#mrs.g

Leia woke with a start. She had cried herself asleep and now felt overwhelming sick. Barely making it over to a corner, she puked up all the food she had stolen. It didn’t smell great but at least she felt better afterward. Rubbing her mouth with the back of her sleeve, she trudged back over to the center of the room where Miss. Lambkins laid.

Plopping down next to the stuffed lamb, Leia tried to remember what she was suppose to do next. She vaguely remembered something about a red button.

“Smthn... Smthn... red button… ‘ast resorrrrt…. Boom?” Leia muttered to herself.

She took off her hat and nibbled the brim. The ‘boom’ part sounded like fun but she wasn’t too sure about the rest of the words. They had sounded important.

Loud scratches from the door made Leia jump. Mrs. G must have come back.

Panicking, Leia looked over at the various consoles. Various buttons, switches and levers stretched over the wall length consoles. Several large screens hung from the ceiling, wires twisting down to the consoles below like vines.

Leia perked up. This looked promising! With Miss. Lambkins in her beak, she climbed up on the tall counter. Struggling a bit to find her balance, Leia looked at all the colorful buttons and tempting switches.There was only one huge problem.

“...so meny red buttons,” Leia whimpered. Most of the buttons she could see were red or various shades of red. There were a few light blue and dark teal buttons and one or two white buttons. She could avoid most of the red ones till she found the one her dad meant.

Still, it was a problem she noticed more and more. Birds would point at a color and call it orange or yellow but the colors they pointed to just looked like shades of red. Even Mista Grooves would call her dad an “yellow migraine” but that didn't make sense either, unless yellow was just another word for pink. She was still a little fuzzy on the concept of words and their associations to real world objects but that didn't sound quite right. It was annoying but she wouldn’t let her distract her from figuring this out.

Stuffing Miss. Lambkins down the front of her jacket, Leia dramatically stomped down on a light teal button. Various other buttons blinked on and off, the screens buzzed slightly before blinking on; displaying the room outside and several corridors of the train and several shrill beeping noises started to echo throughout the train.

Wincing, Leia scanned the screens for signs of Mrs. G. Nothing in front of the panic room doors except a small pile of… bags? Small boxes?? Leia squinted and moved closer to the screen. She couldn’t really make out what it was. Ignoring it for now, she scanned the other screens.

There was movement! The door to the engine room slid open and Mrs. G trudged out, dragging a bag behind her. There must have been something heavy in the bag, as the goose stopped every thirty seconds to catch her breath. When she got to the edge of the platform, she carefully grabbed the neck of the bag in her beak and flapped her wings hard. She struggled to get airborne and very slowly rose to the safe room platform. Dropping the bag carefully, she collapsed on the floor, exhausted.

Leia watched the wheezing form of Mrs. G for a few minutes, waiting for her to do something dangerous. The shrill alarm was still ringing out loud and clear.

On the screen, Mrs. G struggled to her feet and waddled over to the bag. Opening it with her bill, she stuck her head inside and pulled out a welding torch, which was still attached to its gas canister. She dragged it over to the pile next to the door.

“Wat?” Leia mumbled.

Mrs. G went back to the bag, rooted around and pulled out some small sticks, a stone and a tiny bag. She ripped a small hole in the bag and dumped a trail of black powder leading to the pile of stuff at the door. She threw the tiny bag on the pile as well. With that, she flew off camera.

Twenty seconds later one of the sticks flew into frame. It sparkled brightly for ten seconds, showering the ground with sparks. None of the sparks landed near the black powdered trail. There was a pause when the last of the sparks died down. A second stick of what Leia was pretty sure were firecrackers flew into frame.

Leia’s young, pyromaniac brain put two and two together to make an explosion of understanding. She looked around at all the different buttons and levers desperately. Surely there was one that could stop the goose from blowing up the door. Like a cage button or a weapon button. Or a laser beam! That’d be cool! Desperately, Leia started dancing across the different shades of teal and pink. Various buzzing noises and clanking noises erupted around her but nothing physical showed up on any of the screens.

Another bright fountain of sparks illuminated a screen. This time, it didn't die out. The sparks landed on the trail of black powder and a new spark was born. This fresh spark raced along the black track right towards the pile of various explosives.

Leia torn her eyes away from the screen and bolted across the console to the far side of the room. Wedging herself between the edge of the console and the wall, she hugged Miss. Lambkins and braced herself for the explosion.

The piercing alarm broke the tense silence in painful intervals.

FWREEEEEEEE

Leia’s heartbeat filled her ears.

FWREEEEEEEEE

Maybe there wasn't enough tae set off the boom? Leia thought hopefully.

FWREEEEEEEE

It should have gone off by now…

FWREEEEEEEE

Dare Ah check?

FWREEEE-

The world filled with violent sound. The force of it shook everything; several screws unscrewed themselves and dropped to the floor, metal panels rattled, glass shattered and several monitors were blown off the wall. Sparks showered down from the broken monitors.

