The Train

David couldn’t hold it in any longer. He stumbled toward the giant walls of the station. A train whooshed over the tracks somewhere on the other side. Despite his desperation, he laid his bag carefully down on the ground. Then he yanked his pants down with shaking hands and pissed into a large crack in the corner. He tilted his head back and sighed. This was the only pair of pants he had. Pissing himself would have meant walking around smelling like stale piss for who knew how long. The stench would have certainly repelled customers. 

Ever since he and Sophia had escaped from San Francisco down to San Diego, he had scraped together a living by digging out bits of food and random knick-knacks from alleyway dumpsters, knocking on door after door in surrounding neighborhoods, and persuading anyone who opened up to buy what he’d found. He had tried to find real work, of course, and had begged for a spot in everything from the assembly lines in military weapons factories to the backs of the kitchens in the few restaurants still in business. But times were harder than ever with the civil war stretching into its fifteenth year. No one could afford to hire a scrawny, eleven-year-old orphan like him nowadays, not when they could hire a full-grown adult who would finish twice as much work, and he knew better than to hope that his luck would turn around. 

All his life, the leaders of the Southwest had argued with those of the North and the Southeast over countless laws and ideologies. The true meaning of personal autonomy, the correct definition of democracy, trading restrictions with countries overseas, the list went on and on. He was sure that none of the leaders–being the rich, dumb, privileged old farts that they were–would ever resolve any of their ongoing arguments, and if he couldn’t rely on them to bring peace and stability, he couldn’t depend on the Southwestern job market to improve anytime soon either. He was on his own to try and make ends meet. 

Sophia had broached the topic of trying her luck and looking for work too, but he had forbidden the idea. Being younger and punier meant that she was even less likely to be hired. Even if she had been stronger, though, he never would have let his little sister skip school for work. At least one of them had to hold on to the dream of a better future. 

A swarm of surveillance drones buzzed past overhead as he finished relieving himself with a final squirt. During his first weeks in San Diego, he’d been embarrassed of being caught on camera with his pants down. Now, he could care less as long as he got to take his piss. He allowed his mind to relax and his imagination to wander, as was his habit whenever he stopped for a rare bathroom break. He imagined the large, oblong crack in the wall morphing into a portal. A portal that would lead him out of this hellish world and back home, where his mother was waiting for him with warm food and a soft embrace. Sorrow needled into his heart at the thought of her, driving grief deeper into his soul. Another train whooshed out of the station on the other side of the wall. The sound of metal clicking rhythmically over metal pulled him into a trance filled with memories of their escape from San Francisco. 

He and Sophia had managed to escape solely because of their mother. Bits of news, flying rumors, and a strong intuition had led her to believe that the North was planning to destroy a major Southwestern city. She hadn’t been sure which city the North would strike but was certain that San Francisco was high up on their list. SF was the Southwest’s most valuable port city, after all, and a critical military base. Its loss would be a devastating blow to the Southwest. She had consequently moved them into an apartment close to the train station to ensure that they could make a speedy escape out of the city should the need arise. 

“The North has been chipping away at the Southwest for years now. If they hit us hard enough at this point, they might be able to take the entire Southwest. I know they’ve always been scared about making drastic moves up until now, but we’re already going into 2173 next year. The North can’t afford to have the war drag out much longer. They don’t have the resources for that anymore,” she had told them while scrolling through endless passport laws. She’d been researching ways to move them to a safer city at the time, but each law had only varied in its degree of severity, never its flexibility. 

“If they do attack SF, the whole city will be gridlocked, you mark my words. All the ships will sail out to try and fight a battle they’ve already lost, and they won’t let people like us onto the planes they have left, or even any of the rotorcrafts. They’ll fly all the rich bastards out of this hellhole first then leave everyone else to figure it out or die. It’s always been like that, and it’ll always be like that.”

And it had been exactly like that. The sirens had gone off, and speakers throughout the city had looped an automated message that warned of the two hours they had until a winged drone from the North arrived with a nuclear bomb. Screams and honking cars had clogged the streets. Rotorcrafts had crashed and exploded overhead as their panicked drivers failed to navigate a clear path out of the city while others had chopped toward the horizon as people clung to them or fell to their deaths. 

David’s mother, though, had remained stoic throughout the chaos. The moment the first siren had started howling, she had grabbed him and Sophia and fled with them to the train station. They had barely managed to squeeze through the entrance before the guards had closed the gates on the oncoming horde of men, women, and children. And that had only been the beginning.

