Baa-Ram-Ewe!

by Darkonshadows

127. Hard Die the Train.

-Earth, Eastern Kazakhstan, Shanty-

“I give up!” Mopsy shouted as we sat at a China Hippo and ate.

“At least it be good food.” I continued to eat my dumplings, it reminded me of Tigress, Po and the other kung fu warriors.

Wonder how Pom or Ocellus and Smolder are doing?

We were almost to the Kunlun Mountains and soon I would be helping Sly with bringing down Panda King.

I be getting in a lot of training with the team.

-On a train somewhere in the mountains, Pom-

So we were in the state of Colorado and I was still quite alert despite an hour passing, we could have jumped off and headed for New Mexico and then head straight west. Instead we were going straight west, then southwest out of Utah.

“Does it have to be like that?” Bolt was a good and healthy dog, but he wasn’t actually quite capable in a real fight yet.

“I don’t know what you said, so I’m going to guess. If they get into another fight their bruises and already rather prevalent injuries are just going to worsen, not that their mental states aren’t already at a deficiency from all the stress already. Dolly is not in too much of a condition to really be fighting, much less Pom. Pom is still our best option should something like that occur, but in a limited fashion given her current state.” Dormarch was just concentrating on our health and while he may be a bit too overbearing about it, he did have a very well thought out point. I was one more incident away from snapping, I really didn’t like getting violent and… I’m pretty sure I threw someone face first at a tree back there. “Unfortunately neither of them will relent on being the ones to take action, even if it is to their detriment. Pom still needs more than a week of constant rest for the heart problems she’s acquired alone, she’d need a vacation to properly recover and that’s not in the books as we all know, she probably should be on pain killers even now as we speak. Don’t even get me started on how long it would take to fix her mental issues, at least Dolly doesn’t seem to be letting her injuries get her down even if she’s not much better.”

“Oh, they are getting me down, I’m just hiding it well.” Dolly was a walking bruise by using her board to block bullets, that her board didn’t even have a scratch was amazing. “Who knew being a sidekick would hurt this much?”

“No probably about that, the stitches in my chest still ache quite badly.” I’m surprised I haven’t come down with something. “At least those mouse doctors did good work.”

“Also Dolly now has an injury around her midsection from where she used the leash to get off the caboose. Can you please refrain from doing any more stunts, I want the both of you to be healthy and whole as you can be.” Idly noting that Dormarch didn’t say happy. “For as long as you can... I don’t want to be alone in this world. Remember that you’re all that I have! That and an ability to connect to the internet connection where possible, which doesn’t quite fill the void like social interaction does.”

“I’m going to go up and look out for any more trouble, maybe get some fresh air.” I calmly passed by the number of animals that were being transported in this train car. “If I wasn’t paranoid before, then I wasn’t doing it right.”

“I’ll come with you Pom!” Dolly was still full of energy, even with her injuries she was still raring to go.

“No, I need to be alone for a bit, talk to your family some more.” Please don’t cut them out of your life for me Dolly Dalmatian.

“But… okay…” She could read my feelings as much as I read hers. “I’ll still come when you need help or me.”

I know.

I silently climbed and got out of the car to look around before sitting on the roof and laying down to just stare at the sky, a bit of wool hanging over my eyes and protecting them from the sun. Closing my eyes to let the tears spill from them, my body was a wreck and Dormarch was just being nice about that estimate of how long it would take me to recover.

Even doing what little I did to get the mercenaries off the train taxed me, I really didn’t have much more in the tank to keep going.

-Dolly-

“Hey ‘fam’, so mercenaries attacked us as we were getting on a train, we’re currently passing through Colorado.” The number of puppies gathering around were happy to see me at least and I gave them a wistful smile. “Had to take out an armored vehicle and everything, I basically have the rope burn from the leash to prove.”

I still loved them all, when was I going to tell them that I’m not staying in this world?

“Did you really meet Bolt?” One of the puppies asked with a wagging tail.

“Are you going to get an outro-giraffe for us?” I think the puppy was trying to say autograph, adorable.

“Hey Dolly, I’m trying to be the high energy dog with Dizzy!” Dee Dee popped up with Dizzy, my two little sisters looked to be doing well.

“You are positively covered in nasty bruises Dolly.” Way to go Dylan, bring them all down to earth and upset them why don’t you?

“Yeah, deflecting bullets isn’t something I thought I’d be doing unless I was a police dog.” I rolled my eyes and then chuckled dryly. “By the way you know how I modified my deck… well apparently I found out its bullet proof.”

