by Dean Murray
I thought for a second that he was going to argue with me, but after a slight pause he nodded and let Anya and I help him out of the bed and into a wheelchair. Anya clucked slightly at the bloody state of Ash's jeans and then grabbed a blanket for him to wrap around his upper body. The elevator was only a short distance away, and once we arrived, Anya pushed the first and second floor buttons simultaneously and then repeated the action twice more.
"I fill as many of my staffing needs as possible with family, but even my family isn't large enough to provide all of the manpower needed. There are two additional floors below the bottom one listed on the elevator. It will now take us to the one furthest down."
Josef was waiting for us when the elevator opened up to reveal a kind of large underground parking garage. He raised an eyebrow when he saw my shoulder holster and then took over pushing Ash's wheelchair.
"What kind of round do you shoot?"
Ash smiled and looked over at me.
"She's carrying a five-seven, but she shot herself dry chasing Anton down a cliff. It's not a round I usually use so I didn't have any in the bug-out kit. I'll have to see if one of the nines will fit her hand."
Josef shook his head. "We can spare you a couple of boxes. Do you want the military-grade stuff or are you trying to keep a lower profile?"
"Best to go with the penetrators. She's not licensed or anything so if we get enough attention from the authorities for them to be checking what kind of rounds she's carrying we're already in over our heads."
Josef nodded and relinquished the wheelchair to me so he could retrieve the ammunition. Twenty feet later we came around a corner and I was able to see the vehicle that had been prepared for us. It was another black SUV. Less ostentatious than the Hummer, but still very late model.
As I reached the SUV I realized that Ash had passed back out, and it was like my whole world came crashing down on itself. The sane response would have just been to ask for help getting him into the car, but instead I found myself shaking, nearly on the point of tears.
I hadn't slept in nearly twenty hours and now I was going to need to keep us in motion for days until Ash recovered enough to take a turn driving. Anya looked up from her smartphone and saw how close I was to the edge of despair.
"Dear Kristin. How long has it been since you slept?"
"I…it's been a while. I'll be OK though. There isn't any other answer."
Once again it seemed almost like Anya was on the point of saying something else, but she instead shook her head.
"There are always other answers. If there aren't, then you aren't thinking hard enough. We could put you on a chartered helicopter or a plane, but either of those would leave too many fingerprints. We need to protect you and Ash, but we also need to keep the family's involvement in all of this as quiet as possible."
Josef was back with two boxes of ammunition extended towards me.
"I noticed that you were two magazines short as well. You'll want to get them loaded up sooner than later. Always a bad idea to run around on empty."
Anya nodded and then tapped her phone. "Josef, I've neglected to think things through. Kristin is too tired to undertake a sustained drive right now. Suggestions? I could send you or one of the others with them."
"I can go if you want, but that's going to leave us shorthanded for the operation tonight."
Anya muttered something that most definitely wasn't English and that I suspected was a curse.
"Sorry, I should maintain my temper better than that. I'd forgotten that you were otherwise engaged tonight."
"I won't tell Mom, she already thinks you're a bad influence on me."
Josef's smile was short-lived, but for a second I got a sense of the bonds that tied the two of them together.
"Put them on The Express."
Even I knew that was a good idea. With the way that airport security had continued to get worse and worse everyone had known that it was only a matter of time before high-speed trains made a comeback. The Express had been under construction for more than twelve months, but it already showed incredible potential when it came to moving people with a speed previously only seen by air travel.
Despite my tiredness I found myself nodding. "If we rented an entire car then we could change destinations as we went. The high-speed couple and decouple feature would mean that we wouldn't really have to worry about being intercepted anywhere."
Anya smiled. "Exactly. Let's proceed. Dear Josef, you'll need to help get them to the train station, grab enough from the petty cash to get them a full car and then grab a half-dozen of the prepaid credit cards."
Josef nodded, and then picked Ash up and deposited him in the middle seat of the SUV. I loaded the wheelchair into the back of the vehicle and then accepted a pile of blankets from Anya.
"You'll have to change cars at some point. Pick a city big enough to allow you to switch trains and get back on your way with a minimum of wait."
I nodded, still a bit in shock at just how fast things were moving, and then Josef was back and Anya clasped my hand with both of her hands.
"I do wish you the best, dear Kristin. Josef will plan your exit from the train with you on the way there."
Josef didn't say anything until we'd been driving for nearly ten minutes.
"Ash isn't going to want to disembark too close to the southern border. He's also not going to want to get too far east. You're probably fine to actually head that way. It will give you the most transfer options, but I'd recommend doing your actual physical transfer between trains somewhere west of the Mississippi."
Josef looked over just long enough to see me nod in understanding and then continued.
"They've got the process automated enough that it generally only takes about five minutes for a car to be decoupled and recoupled onto a new engine. If you can time things such that you change at a terminal that doesn't have an airport nearby that would be the best, but the key is to stay in motion and always change destinations while you still have plenty of options."
