp viewpoints on these subjects. The views expressed potentially match the views of the author, though are not to be considered holy writ. IF YOU THINK I AM BEING OFFENSIVE, LIGHTEN UP FRANCIS. Or, alternately, if your Political Correctness filter becomes overclogged with cold, hard reality, you are always welcome to find something else to read.

ANTI-POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WARNING: In case you missed the last line of the above warning, AT NO TIME will this story be politically correct. Real life is not politically correct, much less 'nice' in some definitions of the word. If you take issue with this, I recommend finding another read.

MATURE CONTENT WARNING: This story contains gratuitous references to violence, some nudity, and extensive use of situations that will be considered controversial. This is deliberately part of the narrative, because this is written random and as close to reality as possible. And the real world, last time I checked, is not a nice place.

FINAL WARNING

This story is RATED 'M' for MERCENARIES, 'MERICANS, and MUCH BLOODSHED!

May the action commence!

(Sigma Mercenaries, story 0001: Initial Public Offering)
(Chapter 01: Express Train to Insanity)

(5 June 2015, 0505 Hours EST (UTC-5))
(Rural Kentucky, United States)

" 'No one can bring me down / I will defend my beliefs / And I will stand my ground / I need to see where it leads,' " the computer technician sung along to the presently playing song on his home theater system, the chorus of the Stratovarius song Stand My Ground, from their Nemesis album. It was a bit of a sharp song in terms of confrontation, but it was something that the technician believed personally. Defending his beliefs in a poisonous political atmosphere was not the simplest of tasks, an environment that demanded the forfeiture of personal liberty for the illusions of safety, but such was the trend in American society nowadays...

Rural Kentucky. Close enough to the minor city of Lexington to make commuting practical, not close enough to suffer the proper 'urban' experience, or even that of the suburbs. 1 hour on the road to work, 9 hours on duty (give or take), one hour commute home. It put him out of the on-call roster for work, since commute times would exceed the SLA (1) for the subordinate companies, but the job paid well and they didn't really want him on-call anyway. With a day job of roaming around an office complex, fixing computers and executing information technology projects, there was nothing exciting in his normal daytime affairs. His home was even farther out into the country, enough so that two vehicles being on his road at the same time was categorized as 'a traffic jam' in local parlance. Surrounded by farmers, crop fields, cattle pastures and rural housing, there was precisely nothing exciting that happened out where he lived.

Weekends and evenings were the point at which things started 'coming alive' for the normally boring technical analyst Erich Hess. There were four persons on his 'road' of like mind and skillset, and the four shared a common passion: guns and patriotism. On a nightly basis, they would congregate at one of their houses and do some gun work or training of some kind. At Hess' place, they would do ammunition loading and preparation; four persons working together could load several thousand rounds in a night. At the house of Clint Jamison, the four had access to a basement full of workout equipment, weights, mats, heavy bags, the works. Clint was a big physical buff, and enjoyed 'chewing' on Hess to lose mass and harden the fuck up, with varying degrees of success from month to month. Clarence and Victoria Williams (married) were new converts to the Militia Group for Claiborne County, but both were ardent patriots and willing to do what they could in defense of their county, state, and if necessary the country. Hess had even worked the newcomers into open positions at the building he worked at, and so far things were going well for the newlyweds. Their garage turned out to be the most spacious for weapons maintenance, assembly, disassembly, and modification — most of their coworkers at Kiessson Technical Services knew that one of the four could fix or mod pretty much any gun that was brought to them, for a nominal fee. Such conduct belied the illusions of 'Preppers' and 'Militia' being social outcasts and crazies, as everyone knew Hess and the Williams were nice, civil, personable, and stable under even the worst pressures of the job.

With the group's frequent forays to the region's shooting ranges and gun shops, both indoor and outdoor, they were very well known around the community and the sheriff department. The deputies routinely shot competition against the Militia 'troops' from the county, and Hess was one of three persons in the county with a Federal Firearms License for firearms dealers that he used to do maintenance on the Sheriff Department's weapons and munitions as needed. Sheriff Hearter routinely hosted cook-outs in the spring and summer on Saturday evenings, and Hess' militia buddies were almost always invited. It wasn't commonly stated outside the Sheriff's Department circles, but the twenty-odd militia troops in the county were all on a dial-down list for the Sheriff's Department as an emergency response group if things went really sour for the deputies, which was the true written purpose of an Unorganized Militia. The Deputies knew that Hess' house, and his neighbor Jefferson Kall (retired Army from the Vietnam War) were two places they could ditch and go to ground in case something went to hell and they needed backup in a damn hurry.

All in all, it was a quiet life for Hess, but sometimes things happen beyond anyone's control...

" 'No one can bring me do—,' " A loud impact east and somewhat south of his house caused Hess to choke. The sound was something of metal or a similar material that had slammed into the ground, a highly unexpected noise in his open grass yard area. "Hell is that sound?" he asked nobody in particular after a few seconds of listening to something that sounded like the whine of an electric motor.

The technician's cell phone rang, and once he picked it up off the table, the name shown was his neighbor, Jefferson Kall. "Morning Jefferson, what gives?"

"It's Cecilia," Jefferson's wife answered. "Son, you're not going to believe this, but you have a train that landed on your corn patch."

"Do what?" Hess asked in shock. "Did I hear that right? A train?"

"Yeah, four cars, caboose, two seat cars, and an engine," Cecilia said.

"It's a no shit train, sonny! You'd better check out your back window!" Jefferson shouted loud enough that the microphone on the phone picked it up while his wife held the cordless several yards away from Jefferson.

"Right, okay?" Hess still wasn't sure what to think of the sheer impossibility of a train being in his backyard, as there had not been any railroad tracks through Claiborne County in nearly 90 years. He slid open the desk drawer under his computer tower, withdrew an old Ruger GP100 long-barrel revolver and a speedloader, and stood up to walk to his back door.

At the back door, he flipped the cell phone over to speakerphone mode and stuffed it into his shirt pocket, where he could still easily hear it and speak into it. Once he pulled the door open, the sound of the electric motor intensified and readily gave away the position of the culprit. "Oh wow, holy shit, my thought processes stand corrected. That is a train, and it's in my backyard. Now, how the hell did a train get into my back yard?"

"Hell if I know, son," Cecilia said. Jefferson was 62, his wife 60, and both were approaching retirement age. Technically they were both too old for Militia service, but Jefferson tracked with the young ones and swore he could still fight from a fixed position if needed.

"I don't like the look of this," Hess said. "There is way too much wrong with this. Gimme a second, I'm going to three-way call Clint." Erich ditched the speedloader in his pocket and pulled his phone out. A few button presses and his phone was ringing again, this time to attach to another phone line while still on Jefferson's call.

"If this isn't a beautiful woman, I'm hanging up," Clint Jamison answered.

"Sorry, Clint, this is your shit-hits-fan wake-up call," Hess said.

"What? This fucking early in the morning? Who's pissing in the wheaties?" Clint answered with more gusto.

"Language, young man," Cecilia chided Clint. It was a common running gag between Cecilia and Clint, she didn't like the foul language and tended to act the part of an old schoolmarm about it.

"Mrs. Kall? You're on the line? Sorry, ma'am, Hess just woke me and I'm a bit groggy. I'm conscious now, give it to me," he said.

"I swear no vodka involved in this, but I have a train that landed in my backyard," Hess explained.

"A train, as in choo-choo, carries material and people around on rails, train?" Clint asked.

"Ten-four (2), one caboose, two passenger seat cars, one engine. Caboose landed on my corn patch, rest of the train landed on the fence going southeast into Grierson's cattle field."

"Now that's a bitch, you know that asshat Grierson is going to try to accuse you of screwing with his fence," Clint said.

"Yeah, yeah, I've said it before, I'll say it again, he can lick the south acre of my left ass cheek," Hess dismissed the coming complaint storm from said farmer-rancher. Roughly once a year, Grierson would try to file complaints about Hess or Kall 'messing' with his fence or his cattle, but without hard evidence the Sheriff routinely buried the complaints.

"Okay, what do you want from me this fine morning?" Clint asked.

"Give the Williams house a call, and keep your ear to the wind. If you hear gunshots, I probably could use some help. Have Clarence call me when you get his attention, I'll give him the run-down."

"10-4, good buddy. Keep your gun up and your ass down if the lead flies," Clint cautioned him before he disconnected.

"Think we should call the Sheriff?" Cecilia asked.

"Might be a good idea, this is sufficiently strange enough to warrant some oversight," Hess said. "You have a second phone?"

"No, you?" Cecilia said. Neither member of the Kall household liked the concept of cell phones, much to the chagrin of their daughter and her extended family.

"Yeah, my work cell. Stand by." Hess pulled his work cell from a phone holster, though rather than immediately place the call, he started by taking several pictures in the summer twilight. They weren't perfect, but easily recognizable as a train. With photographic evidence, he dialed into the Sheriff switchboard.

"Claiborne County Sheriff," the operator began. "Do you need police, fire, or EMS?"

"Police minimum, possibly EMS, unsure at this time," Hess answered.

"Erich Hess?" the Operator asked. "What's wrong?"

"Patti, this is gonna sound like the Twilight Zone, but there is a three-car-and-engine train in my backyard. On my honor, and I have photographic evidence to back it up."

"That I have to see," she said while typing up his information into the dispatch console. Claiborne County had a modernized dispatch system, which included SMS text and SMS Picture capability.

"Just landed there less than 10 minutes ago. I'll send the switchboard a picture," he said. The phone issued to him by work transferred the call over to speaker while he scrolled through the camera memory; once he had the picture, he sent it through the system to the dispatch number, which immediately imported the picture and displayed it for the operator on a separate monitor.

"That is freaking unreal," Patti said.

"On my honor, my last vodka cocktail was last Saturday," Hess said. "Jefferson and Cecilia Kall can confirm it."

"I do," Cecilia said from the other phone. "This is Cecilia Kall, and I confirm Hess' report."

"Okay, you're the man on the scene, Hess, anything unusual happening here?" the dispatcher asked officially.

"Other than the presence of a train where there has never been railroad tracks, it has been quiet. Still, this thing is creeping the Kall residence out just as much as I am creeped out. I have no idea what's in it, who is in it, or what their intention is."

"Roger that, standby," Patti said. She muted her microphone, which was a bit of a useless gesture, as Hess had a radio scanner at his house with the Sheriff band programmed in. "Adam-12, Dispatch, we have a call of suspicious activity at Erich Hess' house, what is your 10-20?"

"Dispatch, Adam-12, I'm over by Milletson's grain farm. ETA is going to be 20 minutes or so slow run. How suspicious are we talking, and how fast do you want me over there?" Deputy Filkner asked.

"Twilight Zone suspicious. Hess is reporting no vodka since last Saturday before he filed this report. He says, and I quote, 'there is a three-car-and-engine train in my backyard. On my honor, and I have photographic evidence to back it up,' as he reported. He sent a picture into the switchboard, which confirms a four-car train in his backyard and trailing into Greerson's cattle field."

"Okay then Charlie," Deputy Filkner said with a deflating sigh. "Very well, responding code 1, should be there in twenty or so. Hess, if you've got your scanner on, keep an eye on it from a safe location."

"Patti, pass on to Filkner that I respond 10-4, Jefferson and I have eyes on and are clear at this time."

"Oh, yeah, scanner," the dispatcher responded. "Adam-12, Dispatch, Hess responds 10-4, Jefferson and he have eyes on and are clear." The scanner popped as she let off the PTT button. For some reason, they wanted to keep the old and slightly worn microphone for the radio console, so Hess obliged when he helped set up the new hardware. Another advantage to knowing the entire Sheriff staff, they also knew Hess' day-job was in information and communication technology, so they called him to fix minor problems and help on IT projects.

"Lovely way to start my morning," Hess said. His personal phone beeped with another call, so he merged the incoming call into his conversation with Cecilia. "Hess here."

"Hess? Williams," Victoria Williams said. "Clint briefed us in. What's going on right now?"

"Nothing, actually. The train landed, no activity since then. It's got us all worried, though," Hess said.

"Want us over there?" Victoria asked.

Before he could answer, Hess' phone rang again, this time from Clint calling in. Hess merged the call in to a four-way call. "You're on the party line, Clint. Victoria and Cecilia are on as well, and my other phone has Patti at the Sheriffs Dispatch on."

"The wonders of modern technology. We've progressed back to the bad old days of party lines," Clint said.

"I'm old enough to remember party lines, son," Cecilia said.

"Whoa, hold the phone, back door on the caboose just opened. Jefferson, you have eyes on?" Hess asked.

"Hell with eyes, son, I've got my Bushmaster pointing in that direction," Jefferson answered after Cecilia set their land-line on speaker. "Whoa, son, we've got persons coming out," he continued. "Could use some more clothes, though, of the three, I count about one and a half full outfits."

"They're scared, they're fleeing something. Patti, Hess, we have activity, something may be wrong here. I have four, no, five persons fleeing northbound from the Caboose."

