My summer class is getting pretty busy so I haven't had time to write...SORRY! I hope you all like this chapter...
Mr. Fogg rushed through his asylum's dimly lit halls, stopping at each cell door and peering past the bars to find the source of the mysterious, sudden singing.
It grew louder and louder as Mr. Fogg grew closer to the room where he kept his blondes.
He stood on his tip toes and stared in.
The inmates, usually aimless isolated even in their uncomfortable communal state, sat in neat rows, swaying back and forth, with their backs to the only exit.
Their golden hair, unkempt and at various lengths, glistened in the darkness of the windowless room.
And he could hear their voices, in perfect harmony, singing this strange, wordless song.
He fumbled with his clanking ring of rusted keys and found the correct one, turning it inside the lock and throwing open the heavy door.
Blonde tresses whipped around as all the women immediately silenced and turned towards the intruder in their black paradise.
Mr. Fogg wanted to back away from them but found himself frozen.
His key ring clanged to the floor.
Toby had checked every train-car in the train that had come after the one he, Mrs. Lovett and Mr. Todd had been seated in looking for the second robber.
Except for the baggage car.
So when Toby reached the aforementioned he was not surprised to see Uniform sprawled on the floor.
However, what he was surprised to see was that the baggage car's door was missing, and that all the trunks and suitcases were opened and strewn across the car, half empty.
That explained all the flying clothing…
Toby ventured into the luggage train-car, stepping carefully around the mess which included the shivering Uniform.
"What happened to you?" Toby asked, confused at the sight of the cowering criminal.
Uniform shook his head, as if unable to speak.
He merely pointed.
Toby's eyes followed the direction Uniform's index finger indicated.
Using the ray of light allowed in by the luggage car's missing door Toby was able to see what Uniform was pointing at.
A white kitten, curled up in the corner of the car, seemingly asleep.
Toby started towards Ruby.
"No! Don't!" Uniform managed to choke out, tugging at Toby's shirt to hold him back, "You'll wake it!"
"…so?" Toby shrugged, looking at the man as if he was crazy (which he probably was…).
He noticed the red, coagulated scratched decorating Uniform's face.
"So! So it's evil!" Uniform whispered urgently, "If you wake it up, it'll kill us both!"
"You're a really stupid guy…" Toby muttered and wrenched himself away from Uniform's grasp so he could collect the kitten.
Ruby's red eyes open and blinked as Toby kneeled in front of her. She jumped happily into his open arms, mewing.
"You're crazy, kid!" Uniform shouted, scrambling up from the floor in order to put as much space between him and the evil beast as he could.
"Aw, Ruby, I'm so glad you're okay!" Toby exclaimed, hugging his cat close to him and petting its soft fur.
Ruby mewed, rubbing her head against Toby's shirt, leaving white hairs behind that Mrs. Lovett often complained about cleaning off of Toby's clothing.
Seeing that both kitten and boy were distracted, Uniform saw his opportunity to escape the baggage train-car.
But just as he was about to cross over into the next one, Toby called after him.
"You're not going anywhere, you stupid train robber!" he declared, "I'm taking you into custody!"
Uniform normally would not take any threats from a child seriously.
But this situation was not normal.
It was abnormal.
Abnormal because this child threatening him was holding a very dangerous weapon in his hands.
A cat.
Uniform raised his arms in surrender and Toby grinned, stroking Ruby.
Nellie's skirts flared in the wind.
Standing on the train was more difficult than it had looked.
Suit had attempted to keep a tight hold on her but had to release the woman from his grasp in order to keep himself steady.
Both of his arms were extended to full length for balance and one of them held the gun, still trained on Nellie.
The train jolted, causing the two to totter violently.
"Don't you move!" Suit warned as he slowly tried to regain his original position.
"I haven't got anywhere to go, now do I?" Nellie replied, holding her dress down. It was quiet on the roof for a few moments except for the air swooshing by until she asked, "Now just what is your plan here. We're not going to jump off the train, are we?"
"…no!" Suit said finally, but from the way he was examining the farm fields rushing past it looked as if he was seriously considering the prospect of jumping off of the train.
"You don't have a plan, do you?" Nellie accused.
"That's none of your concern!" Suit yelled, waving his weapon.
"As a matter of fact it is, since I happen to be involved in whatever plan you do concoct!" Nellie reasoned.
"Well if you care so much, why don't you think of a plan, then!" Suit shouted.
Nellie laughed to herself.
Hadn't Mr. Todd said something like that to her once…
"What's so funny?" Suit demanded.
"Oh, nothing." Nellie dismissed, still smiling, "I'm just thinking of a plan…"
In reality, of course, she wasn't.
She was only stalling until Mr. Todd would once again rescue her.
"Think faster!" Suit ordered, "Or I'll shoot!"
Shaking her head and rolling her eyes, Nellie started to spout off ridiculously complicated and unfathomable ideas to get off the train's roof that would be very unlikely to work.
Suit paid careful attention.