I nodded again. "Right. A plane is still faster, but he'd have to charter one in order to have a hope of keeping up with how much I'll change direction, so his top speed is probably not going to be much more than five hundred miles per hour. As long as I stay on the better parts of the track we should be doing three-fourths of that."
Josef seemed satisfied that I understood enough to give us a chance of surviving, and probably would have been content to travel the rest of the way in silence, but I had too many questions to let that happen.
I started sliding bullets into one of the magazines that he'd provided while I worked my courage back up to the point of actually saying something.
"Are you guys some kind of spy family or something?"
Josef shook his head and slowed for a turn.
"We simply do that which needs to be done. Ash may be currently estranged from the family, but that doesn't change the fact that he's part of the family. Modern people talk of loyalty but, in my experience, they view it as a transitory kind of thing. True loyalty is a mutual bond which lasts for centuries and requires a special kind of people on both sides of the commitment."
"You've been serving Ash's family for centuries?"
Josef smiled slightly. "Like so many things, that all depends on your point of view. I would say that we've been protecting that branch of our family best able to serve the rest of the world at large."
I didn't really know what to say to that, but Josef seemed content to let his statement stand without further elaboration. Instead he thought for several seconds and then broached the problem of what Ash and I were going to do as far as an exit strategy.
"Ash might have something else in mind when he finally wakes up, but my recommendation would be Colorado. Some place close to Denver. There are plenty of options as far as transfers, and it's far enough away that this Anton that has been giving you guys so much problem shouldn't be able to just jet over there quickly if he stayed in this area for some reason.
"
"Alright, that makes a lot of sense."
"Unless I hear otherwise I'll make sure we've got a black SUV in the long-term parking in Denver. Unlock code will be today's date, you'll know it's the right vehicle because it will have a cartoon wolf on the back window."
When we finally arrived at the train terminal Josef brought the wheelchair around, casually lifted Ash into it and then set a small case on Ash's lap before covering him with a blanket.
I grabbed the two small suitcases that held our clothes and suspended them from the wheelchair's handles. It made for an unwieldy mess, but it was better than trying to carry them somehow while pushing Ash along ahead of me.
Josef set off towards the ticket counter at a brisk pace while I made my slower way along behind him. The Express knew it couldn't compete with the airlines when it came to sheer speed. Even a train that regularly broke three hundred miles per hour couldn't hope to do that. Instead, the line had been built around the idea that you could limit the invasiveness of the security and automate nearly everything about the trip.
As the list of things that you couldn't bring with you on airplanes grew, there had been a larger and larger market for transportation that was more flexible when it came to prohibited substances. If you went coach then you still had to submit to x-rays and metal detectors, but I'd heard that they were much less fussy when it came to people who paid for a private car.
I got Ash into the terminal and then only had to wait for a couple of minutes before Josef returned with our tickets. He handed me a pair of magnetic cards with numbers on them and pointed towards a doorway that was flashing our number.
"That door will lead you to your car. You shouldn't run into any people between here and there, but if they stop you allow them to x-ray your suitcases. You're allowed a limited allotment of baggage that they don't screen, so you should be fine with the box on Ash's lap. Likewise they shouldn't run you through a metal detector."
I nodded. "Thanks, Josef. I know that there is an element of risk to you helping us."
"It's been my pleasure. I wish you luck."
Josef watched me wheel Ash over to our door and then wave my card at the sensor. Once the door opened I found myself inside a surprisingly long hallway. The automated systems detected that there were two of us and demanded that I swipe Ash's card as well before it allowed us past the next door, and then we went past half a dozen cameras and a weight sensor before clearing what looked to be a final automated checkpoint.
I breathed a sigh of relief when our private car finally came into view. Corridors on either side of us led to other cars, some with lines of people leading to them, others that seemed to have already been loaded up. Further back, almost hidden by the edge of the terminal, I could see freight cars, identical to the modular passenger cars but for their color.
The interior of the car had what I could only call commercial elegance. It was clean, with a couple of bunks on one side, a bathroom on the other which actually included a shower, and several fairly comfortable-looking chairs taking up the third side of the rectangular cabin.
I pushed the wheelchair over to the bunks and then pulled and pushed until I got Ash into the bottom bunk. He seemed to be resting more or less easily, so I stowed the wheelchair in a tiny, latching closet before taking a seat in one of the chairs. A foldout, touch computer screen eagerly offered up information about The Express, including detailed route information and an explanation of some of the security features that each car offered. I understood a little more after that how it was that they'd so far gotten away with less security screening than what the TSA demanded, but I still suspected that there was some lobbying going on behind the scenes, both by the people who wanted more security and the people who wanted less.
The train kicked into motion while the screen finished up with the safety briefing and moved on to explaining the amenities of the cabin. I saw that there was a refrigerator and a microwave locked away behind one of the small doors next to the bathroom and mentally noted that I'd need to check how well-stocked it was before we got too far into our journey. I started in on the route information next. The screen helpfully showed me what was available as far as non-stop car transfers and I began mapping out a route that would take us north once we reached LA, and then back south before we hit the Canadian border.