"Go! GO! Keep running!" the last person out shouted. "Keep running!"

"What the — "

"Oh shit! Shotgun!" Hess shouted as a person came to the doorway of the caboose, aimed out, and fired. "Shit! Shots fired!" A second shot was loosed toward the fleeing ladies. The shooter pumped the shotgun, fired a third, pumped again, swung it around toward Hess' house, and dropped a fourth shot into the kitchen window, which shattered under the birdshot abuse. "Fuck! My house is taking fire! I'm returning the favor!"

Hess braced the revolver against the frame of his door, sighted in as best as possible given the limited light, and began firing. He dumped all six rounds in three pairs, and from what he could see, he thought he may have hit the target at least once. The tango had ducked back into the caboose, and after 30 seconds, did not reemerge.

"Hess! Hess! Report!" Clint shouted over the phone.

"I'm alive," he responded. "No injuries as far as I can tell. That guy must have fired four rounds into my house, at least."

"Hess, Dispatch, I have advised Filkner we have shots fired. Can you tell what happened to the fleeing persons?"

"I don't have line of sight to the escapees. Jefferson?"

"Hess, Jefferson, you have three downed between the houses. How do you want to proceed?" Jefferson asked.

"Jefferson, Cecilia, remain at your window, provide cover. Clint, Clarence, Victoria, I could use a hand evacuating the wounded over here," Hess said.

"We're on it," Victoria hung up quickly.

"Be there in five. Get geared up, big guy," Clint hung up.

"Dispatch, Hess, be advised the party line is gearing up, we're going to try to clear the wounded," Hess told Patti.

"Adam-12, Dispatch, Hess reports the group is gearing up, they will try to clear the wounded. EMS is rolling now, ETA 10 minutes," Hess barely heard from the scanner as his ears were still ringing from the six shots of .357 magnum he had just loosed while standing in an echo chamber.

"Patti, have the EMS roll in hard, no sirens, from the east. That's going to be the best covered direction, and have them pull all the way into Jefferson Kall's driveway. That should keep them behind cover, in case anyone else shows up." Hess pocketed his work cell so he could gear up in his personal-built tactical gear set. The big guy figured, if he was going out into the shooting zone, he was going to go with the firepower necessary to return the favor.

-x-

(5 minutes later)

"Hammerhead!" Clint shouted at Hess' door.

"Spinach!" Hess shouted the counter-sign to the challenge phrase. "I'm in my gear room, Clint!"

"You all right, big guy?" the significantly-smaller Miltiaman asked after he approached the door to the arsenal at the center of Hess' house.

"Ears are still ringing a little, but no pellets in my sorry ass," he said. "Patti, what's the ETA on the medics?"

"Two ambulances are running now, should be there in five to seven. I have volunteer paramedics on the way, they've all been told to approach from the east. What about you guys?"

"No further activity from the train reported by Jefferson, I have Clint Jamison here with me, we're going to move out to try to pull the wounded clear from the caboose field of fire."

"I can't tell you not to do it, but watch your ass, Hess," Patti said. "Sheriff Hearter is on the way, and a general emergency call has gone out to the rest of the Deputies. They will be filtering in at intervals."

"Have the Sheriff call my personal cell when he is about two minutes out," Hess said as he finished securing his light rucksack. Once the shoulders were settled, he looped the three-point sling on his AR-15 over his right shoulder and drew the bolt back. With that done, he safed the AR and grabbed up his old Enfield Number 4 Mark 1 battle rifle, an ancient British bolt-action rifle that he loved for its accuracy and hard-hitting ammo. With his rifles ready, Hess pulled his electronic earmuffs forward and switched them on, giving him easy hearing and protection from the gunfire sounds.

Clint drew the bolt back on his personal choice rifle, a WASR-10 civilian-legal AKM from the Czech Republic. Much like Hess, he packed a heavy kit for defensive engagements, but unlike Hess, Clint called it at one rifle (the AKM). Hess carried the Enfield as a 'drop gun' or for hard-hitting munitions requirements. "Ready when you are, big guy."

"Let's roll," Hess said. His last action on the way out of his gear room was to turn on his personal 2-way CB radio, which everyone in the Claiborne County Militia used for coordination purposes.

"Hess, Victoria, come back," the lady of the husband-and-wife duo said.

"Go," Hess answered immediately.

"We're at the corner of Jefferson's house, nothing happening. I think I saw one of the downed ladies move a few seconds ago."

"10-4, Clint and I are coming out my front door now. We'll be ready to jump off in fifteen," Erich said as they walked in front of his garage. At the corner of the garage, the two stopped.

"Ready?"

"Good to go." Both Militiamen moved in sync, rifles pointed toward the caboose as they began moving toward the downed ladies in the middle of the open grass between Jefferson's house and Erich's garage. Once out into the open, they moved fast and carefully, a measured pace to compromise between aiming toward the target and moving toward the victims. At the first downed lady, Hess held aim on the caboose while Clint checked the downed lady. "She's gone, man. Buckshot pellet to the back of the skull."

"Fuck," Hess groused. "Patti, Hess, confirm one of the ladies shot by the gunner is DRT, buckshot to the head," he said into his gadget pouch, which was unzipped with his work cell in it so he could stay on the line with the Dispatcher.

"Understood, I'll inform county morgue. Any sign of the shooter?"

"Negative, he ducked back into the caboose. I have no eyes on the shooter," Hess said as he waved Clint toward the next downed lady. She was ten yards closer to the caboose than the first casualty.

Hess' personal phone rang, and the caller ID number reported the Sheriff. He merged the call into the active call with Cecilia and Jefferson. "Hess, go," he said in a clipped fashion.

"Hearter here, report status," the Sheriff said. The gruffness of his voice told enough tale: the Sheriff was not happy to be mobile this early in the morning, but he was significantly more worried about his county citizens.

"Shots fired at caboose, no threats visible. Three fleeing persons downed, two more running northbound and no LOS or contact since the initial shooting. One downed lady confirmed dead, checking the second now," Hess gave him the 20-second rundown.

"This one is alive, but barely. She's gonna need some serious work seriously fast," Clint reported. "Fuck, we can't move her! These hits may be spinal, if we move her wrong it could paralyze her."

"And this rough ground, a wrong move could happen inside of two yards," Hess said. "We leave her for professional hands," Erich decided, referring to the oncoming medics. "Check the third," he waved Clint forward toward her.

"Help me," the third lady said in a strained voice, waving an arm toward Clint. "Help… please, help…" she said as Jamison and Hess approached her.

"Where are you hit, ma'am?" Clint asked as Hess took a knee next to her left side, Enfield rifle still aimed to the Caboose.

"My ass and legs, lots of little pain pricks," she said.

"Birdshot pellets," Clint said, after he picked one out of her body armor vest surface. "Pattern is all up and down her backside. If she wasn't wearing the armor, she would have taken spinal hits as well."

"That armor has a drag handle, use it," Hess suggested. "I'll cover you."

"On it," Clint said. Hess shuffled backwards at a fast pace as Clint dragged the wounded refugee away from the train and toward Jefferson's house.

The two only made it partway to cover before — "HESS! Charlies!" Jefferson shouted.

"Tangos!" Clint shouted as he released the refugee and brought his rifle up onto target. "DROP YOUR WEAPON!"

"DROP THE GUN, ASSHOLE!" Hess shouted.

Intellectually, Hess recognized the front end of some manner of sub-machinegun in the model of either a Mini-Uzi or an Ingram Model 10. At the 40 yards distance, he couldn't tell which exactly, but he knew it was bad business. The thug put the trigger down, aiming somewhere near where Hess was, but Hess put the first accurate round downrange, followed less than a full second later by two rounds rapid from Jefferson Kall. None of the shots were sniper's triangle rounds, so when the shooter went down his finger held onto the trigger until the bolt slammed forward on an empty chamber. The line of bullets had run up the wall of Jefferson's house, but mercifully missed anyone inside.

The rifle came down a whit as Hess ran the bolt back to kick out the empty shell, then forward to chamber another live round. The second tango had a shotgun aimed at Jefferson Kall, and fired one shell toward their second-story bedroom window, but she didn't get the chance to rack the slide for a follow-up. Clint had his AKM up on target and loosed four rounds with the Reflex sight centered on her chest. Three rounds struck inside a fist-sized group centered over her heart, the fourth went a little left to her breast and lung, but without doubt the enemy was dead, dead.

Hess was back on target for the third enemy, some kind of unusual machine gun that Hess had never seen before, but arsenal was arsenal and it was pointing in his general direction, so he fired next. The 180-grain round nose soft point .303 British bullet was Erich' preferred Enfield load, as the bullets were common in North America and reliably stopped just about any kind of game shot with them — including people, if necessary. He custom-loaded the rounds in his rifle to a personal specification that gave him the greatest balance of accuracy and power, which in this case paid off. The large rifle slug punched into the guy's left nostril, blitzed through the left sinus, mushroomed on the front of the skull as it continued into the brainpan, and began tearing through the gray mush found inside. By the time the slug reached the back of his skull, more than 90 percent of the brain had been disrupted or shredded by the bullet, so when the skull was cratered out his body collapsed nearly straight down with no flopping or trigger-from-the-grave effect.

"What the fuck?" Clint asked on seeing the next guy at the doorway to the caboose.

"OH SHIT!" Hess shouted.

"R-P-G!" Jefferson shouted, which was picked up by both of Hess' phone calls.

"GET DOWN!" Hess shouted as he dove forward, hoping to escape injury from the rocket-propelled grenade now aimed toward him.

Jefferson fired on the tango, since the rocket launcher was aimed in the general direction of Clint and Erich, who were both diving for cover. One shot contacted before the gunman closed both triggers, which caused the shooter to jerk the shot off course. After the second trigger contacted, the older RPG-7 fired electrically and leapt out of the old 'recoilless' tube. True to design, the rocket streaked straight and true, though with the misaligned aimpoint, the rocket passed wide right of Hess and detonated on the far side of the street in a stand of trees, some 140 yards behind the militiamen. In the seconds thereafter, Jefferson hammered the shooter another nine times with 5.56mm XM193 rounds, until he was sure the gunman was dead and not a threat any more.

"FUCK ME SIDEWAYS!" Hess shouted. "Everyone all right?"

"Holy fucking shit! I browned my shorts on that one, big guy!" Clint said.

"Jesus H. Christ," Victoria said as she approached behind Hess, her AR-15 pointed into the doorway. "Are you alright?"

"No more contacts," Hess groused. "No more contacts. Holy shit," he said. "Sheriff, you still on the phone?"

"I'm fifteen seconds out," he said. "Get your asses to cover, now!"

"Clint! Get the wounded out of here!"

"On it!"

Hess and Victoria both maintained aimpoint on the caboose as the downed refugee was finally dragged behind the corner of the house. "Lord have mercy, this is a helluva start to the day," Clarence said.

"Hess, Dispatch, be advised that SRT is rolling now, ETA 15 minutes to your location. Sheriff Hearter should be there now, Deputy Filkner will be there in 60 seconds. Medics are 90 seconds out."

"Erich! Coming up behind you!" Sheriff Hearter shouted before the sound of an AR-15 bolt was heard by the four-man militia team.

"Welcome to the party, Sheriff," Hess said, never moving his rifle aimpoint from the caboose. "Holy shit…"

"How bad?"

"They snapped a RPG shot off, it detonated in the trees to my right," he pointed in the general direction of it. "We got four of the fucks, though, and no casualties on our side."

"Scratch that, Hess, I took a buckshot pellet to the arm, nothing serious," Jefferson reported over the other phone. "I'm still in the fight."

"This is a bloody bitch," Sheriff Hearter said. He reached for his lapel mike and activated it. "Dispatch, Adam-1, Code 0, repeat, Code 0. This situation is gone to hell in a hurry. Activate the Militia and have them report here. Call the neighbors and request extra paramedic support, then get on the horn to the FBI and ATF, they'll need in on this."

"Do I call in DHS?" Patti asked.

"Negative, this doesn't look that widespread yet. They'll probably be involved soon enough anyways." He let off his lapel mike. "All right, big guy, your team is deputized retroactive to midnight. What are your thoughts?"

"This train suddenly dropped in on us, it could leave any minute. It's got some pretty nasty customers aboard, and there is at least one more shithead in there that has shot at us. Question is, why?" Hess said, still staring down his sights at the caboose. The first of the two ambulances had turned into the driveway at Kall's house and was coming toward the garages.

"I can answer that," the injured lady said from beside the garage door. "They're Slavers, they take slaves and drag them into the train, to be sold off at other destinations where the train lands. They don't like us kidnapping their sex slaves back, and they tend to shoot at us if they can't capture them back."

"Are you fucking serious?" Sheriff Hearter said.

"It's my job," the lady said as the medics hoisted her onto a gurney. "Hold here, I need to tell this," she said to one of the paramedics, then reached across her chest with her right hand and ripped a patch off her left sleeve. "I'm a Returner, we go into these Jumper Trains to get the hostages out. We're commissioned non-military, though, so we can't use arms to do the rescue."