“That’s, scientifically speaking, very confusing Dolly. None of the stuff you did to your board should have made it bullet proof.” Dawkins pushed Dylan to the side and looked at me, the brainy Dalmatian seemed to have the inventing spark back in him. “I try not to remember all the stuff you did to it, we did try to tell you not to overdo it and you did such an unsound thing anyway!”

“About as unsound as her deflecting bullets with it on a whim!” Dylan was being a worry wart, but he looked to be getting more sleep and was looking less tired than when I was around. What did that say about me? “How did she even know that her skateboard would do that? Those bullets could have gone through the board and hit you Dolly!”

“Hey, I may not be a geek or a science buff, but I recreated what I did to my board on my new helmet here.” I smacked my helmet twice with a paw for emphasis. “Apparently I accidentally discovered a formula for bullet proofing stuff, go figure.”

“Can you recall the formula exactly?” Dawkins was excited now, always willing to learn as much as teach.

“The only reason why I remember how to do it is because I cared enough about my skateboard to remember everything I put on it. Not that my formula will be greatly detailed as you would like, but at least I know the order I added the stuff in.” So I listed off a number of specific things and the order I used them in, Dawkins was writing it down while nodding. When I finished Dawkins ran off to test what I did and how it made my skateboard and new helmet feasibly bullet proof. “Aside from the recent mercenary problem, we also fought a sentai based team of demons. Only it turned out to be more boring than I thought that’d be, they kind of blew themselves up.”

“Bakuhatsu!” Daisuke stated loudly while throwing his paws up in the air, he was wearing a white headband with a red spot on it.

“Sure, whatever that is. Anyway, that’s Bolt the Super Dog, sorry if he’s not feeling talkative at the moment.” I looked over at him, Mittens and Rhino talking quietly while directing my family to look at Bolt. “He’s currently living with the fact that he found out he’s just an actor on a show, never been told he was before and actually believed all that stuff was actually happening. Of course now he has to live with happening for real with us!”

“Well that would explain all the more comical stuff that happened on that show.” Dylan shook his head while looking to the ceiling, he sighed and then looked at me. “Just be more careful Dolly.”

“Don’t worry bro, I’m getting a pretty good hang of this sidekick stuff!” My need to wave off his concern with a paw just made him more concerned. “Really, aside from the bruises and trauma, I’m feeling mostly okay. Probably need a week of rest, but everything is…”

A series of explosions rocked the train, a minute of silence later another series of explosions rocked it.

“Fine. Okay… I’ll have to call you back Dylan, apparently the mercenaries we met are attacking the train to get at us again.” Shouting this as I covered my ears having dropped Dormarch, one quick glance at Dylan’s concerned gaze made me quickly tap out a message to end the call. I passed Dormarch over to the shocked and worried trio of traveling animal friends we’re acquainted with. “Here hold onto Dormarch for us, I’m needed up top to see what’s going on. The train’s still moving so that’s a good thing at least.”

-Pom-

“Pom what’s going… on… oh holy dog why?!” Dolly was now seeing what the problem was as she popped up on the roof and was adjusting her helmet as she came towards me. “Okay, so the guys we dealt with previously weren’t exactly their A Team.”

Apparently five rocket launching vehicles were attacking the train, they were firing off another volley of rockets and the train was rocked with explosions. While they haven’t hit anything important yet, it was only a matter of time.

This cargo train thankfully didn’t have much on it that needed defending, aside from the animal transport car we were taking shelter in and the people on the engine at the front of the train.

“I don’t think my board can handle explosives Pom.” Energy and bullets sure Dolly, but even I would be mulched if hit directly by explosions that powerful and the rocket launching vehicles were angling another shot as they followed alongside the train on a road above us. “Ah, what do we do?!”

“You figure out how to evacuate every living animal off the animal car Dolly, I’ll try to safely throw off the conductor or anyone else on this train before it’s destroyed.” This was a cargo train so that was about three people at best near the front that I have to rescue. “The train is not going to be able to outrun those vehicles, if they haven’t caused an avalanche to stop the train then they might bring down a portion of the mountain on the train to do just that soon.”

I sent Dolly a feeling to get a move on and I started running across the top of the train cars and making small hops between them. Two cars later I manage to jump off the roof of a train car in time to get caught in the explosion and flung forward.

My chin stung as I landed on a train car two ahead of the one that just lost its roof, I sat up rubbing at my jaw and then looked down and paled. I was on a large cylindrical train car, one that had the labels flammable all over it.

-Shred Tread Mercenaries, rocket artillery unit-

The first two shots were to acquire a more accurate picture of where we were aiming, now we had the targeting data.

