The dreaded Locomotive
of
the
LIVING
Tuesday, June the Eighth
Since Mr. Vandenklamp tragically perished
in the unfortunate incident with the robots,
the entire group of monster hunters came
together and decided to attend his funeral. It
was not far off from where we were crashed,
and as repairs were going on, it gave us some
free time.
Mrs. Clothilde Vandenklamp is suddenly
quite frugal since her husband died, and
claims that if we take a certain train, and
disembark at a certain station, we can
switch over to the Necropolis line, a train
that runs the dead from the major cities to
the countryside for burial. That train stops
directly at the Vandenklamp family plot and
costs under half the fee of any other railway,
as long as the travelers are in mourning.
Many in the group like the idea of the
savings, though I'm not so sure I need to be so
frugal as to ride a train of death! After all, one
could place the blame for our entire situation
on her. But she has been very helpful, perhaps
trying to make up for the crash, by helping
us take care of the arrangements and luggage.
The Mayor is staying behind. All of his
belongings have been scattered across the
countryside and he means to go looking for
them. Poor man has been left without a shirt
on his back! I envied his adventure to recover
his clothing, for a train ride and a funeral
seemed dreary by comparison.
It is the Mayor's express goal to learn more
DEAD
about monsters to protect his city, that most
glorious jewel of all Italia, Venice. However,
the handsome man seems to have the most
terrible luck. It turns out that he slept through
our encounter with the Genie. He was quite
contented with the hot bath and dessert he
was given by the renegade automatons — until
they jettisoned his luggage in the crash. He
wound up lost and ended up taking tea with
a charming young lady during that debacle
with the witch. The mummy he had located
in Egypt had remained most resolutely dead.
As far as his adventure was coming along, it
was rather uneventful compared to mine, and
he seems to despair of ever finding a monster
worth his mettle.
Thursday, June the Tenth
We boarded the first train and switched
to the death train a few hours later. Night
fell during the ride and many of the hunters
fell asleep in their seats—which are only as
comfortable as the cost of the ticket allows,
much to my great annoyance. While I sat
trying to gain some semblance of comfort,
Missus Mister crept up upon me and
whispered in my ear, “Come with me.”
Oh, covert secret operations! This was
the type of adventure I signed up for! We
navigated through the rows of mourners,
through the cars, and to the back until we
came to cars filled with the corpses of the
dead in rows of coffins lining the walls.