Weird Revisited: The Black Train is Coming

This is a Weird Adventures related post from 2011. I don't think it made it into the book. I re-read the Manly Wade Wellman story that inspired it yesterday, so it brought it to mind...

“A black train runs some nights at midnight, they say..”

-- Manly Wade Wellman, “The Little Black Train”

Hobo-goblins, human tramps and bindlestiffs, and other Brethren of the Road, tell stories in their camps of a preternatural train that runs from this world to planes beyond. This lore is seldom shared with those outside their communities, but folklore records regular folk having chance encounters with the phantom.

The appearance of the train changes with time. It always appears old, like it has a decade or two of service behind it behind it, but otherwise stays current with locomotive technology and styles. It's not marked in any way, and has been described by observers in paradoxical ways. It’s plain and nondescript, yet powerfully commands intention. Some feel an intense unreality upon seeing it, others the cold hand of fear.

The train starts on mundane tracks, but as soon as it's "out of sight" of its observers it begins to shift into other realms. Some dreamers have seen it crossing the lunar wastes from the vantage of the parapets of the Dream Lord's castle. It is known to make stops in depots in the Hells. Planar travelers have attested to seeing rails that fade into nothingness at the mouth of the gyre at the bottom of reality.

Mostly, it seems carry certain dead to the afterlife, though why it comes for some and not others is unknown. Hell Syndicate snitches know of it, but not who operates it. Angels likewise keep a serene silence. Most who ride the train are dropped off in the waystation realm of the dead, from there to travel on to their souls' final destination.  Some, however, are taken directly to the outer planes. Others seem to ride the train for longer periods of time. They're found snoozing in couch cars, or drinking and playing cards in the dining car. Waiting, perhaps, for something. They’re sometimes inclined to conversation, though they seldom have anything useful to say.

Adventurers have sometimes used the train as a quick ride, either to the Other Side, or the Outer Planes. Hobo-goblin glyphs sometimes point the way to likely places were the train may appear. The train’s gray, nondescript, and seldom seen staff do not object to taking on new passengers, so long as they pay the fare--which varies, but is always in silver.

There's always the option, for those with fare or without, of hopping one of the train’s empty freight cars, but riding an open car through other planes is a dangerous proposition, and the boxcars are only empty of freight--not necessarily other travelers.

3 Pitches, 4 Colors 3: Agents of A.X.E.

This is the third in a series of posts with brief campaign pitches for superhero games. This one is written by Jason Sholtis of  The Dungeon Dozen:

(based on a rejected proposal found in a briefcase left on the subway by Steve Ditko
in 1968...)

Dateline 1999: Thirty years after the total victory of the hippie counterculture,
a unilaterally disarmed America watches helplessly as nation after nation falls before an unstoppable blitzkrieg of super soldiers, futuristic war machines and weapons from newly independent Transylvania.

Shocking the world in a live press conference, President Tom Hayden unveils the existence of the Agents of A.X.E., secret defenders of America. These highly trained super-operatives, each a paragon of American virtue, are entrusted with the use of super-devices derived from the technology of an alien civilization (details still classified) such as the Gauntlets of Potential, the Girdle of Density, and the Eye of Mastery.  

Moments later, the secret headquarters of the National Institute of Xenostudies beneath
Mt. Shasta falls to a sudden strike by Transylvanian stormtroopers, the scientists and leaders
who created A.X.E. all either dead or missing. If only the Agents had been there to help instead of
a Washington dog and pony show! How can you Agents ever forgive yourselves?

There is only one way: Defend America from the Transylvanian menace until they have to peel the Girdle of Density from your cold, dead midsection.

Style/influence: In a nutshell, THUNDER Agents vs. MARS Patrol written by Pat Mills in the 80's as reactionary silver age satire but drawn by Wally Wood and Steve Ditko in their prime, so it looks cool. Old school in tone, emphasizing all-out super-hero war on beach head America, so there will be black humor, super mayhem, and super death. But fear not, when Captain Density perishes, sidekick girl is there to pick up the girdle.

