Forever, Jude

A young petite girl looked ahead as a man who is lying down on the seat in front of them is asleep. They are in the middle-class compartment on the train and although both her clothes and her father’s clothes are wrinkled and cheap, the young man in front of them has a neater-looking suit “Father why do you have a suit of a different color than your coat?”

“It is expensive to get the matching ones, Edda.”

“Argh”

Edda looked back at the young man and saw as he fell down from his seat, she was a little confused and looked up at her father. Her father is also looking at the man at this point “Young man… Have you had a nightmare?”

The young man looked up at Edda’s father and looked all around him. “Where am I? Who are you?”

Edda’s father sighed “Lad, please calm down. I do not know what nightmare you had but surely you know better than to raise your voice like that, you might scare my daughter. You are on a train that just left from the Ayton train station.”

“Why am I here? Did you cause this? Who are you?”

Edda nudged her father as a man stood close to her “Ticket?” Edda looks as her father fished around his pocket for their ticket. She could see though that the young man is also fishing for a ticket, however unlike her father, the young man looks a little panicked for some reason, he even took his coat off and started looking.

“For two. My daughter and I.” Edda’s father gave the ticket collector two tickets.

The ticket collector punches a few holes in the tickets and sighs as he stood across the young man “Very early on in the day for this. Let us just get over this. No ticket?”

“I… am not meant to be here. I am not sure who set me up for this, but I am willing to get dropped off at the next station, you can question me. I swear to you, sirr. I do not know why I’m here. I am Jude Walter, you may contact my family if you’d like. They will even tell you I would never do this I swear.” Jude said. The ticket collector looked at Jude’s suit-it was neat, but certainly not lower middle class. Jude looked but noticed the ticket collector looking at the pocket watch on him “…You can keep it. Just please believe me. I swear I don’t want trouble.” The ticket collector took the watch and walked away. Jude sighed and looked ahead. The father and daughter in front of him had watched everything.

“Why haven’t you said anything?” Jude barked..

“We do not have another ticket and I also do not want trouble. If I had helped you earlier, the train collector might have thrown me out just because I helped you. I have somewhere to be with my daughter and do not want delay.”

“What’s your name?” Jude asked.

“Edward, Edward Millard” He then gestures to his daughter “This is my little girl, Edda.”

“Nice to meet you, Jude,” Edda cheerily responded.

“Hello, Edda... can you tell me more about what situation I was in before I woke up?” Jude asked.

“When we arrived, you had already been sleeping there all alone. I do not feel the need to talk to you nor did I have something to say,” Edward said. Jude looked as if he was confused and did not really know why this happened to him “The next station is near. Have your family or friends contacted, maybe they will know.”

“I agree” Jude looked out the window and saw the next station coming to view, however, the train they were on not only seemed not to slow down at all, but other passengers on the train who may also have planned to go down at that station also noticed it too. Before anyone could even come to complain, the train zoomed past the station. Other passengers were mad and had gathered to go to the other compartments ahead to either make someone stop the train or go to the conductor themselves.

"Are you not going?" Jude asked Edward.

Edward shook his head as he patted his daughter's back "We don't want trouble. And we were not meant for that station anyway."

"Are you sure?" Jude stood up "I'm going to take a look."

"Why don't we sit for a while and just see what happens. Maybe something has happened and they didn't stop there," Edward said. However, less than an hour later, the next station came and went by too. The train had not stopped yet again and this time more passengers were on alert. Clearly, something was happening and the people from the station they first passed by had not resolved the issue. Edward pulled Edda next to the window seat as more passengers started walking the halls from the lower class to go to the conductor or someone.

"I'm going," Jude stood up. He plans to know a little more about what exactly is going on too. Jude squeezed through the crowd of people as best as he could as there were many people wanting to complain. Through the sea of sweat and an earful of complaints from their mouths, Jude had easily made it into the upper middle class, mostly because the people were complaining and looking for an official rather than actually pushing through the other compartments. After reaching the upper-middle-class Jude had seen a man wearing a hat keeping calm in his seat much like Edward “Excuse me, do you perhaps know what is happening?”

The man shook his head “They cannot seem to get past the upper class. There seem to be no officials anywhere. They might all be by the boiler room or the conductor’s cabin.”

Jude looked into the compartments ahead and saw men trying to push the door connecting the upper class to the faculty space of the train. They cannot seem to push the door, it was like the door was heavily nailed down and even have something blocking it, either way at least four grown men could not push it. Jude looked back at the man but saw him looking at a very familiar looking pocket watch, he is no longer wearing a uniform but Jude knows that pocket watch “Pardon me, sir… it is you, is it not?”

The man chuckled “I did not expect you to recognize me over a pocket watch that you can see everywhere.”

“My pocket watch has a rusted chain, it was the reason I was willing to hand it over in the first place. Other than that, the back has a splash of red paint from a mischievous act I was doing along my friend,” Jude responded, “However no more on that, what is going on? I implore you to stop the train.”

The man shook his head. “Best to pray you go to heaven, young man.”

“If you were going to abduct and kill me, you best leave everyone else out of it,” Jude said.

“I am afraid this is not just about you young man. It is true you have an influential family, however just you will not be enough for our revenge.” The ticket collector gestured to the crowd, Jude looked, he could not tell what he was supposed to look at, but noticed an acquaintance mixed in the crowd and a few others he knows of- “Members of an influential family who look down on the poor, we are left scarfing down every last bit of dirt we can while you laugh about. Apologies for my poor construction of words, the one who is giving the speech itself is at the gathering you people have, currently announcing your death along with others.”

“You will die along us then.”

“I am well aware but it is a small price to pay to send a message. We will no longer stand for your abuse even if we get killed along with you,” the conductor sighed.

“…There is a little girl here along with her father. There are innocent lives here! ” Jude exclaimed.

“No lives are truly innocent. We will do the others a favor by leaving this hell early. This train will eventually stop, however it will also take the lives in it and you cannot do anything about it.”

Jude started running around trying to look for a way to stop this train or maybe an exit so he could jump when there is a lake, but the doors to the outside are sealed shut and the windows are too small. Jude ran back to the ticket collector but he has taken his life. The crowd started to get more and more panicked as Jude found his way back to Edward and Edda. Edda is asleep while Edward sat there with his knee shivering.

“How are you so calm?” Jude asked, he has ripped clothes and has some blood on him from trying to escape and scratching through the crowds.

“I cannot panic. Edda will also panic. We have enough of constantly being in fear. Seeing you frantically running around earlier… I understand that something bad is going to happen, but I would like my remaining time to be in peace,” Edward sighed.

“It is my fault you are here,” Jude said, “I am sorry”

“I appreciate you saying it, though I have no idea why you would be,” Edward looked as the crowd started screaming. “Ah the cliff is nearby!”

“It would seem so,” Jude looked at Edda, however, saw that she actually has some blood on her neck.

“I apologize… she was getting too scared and I did not want to let her die in fear… I took her life when I got her to sleep…” Edward said. Jude looked as Edward smiled at him as a loud crash resounded throughout the whole train and his vision went dark.