"That's some dumb shit," Clarence said.

"I know, and the birdshot in my ass agrees with your assessment," the Returner said.

"Are there more slaves in there?" Hess asked.

"Yes," the Returner said. "My sister went in with me, she had a second group she was recovering, she should still be in there. And I know of at least another four, five slavers in the train as well," she said.

"Pretty crowded for such a small train," Sheriff Hearter said.

"Oh no, that train is much bigger on the inside," she said. "The visible cars are only part of it, the rest of the train is suspended in pocket space between the visible cars."

"How big are we talking here?"Clint said.

"I don't know, I only went in about 50 cars, and most of that was luggage cars, sparsely populated," she explained.

"Son of a bitch," Hess groused.

"This smells like Beirut to me," Clarence said.

"How long between train jumps?" Victoria asked.

"Roughly an hour," the Returner answered.

"It's been here about thirty minutes. Think we can stop it in thirty?" Clint asked.

"Can we get in the locomotive, stop the engine?" Hess asked.

"The locomotives are locked and fortified. If you go through the train, though, you might be able to find the equipment necessary to break the security on the loco — or you can find some personnel who knows how."

"Jesus, sweet Jesus," Victoria groused. "What do we do, sir?"

"Nothing, for now," Sheriff Hearter said. "We wait for the SRT guys to show up,"

"I'm here," Deputy Filkner said. He was carrying a riot shotgun but had his AR-15 slung over his shoulder. "Son of a bitch, sir, looks like you guys have had some party time already."

"Ain't my party so far, this has been Hess and his crew," Hearter said. "Okay, now that we have enough of a crew, I want to secure some of those bodies and take photos. Do you have gloves, guys?"

"Nitrile gloves, all of us," Hess said. It was part of the basic kit amongst the Militiamen, both for their medical kits and some extra pairs in their general kit for certain unusual circumstances.

"I want two of you heavy hitters inside, watching the door to the next cars, and the rest will help log and move evidence. Pete, get your cameras ready, one on video and one for pictures."

"Clarence, you and I have the door," Hess said. "Ready to move?" the deputized Militiaman asked the rest of the team.

"Go," the Sheriff said. Clint, Erich, Clarence, Victoria, Ron Hearter, and Pete moved out in a stack, their guns all trained on the caboose or the flanks of the train. They did not approach the caboose directly, they approached at an angle to prevent easy targeting if there was a combatant in the room. Once they closed up, Clint signalled for two to stack on the caboose stairs to the actual car room; Clarence climbed up onto the stairs, then Hess joined him. A quick nudge and Clarence went in with his old M1 Garand rifle bayonet-first, followed by Hess going in bayonet-first right behind him.

Inside the Caboose, there was no living persons besides the Militiamen. "Clear!" Hess shouted after it was obvious there was no threat. Two dead persons, though, awaited the Sheriffs personnel: the RPG shooter, and a second guy who appeared to have taken the backblast from the RPG to the face, which killed him. Eric nudged the body with his bayonet, but got no reaction. "He's dead, probably got popped by the backblast."

"Son of a bitch, that was hairy," Clarence complained.

The CB radio crackled. "Hess, this is Big Mike with two, we're at your house. What's your twenty (3)?"

"There is a four-car train in the garden behind my house. Hard to miss. I am in the caboose. No contacts in the area, but approach slow and cautious, these guys are packing some serious shit."

"Ten-four, big guy," Big Mike said.

"Man, this stinks," Clarence said.

"Part emptied bowels from the dead, part rocket backblast, a hint of blood, and fear thrown in for good measure," Hess said. "Damn, I never thought I'd really be ass deep in it like this."

"Welcome," Sheriff Hearter said as he began taking pictures of the guy who was downed by the rocket backblast. "At least this one was done in by Darwin, he was packing a Mauser rifle."

"The dark side is represented, now," Clarence said. "Brits, Americans, and Nazis. Hat trick."

"We won, then, we won again," Hess said with a grim chuckle. "Darwinian death, thou — " the door to the next car popped and began sliding open on its own. "Door! Hands up!"

"Hands up, lady!" Clarence shouted.

"Don't shoot! Don't shoot! We're trying to evacuate the train!" The lady at the front said. "I'm a Returner, we're trying to get out of the path of the Slavers!"

"Hands up, move out of the car. Don't step on the bodies!" Sheriff Hearter ordered. "Mike! Pete! Hostages coming out, get them on the far side of Erich's house and get them set down!" the Sheriff tripped his lapel microphone. "Any responding units, be advised that we have a group of hostages that will be at Erich Hess' house with militia on guard. Incoming units are to secure them and escort to safety. SRT report to the caboose immediately on arrival."

"Jesus, they could use some more clothes," Clarence said. All were ladies, all were in various states of dress, and all were rather frightened as they passed the Militiamen.

"This must be a bitch of a Train, to kick out refugees like that," the Sheriff said.

-x-

(10 minutes later)

"Reggie! Get these bodies back past the garage at Kall's place! When this thing jumps, I don't want the evidence anywhere near it!"

"Boss, I've done what research I can on this gun, it doesn't exist. Plain and simple, the bastard doesn't exist, hell, the cartridge it uses doesn't exist," the county CSI reported, waving to the small rotary-barrel support machine gun that one of the troops Hess had shot was carrying before his death. "Fucking 10mm Kurz, suggests German, but if this damn thing is a short round like the name suggests, I'd hate to see the big bitch that spawned it." The CSI guy held up one of the cartridges between thumb and middle finger, and the shell was easily recognizable to be larger than the old 30.06 round.

"You said 10mm Kurz, no?" the second Returner asked.

"Yeah, that's what the headstamp says, miss," the CSI answered.

"It's a chopped down chambering derived from a Magi caliber, the 10mm Boxer Gatling, which was designed well into their past as a cost-effective substitute for the 12.7mm Browning cartridge. The 10mm BG is used commonly by their Armored Infantry troops as an area suppression and light armor weapon. The chopped down version is used in certain Close Assault Weapons, as it never was intended even in Kurz configuration for unmounted use."

"Makes you wonder what kind of a history spawned that, eh?" Clint asked Erich.

"Fuck, amigo, my mind is already working overtime trying to guess, and I'm reasonably sure I would be wrong," Hess said. He looked to the latest of the arrivals. "Hey! It's the Tweety Birds!" Hess said with cheer at the arrival of the SRT guys. The Claiborne County SRT guys had such an illustrious nickname due to their love of Twitter for posting 'cool guy videos', usually of them doing paintball exercises against the other Sheriffs or the Militiamen. It was all in good fun, and the SRT guys traded guns and bets with the militia guys on a regular basis.

"Good show, big guy," Corporal Johnson said as he extended a hand to Hess for a shake. "Heard you got into some serious shit this morning. Nice to see you only got one scratch on five guys for it."

"That was some brown shorts material, though. RPG-7, nasty customer."

"Do we enter and clear, sir?" Corporal Pellis asked the Sheriff.

For that, the Sheriff turned to the second Returner. "Are there more hostages?"

"Yes sir, there will be," Returner Else Herzen answered coldly. "We know they had at least six veteran Slavers and eight greenhorns on this train."

"So, were we killing the greenhorns, or the veterans?" Clarence asked.

"No guarantee on either," Else answered. "Hell, they might have even been Mafiosi, not really Slavers."

"Great," Victoria said. "Circumscribed conundrum: we have a train of people at risk, with known hostages to be sold off as sex slaves, and no way to stop the train so it can be properly cleared. The hell do we do to solve this?"

"That's sick shit," Corporal Pellis said. He was one of two Claiborne County SRT guys, having been a Chicago SWAT operator that decided he didn't want to work for a corrupt city government any more. How he ended up out in Claiborne County, Kentucky, nobody knew and he wasn't telling.

"A long game," Hess said. Given the looks he received from the Sheriff and the others around him, they figured he made as much sense as someone would have if they had said 'the crayon is purple' in this conversation.

"A long game," Hearter echoed, then smiled. "Get on the train, sweep it, take the engines, jump it back here, we clear it out for good, problem is solved. Hess, you are one crazy bastard, you know that? You think you can make that shit work?"

"No guarantees, Sheriff, this shit wasn't exactly part of my IT certification tests," Hess said, waving toward the locomotive.

"If you're going, I'm going," Clint said.

"Lives to save, and we need to track down that asshat that shot up the three evacuees and your house," Clarence said. "Bring him to justice, such as it is."

"Not exactly what I was thinking when I joined the militia groups in the county, but I'm go," Victoria said with a smile.

"Is it even possible to bring the train back here?" Corporal Johnson asked the Returner.

"I don't know enough to answer that question solid, but my guess would be yes — it landed here once, logic would say it could land here again."

"Sold," Clint said. "Permission to assault the express train to Hell, sir?" he asked the Sheriff.

Sheriff Hearter opened his mouth to answer, paused a second without any speech, then closed it. Again he paused, then sighed mightily. "I can't and won't ask you men to do this, and I won't let your whole Militia unit go, either," he said, eyeing Big Mike who had approached behind Hess. "Four men, Hess, Jamison, and the two Williams troops. Hess, I figured it was between you and Connell as to who I was going to put as the Lieutenant for the militia troops in case of a call-up, and the runner-up gets the Sergeant position. Since Connell is vacationing in Nova Scotia right now, you're it. You are team command."

Erich clenched his jaw; he didn't have any expectation that he would have had command position in the Militia at any point, but the Sheriff had just told him that Hess was running head-to-head against the other resident brainiac of the Militia troops. "Understood, sir. What are my orders?"

"Make entry, make all necessary actions to rescue hostages and disrupt the slave trade, capture if possible any Slavers, defend civilians in the train, and attempt to bring order to chaos. Bring the train back to the county and disable engines for full clearing if at all possible. Do not, repeat, do not put your lives at undue risk to achieve these objectives. Questions?"

"No sir," the four Militia troops answered.

"Johnson, Pellis, give them your handcuffs, zip-cuffs, tasers, and cartridges. Pete, in my storage box in the back of the Ranger, I have deputy badges for this kind of job. Bring 'em here." The Sheriff tossed his keys to the Deputy.

"Got it, boss," Deputy Pete Filkner jogged off toward the Sheriff's truck.

"Food and water?" Militiaman 'Big' Mike Gaul asked.

"There will be supplies on the train," Returner Else Herzen said. "They have a supply network that keeps the trains provisioned and fueled for independent operation."

"Got it," Hess said as he fit a set of the handcuff pouches to his vest. The SRT guys used Olive Drab Green equipment, just the same as the Militiamen, so there was no clashing camo pouches involved. "Ready to go?"

"Here," Deputy Filkner passed each one of them a badge. Hess attached his right below the pocket organizer pouch he kept, which put the badge immediately under an ODG-colored American Flag.

"You are one contradictory son of a bitch, Hess. Fat boy computer technician, nice guy, never put a foot wrong, and you turn out to be a hard mofo with a penchant for saving lives and shooting straight. Once you get back, remind me not to piss you off," the Sheriff said with a handshake to accompany.

"When I get back, I will have a few stories for you," Hess promised the tall-and-built Sheriff. "Listen, can you do me a favor in the next few days?"

"Hit me," Hearter said.

Hess unzipped his pocket organizer attached to his general-purpose vest pouch and removed a business card from it, then passed it to Hearter. "This clown is my lawyer, but he knows his stuff. The lawyer has an order package in case I am killed or lose contact. If you don't hear from me in a week, have him execute the package."

"Next of Kin?" Hearter asked. Filkner, Johnson, and Pellis were asking the other troops the same question.

"You have my mom's contact info. Tell her what happened here. What really happened here. She'll know what to do." The whistle on the train blew. "Come on, guys! We need to move!"

"Ten minute warning," the Returner said as the train whistle blew again.

"Good luck, you son of a bitch," Hearter said with a final shake and a chuckle. "Come back alive!"

"Yes sir!" Hess turned to his team. "Clint, point! Clarence, rearguard! We've got a train to catch!"

"Is my life insurance going to cover this if something happens?" Clint asked as the team moved on the caboose.

"Not likely," Clarence said as the four arrived at the stairs.

Two other Militiamen cleared out to allow the entry team easy access into the caboose. The inside was still mildly slick due to the blood in the car's interior, but Victoria recovered from a stumble readily enough.

"All right, guys, once we go in, no turning back — it's the engines or bust. Last chance to duck out," Hess offered.

"Clint, pop the door," Victoria said. "You worry too much, old maid in a young man's body," she chided Hess. "We'll make this happen."

"Told," Clint said with a smile. He reached for the door latch, but —

"Hold," Hess said quickly before Clint could pop the door. He lowered his Enfield, reached over onto Clint's pistol belt, and withdrew the AK bayonet from its kydex sheath. "Use it if needed. We're not here to fuck around. Put it on and poke some shit if you have to."