3 Pitches, 4 Colors 2: Days of Dr. Nightmare

This is the second in a series of posts with brief campaign pitches for superhero games. This one is written by Michael "Aos" Gibbons of  The Metal Earth and Cosmic Tales:

The world lies at the feet of Dr. Nightmare and has for these 30 years. The lands he rules strain under the burden of his mad and sadistic ambition; those he does not struggle in vain to remain free, or exist now only as mutant infested wastelands, scorched by Zero-Bombs and stinking with the taint of gene-gas.

But the weed of hope grows in the garden of despair. A few individuals, scattered across the globe, locked in disparate lives, have begun to experience lucid waking-dreams of another, better world, where they were heroes. All of them know, even if they refuse to face it, that something has gone wrong with time, and only they can fix it- and at the cost of everything they know.

They are the Awakened, and Dr. Nightmare can taste their dreams.

Inspirations: Days of Future Past, Age Of Apocalyse, Uncanny X-Men in general. 

At Midnight, All the Agents

Today I'm proud to feature a guest post: Jack of Tales of the Grotesque and Dungeonesque explores an unchronicled aspect of the City... 

“Desperation is the raw material of drastic change. Only those who can leave behind everything they have ever believed in can hope to escape.”

– William S. Burroughs

The vampiric blood-addicts are a known menace on the streets of the City; however, out of the all-too-common tragedy of need has come an ever darker threat to the City's denizens. Agents from Ealderde, the Old World, appear to be tracking the movements and aptitudes of blood-junkies; those that show “promise” are introduced to a mysterious injectable referred to as Malthus serum.

Malthus serum doesn't cure a vampire, but it makes blood addiction manageable; it allows the vampire to function in society and even alleviates the physical and psychological symptoms of withdrawal—at least temporarily.

More importantly, from the point of view of the Ealderdish agents who lurk in the shadows, Malthus serum treats the tell-tale signs that indicate a vampire's foul addiction; vampires who have been administered a steady dosage of the serum develop neither the usual bodily sores, nor do they lose hair or muscle mass, nor are they jaundiced of tooth, claw, and eye. In fact, on a Malthus regimen a vampire will face none of the physical drawbacks common to their condition, but retain all of the powers and abilities granted by their addiction.

Of course, the agents don't provide Malthus serum out of the goodness of their hearts. Rather, they administer the supplemental drug in order to hook the vampire on the “high” of exercising their powers without the gnawing pull of crippling addiction.

Nothing comes for free in the City. Once a vampire has proven themselves useful to an agent, the agent will begin requiring them to perform acts of spying, sabotage, and even assassination in return for the next serum injection. The agent becomes the vampire's handler, dispensing both drugs and secret missions that fulfill strange agendas to the of benefit distant financiers in the Old World. The vampire, for his or her part, becomes a nosferagent in thrall to unknown invisible hands that order machinations from afar.

Forgotten Fantasy: Along Came A Spider...

Today, Jim of the Flashback Universe, a friend of mine and player of Brother Gannon in my current game, steps up to offer a defense of a book from an era in fantasy literature I usually dismiss...

Back in February, when Trey posted his nice Forgotten Heroes of Sword and Sorcery, I somehow reimagined the singular article as a new series of posts and quickly promised to contribute something the series.

Trey was quick to bring to my attention that the article was not a new series, but was simply a standalone post. Still, that didn't keep him from accepting my offer to contribute to this site. So, I present today a sequel to a post that didn't really need one: an examination of another Forgotten Hero of Sword and Sorcery – Dar elLan Martak, the champion of Robert E. Vardeman's Cenotaph Road series.

March 2010 marks the 27th anniversary of Robert E. Vardeman’s Cenotaph Road – not necessarily the type of anniversary one makes note of typically. You can either call me early to the 30th anniversary or late to the 25th, but be that as it may, the first book in the series was originally published in March 1983, so there you go.

Prior to the Cenotaph Road, Vardeman’s main claim to fame was that he was co-author on the War of Powers series with Victor Milan. While I can’t really tell you how will War of Powers series sold,  it seems it’s modest success during what many consider a lean time in the Fantasy genre, coupled with a resurgence of interest in the genre was a enough to convince publisher Ace to green light a series of books on which Vardeman would be the sole author.  In total the Cenotaph Road series runs over five novel , and Vardeman used the series to revisit two characters he had first presented in a short story called "The Mating Web" in the Offutt-edited Swords Against Darkness III back in 1978. These characters were the previously mentioned Dar, a sort of reckless ranger type of character and a huge 12-foot spider named Krek.

