The Clutch (A bar for airship pirates, ragamuffins and other law breakers)

[The Corsair]

I guess that's fair enough
"talk then. What's your master plan?"

[CorneliaCarton]

She closed the door with a slam and turned to Douglas.
"I thought I made it very clear that my days of Piracy were over. I keep my title because I have no choice. I don't know what you want, Douglas" She said, not looking at him.

[The Corsair]

"if you want no part in abigail's plans then I can replace you there. I also have plans of my own that I require some aid for. I need to know abigail's intentions first."

[Ruix]

Abigail looks at the door with the feeling the focus is on her.
...I just need a ship ... so I can leave. I'm not exactly welcome here.

I was hoping for a bit of adventure, initially. And thats why I came for Cornelia. But as things have come up, my focus mainly is to be back on my way. I am however open to Douglas' plan. That is of course if there's anything in it for me.

[The Corsair]

"even trade. I help you, you help me."
hopefully she won't ask for a cut of any spoils...

[MWBailey]

"If you want to carry the investigation further, Detective Norris, you'll have do it all yourself," Watch-captain Fledermaus said severely. "I have too many people in the field already, with too few good results, to throw more after some flying nightmare with a lightning gun." Fledermaus' voice became condescendingly critical, with an edage of gr4andiosely-overacted patience, as if explaining a point that had been explained too may times already. "Captain Bailey might be a good prize for our tanty, but he and those piratical girls are too much trouble to throw a squad of men at for the sake of a constable's hunch -- And that Dr. Foo or Woo or whatever's been seen in the vicinity as well; he's embarrassed us too many times to be running after him with somebody else's rumor tripping us up."

"But if you manage to catch Bailey and the rest, it'l be a feather in your cap as well as theat of teh Watch -- and maybe then we can afford enough men ta go after Dr. Woo-Foo."

"It's Fu Manchu, sir --"

"WHAT?!"

"I said, it's 'Dr. Fu Manchu,' sir, he's a titled gentleman for all he's a conniving oriental."

"WHATEVER! Now get out of my office and do something besides warm a stool in the squadroom, or I'll take yer badge!

"I was just leaving, sir."

And so it was, that Detective Corporal Egbert Norris found himself outside of Number Twenty-Seven Chandlery Row: Spivey's Airship Chandlery, like it said on the card he had found in the gutter at the scene of the firefight the night before...

[Dr. Fu Manchu]

 A lovely young Chinese women enters The Clutch and swiftly moves beside Dr. Fu Manchu and whispers into his ear. The doctor sets aside his tea and addresses his men.

“Our airship is ready to depart, gather the others and “our cargo” we reave immediately.”

The doctor and his thugee quickly gather themselves and depart the bar. Not before Dr. Fu Manchu leaves a most generous tip.

Never let it be said that Dr. Fu Manchu is a bad tipper.

[Ruix]

Abigail pondered restlessly, as if the departure of Dr. Fu Manchu was an opportunity leaving the door. She hadn't a clue if he and his crew did have anything to do with the plans of Douglas, or if they would be a spontaneously incorporation, but she stood up and made for the back room where Douglas and Cornelia were talking. She ripped open the door, trying to be quick with her words before the last of Dr. Fu Manchu's men were outside the bar. "If we leave now, the night-watch will associate us with Manchu there and thus leave us be; or it'll at least buy us some time." She paused, realizing, if she went with Douglas, the heat she would be leaving on The Clutch and Cornelia.

Abigail looked at Cornelia, "You're sure? You want nothing to do with this? in the case it involves piracy..."

[The Corsair]

"I see no problem with leaving." he announced as he stood and made for the door
looks like I owe Manchu another favour

[MWBailey]

"An' what, exactly, are we a-doin' in the Darks at this hour o' the mornin'?" constable Merckl asked lance-corporal Hamish.

"A favor fer a favor." the tawny-haired lance constable said, as she took off her shako and tousled her shoulder-length reddish-blond hair, scratching her itching scalp in the process. The Watch uniforms were a stopgap, taken from the regular military uniforms of the realm and colored dark teal with buff trim, of heavy wool, and everything, including the low-crown shakos, were hot in warm weather, even in the wintertime.

"Yeah, I be itchin too, in 'iss 'eat," Merckl said. "So what's the favor we's doin fer 'oom, an' wha's' it sposed ter be?"