Leia covered her head with her arms as a shower of dust and other debris rained down on her. Her eyes squeezed shut, she waited for the shaking to stop.  

The rumbling silence of the train filled the room punctuated with the occasional clang as a piece of scrap fell to the ground.

Leia risked peeking out from her hiding spot. The doors were still standing but the wall around them and a large portion of the ceiling and floor were gone. She could see the sky passing above and parts of the cafeteria down below. No sign of Mrs. G.

Cautiously, Leia stepped out from behind her hiding spot. Stepping carefully around the pieces of glass and fallen, sparking cables, Leia made her way to the edge of the floor and looked down.

Large pieces of metal and floor had fallen to the floor below, blocking the entrance to the control room. It was a little too far to jump down safely. Not that there was much reason to do so.

Across the gap, the wall of screens had crashed to the ground, covering the floor with a carpet of glass, tubes and wire. Sparks occasionally sprung up from the mess. The other rooms looked relatively untouched but to get there required trekking across a huge mess of shrapnel and wires. If she could fly, getting there would be a different story.

The only other option was to try and leave via the roof. Leia stared up at a passing cloud.

“...No. Maybe red button time,” she muttered to herself. It definitely couldn’t hurt matters.

Leia made her way over to one of the less damaged control panels. Climbing up, she started pressing any button that looked remotely red.

Nothing. Not even a noise. No lights either.

Annoyed, she tried several other colors, stomping on every button as hard as she could.

Still nothing.

Leia ducked into the tall stacks of forgotten luggage that forever towered in the luggage room. Running down the rows and rows of suitcases, Leia looked for one she had marked before with a tiny smiley face with jagged teeth.

Finding it wedged at the very end under a collapsed tower of forgotten duffel bags and travel packs, Leia struggled to pull it out from under the mess. With a final yank, she fell backward with the small, cheap suitcase in her arms.

She stood up and dove behind one of the luggage towers just as the door to the luggage was thrown open. The sound of an angry goose echoed throughout the large room and the slow and deliberate footsteps that followed sent dread coursing through her veins.

Leia winced as the footsteps headed in her direction. Holding the small suitcase handle in her beak, she climbed up the tower of suitcases and snuck quietly along the roofs of towers. She stopped whenever Mrs. G stopped and moved when she could hear movement again. If she was careful, she could make it to the second door. From there, well, she’d have to see.

Her hope was to make it to the panic room her dad had set up for her in the creepy screen room. The small room was right above the massive wall of screens and could be double locked from the inside. She hadn’t understood all of what the Conductor had told her about the room, but she had understood the main part: if she was in danger and he wasn’t around, grab the key and go directly to the room. If it was life threatening, press the red button. She probably shouldn’t have left the key in her little suitcase in retrospect.

Hugging the suitcase, she snuck to the door and waited till she heard movement to open it.

There was a rustle of wings unfolding and the sound of wings pumping hard to get airborne.

“Peck,” Leia pipped quietly and reached to opened the door. No use in keeping quiet now. She caught the sight of Mrs. G landing on the catwalk at the far end of the room out of the corner of her eyes. The goose didn’t look happy and charged at full speed.

Leia’s instinct ridden brain screamed to run through the door, her body second the motion while something deep down in her bones told her to jump below. It overrode everything else and her legs moved of their own accord. She jumped to the floor below just as Mrs. G, unable to stop, crashed hard into the solid metal door.

Leia rolled just as she hit the ground and looked up to see a very stunned Mrs. G trying to figure out what had happened. Not waiting for the goose to find her bearings, Leia sprinted out the door and jumped over to the platform that held the door that lead to the screen room.

She wondered if her da would be mad about the big dent in the door; it was a passing thought to keep the terror at bay. She knew he’d be mad at the whole ordeal. And she held onto that. That he was ok and at the end of this would go on a massive yelling tirade that would shake mountains, cause landslides and generally cause all around chaos. No one would be spared from his sharp tongue and sharper beak. And all the while, he’d be holding her cause she’d be latched on to him like a barnacle to a rock.

Leia rushed over the darken room lit only by the static from the many stacked screens. The buzz and hum from the screens mixed with the other clanks and hisses from the train all somehow echoed much more than they ought to in the dark room. Her footsteps were drowned out by the echoes.

Running over to a small hidden panel, Leia punched in a pattern and the small elevator platform next to it shuttered to life. Hopping on, she rose up just as Mrs. G staggered through the door below. Leia willed the elevator to move faster.

As the elevator climbed higher, the goose’s head turned sharply towards the movement. The unfurling of wings took a fraction of a second and the goose was airborne and headed right at where Leia would be in a few seconds.

The goose was fast, and Leia had to admit Mrs. G was faster than she was, but Leia hadn’t run into a door after having her air squeezed out of her by an angry toddler.

Leia wided her stance and swung her tiny suitcase around as hard as she could just as the goose came within range, letting go at the last possible moment.

