"Why did you have to tell them our names?" Dillon asked me in an aggressively loud whisper.
Inside the room with Rolando were three boys. Emmanuel, Pierre, and Thierry.
I held my hands up "How was I supposed to know they'd be with the target?"
"You shouldn't have said it anyway!" Dillon growled.
I groaned in frustration because he was right, I'd messed up.
"Should we just leave?" Morgana asked.
"No, we can't. We'll just have to follow through." I responded. "My earlier point still stands anyway. They're not going to be able to find us. We're from the other side of town and we're not exactly famous."
"It's too big of a risk Brandon," she complained.
"We'll put masks on."
"They've seen our clothes, idiot." Dillon admonished, shooting me a scathing look.
I cursed and looked away. Obviously they'd seen our clothes. A mask wouldn't do much good if they recognised what we were wearing. We had a change of clothes in our bags but those were for our getaway.
"Let's just stick to the plan," I said, "It's too late to back away now. It's not as if Hugo couldn't describe us to them anyway."
"This is a mistake," Dillon said with resignation in his tone.
"Don't worry, just think about the money we're going to get. It'll make it all worth it"
I decided it was best to not let them think much more about what could go wrong. The longer we stood around deliberating, the more likely it would be that we would get caught, and as far as I was concerned, it was too late to turn back. So I forced the issue by bursting through the door.
Just like with Hugo, the occupants were too stunned to react. Capitalising on this, I rushed across the room and began laying into Thierry. I threw off a rapid combo and by the third punch, he went limp. A great result as far as I was concerned. Further reinforcing my view that these were spoiled rich kids. Not wasting a second, I jumped onto my next target; Pierre.
Finally awaking from his stupor, Emmanuel got involved and tackled me to the floor. He was a big guy and I was in an awkward position so he did manage to take me down. Though I don't think he realised what was going on because it seemed like he was just trying to restrain me rather than actually fight.
He was doing his best to pin my hands above my head but unluckily for him, I wasn't the run of the mill spoiled brat he usually fought. This wasn't a school duel, or whatever these kids did. This was real life and I wasn't scared to fight dirty. Using as much power as I could from my position on the ground, I headbutted him right in the face.
The shock of being hit in the nose made him let go of my hands. Using the opening, I leveraged myself on top and started pummeling him. I had to give him props, he was quick to get his guard up and actually managed to block a lot of my hits.
In the background I could hear Rolando asking what was going on and then some scuffling before his questions cut off. I assumed that was due to Dillon getting involved but I couldn't check because Pierre was trying to kick me off his cousin. He was unfortunately powerful so I had to stop my punches to raise my hands defensively. Not fancying my chances to take one fully into the hand, I pushed his foot in line with their journey, using his own momentum. As soon as it was past me, I wrapped my hand around his ankle.
Emmanuel thought that was his chance to get up and I felt his core tighten in preparation. Honestly, it was cute of him to think he had a chance.
I shut down any idea of escape by squeezing him with my thighs and then yanking the unbalanced Pierre down onto his cousin's head.
Pierre yelped and Emmanual let out an oof but neither were in a position to stop the blows I began raining down. More winces came out of Emmanual's mouth, made worse by Pierre kicking him a couple of times as he tried to wriggle free. Just as he was about to get up, I again pulled his leg so he collapsed. I then used him as leverage to push myself to my feet.
Ultimately the whole thing was too easy. I was tempted to let them get up so that we could make it a bit more exciting but alas, I had a job to do.
"Stay down and this will be over quickly," I told them.
Pierre let out what could only be described as a roar and tried to get up again but I put a stop to it with a swift kick to the ribs. He collapsed with a groan and I used the opportunity to look around.
Dillon had a wriggling Rolando basically pinned on the sofa, and Morgana was holding a lamp like a weapon as she stood in front of the door. Happy to see it all in hand, I turned back to the two I'd just beat up.
"Like I said, just stay down and it'll be over soon."
"All this because Thierry looked at your girl?" Came Emmanual's exasperated, slight muffled voice from under Pierre.