"Got it, sir." Clint put the bayonet on the end of his WASR-10, brought the safety down to active position, and braced. "Ready for action, Sergeant."

Hess pulled the bolt back on his Enfield slightly to verify he had a live one in the chamber. Once he was satisfied, he rammed the bolt forward and down to lock it in place. "Breach and make entry."

-x-x-x-

(NOTE: Train cars are counted forward from the Caboose, with the arse end car being counted as Car 0.)

Car 1 (Luggage) (0602 Eastern Local Time)

On entering a possibly-hostile room, there was an art to it. The troopers always moved in a sequential pattern, and always with certain areas to go.

Clint entered first, moving immediately right toward the strong-side (right) near corner. Once he had that corner cleared, he continued right while he tracked counterclockwise around the room for further threats. His rifle stopped on a group of ladies and two young boys, but he didn't fire — they were more shocked than scared that someone had entered the room, so far as he could guess.

Victoria entered next, her custom AR-15 with long-range scope swept over the weak-side (left) near corner and found nothing, so she swept the room clockwise until she settled on the same group.

Erich entered third and went in right, focused forward and immediately centered on the suspect group.

Clarence entered last, ducked left while he focused forward, and again centered on the group in the center of the luggage pile.

The response of the group at large: shocked stares. "Holy shit," one of the older ladies groused.

"Flags! I recognize those flags, they're Americans!" a mid-twenties lady said, pointing toward Clarence.

"That's an American? No wonder six slavers went out there, and only one came back half-alive," the eldest of the ladies said.

"Street cred," Clint said with a smile.

"We did earn it," Clarence said.

"Who're you ladies?" Victoria asked.

"We're refugees, picked up by the Slavers over the years," the older teen amongst the ladies said. "We band together for protection, but it's not always enough. The kids in the train are either our children, or kids picked up off the streets like we were."

"Some of us were picked up as kids and just live here now," the eldest lady said after she braced her heavy sniper rifle against a shoulder to light up a smoke. "Some of us were born on this train, and this has been all we know. Thank you for killing five and wounding a sixth."

"You can thank us when we've killed 'em all and stacked the bodies," Clint said. "You gonna let us pass?"

The young teen amongst the ladies gaped at Clint. "You're going after them?"

"Damn straight we are," Victoria said. "Sick bastards."

"The long arm of the law is after them," Clarence said.

"Make way, ladies," the smoker said, waving the other ladies and two kids to the side. As the group passed, Hess fell into the rearguard position, but was stopped by the lady with the bolt-action 50-caliber rifle. "Watch your ass, American. We Mafiosi, we can sometimes defend against the Slavers, but we don't talk about hunting them down. You may be asking for trouble."

"Trouble landed in my backyard and shot up my house. I'm just here to bring that trouble to justice."

Car 2 (Luggage) (0606)
Car 3 (Luggage) (0608) (Evacuated 4 civilians)

A second car held no presence, just luggage and items strewn about the floor. A third car contained less of the same, but something else…

"Big guy, blood," Clint said quickly.

"Damn good, given the way he is staggering, he won't get far before he collapses," Victoria said.

"Not expecting we'll find him alive, given how much he is losing," Clarence said.

"Relax, guys, I expected this," Hess said. "If he's dead, we lump him in with the initial shoot. If he's alive, we stabilize him and haul his sorry Slaver ass in front of the courts. It's how we roll."

"Can we help?" a young lady's voice asked from somewhere in the room.

"Who said that? Or what said that?" Victoria asked.

"Sister!" a young man's voice half-shouted.

"Both of you shut it," a third voice said.

"I believe, what we have here, is a sentient clothes pile," Hess said, doing a '10-o'clock-stare' at the pile in question. He wasn't truly looking at it, but off to the side so as to reduce suspicion. His teammates picked up the visual reference fast enough.

Clint and Victoria went forward, guarding the front door access, while Clarence moved for the rear door to prevent an easy escape. Hess moved toward the pile and knelt next to it. After one of the occupants gasped rather audibly, Hess simply lifted a shirt to reveal the speaker.

"Busted," a young man said.

"Don't hurt us, mister, we'll go quietly," a kid said. From the voice, Eric could not tell gender.

Erich braced his rifle on the ground and leaned it against his right shoulder. He reached past the rifle to his pocket organizer pouch. "American," he said, pointing to the OD Green flag of his home nation. "Law enforcement," he said after he pointed to the badge below the flag. "We will neither harm, nor take you as captives. Now, what can you tell about the Slaver that came through here?"

"He was shot!" the youngest of the four kids in the clothes pile shouted. "At least once in the body, and once or twice in the near arm," he continued.

"Left arm, probably," Victoria said.

"He was dripping pretty fast," the one young lady under the pile explained further.

"That's what I need to know. Thanks, kids," he said before he tossed the towel back on the top of their pile.

"Hey, mister!" The eldest of the boys shouted after Hess had moved three paces away. "Can you kill him for us? We hate the slavers!"

"I have rules, kids," Hess answered. "I'll do what I can, though, if he forces me to shoot him."

The clothes pile exploded as the four kids bolted up to standing, two girls, one boy, and one that Erich wasn't entirely sure about. All, at a guess, were under ten years. "We're coming with you! We want to see this!"

"Yeah! Yeah!" the one girl said.

"Clarence, you have the rear, so make sure the kids are out of the field of fire," Hess said, knowing he had lost this argument before it even began.

Car 4 (Luggage) (0610)
Car 5 (Luggage) (0612)
Car 6 (Luggage) (0614)
Car 7 (Luggage) (0616) (Evacuated 2 Civilians)

The door to the number seven car slid open smartly, though what was beyond it immediately had everyone's attention. "Scarlet! Get back! Get down!" A guy said in a hurried whisper.

As the team executed a standard entry on the car, both the lady and the speaking guy were easily seen and identified. The guy, in particular was an easy acquisition, he had picked up a bar from the luggage rack frame and brandished it toward Clint.

"Don't do it, big guy, it's not worth it," Clarence told the twenty-something with the rod.

"Better dead on my feet than a slave!" He brandished the pipe again, this time waving it towards Hess.

"Whoa there, sparky, I think you have this one backwards," Clint said. "We're not Slavers, we're American Militia. We're here to clear out the Slavers."

"You're dragging kids along! Like hell I'll believe you on that!" This time, the bar was waved toward the four kids Hess had inadvertently acquired as an audience.

"No way, man!" The young lady said. "We're here to watch him shoot a Slaver!"

"He's an American Law Enforcement!" the androgynous (?) kid declared.

"Americans?" 'Scarlet' said as she slipped out from behind cover in the luggage. Hess could guess that Clint went from zero to hard just looking at the lady in question, who appeared to be an au natural size larger than the average porn star.

Hess lowered his rifle, followed quickly by Clint, and shortly thereafter the husband-wife team. "You believe me, you don't believe me, your call, kid. I have a slaver to catch."

Hess took the left side of the partition in the luggage car, deliberately on the other side from the pair, and marched past them in good order. By the time Clarence had passed the pair, it was obvious they were following. "Change your mind, kid?" Clarence asked as the team stacked on the door to the next car.

"If you're hunting Slavers, I've got to see this," the malcontent with the rod said.

"What's your name?" Hess asked.

"Quintin. Lady's Scarlet. You?"

"Erich," the big guy answered. "You're volunteered. Make sure the kids stay out of the line of fire, and you'll earn your keep. Follow?"

"You say so," Quintin answered.

Car 8 (Luggage) (0619)
Car 9 (Luggage) (0621) (Evacuated 4 civilians, 10 Bravo Mafia)

Once the car opened, Clint had no trouble realizing that it was far too crowded for a tactical situation, and something about a couple of the residents changed the dynamic in his mind. "Ahoy in there!" he half-shouted.

"Who's there?" one of the armed ladies asked.

"Claiborne County Militia!" Victoria answered. "We're tracking a slaver!"

"Holy hell! They do exist! The Americans are here!" A rather jiggly lady shouted in joy.

"Come in! Come in!" A not-quite-as-jiggly lady with another large-bore sniper rifle shouted.

"Excellent call, Clint. We get smothered to death in Marshmallow Hell," Clarence slugged Clint on the shoulder by way of reaching around his wife and Erich. What he was referring to was obvious in context: three pairs ballpark boobs, four pairs lingerie advertisement, and two more pairs that could easily crush a porn star, with two 'normal' sized ladies thrown in for good measure. And that wasn't even counting the two female cases of anime hair in the room or the obvious Elven lady.

"Beats the hell out of the alternative," Hess said as he nudged Clint forward toward the group. "At ease, guys. Looks legit," he said, which was an informal code amongst the Militiamen to be wary nonetheless, but at least look less serious.

"Holy hell indeed," one of the slimmer ladies said. "These guys are carrying enough firepower and ammo to kill most of the residents on this wagon," she said.

"Some days, you gotta pack it big to get the point across," Clint said with a perfectly straight face.

The large lady with the large sniper rifle looked to Hess. "You're his CO? And you let him out of the country?"

"I'm beginning to question such wisdom," Hess said as something of an oblique caution to Clint to watch his tongue. Hess guessed the lady in the neighborhood of his age give or take a year, 5'8", 175 or so, and she showed every sign of being able to properly manage the Harris M-95 fifty-caliber sniper rifle she was carrying. What, exactly, someone would use a 2000-meter sniper rifle for in this train, Hess had no clue whatsoever.

The Brevet Sergeant decided business was preferable to Clint's lame whang jokes. "How bad did that punk look when he stumbled through here?"

"He'd definitely seen better days," a different lady answered. Hess had a brief glance for the flame-orange-red hair, which was a bit too 'flamed' for natural human coloration. The lady under that hair was certainly respectable so far as he could tell, extremely fit, 5'6" and 155 or so, possessed of certainly good looks, but his attention kept coming back to the flame-colored hair. "Three or four hits, pretty decent sized rounds, someone was gunning for him. You guys?"

"Not us, that was all his bust," Clint punched Hess in the left shoulder. "Six rounds from a GP100 like hers, from about this car length and half more." Clint was pointing to the GP100 carried 'Appendix Style' by the lady with the Harris sniper rifle.

"A car and a half distance? That's some wicked shit," The one native guy in the room answered. "You accepting apprentices, O Great Master of Pistol Shooting?"

"Apprentice?" Hess echoed, shocked.

"Probably for cooking as well," the Elven lady said.

"She's right, you probably could host a class on good cooking," Victoria said.

"Grand Master Chef Hess, dicing vegetables with a survival knife, in tactical harness and with 80 pounds of ammo," Clarence said with a smile.

"Love your homemade ravioli, Sarge, I think I want to learn how to do that," Clint piled on top of the rest of his team's play on the gag.

"You may yet learn the secrets of a good tomato sauce, young padawan," Hess slugged Clint lightly in the shoulder with his left fist. "If you're willing to follow a fatarse American into the depths of this train, you're welcome to come along. I am not going to make a guarantees, though; I'm here to stop the train, hopefully turn it around to home. If you're willing to gamble on an American, I might be able to get you a new home off this hellwagon."

"Anywhere but here," the lady with the fiery hair said. "Name's Toni. You're Hess?"

"Last name, but yeah," Erich said.

"I have a few skills you might find handy." She looked past Hess to where Clint was. "And I'm not talking gender gap here, pervert."

"I didn't say anything!" Clint protested.

"Your eyes said enough," Toni said.

"Message received," Hess acknowledged. "Anyone else?" The remaining ladies — Bravo Mafia — threw in to the last.

Car 10 (Luggage) (0626)
Car 11 (Luggage) (0628) (Evacuated 2 Delta Mafia, 3 Charlie Mafia)
Car 12 (Luggage) (0630)
Car 13 (Luggage) (0632)
Car 14 (Luggage) (0634)
Car 15 (Luggage) (0636)
Car 16 (Luggage) (0638)
Car 17 (Luggage) (0640)
Car 18 (Luggage) (0642)

"You always enter the cars like that?" Yuuki (the elven lady amongst the three) asked.

"When we don't know what we're getting into, yes," Clint answered. "It only takes one fuckup to end up dead. I'm not in a hurry to do so."

"Do it right or die trying," Victoria picked up where Clint left off.

"Boss, got something," Clarence said from the far side of the partition that separated the car left to right.

"Such as?" Hess asked.

"A woodie," his wife commented. "And a THO to go along with it."

"TMI, thank you," Hess shook his head ruefully. "What's got you standing tall?" he asked as he looked around the edge of the partition to what they were. "Whoa," he said after he saw the involved hardware.

"That, ladies and gentlemen, is a crowd-pleaser," Toni said. "100mm short-charge autocannon. Where I come from, that is an Armored Infantryman's common weapon for anti-armor work."

"You follow that, big guy?" Clint asked.

"Like I said, what I'm imagining is probably wrong," he said coldly. "Bit big, probably a bit powerful for one-man carry. What about the rifle on the far side of it?"