So many people had already packed themselves into the last, remaining freight train that they had taken up every inch of the wide floor space normally reserved for enormous military weapons. David, his mother, and his sister had been forced to climb on top of one of the boxcars along with other stragglers. His mother had yelled at them to press themselves flat onto the surface of the car and grip the ledge with both hands. Then she had thrown her arm across Sophia to ensure that the winds wouldn’t rip her away as the train sped off a few seconds later. 

The winds had attacked David as if they were bent on taking him in place of his sister, filling his nose and mouth so completely that he thought he would suffocate. At least an hour had passed before he’d grown used to those cold, stifling winds. The pain in his curled fingers numbed along with the rest of his body. His panic waned into a single instinct to remain exactly as he was until all of this was over. Even the continual stream of bugs crashing into his face didn’t bother him after a certain point. 

And then they had reached the tunnel. 

Fear struck him in the fraction of a second before the train rushed into the darkness. The tunnel’s entrance was giant and black with a million cables snaking in so that the tunnel looked like a dying monster with tubes stuffed into its gaping mouth. Darkness blinded him for several moments as the tunnel swallowed the train. Metal clicked rhythmically upon metal. The winds whistled louder in the dark and forced the taste of iron into his mouth. The smell of mold was so strong that he could smell the mustiness despite the winds. He could also smell the fishy stench of decaying flesh. The light at the tunnel’s end outlined the numerous cables draping the ceiling like jungle vines.

There was a yelp, dog-like and sudden. Then the train rushed out of the tunnel and into open air. He glanced up at the murky sky, relieved to be free of the smells and noise, then looked at his sister. Confusion then panic then confusion flashed through him before hitting realization. His sister was alone, clinging to the ledge, her face buried between her outstretched arms. His mother was gone. 

The cables. The dangling cables had caught her and thrown her off the train. 

Madness seized him. He was about to let go of the ledge, to jump off the train to find his mother, to make sure she was all right, to check that she really was dead. It was only the sight of Sophia clinging to the ledge with all the strength her small body could muster that made him maintain his hold instead. He wanted to inch closer to her and put his arm over her as his mother had. But he reminded himself that one moment of relaxation or a single misplaced movement would send him flying off the train to his own death. 

All around him, on the cars in front and behind, survivors were weeping for the loved ones who had met the same fate as his mother. It took several seconds for him to realize that he, too, was weeping. And he had continued weeping all the way down to San Diego. 

A pack of dogs began barking in the distance, pulling David out of his memories. He stared at the barbed wire lining the top of the station’s walls then at the sky. The low, red sun was dragging itself closer to the horizon, exhausted like the world beneath it. Wind blew through the crack from the opposite side of the wall, stirring up the smell of urine. He turned away from the smell and sat down on a small mound of rubble piled at the base of the wall. He leaned his forehead against his clasped hands as he stopped himself from questioning how their escape might have been different had his father been alive. Such questions always led to imaginary images of his father and mother both dead on the tracks. 

He still remembered the smile his father had forced past his exhaustion each time he had come home from work. David tried to do the same at the end of each day when he returned to the refugee settlement and asked Sophia how school had been. And, of course, he remembered all the knowledge about wartime machinery and vehicles his father had taught them both. He tried to review his father’s lessons each night before sleep overwhelmed him. It was his way of honoring him, and he took pride in the fact that he could still recall the schematics of any major machine used in not only the Southwest but also the North and the Southeast. His father had believed that imparting his knowledge to them would secure them a future as prized engineers. Engineers were always given office positions far away from the front lines of war. The more talented the engineer, the farther away from the front lines. 

But no position, office or front-line, had turned out to be safe in the end. A barrage of enemy bullets had drilled through his father’s office over a year ago, killing everyone inside, and his father had come home in a wooden box. 

He pulled away from his thoughts again before picking up his bag. He took extra care to avoid jostling the glass bottles he had found before his bathroom break. Glass was becoming a precious commodity these days. These bottles would fetch a great price if he found the right people, and he was determined to push extra hard to find those very people. His parents were dead, but he was still alive. Now, it was up to him to do everything he could to make sure that he and Sophia both survived this war. He owed his parents that much.

He jumped as the howl of sirens split the blood-orange sky. 

No. No, no, it couldn’t be. But those sirens could only mean one thing!