I was confused for a moment and was about to blurt out that Morgana wasn't my girl until I recognised the opportunity the situation presented. This was an easy way to disguise our targeted hit. I couldn't have planned it better if I tried! They might not even come looking for us if we could pass it off as a jealous lover getting emotional over a perceived slight.
"He should have kept his eyes to himself," I told them, trying to sound like a jealous lover.
"That creep was ogling me nonstop," Morgana spat, picking up on what I was going for.
Pierre let out a groan "Why can't he just keep his eyes to himself? He's always doing this."
"Listen, my cousin is an idiot but this is too far. You could have told us he was bothering you and we would have had a word with him. We didn't need the violence."
He tried to push Pierre off him but I used my foot to stop it happening.
"Oh so we should have let him creep on the next girl? Don't act like you weren't also looking at me," Morgana hissed. She actually sounded mad and if I hadn't seen her act a million times, I might have bought it as well.
"Yeah you pervert," I said punctuating the point with a kick.
"Get off me! This feud has nothing to do with me and if you don't unhand me-" Rolando demanded. I leaned over and punched him in the mouth before he could be finished with his threat. Like his cousin, the tears started flowing.
"No!" Emmanuel cried, pushing Pierre and getting to his feet in one smooth motion.
"I told you to stay down," I threw a half hearted punch but was shocked when instead of it landing, it was blocked. Instead I found myself stumbling back a step after his fist connected with my chin.
"You won't touch him again," Emmanuel growled, his voice hard as steel.
This didn't seem good. Fun sure but he seemed serious now and we had a job to finish. I reacted by throwing a quick combo of jabs trying to force an opening for a hook. I had to hand it to him, he was a lot better at boxing than he was grappling, dancing away from each of my blows. Gone was the look of confusion in his eyes, replaced by resolve to protect his charge. It was quite admirable actually. To make things worse, Pierre was equally incensed and had also managed to get to his feet.
"Ah well, at least I get a good fight."
Doing his best to take advantage of my look towards his cousin, Emmanuel went on the offence with a big hook. I managed to move my head in time but the blow still landed on my shoulder, pushing me so my back was against the wall.
Pierre rushed in, slamming a knee into my gut. He got that through my guard taking some of the wind out of me but I was able to block his follow up punch.
Morgana used that opportunity to smash the lamp into his head, dropping him to the floor in a heap, knocked out. That drove Emmanuel into a rage and he started attacking me with everything he had.
I blocked and dodged as much as I could but he was honestly better than me standing up. It was a bit of a blow to my ego and I resolved to do my boxing with the training dummies when we got home.
I went defensive, doing my best to weather the flurry of punches. After taking more blows than I was happy with, I finally saw an opening when he wound up for a big swing. He'd done it a couple of times already so I knew he would be top heavy for a brief moment. Seizing my chance, I put everything I had into a kick to his knee. It was part of a routine I'd run a few times in training and I was glad to see it work here as well. He went down like a sack of bricks, his head bouncing off the sofa. A shame these things were so soft otherwise he might be out as well.
I tried to get on top of him but he used his feet to keep me away, managing to roll out and back standing before I could get to him. He was a bit more cautious now, the kick causing his burning rage to become a simmer instead. He went to speak but I wasn't in the mood to let him.
There wasn't much room in the cabin with the six of us. Thierry was knocked out on one of the sofas, Pierre was out cold on the floor becoming an obstacle, Rolando and Dillon were still on the other sofa, almost looking like lovers, and Morgana was near the door. If it wasn't so cramped, I think this whole situation would have been a lot worse. It was quite fortunate for me they weren't ever able to properly gang up on me. This also meant that there wasn't much room for fancy footwork which I would bet Emmanuel excelled in. Seeing this, I closed the gap between us, tanking the heavy blows he sent my way.He hit hard and it was starting to take its toll on me but at the same time, he had nowhere to dodge.
I landed a big knee to his gut, forcing the air out of his lungs as keeled forward, wrapping his arms around my waist. It was clear he was mostly a boxer and this tactic might work in a boxing match but as it was, he'd given me access to his back and I wasn't going to pass that up.