"Rifle? What rifle?" Clint asked.

"So busy slapping the hundred-millie with your dick, you completely overlooked the rifle on the far side of it. Amazing," Hess reached up to the hanging clothes rack beside Victoria, yanked one of the 4-meter hanger rods clear and braced it on the ground. After a moment, he threaded the open end of the rod onto his Enfield bayonet, and scraped it along the deck to where the autocannon was.

"What are you doing, boss?"

"Checking for traps, this is too neat a setup." Hess basically used the pipe on a stick to shove both the autocannon and the rifle toward the far end of the car, and thus would have dislodged any devices. "Looks clear. Clint, use your bayonet to lift the rifle, just to be safe."

"Roger," Jamison warily approached the pair, then used his AK bayonet to slow-lift the rifle. "Clear, no wires, no devices, nothing." He let the AK hang and picked up the rifle. "Wait… is this a Springfield SOCOM II?"

"Okay, that's some serious shit in and of itself," Hess said. He popped the magazine to check it. "Got some beans in there." With the mag out, he pulled the bolt back, which ejected a live round from the chamber. "Looks like it is mechanically in good shape."

"Nice. Who carries it, though?"

Hess looked past the Militiamen. "Someone have rifle experience?"

"Aye," Scarlet answered.

"As do I," Toni raised her hand. "I'll forfeit, though, until everyone else is armed."

"Scarlet, up here, then," Hess said.

"Now we're doing a Special Forces job," Victoria said. She did choke up a bit when she saw the look on the face of Scarlet after she received the rifle. Apparently, simply holding a gun meant power to these denizens — power over self, the power of defense. That alone told plenty of story to both Victoria and Hess.

"For now, you're on the reserve group. Keep any evacuees in good order, and back us Militiamen up if needed. We train for this, so let us do the dirty work. Worry about keeping the tail safe, we'll worry about getting out of here, follow?"

"Yes, sir," she said quietly.

Car 19 (Luggage) (0645)
Car 20 (Luggage) (0647)
Car 21 (Luggage) (0649)
Car 22 (Luggage) (0651)

The second door into the next car had not completely opened before two shots rang out in the general direction of the door. "Shit! Now what?" Clint asked after a third shot was loosed.

"Cap that punk's ass!" Clarence half-shouted.

Clint did a quick-check out into the corridor between cars, and caught sight of the tango. "Got him!" He paused for another five shots to fly by, these a little better aimed than the first three. Still, the aim was overall lackluster and the five simply caught suitcases in the prior car.

This time, Jamison ducked out and put his sights on… maybe a ten-year-old? "What the fuck? Drop that gun, kid!"

The kid did exactly that — he dropped the empty gun, then went for a 'New York Reload' with a revolver in his waistband. Once the gun started traversing, Clint and Hess both engaged the kid, two rounds of AK and a chest shot of .303 dropped him hard, the revolver unfired.

"Sweet Jesus! That punk was packing some serious heat!" Clarence shouted.

"Enter and clear!" Hess ordered quickly, on the possibility that this might be an ambush scenario and being bogged down in a fatal funnel could spell death for the team.

The order was carried out quickly and efficiently, though in contrast to Erich's fears, there was nobody else in the car with hostile intent. Once cleared, though, Clint returned to the clearly-deceased kid with the pistol and revolver. "This is skull-fucked, sir. Nowhere near legal to drive, yet emptied a mag like nobody's business."

"This is a near-complete breakdown of law and order that causes things like this to happen," Hess said coldly. Such were Prepper theories about when The Shit Hits The Fan (TSHTF / SHTF) scenarios, and Hess was not the only Prepper in the room. "When proper law collapses, and there is no tenable turf to work with, the law of the jungle takes over. He who has the most lethality usually reigns supreme, and kids will go out of their way to survive, even over what an adult would use empathy to get out of or around."

"And for us, it's a bit simpler. Saving lives means dropping a few punks, even if they're not up to voting age," Clint said in a semi-detached fashion.

Hess didn't miss the change of voice in the younger Militiaman. "Clint, I'm rotating you to rearguard for a few. Clarence, you have the front."

"Yes sir," Clarence said.

Car 23 (Luggage) (0654)
Car 24 (Luggage) (0656)
Car 25 (Luggage) (0658)
Car 26 (Luggage) (0700) (Evacuated 3 civilians)
Car 27 (Luggage) (0702)
Car 28 (Luggage) (0704)
Car 29 (Luggage) (0706) (Evacuated 1 Charlie Mafia)
Car 30 (Luggage) (0708)
Car 31 (Luggage) (0710)
Car 32 (Luggage) (0712)
Car 33 (Luggage) (0714) (Evacuated 2 civilians)
Car 34 (Luggage) (0716)
Car 35 (Luggage) (0718) (Evacuated 5 Delta Mafia, 3 Charlie Mafia, 1 civilian)
Car 36 (Luggage) (0720) (Evacuated 11 Charlie Mafia, 5 civilians)

A good stretch of quiet cars went a long way to helping both Clint and Hess clear their minds for the coming challenges. Hammering a kid flat with rifle fire at short range would be something that haunted both Militiamen for years to come, but the necessity of it was writ. In the absence of law and order, there was always someone willing to push the Law of the Jungle. Even still, most of the denizens of the Train were live-and-let-live types, nary a hostile word and usually some encouragement for hunting the Slaver.

In this case, with Clarence at the lead, entering the 36 car came with a bit of an interesting greeting.

"The Americans are here! Finally!" a young teen lady shouted.

"Awesome! And a bit frightening," an older teen lady said.

"Slaver just passed up ahead a few minutes ago, American," a taller guy said as he stood up from sitting down on a luggage rack. The first and loudest distinguishing feature of this guy was the sapphire-blue 'Anime hair'. Whatever was causing the rash of odd hair colors, Hess wanted to know but would not embarrass the rescue effort by asking. "He was limping slow, dragging, must've lost a lot of blood. Your handiwork?"

"Mine and my neighbor from back home," Hess said. "Any weapons you saw?"

"He had a grenade, pin in, and a pistol, that's all we could see," the second speaker was a mid-twenties lady with the same sapphire-blue hair. Again, Erich had to force down the desire to ask what was up with the hair colors, given his innate curiosity on weird subjects as such.

"You trying to leave this train?" a young girl asked, waving a hand-held radio at the Militiamen.

"Trying to stop it and secure it," Hess told. He specifically didn't tell them he intended to stop it at his own home, but…

"We'll run with you, if you kill the slavers like you say you are, we'll follow you to the Pearly Gates if needed," the same girl said.

"Whoa there, kid, not intending on checking out that real estate yet," Clint said.

"Serious? I mean, it sounds like a good place, y'know?" she said innocently.

"You only get to the Pearly Gates after you are dead," Victoria said calmly.

"Oh," she squeaked.

Hess noticed something about her handheld. "That is a CB handset, right?" he asked after a moment.

"Yes?" she said.

"What channel?"

"Uh, 12, I think?" she showed Hess the front panel of the radio, which indicated it set to 22. He chalked it up to a nonexistent education system on these Trains…

"Clarence, can you program double-deuce into my radio?"

"Certainly," Clarence took a few seconds to program that channel into Hess' equipment.

"File in toward the back of the column, and make sure you keep your asses out of the line of fire if any shooting starts." Hess waved to the pair of Sapphire-haired adults, who had been joined by 3 Elves (!), two male and one female. "Can you five keep an eye on the young ones?"

"Yeah, we got that," the guy with the blue hair said. "You get us out of here and somewhere safe, we can work an arrangement out," he said.

"Interesting…" Hess said mostly to himself as he followed behind Clarence, headed for the next door.

Car 37 (Luggage) (0724)
Car 38 (Luggage) (0726)
Car 39 (Luggage) (0729)

With his faith in the kids restored, Clint had resumed the lead position on entering the rooms. It was a good thing, as well; Hess trusted Clint's eyesight more than he did Clarence's perception, all things considered.

"Sarge, that Tango look familiar to you?"

"A little bit, yeah," Hess said. Against the far end of the train car interior walls, a single unmoving body rested alone and sitting up, eyes closed as if napping.

"Looks a bit dead from here," Victoria said.

"Is he dead?" Toni asked, trying to look around Clarence's shoulder.

"Might be. I see a pistol on his lap, hand is away from it, and a grenade about a yard to the tango's left, pin in."

"Check?" Clint asked.

"Well, by default, we have to move past him. I want to make sure he didn't leave us a present from the grave." Hess began advancing slowly, dodging around objects in his way, a purse to one side, a can of food to the right, a pair of jogging pants for a 'big bertha' in the middle of the aisle. An approach that took him over a minute ended when he arrived at the body, bayonet touching his chest in an attempt to provoke a reaction. No such movement happened, meaning this guy was either insanely disciplined or dead (Hess was betting toward the latter).

With that verified, Hess transitioned from his Enfield to his Springfield XD Tactical and set the rifle aside to free up his left hand. The pistol went against the guy's cheekbone while his left hand reached down to the Slaver's lap and picked up the Smith and Wesson Sigma pistol resting there. With the enemy pistol in hand, he ejected the magazine, ran the sights down the front of his leg to rack the slide and empty the ready shot, then he dropped the Smith Sigma in a drop pouch on his MOLLE gear. Since there were no other visible weapons on the Slaver, Erich thumbed open the guy's left eye to check the pupil. After a pass or two with the weapon light on his pistol, there was only one conclusion. "He's DRT. No reactions whatsoever."

"Chalk that one up on the first shootout, big guy," Clint said. "And next time I start in with running off at the mouth about pistol-sniping, remind me not to challenge you."

"No fun, that," Hess said as he packed his sidearm away and secured it. With that done, he picked up the grenade that had rolled loose and hooked the spoon into one of his MOLLE loops for easy access in coming engagements. "Now we test."

"What's the plan, boss? Kick his body over and run?"

"You have the prescribed minimum fifty feet of paracord in your kit, right?" Hess asked.

"Hai, sensei," Clint said in jest. Hess held up his left hand toward the younger Militiaman, and received the bundle of paracord. The 'Sergeant' looped the cord into a lasso, then slipped the top of the lasso down behind the decedent's shoulders. "All right, everyone, back off. Clarence, play this line out but don't put tension on it."

"Got it." Erich remained in place to make sure Clarence didn't inadvertently yank the body by holding the paracord in fist. Once the line was played out but slack, Hess released it and grabbed his rifle from the wall. "You want the honors, big guy?"

"Sure. Hold this," Hess passed off his ancestral Enfield rifle to Clarence, then stepped into the slack of the paracord. "Here goes."

The method was all size and power. Erich took up the slack with his left hand, braced the cord against his right bicep, and rotated all his mass around to the left to dislodge the body. Even with the give of the paracord, the Slaver's corpse was easily yanked clear of where he had been resting.

"NADE!" Clint shouted.

"DOWN!" Hess shouted as he jumped away from the body that was 40 feet away.

The big guy hit the deck and waited for the inevitable blast, a wait that seemed to stretch on and on until he finally felt the blast. He didn't recall hearing the grenade go off, just the feeling of the shockwave as it passed him.

A few more lengthened seconds passed before something happened. "GOD I LOVE THIS JOB!" Clint shouted in significant frustration, meaning he distinctly did not like what was going on. "First a fucking RPG, now a grenade. What the hell have we gotten ourselves into, big guy?"

"Anyone injured?" Victoria asked.

"Just my cavities," Clarence said. "Maybe my butthole got clenched too tight when that went off."

"Habanero sauce will take care of that," Clint said. "Cause you to fart fire, that'll open your bum in a big hurry."

"Thanks," Clarence said. "Anyone else hurt?" He looked back through the trailers.

"Couple minor scratches, nothing serious," Toni answered. "How did you know?" she asked Hess.

"If I was bleeding out, hated, probably pursued by my victor, I would do the same thing. Maybe have some company in Hell shortly after I arrive," he said. "Seriously, though, ISIS, Al Qaeda, Iraqi Republican Guard, Viet Cong, North Koreans, Nazis, Imperial Japanese, they've all done that to American troops over the years, booby-trap the dead to possibly take an American with them. That's why I always check stuff on the ground rather than just grab and run."

"Ready to go?" Both Clint and Clarence offered hands to Hess to assist him in standing up. Even with the assistance, though, the big guy staggered briefly on the way up but maintained his footing.

"Op! Found a fragment," Erich said as he immediately took pressure off his left boot. He braced against the center divider in the car, brought the boot up, and yanked a piece of shrapnel about an inch long from the bottom of his boot. "I'm keeping this bastard as a keepsake."

"Hell yeah, big guy," Clint said.

"Fun's over, guys. Back to it," Erich waved at the far door.

Car 40 (Luggage) (0735) (Evacuated 4 Bravo Mafia, 11 Charlie Mafia, 12 Delta Mafia)

Before Clint could latch open the doors, someone else did for him. The teenage guy through the door had tried looking around the corner in some semblance of caution, but ended up stopping only a bare inch before he stabbed himself by walking into Clint's bayonet.

