We docked at a port and were now on a train ride, moving towards our next mission destination. I had managed to get my panic under control. But it was a rough thing.

“Knock, knock,” Mousethief said with his trademark grin as he entered our private room on the train. We were all sharing it together, but Mousethief was off and about. Doing whatever he was doing. He entered our cabin and sat down. He was my friend and I trusted he was doing things for my benefit.

He hadn’t given me any weird looks or hinted that he thought something was off. All I could do was just keep going along with things.

“What are we looking at exactly?” I asked Mousethief. We had started traveling towards our next mission, but the information had been limited. He had been working on getting more before we arrived, beyond mysterious deaths.

My father looked at Mousethief as he hopped into his chair and pulled a lever, raising it. “A munitions factory has lost four creatures working there in mysterious circumstances. It is probably Apostates. Possibly a High Apostate. Since the creatures were never recovered. And the Nine Tail Syndicate was not involved.”

“How critical were they?” my father asked.

“Mid level employees. But they had technical knowledge. The snakes are looking to counter our technical knowledge. It could be the Great Lizard Empire as well,” Mousethief explained. I noted the snow outside the train window.

“Father, will Apostates be impacted by the cold?” I asked just to be sure.

“No. Just the snakes themselves and not their Ancestral Spirit.”

“All four creatures disappeared, and there is no trace. I won’t know anymore until we arrive,” Mousethief explained. I considered things carefully.

“What do you think Mittens?” my father asked me. I knew he was using this as a training exercise. I wouldn’t complain about stretching my brain muscles, instead of my physical muscles.

“If there are Apostates, they will be well hidden. They clearly aren’t starting up a cult in the area. It will be much harder to locate them, since they are gathering information.” I wanted to say we split up so I could find them and kill them, but that would defeat the purpose of sending out Assassins together now.

“We can’t split up to gather information. That is too risky if there is a High Apostate. We both need to confront them together to ensure we kill them,” I said, and my father nodded at that. “That means they have a base somewhere in the city. We need to find it somehow. Can the Nine Tail Syndicate help?” I asked Mousethief.

“Possibly, but unlikely. If they knew about any Apostates they would have reported them right away to the Covenant Church. They might be in the shadows but they know the snakes are worse than the Covenant Church. The devil you know and all that,” Mousethief said, and I nodded at that.

“We can only observe the factory and look for clues. Mousethief will follow up locally, while Missy looks into the records of the creatures that disappeared and the police reports. Maybe there is some connection. My father and I will cover the factory and be ready to act, while scoping out the area for any clues,” I said. I looked at my father who nodded.

“A solid plan, any objections?” he asked, and the other two creatures shook their heads.

“There is one more thing,” I said, and they all looked at me. “Mousethief I want you to get a vehicle ready for pursuit once we arrive. The Apostates are not escaping again, no matter what.”

“Will do. Mousethief will be ready, don’t worry about it,” he replied.

“And if one of us is poisoned?” my father asked me.

“Then we deal with that when it comes up. But I have been preparing myself in case they use poison again. I will be careful. You know how well I can fight. Unless you are worried about yourself old cat?” I asked my father. He let out a mock gasp and put his paws over his heart.

“Old, me? You tease too much Mittens. On a serious note. If a High Apostate is there, delay Mittens. You are good, but if we are going to kill one then we need to work together.” I nodded at this.

“I will be careful. But you know how fights are,” I said, and my father nodded at this. The train suddenly shook and my danger sense spiked. I quickly stood up, and looked around.

“What is it Mittens?” my father asked while looking around as well.

“Something is wrong.” I sniffed the air. There was poison in the air! My paw quickly darted out as my claws extended. It slammed into the window of the compartment. It shattered apart. The wind whipped into the compartment. “Poison in the air!”

My father quickly spun to the door. I glanced at Mousethief who had retreated to a corner while looking around worriedly. Missy was looking around a bit confused. The train shook again.

“We are speeding up, we need to stop the train,” Mousethief quickly said. I considered going out the window onto the roof, but it would be icy and the wind would make it hard to advance. “At most we have ten minutes, before there is a sharp turn in the track at the Frost Cliffs.” I stretched out my neck.

“Watch my back,” I told my father and he nodded at me. “You two follow us, hold your breath, let’s go,” I said. I slammed open the compartment door and quickly raced out into the hallway. A cloaked figure was at the far end of the carriage, an Apostate.

