Gettin' Off the Train (02)

"How did you get on this train?" The conductor demanded, reasserting his presence. "You should not be here."

For a moment I worried that they knew who I was; what I'd potentially been. But if that were so I figured one of them would have taken me down the moment I stepped on board, and I also took the conductor's last statement as reassurance. They just assumed I was some particularly unlucky human.

I decided to go with the best defense.

"Listen mate," I took a step closer to the conductor; ands at my sides. "I dunno how you're expecting me to have the right ticket when I got the only kind available, then boarded the only train going my way." The demons behind me listened silently gods, just like a normal tube ride.

"So calls to reckon you need to take care of me for this mess." Our eyes held as he processed what I said.

"Sit here and don't move. I will return right away. Miss." I guessed it could still go either was, not that I knew what either way meant. At least he was still polite.

I sat down as he checked on the other passengers, then passed back by me and stuck his head in through the pilot's doorway. A quiet but heated conversation ensued. Finally the conductor returned.

"Your ticket again." He held out his hand and I, politely, handed my ticket back to him.

"Okay miss, we're near the next stop," Out the windows the darkness was fading into faint light, "You get off here. Wait for the third train after this one leaves. Third train total. Understood?"

I nodded me accent.

"Good," He continued, "That train, third train, will know you. You get on, show this to the conductor." A little smoke rose from where his thumb pressed on my ticket. He then handed the marked ticket back. "He will know to take you back."

I nodded my head again while continuing to stare at that mark which looked nothing like a thumbprint.

The conductor was still talking, "This is a big thing we do for you. Disjointed many schedules you understand? You own us, okay." He waited a moment then repeated, "Okay?"

Absentmindedly I replied, "Yeah, sure. Whatever you say."

Soon enough the darkness outside had fully faded revealing an open air station situated between a mountain and a sun baked parking lot. I stepped out over the gap and when I turned around the train no longer remained.

I looked around for a shady spot to wait for my return train. There were none. Gods again, you'd expect a place that gets weather like this would have ample shelter. At least for the old ladies who rode the train. I sheltered in the shadow of an upthrust slab that on one side showed the rail lines and on the other laid out the surrounding city.

Time dragged in that useless heat and I thought, not for the first time, about my work for the Council. It's not that I care about what they have me doing; more that I worry about my failure to care. My training told me that I should be content to serve; that what the Council does is just. Maybe I just hit my rebellious streak in my late teens, but in the previous year the desire to find my own way about the world had grown. Didn't think the Council would've missed me either. Maybe someone would notice one less old girl for the old boys to delegate menial tasks to. I doubted it. And there I was, gods knew how far from Council headquarters. All I had to do was face away from the tracks and start walking.