Ask nothing, Guilty of nothing

Simple drops were always scheduled for the evening. The last three were the easiest fifteen grand Shaun ever made, and although cryptic, he deciphered the coding to follow the directions to the letter. Never open the bag, carry it everywhere but draw no attention to it, and look out for the next Staples sticky note for instructions. Staying focused until the drop was complete managed to be his biggest struggle. Then again, the threats he received while stopping for an energy drink on the first round smoothed that hiccup to tempered glass. The directly deposited fee for this one had been tripled; cryptic riddles with sinister overtones be damned, he thought, picking up the bag from the trunk of the ’87 Cutlass Supreme. He even held on to a lotto scratcher to justify any excessive spending as a result of his job well done. Pretending his expensive California move had been a stumble into a gold rush became a farcical endeavor the moment he was left to his own devices. The collection of criminally worded positive spin in letters home finally reached the level of light bull shit following the clues to his fourth carry.

He thought maybe in the next one, he could say he sold his work, nothing special, but the recognition would do wondrous things; he’d just need to work on the wording. Note one’s words were oddly positioned on the little pad, but it led to San Diego, where note two used an anagram that led to a trash can lid for the trunk keys. Thankfully, the third was bright pink and simply stated, ‘put this on.’ He adjusted the straps to fit over his lanky wingspan when he noticed a blue Sticky note that must have turned as he moved the backpack.

….A smack by an irate ticket collector woke him next to two others, demanding clarification on the contents of Shaun’s bag. Instead of answering, his attention was glued to the window, whizzing by scenes of Bakersfield. Next came the headache as they blasted past contrasting yellow lights, leaving them entering and exiting golden domes before the tracks darkened to an occasional branch hanging closer than the rest. The black eye had to be confirmed by the reflection, and he now understood he hugged the bag in question rather than wearing it. “I’m not sure what’s happening,” Shaun said, “but I’ll gladly get off at the next stop.” He slowly put the bag on his back as if their eyes were cocked, and sudden moves were a grave ‘no-no.’

“What does your ticket say?” The conductor leaned in with no patience for Shaun’s pocket pats and seat-back searches.

“Sir, I don’t have one, but whatever the next stop is, I won’t argue. I’m very sorry for causing anyone any distress.”

The abrupt nature in which the rageful chatter morphed into a terrifying confusion. One line that stood out to him was, “he doesn’t know shit either,” spoken by an eavesdropping passenger on the opposite side of his headrest. Like a bolt shooting from eyes to sphincter, he turned just in time to see Wascoc station and the blur of unhappy patrons missing their 12;25 north. The rumbling and bouncing, jostling people to the edge of their seats now held a different meaning if the speed didn’t spell trouble before. To his stunning realization, the sudden grabbing of Shaun’s collar made much more sense.

“Why are you two here?!” Engineer Albert shouted, spreading spit and, to a great extent, liquor breath over his life.

His row had only one occupant with no signs of another, and he was being jacked up and crudely interrogated. “I’m alone; I don’t even know—”

“Bull shit,” Albert began with a shake, “everyone but you and that prick barricaded in my office with the controls was scheduled to be here. What are you doing here?” He dropped Shaun, but his options remained limited.

Every excuse typically slung out like the last Uno card did nothing as far as extinguishing his guilt, as they did with curious security officers and undercover folk failing to remain undercover. As the speed blew through 75 miles per hour, honesty felt inevitable.

“I—I can’t remember. I was at this store in San Diego then you slapped me awake. Did anyone see how I got on? Did someone carry me?”

Sucked teeth, exacerbated sighs, groans from blatant disbelief from most of the sparingly populated car. “We’re not stopping, and one of the passengers saw you sleeping on their shoulder just before departure.” None of the other people seemed to know what he was talking about, but how many cars were there, he thought.

“Did they help me on board and through the station?” Shaun asked, standing to see over the headrests for this witness. Maybe it was one of the staff working the other cars, or perhaps a kid peaking up against their mother’s best wishes. These were supposed to be easy, free of this sort of controversy or police presence. A Stick note, whether in his pocket or forehead, would do wonders for his deep breathing, not remembering what the final blue one said. These tasks were never to be missed, and this growing non-plus mob created too many moving parts, not including when he apparently blacked out. He hadn’t enjoyed conversations with Californians since arriving, feeling everyone’s conflicting agendas made every attempt at something authentic foolish from the jump into disappointment. Making connections, however, paid off regularly since no matter the size or potency of their alleged pull in tinsel town, everyone was in search of a break; small ones are always worth a hello. “Maybe they can tell me how I got here; if you’ll all would let me try,” Shaun said.