It was not a well made suitcase. Since Leia had a tendency for destruction, the Conductor had made the wise decision to get her one that could be easily replaced when she eventually wrecked it. As such, it was made up thick cardboard rather than wood and was already falling apart in several areas from the number of times Leia had left something soggy in it or had spilled a drink on its cover. The fake wood texture was peeling and some spots were green with mold. Coupled with the amount of junk Leia had stuffed in it, one good hit would be all it took to break the little thing open like a piñata.

So when the tiny suitcase collided with Mrs.G’s head and she smacked it away angrily with a hard peck from her bill, it exploded and random bits of paper, glitter, crayons, snack wrappers and various shiny odds and ends filled the air like confetti. Two items dropped from the bag like stones: the key and Miss Lambkins.

Grabbing both as she darted around the goose who was choking on bits of paper and blinded by the shower of glitter, Leia jumped off the platform and shot towards the heavy doors. She jammed the key in the lock and twisted it. The door shuttered and opened quickly as the lock fell away.

Running inside, Leia slammed both hands on the two emergency lock buttons on the inside of the doors.

A heavy bullet proof glass panel shot up just as Mrs.G tried charging at Leia again. She bounced off with a heavy thud.

Leia stood and faced the goose behind the glass as the second emergency door started to rise. She made eye contact with Mrs. G and stuck her tongue out while making a gesture she had seen her dad make before.

The doors closed with a heavy thud as the goose opened her bill to hiss silently at the gloating Leia.

Leia stood, shaking, holding the much loved lamb plush against her chest for all the comfort it gave her for a full five minutes. She could hear Mrs. G trying to force the door open but knew it was a lost cause. Eventually, the thuds stopped and there was silence.

Falling to her knees, she started to sob.

“D-Da,” she sobbed through the thick tears as she squeezed the toy. “Ddaa, ‘ere ‘re ye? Ah wanna go ‘ome! Daaaa!”

“What a weird train, I was just saying to Mrs. G! It is very differently on inside than it looks from outside. If you were to tell me that this train had second floor with several rooms branching out every which way and I had been only on outside, I would call you crazy!” The peacock laughed. “What a wonderous way of travel!”

Leia just nodded her head as she lead them to the control room, the only room she really knew of that she was allowed in that had a phone. She couldn't quite make out whether the peacock was impressed or annoyed with the train. She had never really thought of the train’s layout as anything weird; it was just the train.

Mrs. G honked and grunted a few times.

“Ah, you're right, Mrs. G! We should ask the Engineer how it all works when he arrives! Or maybe even the conductor bird could be bribed into spilling some peas!” The peacock excitedly replied.

“Ghnonk!” Mrs. G honked and pecked his sleeve.

“No, I am pretty sure it is peas, Mrs. G,” the peacock said confidently.

Leia just stared at the two of them in a mix of morbid fascination and fear as she worked the elevator to get them to the lower level of the train. Hopping off, she motioned to the front of the train. Chattering back and forth, the two larger birds followed the terrified Leia to the control room.

Hope Da is there, Leia thought, not being this scared since she had destroyed that horrible poster. Even though the peacock talked in a friendly way, the way he walked and acted was just as off putting as the entirety of Mrs. G: though Leia couldn’t really put it into words why she felt that way.

Leia sniffed. She wanted her dad; he’d protect her.

As they passed through the cafeteria, the peacock perked up.

“Ah! I know where we are now! So where is the phone?”

Leia pointed to the control room door.

“Perfect!” The peacock clapped his wings together. “Come along, Mrs. G!”

The peacock stepped around Leia and walked through the door. Mrs. G, however, pecked at Leia’s legs, herding her into the control room and preventing Leia from escaping.

Much to Leia’s dismay, when they entered the control room the Conductor was nowhere to be seen.

“Right, time to make my call. Do not worry little one, we will be done soon and you can go run off and be inhospitable elsewhere,” the peacock said with a smile.

He picked up the hanging handset, puting it to his ear before reaching to dial.

Chatter from the police station poured in from the receiver, a loud bird was yelling in the background about mobilizing a squad and various responses of ‘yes captain’ and ‘right away sir’ echoed hollowly.

The smile remained fixed on the peacock’s face but his expression darkened.

“Hmmm… How regrettable,” he muttered before hanging up the handset. “Mrs. G, grab the little one.”

Leia squeaked in terror and tried to run, only for Mrs. G’s wing to catch her hard on the back, slamming her into the wall. Stunned, Leia whimpered as Mrs. G grabbed the back of her collar and dragged her up.

“Sorry little one but we cannot afford to deal with police. We will need you as hostage and negotiation card. I would say we will try not to hurt you more than necessary but we are traveling with a none too stable cat that we have already had to stop from killing several times. We will try but no guarantees,” the peacock said nonchalantly.

There was a distance yell of pain. The peacock sighed.

Mrs.G: Conner what's 56-18?