Blood on the Tracks

The investigators find themselves sharing a compartment on the express train from Boston to Portland, stopping at Arkham amongst other places. Just as the train leaves North Station, a drunk man staggers into the compartment, slams the door shut with an effort and collapses in the corner seat. It soon becomes apparent that the man isn’t drunk but is suffering from a fatal stab wound to the lungs.

As the investigators tend to him, he gasps out his last words:

Looks like they’ve done for me, don’t it? ... They’re after it, see ... They want it more than anything ... only ... I took it from them ... Had to, see ... Someone had to ... Else Christ knows what they’d’ve done ... Can’t tell you what it is, though ... Too dangerous ... Can’t even tell you where it is ... ‘cause then you might tell them ... But I fooled them ... They might’ve stuck me through the lungs with a damn butcher knife ... but I shot the bastard dead who done for me and got away for long enough ... Long enough from them and those damn things of theirs ... Only maybe it’s the things that’re runnin’ the show ... Who knows ... Who kn- ...

Possibilities

1 The man, Adam Tubbs, has stolen a powerful cult artefact. He escaped from the cultists chasing him long enough to hide the artefact somewhere on the train. Unfortunately, one of the cultists caught up with him and stabbed him with a ritual dagger before Tubbs shot him dead and stuffed the body into a toilet. Several bad guys and two semi-human ‘things’ are on the train searching for Tubbs and the artefact.

2 Tubbs is a minor hoodlum who has crossed the gang he runs with by stealing a package of heroin from the latest consignment from Southeast Asia. He was trailed to the station by several gang members, where one of them ambushed and stabbed him before he was able to shoot the attacker and hide the body. Tubbs staggered onto the nearest train, stashed the kilo of heroin onboard and then stumbled into the investigators’ compartment. The ‘things’ he refers to are Vietnamese drug-traffickers that the gang is allied with. Three gangsters spotted Tubbs getting on the train and are now looking for Tubbs and the heroin.

3     Tubbs is a member of one of a pair of feuding cults that have an overwhelming hatred for each other. In a struggle for an artefact belonging to one of them, he has been stabbed and has slain one of his enemies. He has managed to hide the artefact on the train before staggering into the investigators’ compartment. Several cultists from each faction are also on board the train, searching for the artefact, Tubbs, and each other.

© Tony Hickie