He walked before speeding up into a run. Adrenaline pushed his thoughts past denial, through acceptance, and into full understanding. A nuclear bomb was on its way to San Diego. A Northern nuclear bomb. After all, who else would have sent it? The North had claimed all of northern California after destroying SF. If they destroyed San Diego now, they could take the southern end too. With the loss of their wealthiest state, the Southwest would admit defeat to the North and surrender all weapons and resources. Then the North could use its captured wealth to crush the Southeast. The war would finally end. But everyone in San Diego would first pay the price. He threw aside his bag and sprinted as a click sounded from the speakers lining the street. 

“Attention,” stated an automated voice. “A nuclear bomber is projected to arrive in one hour. I repeat, a nuclear bomber is projected to arrive in one hour.”

Screams began to crescendo from all directions as the voice listed useless escape protocols. An hour. Only an hour. The North must have sent the bomber from northern California to cut down on time and minimize the number of escapes. He shoved past the people spilling out of their homes. He and Sophia had agreed long ago to meet back at the settlement if a day like this ever came. He could only hope that she was there already. 

He dashed across the settlement toward the tent they called home and threw back the flap of the tent. A millisecond of pure relief followed as he found Sophia inside. She was wearing the same hardened look that had settled on her face when they’d finally climbed down from the train that had killed their mother. They said nothing and instead, linked arms and grabbed a fistful of each other’s shirts to lock themselves to one another. They rushed toward the train station. 

It was San Francisco all over again. The gridlocked streets, the screaming, the sobbing, the breaking of glass, the people falling from rotorcrafts. It was all the same. Only this time, their mother wasn’t there. Only this time, they were too late.

They cried out in horror as armed guards pulled the gates of the station shut. They skidded across the dirt before grasping the bars of the tall, metal gates. They slapped the bars over and over again as they begged for entry. A guard rammed the butt of his rifle against the bars in warning, forcing them to jerk back. The sound of feet stampeding across the asphalt behind them made them spin around. Dozens of people were dashing toward them from the far end of the street. It was the beginning of a mob, David was sure of it. A mob that would crush him and Sophia if they stayed here. 

But where would they go? There were no other major train stations in San Diego. The main airport was at least an hour away on foot, and even if they miraculously managed to get there before the bomb came, it would be just as his mother had said. The elite would be allowed on board. Useless orphans would not. 

He stuck out his arm instinctively to shield Sophia as a husband, wife, and their two children–a son and a daughter–ran up to the gates. The husband began shaking the bars while shouting demands, pleas, and obscenities. A guard pointed a rifle at him. The man froze then began shouting and shaking the bars again. The guard thrust the butt of his rifle between the bars. The man fell to the ground as his wife screamed. Blood streamed out from between his fingers as he clutched his mouth. Their daughter burst into tears. David’s eyes met their son’s. A wet patch spread across the crotch of the boy’s pants. David looked away. The wife’s screams and the daughter’s sobs continued filling his ears. The only thought that managed to penetrate his numbing mind was that he was glad he hadn’t pissed his own pants earlier. Then he realized that all his customers would be dead soon anyway.

Wait. The crack in the wall. 

His thoughts whirred into full throttle again. The big crack in the wall of the station. His portal. Their way into the station and onto a train! He forced himself to maintain his composure as he nearly burst out in crazed laughter. He locked arms with Sophia again and muttered for her to follow him. They hurried away and rounded the corner. The people who ran past them to join the growing mob ignored them as they continued running in the opposite direction. Finally, being insignificant was paying off. 

They reached the crack, huffing and puffing. No one else was in sight. Sophia flinched as bullets rattled through the air. The screaming and shouting at the gates escalated. David pushed her in first then crouched down. Bullets continued popping among shrieks as he crawled through the crack too. He gagged on the smell of stale urine but pressed on, squirming furiously. His thoughts flashed back to the boy at the gates. The boy’s sister was around Sophia’s age. He forced their faces out of his mind as he squeezed out of the last few inches in the wall. He didn’t have time to worry about strangers right now.

They ran into the vast, empty station building then stopped and swiveled about. A maze of passages, escalators, and stairs surrounded them. An old-fashioned clock warned that they had thirty minutes left until the bomb arrived. He would’ve bet anything that only a handful of trains remained now and that only one, at most two, would be departing the city in time to escape the bomb. But which path would lead them to their escape? 

Twenty-nine minutes.

“Wait,” Sophia whispered, clutching his arm. “Over there. I hear something.”