“We have the range now and we’ll never get a better opportunity than this, sending artillery targeting data for combined fire, on my mark!” A duck in one of the rocket artillery trucks stated. “Marked target!”

“Load and shoot!” Several voices responded, as the five trucks all fired rockets at the one of the seemingly incredible targets.

They recently learned that they were targeting Leap Lamb and Caper Canine, someone direly wanted them both dead.

Leap Lamb didn’t look so tough, she in fact was running for her life as five rockets arced for her and it was just their luck she was on one of the several flammable fuel trucks.

-Pom-

I was soon caught in a conflagration when the fifth one blew apart the car I was leaping from, I was sent high into the air end over end out of control.

My wool on fire, I quickly tightened my wool and twisted myself into glide mode and angled downward sharply. The flames on my body were quickly put out by the force my rolling impact with the wooden log car.

Once I manage to get standing, I started coughing as the car started becoming covered in smoke and my ears were ringing. My body was slightly burnt and looking at the wood logs I had slammed into… they were now on fire. Also I too was still on fire!

I quickly leapt up onto the roof of the next car and rolled wildly to put out the remaining flames on me, I sighed when my wool finally stopped burning. I looked back and saw the shambles of the neighboring wooden car I was blown over was catching fire too. Smoke was filling the sky, I had to hurry and safely get the conductor and whoever else is onboard off of this train!

This situation was getting nightmarish, as if I wasn’t living enough nightmares as it is!

-Shred Tread Mercenaries, rocket artillery unit-

“Blast it, she somehow survived that! Train rockets on new target point, sending data now…” All the rocket artillery vehicles reoriented their aim. “Marked target!”

“Load and shoot!” The rockets flew out at a high arc.

-Pom-

Those rockets weren’t going to hit the train, but it did look like they were going to… I had to move if I wanted to save those lives! Sorry, Dormarch, other people matter more than my health.

I inhaled and then exhaled quickly to burst along the tops of the roof, moving much slower than I had ever previously doing this. My body couldn’t be giving out on me, not now!

As the rockets blasted the mountainside above. I continued to push myself, even as I was slowing down.

Boulders started raining down towards the train.

No, no, no… I stopped and took a few gasping breathes.

Curling in on myself, I bunkered right where I was two cars from the engine.

-Dolly-

The train care disconnected and we watched as it slowed down behind us as the rest of the train sped up from the lost weight.

I ducked down as we were hit by several boulders doing a lot of damage to the train and slowing it slightly down, but we were still going.

“That still doesn’t solve how we’re going to get an entire cars worth of animals off the train safely when we can’t stop or we’ll be blown apart!” Mittens was freaking out, Bolt looked like he wanted to do something but had no direction and Rhino was just trying to make suggestions about things neither Bolt or I could actually do.

“Hold on… is it me or is the train speeding up?” The train was getting faster, much faster and I don’t think it was because of the cars we just let go to lighten the load on the train as it was pounded by boulders. “I don’t think they have that much ammunition left, I mean there’s got to be a limit to how many more times they can fire right? Not that we can really do much about them.”

-Pom-

I uncurled and looked behind me at the devastated portions of the train that were left behind. The animal car was still intact and Dolly was in distress for fairly obvious reasons, I moved forward two cars and froze.

“No…” I might be too late to save anyone concerning how a portion of the train engine was crushed under a boulder… also I think the train was now out of control and picking up speed.

I really am in too horrible a condition to really help anyone… much less fight, not that this was something I could actually deal with. Maybe they survived somehow? I’m currently not one for optimism, but if there’s a chance.

Needing to figure out if anyone survived what normally looked like a death sentence, I moved forward and hopped over to another car and finally I was on the crush engine portion.

I quickly climbed down and walked along the side of the engine trying to get a look inside. This train engine looked a lot more futuristic than the ones back on Equus.

There was smoke and fire spilling from within, I sighed and concentrated and raised my left hoof before slamming it down against the glass. I smashed a large hole in the window and hot smoke started pouring out of it.

“Is anyone in there?” I tried weakly, before getting loud. “Is there anyone still alive in there!”

“Yes…” A voice spoke out before coughing.

Not thinking twice, I began holding my breath as I dove into the smoke through the window.

The fire from the engine was raging, that was a little out of control and only a few small sections of the room were on fire. One glance around the room with the smoke filtering out of the hole I made in the glass I could see three people.

“Who needs the most help and what do I do?” I was having a mild panic attack, but I was the one currently standing and able to lend aid however they needed it.