Using my elbows, I slammed down onto his back with all the power I could muster. Each of my hits sapped the already waning strength from his body and he sort of fell down into me as he tried to drive me into the wall. Now I was completely in control and used the shifting position to wrench his arm into a hold.
"Aaah! Stop! Stop!" He shouted as I threatened to pull his arm out the socket.
I let up slightly but still kept the grip in case he was trying to trick me. "You gonna stop fighting?" I asked him, my breaths coming heavy.
"Yes, just stop. I don't know why you're taking this so far."
"Morgana, get some rope."
"Why do you need rope?!" He cried. I pulled his arm in response only letting up when he once again cried for me to stop.
Morgana produced some clothes we'd stolen from Hugo and I used them to tie Emmanuel up in a similar position so he wouldn't be an issue.
"That was harder than I thought. Dillon, I'll hold that one down if you can go through their things to get more rope. We don't want them waking up and deciding they need another whooping."
Rolando tried to get away as soon as Dillon let him go but I disabused any notion of escape by putting my knee on his chest and shaking my head. He whimpered and let out a sniffle which made me feel bad but the pain in my jaw from Emmanuel's punches prevented too much sympathy from taking hold.
Dillon threw me some clothes and I used them to tie Rolando up, trussing him up like his cousin. He tried to resist a little bit and I used it as an excuse to land a decently hard punch to his nose. It made a crunching noise and blood started flowing. He of course started crying and Emmanuel began thrashing about like a fish out of water.
I was glad he couldn't see the blood of his sworn lord because he was facing the other way. He'd probably try a lot harder if he saw the state of Rolando's face. I gave him a quick kick to remind him of his position and looked to see what Dillon had found.
"Jackpot," he mouthed, tilting an open bag towards me. Inside I could see a few coin purses, what looked like glasses, and a nice looking dagger. He hadn't been searching too long but we seemed to already hold a good score which was excellent because the fight had taken more time than I liked and I was starting to think of leaving.
I started patting Rolando down but didn't feel anything in his blazer, or his extremely tight trousers. What I did find was some sort of glowing medallion that hung from his neck. He was deeply distressed as I removed it but he was bound too tight to do anything. I looked at his hands again and noticed he didn't have any rings but Dillon caught my attention to show he'd already taken them.
"Right, I think they've got the message," I said loud enough for them all to hear. "When your cousin wakes up, you better tell him not to ogle any more girls. Otherwise he might not get off so lightly."
I put my foot on Emmanuel's back and let him feel my weight so that he accepted the threat. Satisfied, I motioned towards the door for Morgana and Dillon to leave. We were getting close to Sea Drop Gorge which meant we needed to be towards the back of the train sharpish. I gave one last look at the occupants of the cabin and then left.
"We're rich!" Dillon said as soon as I got outside. He and Morgana were both holding the massive bags Emmanuel and his cousins had been carrying.
I put my arm around his shoulder in a half hug. "I told you this would be worth it. Now, let's get out of here before someone comes knocking."
"Are we going to hit any more cabins?" Morgana asked.
" If we get to the back of the train in good time then I think we should," Dillon answered, surprising me. Clearly the amount they'd looted had overcome their fears of getting caught.
I smiled, "Let's get there quickly then."
We broke out in a fast walk out of the carriage. I peeked through the window of Hugo's cabin as we went by but he was still in the same position as when we'd left. I was tempted to sprint to the back of the train but I was worried someone would hear us and come to investigate. I could probably deal with anyone that did so but fighting Emannuel and his cousins had taken more of my energy than I would have liked.
We made it back through the carriage without causing a scene. I was tempted to stop at the beautiful woman's cabin as we went by but kept my wits. Yes, she probably had items worth a fortune given the power being funnelled into the chandelier. Yes, she was drop dead gorgeous. But we were on a schedule, I was a professional, and I trusted Dillon's reaction to the loot we currently had. If I gave in and started taking everything of value then we'd never make it out. This turned out to be one of my rare good decisions as in the entrance of the next carriage, the situation once again became problematic.