thatrainbowcity | Midnight Express

Midnight Express

[Noon.

With all the suddenness of a tunnel, noon sweeps over the train.

Suddenly, somewhere in the carriages, cries and shouts of surprise.

The lights flicker, sputter, gutter, go out completely, dim to malevolent glowworms, or burst in showers of glass. The walls sway, heave, flex, bend, press in close, and breathe. The floor ripples, shivers, twitches, twists, curls on itself. The length of a carriage grows to tremendous proportions without moving at all: two inches seem to be two yards, and there's no way these things could be stretch inside without being stretched outside, but they aren't, and that's impossible (isn't it?). Doors slam open, slam shut, refuse to open, refuse to shut, or pull against the one with a hand on the latch. Water in a glass ripples in time to a rhythm that does not match the rhythm of the train on its tracks. A seat in a compartment swings wildly, tossing its occupant out. Ceilings lower. Heat burns in places that should be cold, cold filters in where it should be warm. Ice forms on windows, or condensation forms on glass. Voices call from too far away or too nearby, or perhaps from nowhere at all. Darkness rises up out of the corners, like fog or miasma or dark and oily water.

And the view from the windows changes: gone are the visions of apocalypse and destruction, of fire and ice, of rain and suffering, of worlds broken in two. But is the view of nothing in this moment any better? The blackness outside the windows is deep as as the sleep beyond dreams, the sleep riddled with nightmares. But, gently, darkness breaking on darkness, there are ripples in the deep.

There are ripples in the dark.

It lasts only moments, no matter how long it seems. And then things are calm again. Doors open, lights turn on or are swiftly replaced, the scenes of chaos return to the windows.

But there's more to this, sadly.

A young woman has died during the chaos and darkness.

She's young, very young, fair-haired, and pretty. She's dressed all in pink, despite the lateness of the season. Or, well, she was quite pretty--perhaps she is, even with death's pallor on her face. How did she die, though?

She has broken her neck. And one needs no doctor or police officer to see this, as twisted as her head is against her body. She has broken her neck, somehow.

Beside her is a bouquet of flowers--roses--already withered far beyond their pink blush. Now they look more like a bundle of brown paper, twisted up to look like roses, and just as dry as any yellowed page. What woman would buy a bouquet of withered flowers? They must have been fresh when she got on the train, certainly--?

And now she's as dead as her flowers.

But how?

Did she trip? Not with her neck at such an angle--though perhaps it's possible. It would have to have been such a fall. There are no steps here for her to fall down, but the way she's lying would make it seem so. Are there bruises at her neck? No, she hasn't been stabbed. Perhaps there are bruises. Shouldn't someone close her eyes, given the way she's staring, almost as though she saw someone she recognized? Or maybe she's just staring in surprised. Was this just an accident? That pandemonium, that chaos that just went on, it would have been enough to unsettle anyone, to make anyone trip.

But something isn't at all right in this. How did she die?

By accident? By another's hand?

Someone should see to her body...]

[ooc: Welcome to one strange ride... The events in this post took place today, Friday, at 12pm, noon. Set to work! There's been a murder! It's high time someone should investigate! The young woman in this scene is an NPC and obviously can't say anything, but investigative questions asked here could be answered, if the detail is not made clear in the above...narrative. Things like body temperature, whether rigor has set in, &c--things that could be observed, but which may not have been written above. Anyone is welcome to find the body, of course. If no one does, another NPC will, and word can travel fast around the train about this ordeal. Good luck, happy hunting~]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[After the initial panic caused by the power outage, word that someone--someone else in addition to the little girl--has died spreads like wildfire. Justin makes his way to the car rumored to contain the body quickly, hoping to inspect the scene before it can be tampered with.

Justin doesn't need to look twice to affirm the cause of death, but he kneels next to the corpse, moves the girl's light hair aside, and gingerly touches her neck. He knows there won't be a pulse. He's more concerned with little things--surface body temperature, bruising, a bluish tint to her face, burst blood vessels in her dead eyes, traces of blood. There's nothing in the immediate vicinity that would have caused such a death; perhaps she was dead before she was placed here. He takes one of her hands, tests the rigidity of her digits. Approximate time of death, cause...

An accident? A murder? Justin can't imagine an accident on a train that would lead to a broken neck. Two deaths in less than one day can’t be accidental.]

[She isn't rigid as yet--rigor hasn't set in nor resolved. She's cooling, but not cold. She's newly dead, and her eyes are still wide open. And her neck is certainly twisted.]

[She died on the train, then. There hasn't been enough time since the last stop for someone to board with a body this fresh. It would have taken a good deal of strength to twist her neck to its current angle... not impossible, given the makeup of the City's citizens.

Justin reaches over to close the dead girl's eyes. He won't straighten her neck, even though that seems like the right thing to do. Maybe someone else will be able to do more with the information the corpse provides.

He gets up and leaves. There's no point in staying, and Justin can't help but feel a desire to get away as soon as possible. Maybe two deaths are making him paranoid. Maybe there's something more to it.

Someone else can solve that mystery.]

[The somewhat annoying part of this whole ordeal is that Rudy has gotten himself caught up in this train mess entirely by--well, not accident, because that would imply that Rudy makes mistakes, which he does not. But by miscalculation, perhaps, or sheer force of chance. After several hours of self-imposed exile following Mike's departure, he was merely on his way home to see to his dog, and possibly to retrieve some cash and have a shower before making his way out again.

And so, of course, he'd done what any sensible person would do, and hopped on the subway to catch a ride back to his building. Only this time, he's been informed that the train isn't stopping, and he will not be permitted to get off.