"Howdy," Clint said.

"Whooshit," the guy said. "Who're you with?"

"American Militiamen," Clint said, never moving his aimpoint from the guy's intestines, but he used his free left hand to tap the flag patch on his chest.

"What was that explosion, cutie?" a lady behind the guy said. From where Hess was standing, he could see a Glock product in her hand, but it was down to the ground.

"Slaver with a grenade under his ass, and what's with calling me a cutie?" Clint asked.

"You look pretty decent from over here," she said. "Slaver killed?"

"KIlled him? Pfft. He was already dead, he bled out from wounds inflicted by the Sergeant," and Clint jerked his thumb over his shoulder at Hess. "Either he stuffed a grenade under his own ass as payback, or someone booby-trapped the body."

"Whoa, you don't look the type," the teen with the Fallschirmjagergewehr said, looking past Clint to Erich.

"There's a story in there somewhere. Look, we're trying to capture or take out the Slavers, may we pass?" Hess asked.

"What? Oh, yeah, sure, definitely," the three who were trying to go south through the train backed off to allow the Militia in.

Clint and Hess were quick to step in; Clint was eyeing some of the ladies, Hess had checked what he could of the denizens and didn't see anything too troubling. Clarence and Victoria were slightly hesitant, given how crowded the car already was, but followed close regardless.

"Anybody know anything about the other Slavers on the train? Numbers, locations, hostages held?" Hess asked.

"At least five more Tattooed ones, maybe three or four recruits," a pre-teen boy with a heavy rifle answered. Hess seriously doubted he could fire that rifle more than once without serious personal injury (It looked like a Weatherby big-bore product at a distance), but with something that big, one good clean shot would be all that it took to do the job.

"Five and some trainees," Clint nodded twice. "How many have we killed so far?"

"Two and four passed through here, pursuing some rescuers." This came from a late-twenties lady, wearing the colors of a Bravo Mafia trooper and a set of soft body armor. "One of them had a rocket launcher."

"We noticed," Victoria said drolly. "They're all dead. So, five more of the senior pukes. That's going to get interesting."

"Kill one, kill 'em all," Clint said. "If the fuckers want to capture slaves and shoot refugees on American territory, let's see how they like the return fire."

"You make it happen, we'll defect to your banner," a mid-teens girl said with steel to voice. "We can't fight the Slavers on even terms, but you've already killed six of them."

"Run the cars red with their blood, and you'll make some friends for life, mister," a teenage (and physically large) Delta Mafiosi with a Desert Eagle said.

"That's a hard request to ignore, Sarge," Clarence said with a clap on Hess' shoulder.

"True, especially given their firepower," he acknowledged. "Alright guys, if you're running with the Claiborne County Militia, fall in at the back of the column. We've got a long way to go and a short time to get there. I'll get you out of here."

Car 41 (Luggage) (0737)
Car 42 (Luggage) (0739)
Car 43 (Luggage) (0741)
Car 44 (Luggage) (0743)
Car 45 (Luggage) (0745) (evacuated 4 Delta Mafia)
Car 46 (Luggage) (0747)

"This is nice," Toni said after she bent down to pick something up from the ground.

"Nodachi?" Hess asked.

"Yeah, looks like it was artisan-made," Toni said. "Think I'll keep it. Now I need to learn how to use it."

"Somehow, not surprised to hear that," Clint said.

"Nor I," Victoria said.

"Everyone starts somewhere," Hess cut their complaining short. "That said, swordcraft is something I always wanted to learn. Not sure this is a good time or environ to learn it, though." As Hess moved past Clint, his leg scraped up against a suitcase, and his medkit (on his right leg rig, forward of his pistol holster) dragged it to the ground. On top of the clothes bag was an electronic device…

"What is this thing?" Clarence asked the device as he picked it up. "Hess? Recognize this?"

"Not really, no," he said. "Wait a second, hold it up straight."

"Like this?" the junior Technician held it up.

Hess looked at the back of the device, then whipped around to look at the control panel next to the exterior door on the luggage car. "Son of a bitch! Same interface. What's the labeling say?"

"Security control box, SL Standard Interface."

"Son of a bitch," Hess said. "And I see a smart card in it, which probably controls the credentials. Drop it in your dump pouch, might come in handy up forward."

Car 47 (Luggage) (0749)
Car 48 (Seats, 2 Level) (0751)
Car 49 (Seats, 1 Level) (0753)
Car 50 (Seats, 2 Level) (0755)
Car 51 (Seats, 2 Level) (0757)
Car 52 (Seats, 2 Level) (0759) (evacuated 5 civilians)
Car 53 (Single Sleeper Car, 15 Rooms) (0801)
Car 54 (Baths, Individual Rooms) (0803) (evacuated 5 civilians)
Car 55 (Double Sleeper Car, 9 Rooms) (0805) (evacuated 8 civilians, 14 Delta Mafia)
Car 56 (Baths, Enclosed Stalls) (0808)
Car 57 (House Car, 1 floor) (0810)
Car 58 (Dining Car) (0812) (evacuated 6 Bravo Mafia)

"A diner car? This is freaking awesome," Clint said.

"Like an old 40's Diner, with high-tech gear," Clarence groused.

"Didn't have any breakfast this morning," Victoria half-whined.

"Some of the tail could use some water, sir," Quintin noted.

"And a meal, if available," Toni said.

"You hard taskmaster, many need break," The larger of the Elven men in the group said.

"Not a bad idea, actually," Hess said. "Hey, chef, you know what cars are ahead of here?" Hess asked as he approached the dining counter.

"Yeah, should be a block of five seat cars, and a sleeper block. That's how the whole train is assembled."

"Ah," Erich said. He was silent while the chef dialed in an order for material to make grilled ham and cheese sandwiches. The indicator plate above the storage unit went red and the unit locked audibly, then the storage unit indicator went green and unlocked audibly. Waiting inside once opened was a loaf of bread, a brick of cheese, a tub of butter, a slab of ham, and a can of cooking spray.

"Did you see that?" Clint asked. "There's no cold storage around here. Where did that stuff come from."

"That's because it's not designed for it," the Chef answered. "It's all interdimensional zero-time-expenditure storage. The Dynasty perfected it for their cars, the Star League made it technological. Pocket Dimension storage."

"Gosh, boss, is that a woody?" Clint asked.

"I always wondered what it took to arouse the boss. Technosexual?" Victoria asked. Her comment was predicated on the fact that Hess' dating scene was shrouded in mystery (and mostly short-lived) and once when Victoria had a 'gunpowder malfunction' she had to strip down her entire upper ensemble to shake it out, and so far as she could tell, Hess' only comment was 'impressive'. It made some question his orientation, but not in any seriousness given how often he dated around the offices.

"That list of attention-getters is a long one," Hess commented. "Of course, given my day job, efficient high-tech equipment will have my undivided attention. Office booty as well, so long as it is not married or otherwise claimed," he continued with a smile.

Victoria snorted. "And that explains the Varget (4) incident," Victoria said, referring to the aforementioned spilled gunpowder.

"As I said, not otherwise claimed. And certainly not going to comment at length with your husband standing nearby with a dozen guns and loaded magazines in arm's reach," Hess said matter-of-factly.

"Damn, all this time I thought you were a prude, when it was only basic survival instinct," Clint said. "Settles that."

"Okay, Chef, next question, can that storage unit do bottled water and MREs?"

"Sure, if you like eating preservatives on the go," the Chef answered in a standoffish fashion. "Who in their right mind would want to eat storable dog chow when you can get fresh cooking?"

"You would do fresh cooking for a group of over 100?" Clarence asked in counter.

"That much?" the Chef looked over his left shoulder at the doorway, and was a bit surprised to see the line of persons behind Hess was out the door into the prior car. "You have a point. Tell you what, big guy. Swing around here, I'll register you on the system so I can continue cooking while you hock the stuff for your troops and tail."

"Roger," Hess answered by rote. He took a few seconds to find the counter entry, but once inside made his way to the terminal. "Huh. Japanese."

"You're English only?" the chef asked.

"American. Only language required," Erich explained by way of answer.

"Ah. That can be set up. Here," and he did some selections on the menu. "Give it a fingerprint so you can register."

Hess dropped his right ring finger on the reader plate, which was a finger he didn't normally use for biometrics in his day job. Security concerns, he figured; no sense giving a strange system an easy in to his day job of running IT systems. The screen changed over to a first-run menu, which included a language selection that defaulted to Japanese, but Hess selected English (Americanized) and selected 'next'.

"Whoa shit, am I reading that right?" Clarence asked from the far side of the diner counter. "You have full system access?"

"Apparently so. Wonder what I did wrong enough to earn that." Hess continued through the first-run / tutorial and by the end had an idea what he was doing.

Finding the right selections for the desired food (Meals Ready to Eat, or MREs) and water (Water, bottled, 12 ounce) was fairly simple with clear English menus. The system had a 'transmit budget' that only allowed so much material per transaction, but there was no notable transaction limitation so far as he could tell. Hess maxed out the MREs, which were 96 per transmit (8 boxes at 12 per box), and once he selected that much he threw in some extra single water bottles of a large type (32 ounce) to use to refill the water bladders of the Militiamen. The system was buffered, even, in that Hess could put in a grossly large order that would be too much for the system to process at one time, and it would do it over several runs of the system.

The hatch locked, ran for a few seconds, then unlocked in the same fashion as Hess had seen prior. With the pull process completed, he opened the hatch and slung the eight boxes up onto the dining counter at some unused seats. His next material pull was two cases of MREs, but the remainder of the material pull for the second round was water bottles (192 bottles total). A third pull of two more cases of water finished up, and Hess logged off the system.

"Quintin, Scarlet, make sure everyone grabs an MRE and two bottles of water." Hess pulled a Beef Brisket MRE for himself and one of the larger water bottles, since he had not been hitting his hydration pack as hard as usual. "We will take a thirty-minute breather in the next double-decker seat car."

Car 59 (Seats, 1 Level) (0824)
Car 60 (Seats, 2 Level) (0826) (evacuated 13 Charlie Mafia)

"Two and a half hours grinding our way through this train, finally a break," Clint said. "How the hell do you do this, big guy? Your feet have to be killing you by now."

"Honest answer, hell yes my feet are killing me, it feels like someone has been beating on the ball of my foot with a hammer." Hess was quick to sit down at the far end of the car, facing the 'unsecured' forward door. The Enfield rifle was braced down on the ground by the buttstock and he rested it against the inside of his left knee, freeing his hands up. "I was planning on replacing the insoles in these work boots later this week, but I think that boat is no longer at the dock, follow?"

"Excedrin in your scratches and sniffles kit?" Victoria was referring to the full-load medical kit that each Militiaman stocked for their gearset. All four of the Militiamen used the Condor Rip-away IFAK pouch, since it was cheap, durable, and could store nearly twice the material that some other pouches on the market could hold.

"Always." Hess unbuckled the IFAK and pulled it off the backplate for the kit that was attached to his leg platform. Once out on his lap, he opened it up and flopped the partitions open to the small items zipper pouch where he kept individually-wrapped doses of Excedrin. A dose, a slug of water, and he put the pouch back on his leg platform for quick availability. "So much better. Here in about thirty, my feet might slow down hurting."

"You gonna heat your dinner?" Clarence asked.

"Nah, I'll just chow and run," Clint groused. "Heating is good, when you have fifteen minutes to wait for it." The heaters always said ten minutes to heat the entree, but most persons that ate them waited fifteen — more thorough heating of the main course.

"And we're not here to foxtrot oscar (5) for that long," Victoria said.

"Chill, no need to get in a rush doing this," Hess said. He watched some Charlie Mafia kids come down from the top floor, likely as his 'tail' was filling up the upstairs, and the kids immediately set to grouping in with the rest of the refugees. "Those engines aren't going anywhere fast. We can be calm about this, we will get there eventually. Playing it slow and smart beats the hell out of the alternative."

"Sarge, company," Clint waved a spoon at the area behind Hess.

"Oh, I can sense her," Hess said nonchalantly. He was notorious around the offices for being immune to people sneaking up on him. "What's on your mind, Toni?"

"Got a question for the four of you," she prompted them.

" 'Kay, trade a question for a question?" Hess offered in counter.

"Certainly," Toni replied as she edged closer to Hess until her chest was against the back of his head. "I go first, though."

Hess figured, given her positioning, she was kneeling on the bench seat immediately behind him looking forward. Not that he objected. "At your option," Hess said as he continued chowing down on his beef brisket.

"I've been watching the four of you, and I noticed each one of you has different patches. If you're all the same unit, shouldn't you have the same patches?"

"We're Militia, not regular military. We don't really have a set gear requirement, every trooper is free to customize as they see fit," Victoria said.