Now a competent veteran at train-roof-walking, Sweeney stepped with ease against the gusting winds towards where he could see, just as he expected, two figures struggling to keep their stances.
Suit and Mrs. Lovett.
Suit's back was to Sweeney so he did not see him approaching from behind.
But Mrs. Lovett did.
She met Sweeney's eye although made no expression or movement that would betray his position to Suit.
Over the roar of the air rushing by, Sweeney could faintly hear Mrs. Lovett talking (babbling on, really, like she usually did) about different ways to get off of the roof of the train.
"Well we could try to use my skirt as some kind of parachute, perhaps…" she suggested, "or maybe wait until we see a haystack and jump into that…hopefully it would cushion the fall. Or if the train goes under a bridge we could grab it and hang on…"
Sweeney raised an eyebrow.
Was Mrs. Lovett planning on escaping the train with this robber?
There was no way…
Sweeney pulled out his razors and crept quietly towards Suit, who still hadn't realized he was there.
Just as Sweeney was about to reach in front of Suit and slash his throat, Suit stomped towards Mrs. Lovett, cocking his gun and shoving it in her face.
"Enough with those stupid ideas!" he roared, "You're useless!"
Mrs. Lovett flinched and backed away from Suit but he continued to hold his weapon in point blank range of her head.
Sweeney knew at this moment that it was time for him to act.
He recognized murderous intent when he saw it, hell, he saw it in the mirror everyday and so Sweeney could see that Suit was really going to shoot Mrs. Lovett this time.
Although intervening before Mrs. Lovett was shot would complicate fighting and hopefully killing this robber, Sweeney had to give away his strategic and stealth position behind Suit in exchange for Mrs. Lovett's life.
Because Mrs. Lovett was a lot of things, but she was not useless.
At least not to Sweeney.
"Hey!" he yelled.
"What?" he exclaimed, surprised to see someone else on the roof sneak up on him. He whipped around, aiming his gun in Sweeney's direction, "Who are you and what are you doing up here?"
"It doesn't matter who I am." Sweeney stated, waving his razors, "But allow me to introduce you to my friends…"
Suit jumped back from Sweeney upon seeing the blades. He turned back to Mrs. Lovett.
"He was here the whole time, why you didn't tell me!" he griped, "He could have killed me."
"That is kind of the point…" Mrs. Lovett shrugged matter-of-factly.
"Well I've got a gun!" Suit declared, directing his gun at Sweeney, "Get any closer to me and I'll shoot you where you stand! I'll shoot you both!"
"Shoot me, then." Sweeney bluffed, "Go ahead and shoot me!"
"Fine!" Suit agreed, "I will."
He prepared to discharge his weapon, full distracted by Sweeney and leaving Mrs. Lovett unattended and to her own devices.
She released her hands from the flailing dress she had been working hard to hold down.
All the valuables Suit had stolen from the train's passengers and stored in the folds of the skirt went flying into the air, now stolen by the wind.
"No!" Suit cried, jumping towards and reaching out his hands to catch a golden watch dropping quickly from the nearby skies towards the gravel beside the moving train, "God dammit, no!"
He had dropped his gun and it skidded on the roof's metal before disappearing off the train.
Once all the coins, jewelry and expensive time-pieces had sailed away and hit the ground, Suit, almost in tears, turned to Mrs. Lovett.
"You bitch! All that money…gone!" he sobbed, "How could you do this?...I'll kill you! I'm going to kill you!"
He raised an arm and hand in her direction.
And then realized it was missing a very important component.
His gun.
"Lost something?" Mrs. Lovett feigned.
Suit snarled and lunged at her but she simply stepped out of the way, causing Suit to lose his balance and land flat on his face against the train's roof.
"He's all yours, love." Mrs. Lovett told Sweeney.
Sweeney smirked and then promptly picked Suit up, slit his throat and threw him bleeding off of the train.
Salt water stung Anthony's nostrils and throat as he sank deeper and deeper into the sea after his great fall.
He opened his eyes.
Anthony could make out the blurry outlines of sharks circling around him.
….so this was how he was going to die…
In the middle of the ocean, eaten alive by sharks.
At least he didn't betray the Navy…
Just as Anthony closed his eyes and tried his best to make peace with this he felt something hoist him from the depths.
Air rushed into Anthony's lungs as he smacked against hard, splintery wood.
He opened his eyes.
The masked pirates surrounded him.
"What—why?" Anthony sputtered, sitting up, sopping wet, "Why did you save me!"
The pirates voices rumbled laughter, their usual response.
Anthony gazed up at them, afraid and befuddled.
"You still haven't figured it out, have you, lad?" Swallow chuckled.
"Figured what out!" Anthony demanded.
"Told you he was a slow one, this cabin boy." The first mate snickered, elbowing his captain.
"I'm not a cabin boy!" Anthony exclaimed, his usual response.
"That's right, lad, you're not." Swallow nodded, "You're an officer in the Queen's Royal Navy. And you've passed the test."
"…the test?" Anthony repeated, furrowing his brow.
"Masks off, men!" Swallow ordered.