An off-beat chorus of “don’t do it,” “what if he’s with him,” and more prevalent, “we should throw him off,” followed, filling Albert’s ears, corrupting his rational thoughts. Shaun threw in a well-placed plea to a growing audience of apathetic folk. It seemed only Shaun and Albert had the where-with-all to emotionally show their concern. The swearing betwixt the murmurs ignited where a frown could not be found. “Fine!” he shouted; he’s always shouting, “but I’ll hear every word!”

“Of course, not an issue,” Shaun reassured.

“After you, Sir.”

His meaty paws led him to the hall of glazey stares, haunting his soul with “what’s in his bag” as he walked from car to car to car, to car to another damn car. They just kept going, small amounts of people in each car, all differently designed and far-reaching. The pattern consisted of three passenger cars, a shop, dining car, then back to passengers, with drastically altered seating configurations depending on which class it was meant to appeal to. By the third set of shop and dining cars, they retired to a booth with red suede curtains with gold fringes under a stained glass lamp swinging violently with any given curve, practically causing sea sickness.

“Where the hell you taking me?” Shaun asked.

“Son, I’ve been following you. Besides, if we’re luggin’ this many cars, we cant be moving like this and not hit an engine.”

“Good, I thought it was just me. Where are we going this fast?”

To pray for a miracle would’ve served them better than peering out of the windows for a heading, a landmark, a watermark, anything Californian. Wishes granted on this level displayed a universal sarcastic disregard for their sanity. Not sure of the semantics of the trail cutting through the indescribable scenic route of snow-capped mountain ranges hosting the crashing waves of the pacific ocean on their far side. The lunar position amongst the stars was brighter than they had ever seen, shining on the thin cloud cover, moving faster than they were despite the hill forcing the gas pedal to take a back seat for a spell. The spiral bend under the bridge glued them to the wall feeling that if tipping was this much of a concern, why no one in Amtrak uniforms was clambering to counterbalance the tilt.

“Tickets, please.” The black bee hive worn above her white hair leaking from the back screamed doo wop group between some distant tour dates. Her sunny disposition relaxed them from the thorough startling her instantaneous arrival at their table, sending mixed feelings about their continued disillusionment. What threw them back into panic was their shared inability to produce a ticket.

“Ma’am,” Albert began, “What line are we on; which do you normally--?”

“Oh, look at that. You’ve got your own outfit. Even with the hat. Adorable. But I still need your stubs.”

Her attire fit her era rather well despite being a regulation uniform, and the accent piled atop her natural charm morphed into persistence that was more infuriating than her ditzy attitude could salvage. Of course, he had gotten on somewhere; Albert spoke as if the reminder would bring the event into existence. And, of course, they desired to get off at a preferred stop, but her questions weren’t making tickets to San Fran appear. “Please, Miss, we don’t mean to cause trouble—”

“SO!” She blurted in harsh seriousness that left both of them taking a second to check their tone. Then like it never happened, her smile returned, “you were saying?”

“We don’t know where we’re going or what’s going on with this weird train. We could use our bearings, Ma’am.”

“Well, it looks like we have a couple fresh faces—now I get it. You’ll have to be patient with me. You’re one of many. After what you’ve been through, Albert doesn’t stay buried for long. You two sit--” She stopped abruptly, sinking into an icy stare unjostled by the violently uneven train tracks at an ungodly speed, sloshing them in their booth. In the same fashion she snapped to, she returned to the bubbly southern charm that, to them, didn’t calm as well as before. “I have pressing matters; you two, just hold on here for a bit, sugar.”

She walked out of the first of two merchandising cars winking as the sliding door shut. There was a brief instance where some poor soul’s intestines were vicious slapped onto the glass, lightly salted, limed, and eaten, based on the voice box shredding scream ending with the slam of another sliding door. “I’m leaving. My freaky thermometer has burst,” Albert whispered as passersby walked by, observing them more than where they were going.

“Are you sure—”

“Do what you want. The car I remember is back that way. Might set things right.”