"We do have some semi-standard patches. Everyone wears American Flags, minimum three, at least one Kentucky State flag, and a Militia tape on their back. Other than that, the Claiborne County Militia group voted to require a DTOM flag in yellow for everyone," Hess pushed back a bit against Toni and angled his Admin pouch toward her to show the 'Don't Tread On Me' flag. "Beyond that, we do it to personal taste."

"I wear the classic 'Si vis pacem, para bellum' and 'Molon Labe' patches," Clarence pointed them out. "My worry is a government gone awry will do stupid shit like disarm a people they're afraid of."

"I do the 'Zero Fucks Given', 'Embrace The Suck', and the Shit Magnet patches," Victoria explained, pointing to each in series. "It's a running gag from work, I don't give a fuck, shit happens to me a lot, and I embrace the suck because I like the people I work with, even if the job licks sack from time to time."

"Okay, not expecting that," Toni said. "Clint?"

" I rock the 'Double Tap' and 'F Bomb' patches, and the 'Kalashnikov Classic' logo. Do the Double Tap patch because I'm the fastest double tapper in the Claiborne County Militia with a rifle, and at least as fast as anyone else with a pistol. The F Bomb patch, because I use that word a lot. Fuck 'em if they can't take a joke, I say," he said in way of demonstration. "The Kalashinkov Classic logo is for my choice of rifle." He twitched the WASR-10 in demonstration.

"And you, big guy?" Toni said, looking down at Hess.

"Regular Guy rockers on my shirts, Three Percenter flag, 'Got Ammo' patch, and Duct Tape patch. Regular Guy rockers because I know that is what I am, compared to any kind of military or LEO professional. Three Percenter flag is the symbol of the founding force of America — just three percent of the nation actively participated, and they stomped the preeminent superpower of the day. Got Ammo patch is because I wear the most ammo of anyone in the Claiborne County Militia. The Duct Tape thing is a holdover from work, where if it is really really broke and needs serious fixing, someone calls me."

"That's interesting. A fixer of problems. And here I thought me kinda crowding you would be a problem, or at least get a reaction out of you. You really are as unflappable as you seem."

"See, that falls back on the Regular Guy rockers. I am a regular guy, and I figured if I didn't say anything, you'd stay right where you were," Erich said while working on his MRE fruit pack (peaches). "When something slaps me in the head, I tend to pay attention."

Toni nodded twice, thinking hard about something. She made her decision, but filed that decision away for later… "Okay, I think I like the answer. Your question?"

"Am I just lucky on the language game in this train? Aside from a lot of Japanese writing, everything and everyone appears to be English-speaking to one degree or another," Erich asked.

"No, you're not just lucky. English is the primary language throughout the Star Empires. Japanese is a close second, Russian is a close third, Elven is a distant fourth," Toni said.

"That is good news, I guess?" Clint said. "At least we run a reasonable risk of being understood wherever we go."

"That is so unsettling, watching you sit there and eat your peaches calmly while Toni presses against your head. How the hell do you do it, big guy?"

"Yeah, I'd like to know that," Victoria said drolly.

"Same skillset I use for stress management," Erich said between bites. "No matter how much I don't like it, in the case of work, or no matter how much I do like it, as in this case," he waved his spoon at Toni behind him, "Handle everything calmly, plan on making the necessary moves at the proper times, and enjoy the experience. Everything has its benefits and detriments, just a question of when, where, how."

Toni worked hard to suppress the giggling fit that Hess' comment engendered, especially for the (probably intentional) double entendre of his stress management policy.

"Wow. So right and so wrong, all at once," Clint said.

"You know, this makes me wonder," Clarence said. "When we're at Clint's place, we listen to hard techno and electronica music, goes along with working out. When we're at my place, we listen to country rock," he waved at his wife. "You never choose the music at your place, big guy, you let us pick, which usually ends up being Classic Rock. Why?"

"I'd like to know what he keeps on that phone of his," Clint said. It was obvious he listened to some manner of music through his phone, but it was usually inaudible.

"I plead the fifth," Hess answered immediately.

"The fifth? Right to avoid self-incrimination?" Clint asked for clarification.

"Exactly so," Hess said as he packed up his MRE leftovers. The trail mix pouch went into his GP MOLLE pouch for later consumption.

"Embarrassing choice? Or is it projection? Saying you hate something, while secretly listening to it?" Victoria asked.

"Projection is out the window," Erich said readily. "I wipe my arse with rap music. You can rest assured I do not secretly support the dark side." Hess looked over his right shoulder and around Toni's side, to where the other personnel and trailers were. "We ready to go?"

Car 61 (Seats, 1 Level) (0858)

"You still haven't answered the question, big guy," Toni said, following close behind Hess. "What sort of music do you listen to? You don't strike me as the kind that would listen to classical, you've already disavowed rap, pop would be too soft," she continued. "Ah! I get it! You must be a hard rocker! It fits!"

"How do you come to that conclusion?" Hess asked as Clint and himself approached the end of the car. Nobody was identifiable in the seats, and no miscellaneous material left around to inspect, so…

"You are the kind of quiet, serious person that gives the illusion of being a peaceful sort, but I guess you headbang to the hard stuff in private."

"Nope, can't headbang," Hess said. "I get migraine headaches whenever I try to headbang, so I foreswore that hobby long ago," the big guy answered.

"Clear center," Clint shouted.

"Clear left!" Victoria responded.

"Clear right!" Clarence finished.

"Bring it up," Hess waved the rest of the trailing body forward.

"So, am I right?" Toni asked.

"No," Hess answered simply. "I used to listen to Metal, back when I was a teen, but I buried that long ago."

"Okay, I'm starting to run out of things to guess," Toni grumped. "Or there may not be an answer. He may not listen to anything."

"Listening to the mental exercises of you guys trying to justify the guesses on my music tastes is rather entertaining," Hess said with a smile. "Now, we've done our rest br — " he was cut short by the door opening in front of Clint.

The lady that opened the doors was looking over her shoulder while trying to run forward, and never noticed Clint until she ran body-first into him and bounced off the Militiaman. "Ow! OW! Sorry!" She looked forward after the impact, though took a few seconds to understand what she was seeing. "Soldiers! Americans! I'm safe!"

"Building a reputation in these parts," Clarence said from behind Hess.

"What's going on, milady?" Clint said.

"I was kidnapped by these guys that said they'd sell me into slavery or something," she said. "I tased one of them and was able to get away by running back this way," she said, looking back over her shoulder at the door. "You can help me, right? You are American soldiers, right?"

"Yes, we can help," Clint answered. "We're here to get the Slavers and get the train back home so it can be cleared. We're Militia soldiers, deputized by the Claiborne County Sheriff to rescue this train and the people on it."

Clint probably didn't notice the shift in demeanor, but Hess saw it just a moment too late. "Clint! Get — " he was a little surprised that a stun gun made so much noise as it discharged into someone, but he wasn't surprised to see the much smaller Militiaman collapse under the 600,000-volt hammering administered by the lady. What was more shocking was how she was able to hold him up in some semblance of using Clint as a human shield.

"The hell is going on?" Victoria said as she stepped into a gap between metro-liner style seats and took aim at the suddenly-hostile lady in their midst. Clarence had done the same, though Hess held where he was, simply aiming down the sights of his Enfield rifle.

"I second the question, what is going on?" Hess asked calmly.

"You're Militia!"

"Well, yes?" Clarence said.

"Racist right-wingers that hate the government and want a race war!" She continued.

"The fuck is she talking about?" Clarence asked.

"Help," Clint requested in a stilted fashion, and received a shock from the taser in compense.

"The Militia theory," Hess said, then lowered his rifle. "Stand down your weapons, she is panicking under a false pretense."

"Help," Clint croaked, and received another shock. "Shoot the hostage," he said, mimicking the Speed movie.

"Tempting, but no," Hess said as he set the Enfield aside, deliberately leaving his hands open. "The lady is convinced of the fabrication of the Hard Left media, that militias exist as racist, anti-semitic hate groups that are preparing to overthrow the government and kill off the various ethnic groups. Do I have your understanding correct?"

"It is the truth," she said warily, wondering where this was going.

"Oh, that," Victoria said. "Wow. I didn't think anyone actually believed that bullshit."

"Shoot the hostage, you prick," Clint said, and received another quarter-second shock for it.

"Okay, we've established that, since we four are Militia, we are supposed to be anti-government and racist to the core. Which is very interesting," Hess said. "So, Miss Taser, if I am supposed to be so freaking racist I want to kill 'em all, why did I allow myself to be deputized by a black-as-midnight Sheriff for the purpose of boarding a train to save the lives of obvious non-humans and multiple human ethnicities alike?"

"I don't believe it!" She said defiantly, then shocked Clint again for no apparent reason.

"She'll run out of taser battery soon enough," Clarence guessed.

"Too many more hits and it might induce cardiac arrest," Victoria pointed out fairly.

Hess did not say anything more, he simply pulled his deputy badge and tossed it over next to her. "There is my Deputized badge, issued to me this morning by Sheriff Ron Hearter, Claiborne County Kentucky. Big guy, 6'5" and 265, blacker than Frank White, helluva nice guy. We shoot competition at the local gun range third Saturday of every month, loser pays for lunch. He beats me three times of five in pistol, but I usually win with rifle or shotgun."

Toni gasped behind him; Hess looked over his shoulder briefly at the lady hovering behind him, though couldn't tell what surprised her. When he looked back, he noticed that Miss Taser had put the taser in her pocket, then reached out toward where the badge landed. Rather than stoop to pick it up, the badge slid, slid some more, then vaulted through the air to her hand. Again, Toni gasped, though Hess simply clenched his jaw.

"A telekinetic and a telepath," Toni whispered. Hess nodded very slightly.

"You're not lying," she said after she held the badge for several seconds.

"A final nail in the coffin of the lies you were operating under," Hess opined. "Yuuki, Andrea, up here!" he shouted over his shoulder.

"Coming, sir!" Andrea half-shouted in response. The two did not take long to come up behind the big guy.

"Here," Yuuki declared when she stopped behind Toni.

"Please step to the side here," Hess indicated a seat area to his left.

"Sir," both ladies stepped to the side and faced forward. Once they were in plain sight, Miss Taser gasped again.

"Now, if I am supposed to be so racist that I want to kill them all, why am I working toward saving the lives of an obvious nonhuman, Yuuki, and someone with a wildly unnatural-for-a-human but very real and natural hair color such as Andrea?" Hess asked.

"I get the point," she muttered.

"Case closed," Hess said. "Would you be so kind as to release my pointman now?"

"Oh, yeah," the lady said. She did release Clint, though on a short forward trajectory. He bounced off the corner of one of the metro-liner seats and flopped to the ground.

"I said shoot the hostage for a reason," Clint groused. "That damn taser HURTS!"

"You have no idea how many times I've wanted to see him tased," Victoria said with a smile.

"All's well that ends," Hess said as he hauled Clint to standing with only one hand, though Clint ended up simply collapsing into a nearby bench seat. "Take five, and be sure to ground yourself. You've absorbed a lot of voltage."

"No shit, sensei," Clint grumped.

Hess sighed. "I'm not going to hold the taser incident against you, though Clint may," and Hess received a weak punch to the side for his comment. "You were operating under an ingrained fear, even if inaccurate. I do ask that you refrain from tasing people from now on, unless they are presenting an actual physical or to-be-physical threat. Contrary to the labeling, those are not non-lethal defensive weapons; several times a year, people are killed by tasers. Avoid it if possible."

"Okay," she said, looking at the floor somewhere between herself and Clint's boots.

"What's your name?" Erich asked quietly.

"Cynthia," she said. "Cynthia Williams, California."

"You want off this train, I'll get you off this train. Point out the Slaver that grabbed you, they will be dealt with. And hold your head up; you've escaped and evaded, made it to friendly lines, you're doing better than 95% of kidnapping victims."

-x-x-x-

(Same timeframe)
(At the scene of the train landing, Claiborne County, Rural Kentucky, United States)

"Feds are here," Deputy Filkner said.

"Better and better," Sheriff Hearter groused. "Agent Loucas, what do you have on the Model 10?"

"Good working order, but it's got some wear in some of the parts, tells me this gun has been around the block a few times," ATF Agent Alejandro Loucas said. "Serial number is way above the Military Arms Company production run, which supports the thought that the Returner is pushing."

"How much?" the Sheriff asked.

"Big time. The serial number on this is above 67 million. Military Armaments Corp never put out more than 2 million total guns in its entire business tenure."

"Damn, fits the narrative. And the RPG tube?"

"Same story, Sheriff. The tube is numbered nine digits, above 370 million in the production run. The CIA numbers on worldwide production of the weapon doesn't exceed 12 million. And you already know about the Kelber MG22 CAW," the ATF agent waved to the weapon in question. It had been disarmed and locked open, with a 90-round belt of ammo available for use in a gun that would likely never be fired again.

"Un-fucking-real," Sheriff Hearter said. "I was pretty sure the Returner wasn't lying, but the more hard numbers hit me, the worse I feel about sending those four into the train."