While this pairing of adventurer and giant spider had been seen before in the pages of Piers Anthony’s Castle Roogna, Vardeman’s original short story presenting the idea predates Castle Roogna by a good five years. Interestingly enough, the hero in Castle Roogna is named Dor. Make of that what you will.

"The Mating Web" was not the only story Vardeman reused in the making of the first Cenotaph Road novel, as chapters one and two were appropriated from a short story called "The Road to Living Death" that appeared in Shadows Of in 1982. As one might suspect, the weaving together of old short stories into the larger framework of a novel was not entirely successful, with the first two chapters introducing characters and information that seem unnecessary at best and incongruous at worst.

At its best, the book had the light breezy feel of an author exploring concepts he had long thought about over years of crafting short stories. Once one gets past the haphazard first two chapters wherein the hero's paramour and sister are raped and killed in different circumstances, the story slowly starts to find its true tone, which is a sort of cross between the Robert Asprin Myth Adventures series and the Dragon Knight novels of Gordon Dickson, with maybe a little of the driving pace one might see in the works of Jack L. Chalker. The primary plot of the first books is a bit simplistic, but it belies a more intricate and insidious subplot that will unfold over the course of the series.


Why has this series never been republished?  I don't think we have to look any further than the inscrutable character of Dar. While the story is told from his point of view, I’ll be damned if you ever really get to know the character. Mostly that’s because he seems to sort of just act as a plot device to move you from one scene to another rather than be a fully fleshed out character.

Early on we are told he is good natured and the local sheriff views Dar like his own son. Yet in the same chapter, it is suggested Dar is not only no stranger to violence but that he has no trouble killing his opponents. I guess the sheriff could come from a really bloodthirsty family, but the two descriptions still seem a little at odds to me.

We are also told Dar possesses unparalleled woodsman skills honed from years of experience in the woods, but within the same chapter we are told Dar was able to decipher ancient runes on crypt which have escaped interpretation by scholars for ages.  Again, this seems like an unlikely pairing of character traits.

Possibly his worst sin is that Dar is just sort of boring. Despite him being the hero of the novel, you hardly care when at the end of chapter one he has been framed for murder.

I’ll be honest, if it weren’t for the promise of a giant spider that appeared on the cover, I doubt my 20 year-old self would have ever finished the series.

Fortunately, if you hang tough for another chapter, you will be rewarded when Dar resigns himself to a life traveling to distant worlds via the dimensional gateways that mystically appear at unmarked gravesites, from which series takes its name. For it is on the Cenotaph Road that Dar meets the real star of the series, Krek, the giant spider from the Egrii Mountains.

The character of Krek is just flat out awesome. Too chicken to stay and provide a meal for his mate, the monsterously huge Klawn, Krek has fled his beloved mountain home in search of adventure but throughout the series, he suffers from a bouts of guilt for having betrayed his arachnidian nature. Of all the characters in the first book, Krek feels like the best fleshed out. He is a nice combination of whiny Doctor Zachary Smith from Lost in Space and appalled Spock from Star Trek. His constant indignation at the fraility of humans and their inability to comprehend spider cultural bugaboo are the best thing in the book. He also makes for an interesting action character as all of the best battle scenes center around Krek.

On the flip side, there are times when seems like Vardeman doesn’t quite understand the enormity of Krek as a character, and because of this, some of the humor bits fall a bit flat. In one scene where in Dar is lamenting his inability to penetrate a huge fortress, he fumes when Krek finally reminds him that as a spider, he can easily scale the castle walls. Ha ha! Of course! How could he forget!

Taken as a stand alone story, the first book ends well enough, with some nice plot twists and character moments. If Vardeman’s weakness was cardboard characterizations, his strength was his well thought out plot, sense of humor and innovative ideas. As the series progresses, with the exception of some rather awkward sexual situations in the third book, it builds nicely on the character of Dar and his relationship with Krek. That the series has never been republished in some collected edition is a crime.

For while I can’t really blame you for never having heard of Dar elLan Martak, that you have never enjoyed the witticisms of Krek is a shame.

Turns out Vardeman's second Cenotaph Road novel was titled The Sorcerer's Skull!  Small world.