“Extinguish… the small fires…” The grey rabbit animalistic started coughing as he weakly pointed at the red cylindrical object on the wall.

Quickly pulled the fire extinguisher off the wall and looked at the instructions, pulling the pin I got the nozzle in my other hoof and started to quickly spray down the small fires with the cold foamy substance. Tried not to get any of it on the three injured people, the back half of the train engine car was crushed by solid mass of stone so they had no way out other than through the hole in the window I made.

The boulder crushing the back half of the engine had been holding all the smoke in the engine car, I tried to keep low and not inhale too much of the smoke as it exited through the hole I made. How most of the glass stayed intact is beyond me, but I need to break it to get more of it soon to get better airflow into the room.

It was around this time that the two other injured parties became lucid and the train was rocked with several more explosions. I could still feel Dolly, but she seemed to be focusing on something else so I didn’t want to bother her.

I quickly used the butt of the extinguisher to smash several more windows in quick succession to clear the smoke out faster

“What…” The old horse biped started coughing, he was nearest to the boulder and one of his legs didn’t look so good. “Did we… enter a war zone Thumper?”

“Ask her Horace.” The rabbit, Thumper, pointed in my general direction as I continued to put out the smaller fires around.

“The train is under attack and it’s all my fault, the mercenaries after me really want me and my companion dead.” It should be obvious to them who I was.

“Aghhh…. my leg is broken.” The horse biped stated in agony. The smoke was almost clear so the others were coughing less. “Thumper can you check on Figaro and see why he isn’t moving, he’s breathing at least. Now as for you young lady. Thank you for saving our lives, however long that may last given the circumstance. Now weaken the rest of those flames, don’t want them spreading one bit.”

“Not long if any of those rockets hit the engine, they’d catch up to us not long after that.” I responded by dousing the remaining flames. “Aren’t you going to blame me for all of this?”

“Even if you had hopped off the train and got away from the train long before the attack, I think they were looking for excuses to use whatever artillery they have against the train. Some of the cargo is valuable stuff and I wouldn’t put it past mercenaries to just plain rob a train… heh a train robbery in this day and age. As exciting as that sounds I’m getting too old for this and my lung just took a horrible beating.” The horse biped, Horace I believe Thumper called him, was sitting up and looking at his mangled leg. “Horace Horsecollar, under better circumstances I would ask for your name, but I’ll go with Leap Lamb for now.”

“I think Figaro is in shock, he’s catatonic.” Thumper reported over the cat animalistic. “I’m not saying that to be funny either!”

“Just great, like we don’t have enough problems with the train.” Horace mumbled. “We’re picking up speed too… thankfully we don’t have too many sharp bends to go around, but at this speed the bridge ahead might break apart.”

“Did you just say bridge?!” I went over to the window and poked my head out and looked at it, several rockets struck the far end of the bridge ahead of us. “Yeah… definitely saw that coming…”

“Can you get us all to safety if the brakes are gone?” Horace asked as he hopped over to the controls.

“I can try.” I mentally showed Dolly the problem and we mentally traded general ideas. “Isn’t there some kind of law against using those things on a civilian transport?”

Hwachas in Huoshan were recreational use only these days, but it would be considered a crime to fire them on average citizens and not aggressors. They were mostly used for Fireworks displays, this is what I was likening the rocket artillery being fired at the train to.

“Yes, but at this point I don’t think they really care. They obviously have military contacts and if the military is ignoring all this hubbub, then no one is coming to help us!” As Horace was telling me this, he was at the controls and must have hit the brakes as the train lurched. “Yes, the brakes are still good! We’re not going to stop in time before the train goes onto the bridge though. We’ll be sitting ducks for those artillery pieces, but at least we’ll not immediately fall to our deaths. Thumper, carry Figaro and go for the back of the train, quickly now!”

Helping Thumper get Figaro onto the top of the train engine, I made sure he got Figaro over his shoulder and started to carefully carry him away as he climbed up the boulder.

“You too, come on!” I held out my hoof for Horace, the old guy jumped and I clung my wool to his limb and pulled him up onto the roof and over my back. "Hold on, this is going to get rough!"

He was heavy, but I still had some kick left in me to carry him as I hopped onto the boulder. My body was protesting my current actions as I leapt after Thumper who was several cars ahead on the quickly slowing train.

I really needed an uninterrupted vacation.

Author's Note:

N/A

Comments

[Herald of Opera]

For those playing at home: Thumper is from Bambi, and Horace Horsecollar is from the black-and-white era. Someone else can place Figaro, because I have no doubt that they're also an established character.