He flung his attention to where she was pointing. Several seconds ticked by before he heard it too. He could barely distinguish the sound from the muffled chaos at the gates, but distant voices were echoing from their right. They hurried toward the sound and down a flight of stairs. The commotion at the gates diminished. The voices grew louder. 

At the bottom of the stairs, an agitated crowd stirred on a platform next to a lone bullet train. The train’s sleek, rounded body gleamed under the spotlights. Its tail rested in the dark tunnel out of which it had come. Desperation, fear, and frustration all churned within David in waves that filled his chest and reached up his throat. There would be no climbing on top of the train this time. Even if the top had been flat, there was no way they could hang on to a speeding bullet train.

“We don’t have tickets,” Sophia said. Her hardened expression cracked, betraying her fear. “How are we going to get in?”

“We’ll find a way,” he replied. It didn’t matter that he had no idea what that way would be. They had no time to search for another train and no assurance it wouldn’t be just another bullet train they needed tickets for. They had to get on this one. 

“Damn those guards,” growled an old man as they reached the outskirts of the crowd. He hugged his duffel bag tighter and waved a train ticket. “Let me in. I have a ticket!” 

Others in the crowd shouted too, waving their tickets. But no matter how much anyone waved or shouted, the train’s smooth, metal doors remained sealed shut. Sophia’s stoicism broke completely.

“They don’t care,” she said. “They don’t care about tickets anymore. That means the guards are just waiting for the train to depart now. It’s going to leave at any moment.” 

“I told you, we’ll find a way,” David hissed. 

There had to be another way in, all trains did. He just needed to know the model number of this train. If he knew the number, he would know the schematics. He flipped through every scrap of information his father had ever taught him as he began hopping up and down to get a better look at the train. 

He already knew that this one was a newer model. All the new, fancy ones had a neon blue trim around the windows like that. The seats inside were recliners, and each recliner was housed inside a private pod. The pods could do everything from play a passenger’s favorite movie on its clear, glass shell to dispense hot or cold drinks of the passenger’s choosing. The train’s model number was lasered into the bottom of each pod … and the metal skin of all the cars, two feet above the first window in small, fine print.

There.

N2172. It was an N2172! It was the fastest bullet train in the Southwest and could easily speed across two states in under two hours. 

And it had an emergency hatch built into its last car.

“N2172,” he whispered to Sophia. “You remember the hatch, right?” 

Hope sparked in her eyes before her hardened look fell over her face again. She nodded. They stepped back from the crowd, one foot at a time, then skittered toward the tunnel, as quick and quiet as rats. They climbed down onto the train tracks then slipped into the tunnel’s darkness. The sound of their feet crunching over the rocks and gravel seemed to detonate like dynamite, warning the crowd of their plan as they ran to the end of the train. 

Sophia crawled underneath the last car. David followed then froze. Millions of cables lined the belly of the train like black intestines. His memory replayed the sound of his mother’s dying yelp. Sophia tugged gently on his arm. He mentally slapped himself then crawled after her to the middle of the car. They began pushing aside bundles of cables, digging deep. They jumped as a voice boomed from the speakers on the platform.  

“Attention,” the voice stated. “This train will be departing in exactly five minutes.” 

The screams of the crowd reverberated down the tunnel and multiplied so that all the souls the war had stolen seemed to rise up and cry out about the terrors they had seen. David dug faster and deeper, focusing on the schematics stored within his mind. He knew the hatch was here. It was here. It was right here! He bit down on his lip to stop himself from crying out in triumph as he uncovered the yellow button that would open the hatch. 

Sophia thrust her finger against the button. A hissing sound ensued, confirming activation. A panel slid aside to reveal a square opening. They clambered up through the opening and emerged in a long aisle flanked by rows of large, egg-shaped pods. Startled passengers swiveled their recliners to look at them from within the pods. A woman leaned forward in the pod next to them and pressed her hand against its shell. She laid her other hand over her pregnant belly. David choked on his disbelief as he saw that the pod behind her was empty. It wasn’t the only one, either. Countless pods in this car were empty. 

There were people on the platform. There were people trapped outside the gates. And here these privileged bastards were, hoarding all these seats for themselves. He hated these people. He hated them for their privilege, hated them for their cowardice, hated them for leaving kids like him and Sophia to die. He was only eleven. Sophia was only eight! How did all of these damn adults expect them to survive on their own like this? 