I knew that Ash didn't particularly want to spend any time down around the Mexican border, but it seemed like that was less dangerous than continuing to go back and forth through California and give Anton a shot at us each time we powered by.
I managed to remain awake long enough to book the first destination change. It was a sneaky one that would leave us taking a winding route through a number of different terminals, and I spared a brief moment to feel proud of myself before I stumbled over to the bunks and pulled myself up into the top one.
The next few hours were a nightmare of paranoia and exhaustion. I woke after less than an hour of sleep in a cold sweat because I'd realized that there wasn't any guarantee that Anton couldn't find a way to get our route information. It seemed impossible to me, but I had a sneaking suspicion that someone like Anya would have contacts who could easily hack into almost any computer system devised. If it was possible for Anya, then there wasn't any guarantee that it wasn't possible for Anton.
I logged back onto The Express's customer portal and revised our destination, making sure that we wouldn't be going anywhere within fifty miles of my original route, and then stumbled back to bed.
I slept fitfully, waking periodically to change our route and then making my exhausted way back to bed. On the third or fourth iteration I realized that I needed to see to Ash so I turned the cabin lights on and checked to see how he was doing.
He seemed to be running a fever, and I felt a surge of guilt that I hadn't thought to check in on him before then. I pulled a chilled bottle of water out of the tiny fridge and coaxed him into drinking some of it. He never actually seemed to come to, but he did respond a little to my voice, enough to swallow a few sips of water.
It was more than I'd been afraid I'd manage, but I was still worried about him. I cast about for something else I could do for several seconds before remembering the case that Josef had sent with us.
I opened the case and felt my eyebrows try to crawl up to my hairline. A heavy pistol sat nestled in the center of the case with a pair of knives below it, a wad of cash off to one side and a miniature first aid kit on the other.
I pulled Ash's blankets off and re-bandaged his wounds. They were already looking somewhat better, but the bare skin of his chest was alarmingly hot. There was a small syringe of antibiotics in Josef's case, underneath all of the gauze. I gritted my teeth and stuck him in the shoulder.
It seemed like I should be mostly recovered by now, but moving Ash around so that I could tape him back up had taken more out of me than I'd expected it to. I managed to change our route again, but nodded off while still in the chair.
I slept through the alarm on Ash's burner phone and next awoke to the sound of Ash's teeth chattering. It took me several seconds to figure out where I was this time. Ash was on his side, curled into an involuntary ball as his body tried to warm itself back up. I put a hand on his back and nearly swore at how cold to the touch he was. I was pretty sure that a human wouldn't be able to get that cold and come back from it.
I hurried over to the thermostat and turned it all of the way up before climbing into bed with Ash and covering the two of us with every blanket in the cabin. It wasn't much better than curling up with a block of ice, and after more than an hour had passed Ash became delirious. Most of what he said was too quiet to make out, but shortly after I got up to route us through Houston I heard him call out my name.
He didn't seem to really come to, but he got louder and louder until I made it back to the bed and curled up around him. It was hardly the time or place, but it felt nice to hear him say my name, more and more softly until he finally seemed to lapse back into a less troubled sle
ep.
I knew I was forgetting something, but it didn't sink in until we were in South Carolina. The Express had a maximum ride length policy. It was probably designed to let them replenish the cars, that or something mandated by the Feds. Josef had warned me against it, but lost as I'd been in concern over Ash, I hadn't kept track of everything I should have been keeping track of.
Ash had started waking for a few minutes at a time, just long enough to get some food and water into his system, but not long enough to really carry on any kind of conversation. I could see that even the effort of eating and drinking was almost more than he could handle.
My options were pretty limited. I curved our course back around to the west and picked a station in the corner of Alabama as the location where we'd physically change cars. By the time we arrived it was night again, which was less than optimal, but it was the only station I'd been able to find that was fairly out of the way and had another train coming by relatively soon after ours left.
A few minutes before we were due to arrive, I worked Ash off of the bed and into his wheelchair. I thought that maybe my grunting would pull him back to consciousness but he remained completely dead to the world. Remembering that Ash had said there were more vampires east of the Mississippi, I pulled my gun out of my shoulder holster and racked the slide.
I felt a little better knowing that it was ready to go, but ultimately if it came down to gunfire, I already knew that we were screwed. We didn't have any kind of vehicle or other means of making a quick getaway. I debated for a second and then pulled one of the knives out of Josef's case and slipped it down the back of my pants.
Disembarking from the train went smoothly. I pushed Ash's wheelchair out into the central area of the station and then walked over to a lighted area that looked like it probably held some of the automated ticket stands that I needed.
We passed a trio of older teenage boys and for the first time I saw the downside to all of the automation. There wasn't anyone else around, or rather there probably was someone else around, but the station was so big that we were the only ones visible.