The pirates removed their masks…
….to reveal the crew of the Navy ship Anthony had joined.
Mack Swallow was really the captain the whole time!
Anthony's jaw dropped.
"What? How?" he stammered, "I thought the pirates had killed you all!"
"We took care of those damn pirates a long time ago, cabin boy." The pilot of the Navy ship explained, "But you hid below deck the entire fight and fell asleep!"
"I didn't hide! I didn't sleep!" Anthony countered, "I got knocked out! By a cannon!"
"Well that doesn't explain what you were doing running down there in the first place…" the pilot reminded, raising an eyebrow.
"Don't give the lad a hard time now, then." The captain told the pilot, "He's been through enough today, he has, what with this little…'test'"
"Yes, sir…" the pilot grumbled, shoving his hands in his pocket.
The captain then turned back to Anthony.
"After we defeated the pirates and took them into custody in the brig…" he began, "We were coming back up and saw you sleeping—"
"—Knocked out!" Anthony interrupted, and then quickly added, "Sir! Knocked out, sir!"
"Knocked out." The captain corrected, rolling his eyes, "We decided to play a little prank on you. Just a test to see where your true loyalties lied, lad. So we all dressed up like pirates and put on these masks and took you over to the pirate ship we had commandeered."
"So it was all of you that had me locked down there!" Anthony realized, "That made me walk the plank!"
"We didn't make you do anything, cabin boy." The pilot snapped, "It was your choice!"
"And you chose right, lad, you chose right." The captain declared, "You chose to jump to your death, rather than betray the Navy you made a commitment to, boy. You passed the test!"
"Yeah…!" Anthony smiled, "Yeah, I guess I did, didn't I!"
"You're a true Navy-man now." The captain congratulated, reaching down a hand to Anthony.
Anthony took it and the captain helped him to stand and then they shook.
Anthony never mentioned how he had lost his balance on the plank.
The conductor was busy handcuffing a sneezing Uniform, brought to him by a proud Toby and one really quite adorable white kitten when he happened to look briefly out the window.
To his shock and disgust, he witnessed a man dressed in a suit fall from the roof of the train, drenched in blood that was spurting from under the head dangling from his neck.
As he fell past, some of the crimson liquid sprayed onto the window, causing the train-car passengers to gasp.
And then the falling man hit the ground and was gone, left behind by a train moving a hundred miles an hour.
Uniform began to sob.
"That was my brother….my brother…." He sniffed, attempting to keep the mucus already gathered by his cat allergy in his nostrils.
Everyone in the car ignored him, still staring at the red-washed window.
Their eyes were only torn away when they heard something rattle above them.
Watching the ceiling, the conductor, Toby, Ruby, Uniform and everybody else saw Mr. Todd descend from the train-car's sunroof, land on the floor and then catching Mrs. Lovett when she jumped down through the square opening.
She tried to stay in his arms as long as she possibly could, but Mr. Todd, of course, quickly threw Mrs. Lovett off of him.
And then they noticed everyone staring at them.
"…What?" Mr. Todd finally growled, just to break the silence.
"A man just fell from the roof. His throat was cut." The conductor stated.
"My brother….my brother…." Uniform continued to cry quietly.
"It was the robber!" Mrs. Lovett explained, "He held us all hostages! He forced me on to the roof and tried to shoot me! Mr. Todd was only—"
"Shut up." Mr. Todd interrupted, giving her a warning glare.
"Did you kill that man, Mr. Todd?" the conductor asked suspiciously, walking from where he had hand-cuffed Uniform and over to whom he was addressing.
Mr. Todd didn't answer; instead glancing at the doors at both ends of the train-car and trying to decide which one would be easiest to run to.
The one behind him, definitely the one behind him…
"Did you kill him?" The conductor repeated still moving towards Mr. Todd who was preparing to make a run for it.
There was no way Mr. Todd would be able to slash his way out of this situation.
"He was only trying to save me! He had to do it! He had to!" Mrs. Lovett shrilled, jumping between Mr. Todd and the conductor, "He saved my life! He saved us all!"
"So you're saying Mr. Todd did kill that man!" The conductor processed.
"I…well I…um…" Mrs. Lovett struggled for an answer, knowing she had revealed too much and wondering if that meant she should just go ahead and spill it all.
"He did, didn't he?" the conductor decided and then looked back to Mr. Todd, "You did, didn't you?"
"…yes." He stated, sighing, "Yes I did."
"Well why didn't you just say so, then?" the conductor exclaimed, grinning and hurrying over to pat Mr. Todd heartily on the back, "You stopped a notorious robber who would have stolen and killed had you not killed him! You've saved all England a lot of trouble, you have!"
"Oh." Mr. Todd accepted, dumbstruck.
All the passengers in the car erupted into roaring applause, crowding around Mr. Todd to thank and congratulate him.
And then he knew what was coming.
He braced himself just in time as the conductor smiled and said, "You're a hero, Mr. Todd…"
Another Story Arc complete! Next we get to see what happens on the vacation! And by we, I really mean we because as of yet I haven't decided...lol