"You can hold off on worrying about the four troops you sent in," the approaching FBI agent said. "Special Agent Kyle Longforth, Eastern Area Special Crimes and Actions task force. You would be Sheriff Hearter?"

"I am," the Sheriff said warily.

"Okay, before we continue, I want to say that we're here in an advisory / horsepower role, we're not taking over. As far as the FBI is concerned, this is a local incident with some nasty customers facing off against some hard Americans. What's the score?"

"Tangos got two kills and two wounds," the Sheriff counted off. The lady that had taken the hits with the birdshot to the back had died on the operating table at Lexington Mercy, was revived, and died again with no second return. The preliminary was massive shock from the birdshot, but a full autopsy was underway. "Refugees had ten escapees, I have them down at the station getting cleaned up and taking statements now. Militia has five confirmed kills plus one probable from the first shooting incident."

"Damn good shooting from your militia boys," Longforth said. "As much as The Press has built a mythos around the right-wing Militia guys, they're necessary for just exactly things like this."

"Things?" Sheriff Hearter said. "Don't tell me this has happened before."

"If I didn't tell you, I'd be lying by omission," Kyle dropped a folder on the hood of the Sheriff's SUV. "This train is incident number five that we can confirm, and we've learned more from this train than the past four."

Hearter didn't take more than two minutes to look through the synopses of the reports. "Jesus Almighty," he swore before he handed the reports to Filkner. "The dates. They're on a curve, and it's getting steeper."

"You noticed as well," Longforth said. "The gaps are 7, 6, 5, 4 years respectively. Keep in mind, these are only trains we can confirm landed here, in America. We don't have any hard data on unconfirmed trains, or trains that landed outside our view."

"So we can expect to see another train in 3 years or so, unless our boys can wrangle this train back to us," the Sheriff said. "The Returners think it is possible. If anyone can make it happen, it would be Hess. He's a damn genius with electronics."

"We went over what we have on Hess," Longforth dropped another file on the desk. "This was compiled under a prior administration, one that was hostile to Militia troops."

"Whoa," the Sheriff said. "You guys think his IQ is that high?"

"That or higher," Longforth said. "You'll note the psych eval in there is old. It was done by a Pshrink we no longer have on staff, because he was too quick to call Hard-Righters 'insane', little bit of a political bias there. We had two other neutral docs look it over, they discredit the original report, and one of them thinks he is rock-solid psychologically. The guy may be unbreakable from a mental standpoint."

"And I sent him and three more into the train to secure it and bring it back here. This plan may just work," Hearter said. "Damn, is that for real?" Hearter said, pointing to a line on the psych eval notes.

"Yeah, it's real. He's all over Youtube for that music, as weird as it is. And the hell of it is, he is not known to speak more than four or five words of Japanese, if that."

"Never knew that about the guy. Have to look into that," the Sheriff took a note down for the information in question. "Okay, this brings two questions. One, if this train shows back up, what do we do?"

"If it shows up, and your boys have secured it, grab it and clear it, extract the refugees, capture any suspects possible. Especially try to get the Slavers, but some of the Mafia may be hostile as well. I'd use tactical teams with extensive trailer support," Kyle suggested.

"And if a new train shows up?" Deputy Filkner asked.

"That's not a question I could answer easily. It's reasonable to guess one train is not the same as the next, so who knows what is going on in them? I'd have to say, that is up to the man on the ground. For sure, though, I don't expect any of the Trains to be pretty on the inside."

"This one certainly wasn't," the Sheriff said. "God protect those crazy pukes Hess, Jamison, and the Williams, they'll need it."

"They're the right kind of people for the job, Sheriff. They exist to protect, and they have a whole train that could use the protection. They're unlikely to face any organized resistance, there is none on the Trains. If the worst thing on the train is the Slavers, they're likely to make it out alive," FBI Special Agent Longforth said.

It would be three years local time before the Special Agent had an answer to his prediction, and that answer would be well beyond anyone's expectations.

Author's Chapter Afterword:

Second verse, hopefully better than the first!

I will be the first to admit, my first go was a ground-breaker. I was working on the manner and method of the narrative. And while I think the first go was pretty good, there were some things that nuked the narrative early on. Hence, the motivation to redo it right this time.

Now, this build is a bit different, with things changed around to a significant degree, a new train, new cut, new deck, new shuffle, and some fresh faces to do the job. There are some repeat offenders in the story, but things are for the most part scaled up to a very significant degree. Definitely, because I now have four Militia troops in the op, things are required to get hairier for everyone.

First, the new faces. Clint is a look at the prototypical mid-twenties Patriot. Loves the country, steady job, dedicated lady-chaser (with minimal success, he's too nice a guy), and a major proponent of the Prepper and Militia movements. A bit hyper, big physical buff, weightlifter and as shown, a lover of Kalashnikov rifles. He tends to come off as the hyper guy in the team, but also gets a whiff of the butt monkey treatment, as evidenced by the tasing incident above.

I wrote Clarence out as a look at a Militia prepper / gun bunny type of guy, written realistically and not to the unholy panic degree that Moms Demand Action would show. Clarence is a WW2 gun bunny, a bad habit he picked up from a Great Uncle who was in WW2 and Korea. He owns every civilian-legal non-NFA WW2 firearm except for a 1903-pattern Sniper Rifle. Beyond that, he is also a big gun buff in general, a business analyst and a yard keeper extraordinaire. Clarence and his wife are both churchgoers, but not hard religious types.

Victoria Dee Williams is a look at the unsung group of the Militia / Prepper / Tea Party groups: the ladies, which is a group that Mom Demands Action / Bloomberg / Everytown Mayors would do their damndest to convince you does not exist. In inversion of common trends, though, Victoria is the least worrying of the four in the militia band, to the point of calling the others (and Hess specifically) 'old maids in young men's boots'. She is also a bit of a stealth snarker to Clint's frequent snarker, which can make conversations with her a bit sharp if not expecting the sharp wit. Of the four, she also carries the lightest kit, but for climbing purposes in her case — she can carry a double-rifle kit just as well as the rest of the team, but she prefers the light gear for her sharpshooter preferences.

Hess is the returning offender of the group, and who I initially showed as a not-comprehensive Militiaman. He's a big guy, overweight his whole life, but he puts it to helluva good use — of the four, he is hands down the strongest, but he has near zero endurance for running or heavy cardio activities. He also carries the heaviest kit of the team bar none, with the Enfield, the AR-15 customized, the 870 Express Magnum shotgun, and the XD Tactical with a total of seven magazines. This is due to his preference of being the team anchor, the man who holds positions and denies enemies free movement through his AO. It results in a slower movement pace for the whole unit, but none of the team would deride his firepower or accuracy once the lead starts flying.

There are other Militiamen I wrote out for the story, but they will factor into later stories in the Sigma line, so I won't go over them in depth.

One thing you will notice, I have changed up things to a big degree, increasing the random factor on the opposition. Not as many fights, but bigger units and more varied personnel. Also, a lot more Slavers involved here, and you'll get to see their ranks in full in the next chapter. Also, going forward I am working on tweaking the random character generation and the random location generation effects, which shall help immensely with event, location, and person generation.

The one major thing you will see going forward, though, is the running threads concept — storylines that keep coming back around for another slap in the face until they are finally resolved. That was one of the major things I had going against me in the last run, things got disheveled quickly and didn't work towards conclusion. I do not intend to make that mistake this time around. Things will move forward at a more logical pace, and with more detail and activity.

The downside of this change is I have pretty much scrapped the entire first round down to nothing. New deck, new cut, new shuffle — that is an end-to-end promise. Some thingss will remain the same, but not all. And, as was pointed out to me by a random bird involved in this operation, the political side with the Protectorate was far too neat. The Star League is going to be a bit more asshole about it going forward this time. That will make things harder for Hess and his merry band of miscreants.

That's it for my notes. Thank you all for the first round, and I intend to do better this time!

NEXT UP: Advancing through the train is no simple task, and with the body of the Slavers ahead, things have the likelihood of getting deadly quick.

NOTICE: The next chapter will probably be it for a linear run on this story. After that, I will be working on this in bits and pieces while I do my nominal writing on the mainline stories.

Review Replies:

No active review replies for this chapter (it is the first). Reviews and replies from Chapter 5 of the first round:

Terrace4 / Devil Dog: "Hey, it's the guy formerly known as Devil Dog here. Just popping in to state for the record that you're a good author, and I look forward to more of Archangel's Amazing Adventures.

That said, I'm going to have to discuss the problems I'm having with this story. The characters just don't grab me, as they're all OCs. The plot requires some implausible reactions to get started, and I honestly don't find it interesting. Is this story needed to understand future stories? Is it just side materials? I'm sorry, but I'm just bored to tears reading this one."

REPLY: As I noted in the opening of this redux, this is NOT a standard crossover. Elements will be crossed in at appropriate times, ro as the Random Number Gods see fit. Mostly, this is a take on RTS / RPG done in real-world circumstances with crossover elements thrown in for good measure. Hopefully, this redux is better for you, but if you don't want to read it, no big thang. The entire Sigma line is a massive dimension-hopper crossover, but is not really critical reading to stay current on the MMC, JW, or AAA series.

Holy Dragoon: "Ouch, dices are a bitch at times. Sad to see Tyee buying the great farm, but so is life. They better have some wood on reserve for any future coffins... or whichever is their choice of funeral.

Now that I was reading about transforming people into objects, I was reminded of a little item from the Ogre series called Snapshot (or Snapdragon). The effect is pretty similar, with the difference that it always ends up being a sword that inherits a part of the stats of the snapped character.

... yeah, it's souled sword. Useful Creepy Shit."

REPLY: The dice are unforgiving, and this time will be no different. Chapter two will demonstrate some of that, and it shall only get worse.

As to the transformation spellcraft, I don't know where I picked it up. Can tell you right now, never did Ogre series.

On swords with souls, you ain't seen shit yet. Wait until I cut loose with the Relic Mages.

C0dy88: "I was starting to wonder when they'd start a proper grave yard."

REPLY: The way things are leaning, there will be more of a need for it in this revision.

Knives 91: "Don't tell me that! That glorious man is alive! ALIVE I TELL YOU!

Anyway, I was referencing the German WWII tank, the Tiger. Tigers driving Tigers, as it were. Tigerception, as those modern day jokers might put it.

Given recent losses, exactly what size force can Sigma actually afford to field at this point? Too many and they'll start compromising their ability to hold the base.

Great chapter, as they always are! Hope real life doesn't keep you down too hard!"

REPLY: Nope, he isn't. Sorry, dude.

Tigerception? LOL! TANK RUSH KEKEKEKE! (Sorry, couldn't resist.)

As of the end of chapter five, the total forces were below a full platoon, not counting the Militia. With the Militia, not quite up to a Company.

THANK YOU ALL FOR THE FEEDBACK ON THE LAST RUN! I intend to put it all to good use this time around, and hopefully do way better.

The Gripe Sheet:

No gripes, yet. Thanks to Sieben Nightwing, Takeshi Yamato, Necroblade, and One-Village-Idiot for doing the beta work on this!

Footnotes:

(1): Service Level Agreement, an agreement that problems shall be resolved inside a specified timeframe or contract penalties would be executed.

(2): Ten-Four (or written 10-4) is the most recognized of the Ten Codes for radio communication. Roughly translates to 'yes' or 'acknowledged' depending on context of the answer.

(3): Twenty in this case refers to the radio code 10-20, which is a request for location.

(4): Varget is a brand of gunpowder manufactured by Hodgdon, commonly used in high-speed rifle applications.

(5): Foxtrot Oscar is the NATO phonetic code for FO, which is a common abbreviation for 'fuck off'.

Included Works: This is a listing of the various works I have included so far. As things go on, this list WILL expand.

—Real Life Armaments — too many to name, that is most of the arsenal shown.
—Real Life Combat Gear — the vests and gear carried by the Militia troops are easily constructible from stuff you can buy on Amazon or Cheaper Than Dirt. No, Seriously, Look it up. Do a search for "UTG Modular 10-Piece Complete Kit", and you have a good look at a starter kit for any serious gearhound.
—Real Life Concepts

—Personal Works: The Star Empires are mentioned briefly here. Additionally, the Magi Empire is named specifically.
—Personal Works: The 10mm Kurz cartridge is a shortened / lower velocity / lower weight version of the 10mm BG round, developed by the Magi for 'crowd pleasing' against large masses of Negaverse troops, most of which were unarmored during the Star Empire Wars. It quickly became a favored heavy machine gun round for multiple purposes after the fact.

—Anime General: the oddball hair colors
—Anime General and D&D: the nonspecific concept of Elves, Nymphs, and Sylphs.

—Game: Infantry Online (Sony Online Entertainment): The CAW from the early section, and named in the stinger, is a different-manufacturer version of the Kuchler A6 CAW.

—Movie: Speed: A bit of a subversion here, but the whole 'shoot the hostage' thing is derived from that movie. Only, in this case, nobody does shoot the hostage, so...