 "I toldja! We watch the front o' the clutch, an' tells Norry -- er, Detective-corporal Norris -- what 'appens, 'an who goes in're comes out --!" She cuts off as the Chinese crowd start poking their heads out of the door of the pub, and taking up stations around it as if setting up to protect an important personage. "Look sharp!" Lance-Corporal Hamish hissed sharply but softly to her partner, "Doc Fu's lackeys're settin' up ter escort 'im out, looks like..."

"I 'ope this be worth standin' off-station, we're s'posed ter be watchin' th'  swinemarket over in Doyle Park--!"

"I said quiet, you!" Hamish hissed again as Fu Manchu and his party, including a white man and woman, came out and moved off down the street toward The Docks.

The two constables never noticed that the Church of St. Finian's had grown yet another winged gargoyle, nor that it was dressed in modern clothing and had the pinkish pallor of life, or that it (he?) stared down at them with an impatient gaze... and then flapped across the street to the roof of the building that housed The Clutch, as a steam omnibus passed in front of their position, distracting them from noticing much of anything else in its steaming, smoking, coal-stinking wake...

[The Corsair]

just a few more metres and we can move behind cover of shops...
Shouldn't the nightwatch be posted in other places
he nervously adjusted the top hat he had nimbly plucked off the hat rack in the clutch
"Theyre expecting something to go down, how do you feel about dissappointing them? Oh by the way, you'll find people know me as The Corsair..." he softly asked Abigail beside him

[CorneliaCarton]

Cornelia followed, but not before she stopped to lock the door of her Pub and put up the sign that read "closed".
She was about to turn around when an arm slid around hers. A cry of surprise left her lips, before it was promtly cut off my a hand clamping over her mouth.

[The Corsair]

The nightwatch meandered their way back to their proper posts
he turned a sharp left and moved briskly to his vessel before stopping so abruptly Abigail near bowled him over
something is really not right here
"as a pirate you've learned to trust your hunches right?"
"yes..." was abigail's cautious reply
"my gut's telling me the clutch is the place to be right now... And by that I don't mean I'm hungry..."
he patted down his coat and kissed his cuff
"I'll get that iron multi-barrell for you," he said softly to his wrist, "just one more time..."

[CorneliaCarton]

Cornelia struggled, but stilled when she felt the barrel of a gun press against the side of her head.
'Bugger' she hissed in her mind. She had to get out of this somehow, but she couldn't see how. Any help was well out of earshot.

[Dr. Fu Manchu]

As Fu  Manchu arrived at the mooring mast of the airship Dawning Sun, six more of his men were arriving from the other direction pushing a long hand cart holding a coffin on it.
Even as the two parties converged at the ramps leading into the Dawning Suns cargo bay the airships engines begin to power up. Fu Manchu’s men quickly pulled the coffin off the cart and carried it up into the belly of the airship.
A rather small elderly Irishmen in a longshoreman’s uniform called out from the cargo ramp informing the doctor that all his cargo has been loaded and the ship was, making ready.
Fu Manchu turned to his men and barked a quick order in Cantonese and his men scrambled up the ramp. Then addressing the Europeans for the first time since they started following him from the bar.

“This ship is bound for Hong Kong, I don’t know what trouble your in but I may have use for you should you wish to reave this prace.
You would be wise to accept my offer, some one with a rather ingenuous set of griding wings seems to have been forrowing you since we reft that miserable rittle bar. Should you decide to accompany me however be advised that I am the Master this ship. Decide quickly, we go now!

Dr. fu Manchu boarded the Dawning Sun with out a backwards glance. He was as yet unaware that just two mooring masts down from The Dawning Sun three Air Marshals
Aboard another airship had the Doctors movements under surveillance and that when the Dawning Sun slipped her mooring she would be followed to Hong Kong. Or the the ends of the earth if necessary.

{ inside the coffin a bound and gagged Sir Denis Nayland Smith desperately tried to clear his head from the foul drug he had been given over and over again since his capture. Even in the coffin Nayland was able to detect the sound of the airships engines. If the ship got over open water Fu Manchu would only have to drop the coffin into the sea. Weighted as it was Nayland would sink to his death in seconds! Nayland Smith cursed the day he first encountered Dr. Fu Manchu.}

[MWBailey]

Teh fickleness of Dame Fate was legendary, and justifiably,  it turned out. Bailey grunted silently; so, Dr. Fu thought that he followed the two young whites from The Clutch! And his prosthetic monstrosities were gliding wings?! HA!

