Tuesday, July 18th, 1876

The morning starts ominously well.  No one oversleeps.  The posse make it to Union Station with plenty of time to spare.  The bulk of the posse that was formed the previous evening show up.  The Union Army sends a small detachment with a cannon and supplies.  Everyone loads up on a decoy train to Sterling.  The cannon is hidden in a box car.  The posse hide their weapons out of sight and do their best to look like passengers.

Kansas takes up a position in the tinder car hoping that the thick steel sides will help protect him.  Reg takes up a position in the passenger car with the hired gunslingers.  Lizzy settles down in the box car with the cannon and crew.  Shima climbs into the watch copula at the top of the caboose.

It's early afternoon when the tank shows up to harass the train.  The tank fires rounds from it's gattlin gun at the engine.  The engineer slows the train to a halt while cowering in the compartment.  Thirty armed bandits ride up on horseback and start to circle the train.  Lizzy watches as the cannon crew line up the cannon on the tank and open the side door.  The shot of the cannon starts the firefight.  The cannonball bounces off the shell of the tank leaving a big dent in the armor.

Kansas starts sniping the bandits with his six shooters from the cover of the tinder car.  Lizzy pulls out her shotgun and takes careful aim at one of the bandits. As she pulls the trigger, one of the soldiers working on the cannon steps into her sights and takes the full brunt of Lizzy's shotgun.  The cannon crew quickly jump Lizzy and knock her out.  Shima steps out of the caboose and attempts to shoot a bandit with his bow and arrow.  The bandits find this funny and start shooting at Shima with their guns.  Shima ducks back into the caboose.  The gunfighters in the passenger car open fire on the bandits, decimating their numbers.  Reg slips out of the passenger car and starts towards the box car, shooting at bandits on the way. 

The tank, realizing where the danger to the bandits is coming from, turns it's gattlin' gun the passenger car of the train.  The soldiers work quickly to ready another round for the cannon.  A group of bandits surround the caboose and set fire to it, waiting for Shima to come rushing out.  Shima does, in the form of a spectacular dive from the front of the caboose and underneath the flatbed car that the caboose was attached to.  The bandits come near the flatbed loaded with logs.  Shima releases the chains holding the logs on the car and watches as the logs crush several bandits.

As the tank unleashes hundreds of rounds into the passenger car, one of the army sharpshooters in the boxcar takes a shot at the tank, nicking the front wheel.  The tank turns towards the box car as the cannon crew finish loading the cannon.  The sharpshooter rolls forward out of the car and lands on the ground as the tank unleashes a torrent of flying lead into the boxcar.  No one inside survives the barrage.  A few tense seconds pass and then the cannon fires.  The cannonball slams into the tank rocking it back up onto it's rear wheels.  The cannon comes slamming down and the nicked front wheel collapses spilling the tank onto it's front.  A rush of steam leaks out the view ports on the tank.

Shima rolls out from under the flatcar and turns to find a five bandit firing line sitting atop their horses.  Calling upon the sprits he knows Shima turns towards the bandits, draws his sword and charges at them yelling at the top of his lungs.  Reg manages to take out one of the bandits.  In the carnage that follows, Shima uses his sword to dispose of the remaining bandits.  The bullets that the bandits shot at Shima seemed to bounce right off of him.

Kansas, with a little help from the army sharpshooter manage to mop up the remaining bandits.  The panicked engineer rushes over to Kansas.  He explains that the army cannon team brought a lot of gunpowder onto the box car.  It the fire reached the boxcar the explosion would destroy the train and everyone on board.  Kansas races towards the back of the train.  The fire has spread onto the flatcar from the caboose and it's moving towards the boxcar.  Kansas wrestles with the coupling for the two cars and manages to unlock them.  He waives to the engineer who pulls the train forward.  The posse watch as the two train cars burn themselves down to the wheels.

Kansas cautiously approaches the tank.  He fires a few warning rounds through the view ports on the tank.  There is no response from the tank.  Kansas works on the hatch for a few minutes and manages to wrestle the hatch open.  A gruesome sight greets the marshal.  When the second cannon hit the tank, the impact damaged the ghost rock boiler.  When the tank crashed down the boiler cracked and the steam and hot water cooked the tank crew. 

Lizzy is revived.  Shima spends some time collecting the weapons from the fallen bandits.  The posse spend the rest of  the afternoon working on the tank to re-mount the wheel.  The posse attach it to the back of the train and roll into Sterling after dark.  The station crew find a place for the survivors to rest for the night.

[Monday, July 17th, 1876] [Wednesday, July 19th, 1876]

Northern Colorado Posse

Note to players:  These summaries are the product of my notes that are taken during the game and what I can remember.  They are fare from perfect.  If you note any discrepancies or if I have missed something, please send me a telegram and I will correct the error.  Thanks!