Codex Transportica

(aka “the Velocibleed”)

With an ironic tip of the spiked helmet to the old “penny farthing” bicycles of yore, the outlaw biker gang “Die Totungirrtotungen” (literally “kill madman, kill!”) harken back to days of a better class of criminal.

Scrupulously polite, well-educated, witty and utterly deadly, it was a matter of utmost honour to this gang to maximise robbery, violence and death whilst “keeping it classy”. Bank heists were often accompanied by a small chamber orchestra. Gang slayings took the form of a traditional pheasant shoot, with beaters flushing out rival gang members from hiding, where they would run across the path of the gang’s myriad projectile weapons. Tea would then be served.

Indeed, victims could expire happily, secure in the knowledge that this was the truly urbane death experience: from the tip of the pearl-handled AK-47’s spitting out bespoke hand-engraved “bullettes” all the way up to the highly-polished depleted uranium spike of the Pickelhauben.

Here, Fuhrertotungirrtotung Fred, the gang leader, can be seen in classic pose aboard his Hi-Wheel. Note the complex control mechanisms whereby the vehicle is actually controlled by synaptic couplings in the rider’s helmet, using direct psi-transmission to the small Quidnac Motorrad-class vehicle controller (with safety override overridden). The handlebars are purely vestigial, in place mainly for cosmetic or traditional reasons.

Clearly irritated, or possibly bored, by the inhabitants of the crushed vehicle in his wake, Fred has simply accelerated over the entire car. Closer inspection of his front tyre explains all: it appears that the Velocibleed’s enormous wheel has, horrifically, squeezed the driver out through the windshield. Using one’s cell-phone whilst driving is both bad-mannered and dangerous to others. Actions guaranteed to offend a paid-up member of the Totungirrtotungen.