I can outfly any ship he flies in, Bailey thought to himself, The only reason I need an Airship is for a place to perch for the night and a way to carry cargo... So the coffin's aboard his ship, is it?

Bailey flew over to the edge of teh dock where the yellow fog oif morning was thickest, below the dock, and back up again, landed on the bit of dock up against the old Melliflora's warehouse, and strode ove rto the two men standing watch at teh Air Rangers' masts. BOO! he shouted, and then said as the two nearly jumped out of their skins, "Briggers, Ginger, you two ought to be skint alive!

"Lor' Bless me, Cap'n Bailey, " Ginger replied, crossly, "If'n you wasn't an op-arr-ate-iv I'd-a shot you!

"Same for me," Briggers said, "'an I'm thinkin' I might just do it anyways! Whats the word on that coffin ye mentioned a while back?"

"It's there, they just loaded it aboard his ship, and there go her engines --" A multiple sputter and roar sounded somewhere very close by, just then, "and best you two get aboard you4 own ships, there go your engines too."

"Wha' about you?"

"I've got some business back at The Clutch to be takin' care of. You lads just be sure you get that coffin if they drop it, see, its cargo 's a mite precious, more so'n any of us 'll ken, I'll wager..."

[The Corsair]

"you lead." whispered Abigail
he closed his eyes and exhaled...
His mind went on autopilot
duck
swing
punch
fire
duck
reload
punch
fire
roll
we're being watched he thought as he spotted the sane survelliance airship that had tailed him a few years back
"sorry about the thugs doctor." he announced matter-of-factly while dropping a large bag of coins in Manchu's hand
Abigail was already runiing fir the cover of the clutch
"stop!"he called out
dammit! They won't be that sloppy, we'll both get caught if we split up.
as he thought it, he saw Abigail dissappear into the shadows and heard a scream that was promptly cut off

he ran to the edge of the shadows that had engulfed Abigail not ten seconds before and loaded his wrist gun.
"better safe than sorry" he inaudibly muttered as he loaded the gun on his other wrist followed by the high-powered single shot concealed guns that nestled themselves on the opposite side of the four-shots on his wrists
he crept through the shadows, aware of the certain danger lurking somewhere in it's depths...

[CorneliaCarton]

Cornelia stilled, her eyes closing. She had to get out of this, or she would die.
'Think, Cornelia. Think!' She snarled at herself. How what she going to get out of this? Too much was happening too fast. If she made the wrong move, she was dead.
'If I could just reach my dagger without alerting him....' She thought, slowly moving her leg up as to not alert her attacker.

[MWBailey]

Some of the advantages of thick, soft-rubber-soled shoes and wings that were as effective as anything on a bird, but made of brass and steel, was that (1) they were waterproof or as close as made no difference, (2)when made amd operated properly, the wings operated as silently as any birds did except when flapping or when gliding at high speed, and (3) they made great auxiliary weapons, especially when part of the leading edges were sharpened properly.

Thus, when the Bravo who held Cornelia called for his comrade, back in the shade of the overhanging ornamental brick of the Clutch's building, to come and give him a hand, it was a relatively simple matter for Bailey to glide in silently, clout the comrade on the temple with a blunted portion of a wing pull his Mauser, and press it painfully up against the temple of the man holding Cornelia, just as he raised his own pistol to pistolwhip her for trying something.

"Now, Now, Blackjack," Bailey said. "Ye're supposed tae use yer namesake fer that. Now, look, yer gun's up in th' air, and ye have no threat tae use against me or the lady. let 'er go, an' maybe I'll be nice an' let ye get away unscathed."

He clouted teh fellow as teh gun dropped to the ground.

"Or...not."

[CorneliaCarton]

Cornelia broke free and withdrew her cutlass, holding it out, eyes wide with fear.
"The next man who grabs me will find his head rolling" She said, deadly serious.
She was going to decapitate the next man who touched her with the intent to harm her.

[The Corsair]

there
he fired the quad-barrelled gun on his left wrist first, right wrist second
two bodies fell to the ground with bullet holes peppering their skulls.
they must be new recruits. The nightwatch is never that easy. They almost brought on my funeral last time...