Marvellous.

And now, it seems, there are murders, which he discovers also by miscalculation, as he is currently wandering the cars to survey his surroundings. Which is how he stumbles across the scene of this crime--and Justin Pendleton, kneeling at the victim's side, poking at the corpse.

His distaste, as he stands in the doorway observing this, is palpable.]

[Rudy is, of course, the first person Justin wanted to see when he went to leave. Only not. If he looks vaguely guilty, it's only because he's been caught with a body outside of the safety of the forensics lab. And without his police badge. The badge always gives him a certain sense of authority.]

What?

[Alas, Rudy is no forensic scientist, but he does read lots of mystery novels and happens to be entirely too nosy for his own good. The sight of a dead body--a real dead body, of a real girl, who was alive not long ago and now is actually, truly dead--is rattling him considerably more than his expressionless face indicates, but not enough that he is about to let this moment pass without further investigation. He keeps his distance from the body, which makes it that much easier to distance himself from it mentally as well, but he does survey it with a critical eye, looking for clues.

He notes the roses, Justin's hands, the twist of her neck. And then, at last, his dark eyes find Justin's own.]

She's dead?

No.

[This is said flatly, but the sarcasm is certainly implied.]

She couldn't have died more than ten minutes ago.

[He looks back at the corpse, hoping there's something obvious that he missed. Justin is more disturbed by the fact that two people have died on this train in less than a day than the body. Bodies are fine; it's the people who leave the bodies that one needs to worry about.]

[He lets the sarcasm go past without comment, still examining the scene.]

How much did you touch?

Her eyelids... her throat. Her hand.

[And now he would really like to get out of this particular car. Can't Rudy feel how wrong this is? Two murders, six hours, one train, unreliable lights, apocalyptic views... this is more than a horror movie featuring an ax murderer. Justin moves to pass Rudy.]

I've worked in forensics, Miller. I know what I'm doing.

It matters what was tampered with and what remains intact.

[Rudy, for his part, is doing his best not to think about all the ramifications of this. As long as he can remain distanced from the reality, he can handle this. It's no different than a Holmes mystery. And as long as he keeps telling himself that, he's not going to let it rattle him. It's just a living Holmes mystery, that's all.]

How certain are you that cause of death is-- [A slight pause; it seems he's not quite as good at being clinical about this as Holmes is, after all.] --a broken neck?

Why?

[He looks from the body to Rudy and back again.]

I'm certain. There aren't any flesh wounds, signs that she might have been strangled... nothing that indicates anything other than a broken neck. There's some minor subconjunctival hemorrhaging, but that's not inconsistent with her injury.

Because the flowers are dead, and so is the girl.

[He stares at it intently, still trying to make sense of it.]

And a broken neck is a very obvious cause of death. Perhaps too obvious.

Would it be beyond the City to stage this?

[Justin gestures towards the corpse.]

If you would like to conduct your own investigation, be my guest.

[His lips purse, very slightly. He has no desire to go poking at dead people, thank you, Justin.]

I am merely saying, do not rule out ulterior modes of death merely because one appears obvious.

Occasionally, the cause of death appears obvious because it is.

Did you hear about the first death?

This is the first I have been witness to. I was unaware that there were others.

I didn't see the first... just the aftermath.

[Justin would like to leave now, Rudy. Move or be pushed.]

[Rummy's reaction to the power outtage was more "what the fuck?" than anything else. Then he hears about the dead body. Now that he's gotta see.

Gin makes his way to the car where the body is suppossed to be. Yep, there she is. The sight of her doesn't faze him in the least. When he sees the shape of the body he thinks "bitch just fell and snapped her neck", but something just doesn't add up. He can't explain why, though. He once killed a man through neck-snapping, for one, so he can tell the difference between an accident and when it's done on purpose, and the angle is telling him that this wasn't an accident. The flowers are certainly a bizarre touch, what with them being dead.

There's also the fact that a fugitive of justice is on the loose in his fucking train. And if there's one thing Rummy's good for other than being a criminal mastermind, it's catching fugitives of justice.]

Hanna knew that once the power went out, something was wrong...he just didn't know what. It could've just been an ordinary power outage...but combine that with the sheer wrongness of the train, and he has this terrible feeling it's more than that.

The word about the dead girl spreads quickly, and Hanna rushes over to the car as fast as he can. Somebody killed during the power outage...the bizzare feeling that the train wants them all off...this is not normal. This is Hanna's specialty.

He bites his lip as he arrives and looks at the body, before getting out a pad of paper and his marker, taking notes on the body. Broken neck. Traces of blood, staring eyes...nothing for her to fall over...

The flowers are notable, being long dead. Why would somebody carry dead flowers around...? Maybe they died with her...

This isn't the first death. He heard about the other, but couldn't get there in time...but whoever is doing this, they're gonna pay.

Edited 2010-11-20 03:42 (UTC)

[ Alan's first reaction on arrival is to hope that it didn't hurt. Death is lessened in the City, but pain is the same old terror.

Clumsily, he kneels by the body--doesn't touch it, doesn't move it. Instead, he measures things by finger-lengths, handspans and memory. He needs to remember these things--this is the second death. One is a murder, but twice is a pattern--and with people turning up inside the train, it might have more to do with the city than it had at first appeared. There must be a pattern.

This would be easier with a lookout. Still, Alan makes do. He's pale, but his hands don't shake, and keeping track is as easy on his own as it's ever been. And eventually, he'll go out of the compartment to find the first person near it. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Midnight Express

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[action]

[Action]

no subject