The hatch snapped shut on its own. Sophia swore as a red light began flashing above their heads. 

“Passengers without tickets are not authorized to board this train,” a voice stated. “Guards will be entering your car shortly to escort you back to the platform. Passengers without tickets are not authorized …”

Everyone jumped as something big thudded against one of the windows. Pattering sounds began hitting the body of the car. Hands. It was the sound of a hundred hands slapping and pounding the car as the crowd outside surrounded the cold, unmoving train from end to end. Another suitcase banged against a window as someone else tried to break in.

“Hey!” 

David and Sophia snapped their heads toward the other end of the aisle as the door connecting their car to the other opened. The red light stopped flashing as an armed guard stepped forward. The carpet muffled the sound of his heavy footsteps as he began marching toward them, rifle in hand. 

David yanked Sophia behind himself. He racked his brains again, searching for an answer, an escape, somewhere to hide. This couldn’t be the end. They had come so far. They had to survive, they had to survive, they had to survive. How would they survive? He suddenly realized how quickly he was breathing. His heart cramped painfully as it tried to keep up with his panic.

Air hissed as the pod next to them opened. The pregnant lady stood up. Instinct spurred David to raise his fists and defend Sophia from the lady. Sophia spun him around and smacked him across the face. He stared at her, dumbfounded. She and the lady pulled him into the pod. The lady jabbed a button on the recliner. The door of the pod rushed up out of the base and over their heads, sealing them in. She jabbed another button. The word “LOCKED” scrolled across the pod’s shell. The guard’s mouth scrunched up in frustration as he quickened his pace. He pounded his fist on the pod. 

“Open up, ma’am.”

She crossed her arms. The look she gave him dared him to make her. David’s eyes darted back and forth between her and the guard. What was happening?

“Open up!” 

“This train will be departing in ten seconds,” the voice announced. “Please stand back. This train will be departing in ten seconds.” 

Sophia grasped David’s hand. He responded by squeezing so tightly that both their hands turned white. He was too terrified to believe in the hope filling him. The lady continued glaring at the guard as he yelled more commands.

“This train is now departing the station.” 

The guard groaned and tossed his hand in the air. The lady’s narrowed eyes followed him as he marched back down the aisle, muttering to himself. The train slid forward then sped away from the screams of all those it left behind. 

Several seconds passed. Then David collapsed onto his knees. 

He was alive. He and Sophia were alive! They were on the N2172. They would escape the bomb thanks to this random lady. But … but how did that make any sense? How was any of this fair? Those people on the platform, at the gates. Everyone still in the city. They would all die. 

And it was his fault. His. He had hidden the existence of the hatch from them. He’d hidden the crack in the wall too. He’d been given a choice, and he’d chosen to sentence everyone to death, just like all these rich pricks on this train. But he shouldn’t have had a choice. He should’ve been locked out too. He should’ve been kicked off the train. He should’ve been stranded on that platform, waiting as the clock ticked closer to his death. He shouldn’t have had a choice. Why had he been given a choice? He shouldn’t have had a choice! 

His thoughts continued rushing through his mind so quickly that they seemed to outrace the train as it shot out of the tunnel and into the open, where the last remnants of sunset were cooling into dusk. He recoiled as the lady touched his shoulder. It was only then that he saw that she was weeping. Sophia was too. All the passengers were weeping. Some had their heads pressed against the pods. Others had their hands over their eyes. 

They were weeping. Not because they were happy to be alive but because everyone else would soon be dead. Weeping because they had saved themselves but couldn’t save any others. Weeping, as David was, because they were all united in their helpless need to survive. 

He slammed himself against the pod then crossed his arms and gripped his shoulders. He began sobbing. Passengers stared at him through their tears as he began beating his head against the pod. Sophia lifted a shaking hand and tried to speak. After several attempts, she balled her hand into a fist and shut her eyes. She continued crying. 

The lady drew closer to him. He flinched and felt, again, the wild urge to fight her off. But a small whisper of a thought touched him. This lady was pregnant, and his mother had taught him better than to hit pregnant ladies. And she was alone. Where was her family? Her husband? Was he dead too, like his dad? 

Sorrow shook the woman’s voice as she said, “It’s going to be all right, darling.” 

She shushed him and stroked his hair. He dropped his fists as she pulled him into an embrace. He clung to her as he continued sobbing. It had been a long time since someone had held him like this. He ached for his mother as the train continued speeding farther and farther away from the city.