They were clearly getting bold to attack like this on a train. I rushed forward in the narrow corridor. The Apostate exhaled and a cloud of poison rushed out. I rushed into it. My body subconsciously adjusting to fight back the poison. I leaped to the side, the claws on my hindpaws extending and gripping the wooden wall of the rooms.

A knives passed under me. I twisted and spun in the air, dropping down on the Apostate. My claws slashed out around the rat’s neck. Blood went everywhere and they collapsed to the floor of the train carriage.

I turned and opened the door to the outside of the train. Air rushed in and pushed the poison away quickly. I noted Mousethief had opened the door at the other end of the train carriage. My father quickly came up to me.

“Mittens-“

“No time. I am fine. I have some tricks of my own father. Let’s go.” I wanted to call on Mes, but didn’t dare to since the stone was back in the ship cabin. And the other mice on the ship might be snooping around. If it started glowing, there would be problems.

Also, I could handle some minor Apostates myself. I turned and rushed into the next carriage with my father. There was no poison in the air. A mole was walking in the corridor. “Move!” I shouted at him and he quickly slammed himself up against the train wall. We rushed past him.

It was clear that the Apostate had been meant to slow us down and delay us from the train speeding up. How had they found us? Then it hit me. Mousethief had probably leaked the information. The more I killed, the more EXP he got. Of course he wanted the Apostates to come and attack us.

It would speed things up considerably for whatever plan he had. It didn’t escape my notice that he had arrived right before the poison had been set off. Possibly getting everything into place, and playing all sides. We had been on the train for three stops and two hours, but only after he came back did the attack happen.

Missing during the attack would draw attention. Since I would ask him to slow down the train. So, of course my friend Mousethief would be around. Also, Mes had mentioned that being close helped give more EXP. They had been talking in terms of ranged weapons.

But what better way to get EXP, than have me fight and Mousethief would hang in the back. There were too many coincidences that made it more and more obvious. I just needed to connect all the dots to understand what was happening, even if there was nothing, I could do about it.

I had no doubt that even if this train crashed in a massive explosion off a cliff, Mousethief would survive. He was Mousethief after all. Rushing through various carriages, we came to the coal carriage. We would have to go over to get to the front of the train and the engine.

Climbing on top of the piles of coal, the smoke from the exhaust irritated my nose as the wind rushed by. The cold air and occasional snowflake rushed by me. “I suppose Shatterbite is dead?” It was another Apostate standing at the far end of the coal carriage.

“The rat, then yes. And now-“

“Ah, not so hasty. There is a bomb behind me. One pull on this cord in my paw and it goes off,” the Apostate said.

“And the train is increasing in speed and will crash regardless. What is your plan out of this?” I asked. The fox grinned at me as their robe flapped about in the wind.

“Goal? High Apostate Bastet will reward me handsomely with your deaths,” the fox said as my father came next to me. The fox pulled the cord. He leapt off the side of the train into a snowbank.

There was no explosion. I quickly advanced to the engine. There were two dead shrews. Knife wounds. There was a block of explosives on the floor of the engine. The string had come out of it, but it hadn’t gone off. I sniffed it and carefully inspected it.

It appeared to be dud. My danger sense wasn’t triggering from it. “It appears that the Apostate was poorly trained,” I said with a shake of my head.

“A shame they escaped,” my father said while looking off the side of the train. Jumping off was tempting, but the Apostate wasn’t worth the risk. In this cold and so far away from any settlement, they would be lucky not to freeze to death.

Mousethief came climbing over the coal along with Missy. “Allow me?” he asked and I stepped aside. He reached forward and began adjusting some levers. The train began to slow to more reasonable speeds. “Slowing things down,” he muttered and shook his head.

“How did they know we were coming on this train? You arranged our itinerary Mousethief. Who else would know?” I asked him. It was a reasonable question and I was curious how he would react.

“Ah, it is probably my fault. To get information, I had to make a lot of inquiries over telegraph. The communications were probably intercepted,” Mousethief replied.

“That makes sense,” my father said. I nodded as well even if I didn’t believe it. That was a lie. Mousethief had arranged this ambush to get EXP and to generate conflict. At least he needed me alive to get EXP. That was the biggest comfort of all my realizations.

Killing me would be counterproductive unless I directly caused him trouble or put him in a tough spot. I would keep playing along. Mousethief wasn’t manipulating me for some reason. I was missing large pieces of the puzzle.

“What about the bomb?” Missy asked.

“Oh, I will find a use for this,” Mousethief turned and picked it up. “Don’t worry about it, Mousethief will handle it no problem.”

***-***

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