With one more glance behind him, he darted back the way he came. Unable to cope with Mount. Everest nested in the Grand Canyon; Shaun followed, wondering if crotching was necessary. Several irate folks, still too cool to express themselves, demanded a stop anywhere, others, refreshments, or a bathroom with a baby changing station, none of which was done with urgency. What a relief, Shaun thought, hearing others struggle to place why they were there, ticketless; however, no matter the perceived staff authority accused them of stealing a seat, the passenger couldn’t be bothered. Sprinting through the lunatic masses, neither could tell whether their hearts were out to lunch or vibrating with the humming train, unaware if the intensifying growls were mechanical or turning cars into firey blood baths. Pushing through irritable travelers, car to car, Albert resorted to pinching Amtrak staff if they asked for a ticket losing sense of earthly calm as passengers from every era of train travel past and future. “What wer—did you see those heads?”

From behind, the Ditzy ticketeer called out, “SIt dOwn. wE haVe a DEMOstration foR You—QUIET!”

Shaun slammed the door before the teleporting dame reached the end just as Shaun shut and jammed the door. Through the glass, he discovered he wasn’t the only one running from the older women destroying the car in specific ways. Shaun will never know what the woman fleeing stated while banging on the door, waggling their finger in sheer apathetic disapproval, before her vertebrae were snapped open. Her head dangled from a shred of skin left from her popped geyser from the blood pop-top can of her neck like the latch on her spine was loose from the start, spewing until the glass’ coating was too thick. He had never seen blood ooze so thickly and dry so quickly.

Silence. He turned around to face the seated individuals with his heartbeat actively adjusted to the oddity of the car’s atmosphere prior to knowing why it should. Stillness. Each of the seated souls sat smiling peacefully, teary-eyed staring him down amongst the accelerating train sporadically open to the elements. “They want to know what’s in your bag.”

“It’s not important.” Suddenly, amid fear-coaxed blinks, the walls of the derailing train were ripped with burning slashes appearing one by one. Passengers remained seated undisturbed. The tons of steel pulled by a diesel heavy-smoker somehow seemed to break the sound barrier. Flames were attacking from the emergency lighting burst from an overcharge setting cloth everywhere a flame whipping with the breathtaking wind. Passengers remained seated undisturbed. His grip on two seats for dear life stood as well as the wheels stayed in contact with the track laid on a rally course. Metal sparked every time a torn chunk caught the sides of standard bridge railings, firing shrapnel large and tiny. Passengers remained seated undisturbed. Slivers carved scars over his knuckles and face, yet, he couldn’t respect the inclination to close his eyes, forced to dodge skull crushers. He smelled the overworked Diesel engine throwing pistons to death rattle by the clanks as if he sat between the disrupted firing order. Passengers remained seated undisturbed.

“If you ask us, it’s pretty god damn important,” Albert stated.

Sticky note. That blue note he didn’t have a chance to read before he was knocked out would explain it. It couldn’t have been related, Shaun kept saying. Yet the accelerating mangled wreckage wouldn’t stop. His broken concentration put him on the floor, providing percussional maintenance to his head to jog his memory. The fetal position lasted until the car behind broke away into a collection of thundering clashes with the ground as it flipped end over end, slamming each end to the dismay of those inside the shell. Albert stood over him. “I wonder what’s in that oddly shaped bag,” he uttered without the sarcastic facial expression softening the fuel gargled words.

“I—I don’t know. I didn’t get a Ch—”

“I guess it would have been easier to forget those instructions but to forget following them. that’s new.”

Shaun looked up from his glass at The Tipsy Crow in San Diego, sick to his stomach. The coverage had been going all week, with new investigative leads discovered from the half-mile-long catastrophe, with one survivor and 201 dead so far. The toxicology report of one of the passengers had just proved local law enforcement’s claims that no one on board was away to prevent or call for help. Some experimental gas sent through every car, putting most sleep or unconscious that remains untraceable. What the note said that day couldn’t have been more clear. The death toll rose with every new body part discovered hundreds of feet from the line, every piece of wreckage slung so far that neighborhood kids were getting charged for damage to private property. It was the twisted smile of the poster boy of the tragedy, Conductor Albert Ravn, who was theorized to have died from the highest concentration of the airborne toxin. That fucking note he burned as he’s always been instructed could never be forgotten. ‘Leave on the final bench on the platform D; leave once Conductor claims the bag.’