[MWBailey]

"Easy, there, Cap'n Carton," Bailey said, holstering his Mauser and then keeping his hands in full view and away from his weapons as he pulled his wings in and straightened, for all teh world as if he were now a perfectly ordinary human -- albeit with two rather odd-looking sleeves on the back of his greatcoat. a couple of gears in the port-side -er, left-hand side wing chimed softly as they slid home and shrank, speaking of hard use and a possible need for mending at some future point.

"I may be somethin' of a freak, cap'n, but I'm not a threat to you, an' if we move along right sharp to wherever ye be goin', these three on the ground'll not be a threat either... He held out his hand, and said, "Name's MW Bailey, Cap'n Bailey, late of the departed vacuum lift ship Faterider, an' now 'in th' market' for a ship, as it were." HE gestured to teh still-soundly-comatose men at their feet, and said, "Shall we go? I'd prefer not to be here when they wake up, an' I hear Corp'ral Norris is gonna be snoopin' 'round in a bit." he cocked his head when gunshots sounded from teh Airship docks. "An' it sounds like some o' our acquaintances might be needin' assistance."

[Dr. Fu Manchu]

The confusion on the dock was all the warning Dr. Fu Manchu needed. He gave the order to depart just as the Europeans ran off into the maze of streets surrounding the airpark. The doctor had planed a last little chat with his old enemy, but after being cheated of his vengeance so many times by Smiths blind luck he was not about to risk him escaping once again.

As the airship flew out over the sea leaving the city miles behind, Fu Manchu had the lid of the coffin opened one last time. The doctor looked down at the struggling form of Nayland Smith.

“So it ends as it had to end from the start.
Yes, I will miss you, you were a worthy adversary.
At rast Fu Manchu will have his vengeance! Well worth the wait to be sure.
You once called me a serpent in human form, well you shall not rack for my company. You will spend your rasts moments with one of my pets, the dreaded black mamba!”

One of Fu Manchu’s henchmen gingerly places a open bag in the coffin with Nayland. The snake slithered out of the sack and into the coffin.

“I reave you to two deaths, the venom of the Mamba will kill you or the sea will. I shall enjoy the next hour or so as I think of you.
Good by.”

The lid to the coffin was nailed shut then chained and locked shut as well. The Dawning Sun was by now several miles out to sea so the doctor judged it a good moment. The cargo bay was still open so Fu Manchu could see every moment of his great triumph.

Was it the wind? Or was that the sound of a mans scream of pain as fangs sank into flesh? The thought of the agony Nayland Smith would be suffering made the normally well composed doctor giggle.

” No antidote for my pets kiss Nayland You are riving dead even now!“

“It is time Push him out!” the doctor ordered.
 Fu Manchu watched the coffin fall, he saw it hit the water then sink beneath the waves. The venom of the black mamba could kill in less then twenty minuets. The coffin is filling with water even now. Smiling Dr. Fu Manchu wondered what death would take him first.

Then well satisfied Fu Manchu called out to his men
“ Send word to the bridge, I wish to be in Hong Kong as quickly as possible.”


Inside the coffin both man and serpent were dead

[MWBailey]

The Air Ranger airship Achilles sent a man down into the water with a net, an air bladder, and a short length of rope. He caught up with the coffin while it was still sinking, the wood of the box keeping it at least bouyant enough to float, albeit several feet below the surface. It took the fellow the contents of the bladder, plus three surfacings, to secure the net and tie it off such that the lowered hook could be attached, Then he rode the coffin back up to the airship, and the lid was ripped off, only to find Smith dead, with a dead snake coiled up on his left shoulder.

"Black Mamba!  Even if we had the Antivenin, he'd still be dead as a stone by now!"  Teh ship's doctor exclaimed.

"well, there's nothing for it; we must follow him and dog his steps wherever he goes, now. Vengeace for Doctor Smith!" And it became a battle cry for the Crews of the two airships...

[The Corsair]

Meanwhile, still engulfed in shadows, The Corsair fought his way on
They're scattered, that's the only reason I'm getting through
He heard the whisper of Manchu's distant engines, knowing that he'd want more than gold for the death of the two thugs he'd had to nail to create the confusion that got him past the nightwatch out at the docks

Several reloads later he heard the unmistakable sound of mechanical wings. It was faint, they must've been a good pair, ceratinly not factory-made gliding attachments...
Bailey
He spun and fired...