The Solar Express

He awoke groggy and disoriented, laying on the floor, as if he had been drugged. He instantly reached for his head, still coming out of the induced sleep state he was in. He slowly opened his eyes to find himself on the floor. Upon further inspection, he found himself in a train. The man was confused as to how he had gotten there. There didn’t appear to be other passengers as far as he could tell. At least not in the train car that he was in.

Then the man looked at his attire. He was wearing some sort of space suit but was missing a helmet. The suit was an orange-rusty hue and had patched onto the left chest `LTQ4826’. He was also wearing some sort of neck collar. Metallic and very high tech, the man was concerned about it.

The man was bewildered as to how he had arrived in his present situation as he took in the view of the train car. It was of basic style with some hard leather seats, long cargo racks overhead for luggage storage, and windows dotted along the walls as portals for the eyes into the cosmos. There didn’t seem to be anything weird about the train car the man was in. The train car reminded himself of his childhood. His father was a train conductor for the Southern Pacific Railways during the precious metal boom in the mid-2100s that was found on earths surrounding planets. Billionaire investors were sinking money into the venture when they heard about how much money they could make off of it. The man’s father was one of the people in charge of getting their precious cargo home safely. It wasn’t easy work all the time though and eventually his dad got sick. When he was 7, his dad died rather quickly due to his illness. He always looked up to his dad and wanted to be like him. Train cars always made him think of his dad. It has always been a happy place for him.

The man finally goes to the window to take a look out to determine where he might be. When he looks out, he is in disbelief. He can see the planets and stars and is instantaneously mesmerized. He stares endlessly to take in the view. He is really in space. He had always wanted to be a train conductor like his dad on the space rails and be able to see these views daily, but he made different decisions in his life. He hasn’t seen this type of view since he was a child. Mesmerized eyes weep our forsaken dreams. The man shed a tear while trying to maintain all composure but struggling. His face was stern, proud, and wet with tears as they began to cascade down his cheeks. He began to sniffle.

“I’m sorry dad.” He spoke. “I will make you proud of me someday. I’ve always wanted to be like you.”

The man was looking out still and finally wiped his eyes. Having gained composure, the man looked around to figure out what to do next. Just as he turned around a small monitor had come down out of the ceiling. The screen lit up vibrantly and then all that was seen was a woman standing there. She had long black hair with a prominent and happy smile. She began to speak.

“Hello passengers! Welcome aboard!” She said full of vigor.

“Passengers?” The man thought to himself. “I don’t see anyone else aboard. Maybe there are other train cars? I guess that would make sense. But who else would be on this train?”

When the man’s attention was back on the screen, he heard the woman start to speak.

“Hi everyone, super excited to be here. My name is Jess, and I will be your conductor on this fun little excursion. You’re all probably wondering why you’re here and honestly, it’s all very simple to explain. You are all awful human beings.” She said with a big smile on her face and a laugh. “All of you are convicted murderers and rapists and the downright most vile and wicked individuals we have on death row. So, without further ado, let me introduce you to where you’re at.” “Drum roll please.” She said as she began to make drumming sounds with her mouth and pretended to use drumsticks with her hands. “The Solar Express! OOOOoooooo. AAAaaaahhhhhh.” She made sounds to hype up the passengers. “The government decided to have a fun experiment and you’re all the guinea pigs. So here is the deal. All 10 of you are on death row for very heinous and downright disgusting crimes. We are going to grant you an opportunity to have your freedom back. You won’t be imprisoned anymore, and your crimes will be forgiven. Done and dusted. We will send you on your way to begin a new life for yourself.” Jess said.

The man heard that, and his eyes lit up. He whispered, “Freedom?” He has been imprisoned for 7 years now. He just had his ‘anniversary’ last month. “What a guy wouldn’t do to get the hell out of prison.” He said to himself as he daydreamed about being free. About seeing his daughter again.

The woman interrupted the man’s thoughts and continued speaking.

“So let me inform you of the rules and opportunities in play and tell you about what happens if you don’t succeed. Okay, first things first, let’s get the morbid part out of the way. You are all on death row which you all know but here is where you sentence really kicks in. The train you are on was retrofitted to be able to fly like a spaceship since it was used in the early days of the space rails and the precious metal boom. One of you aboard knows all about those. Hehe, don’t you Frank?”

It was like a shock to his system. His heart sank as if he had been shot. They know him. Everyone on board, whoever they are, knows him now. He was worried and his hand was trembling. But then he thought to himself that they only know the name Frank, not who he was. He has a chance if he keeps a low profile.

“You will all get to know each other very well. Probably. Well, maybe. Who knows?” She shrugged with a big smile.

“Right. So. This train you are all on is headed towards the sun.” Jess said this nonchalantly as she was looking at her nails, not caring at all about the ‘passengers’ on board. “A direct path. Welcome to death row!” She said full of joyous energy.

When those words left her lips every person on board instantly felt the gravity of their situation. Hearts felt heavier than black holes even in the black hole hearts of the passengers. It was either life or death. Judgement day had come, and lady justice was not merciful.

“So, this is where I tell you all about your chances for survival. All of you can theoretically make it out alive if you were to work together. However, that is unlikely, especially with this added in caveat. There are 10 of you here. For each other prisoner that you kill, we will award you 10 million dollars to help start your new life. But if you kill 2 people for instance and then get killed. You get nothing. So sad. You have to poach bounties and also escape the train. But again, you can all work together. Just making sure I put that out there.”

“Now, to get started I’m going to unlock all the doors to each cabin in a moment and you will all congregate in cabins 2-3. On the monitors it should show you how many cabins you have to move up to get to the desired places.” Jess began to speak seriously now and wore a face that was not into jokes. “Don’t think about getting started until you get to the cabins, I will have you start. You will all notice that you have collars around your necks. I can, and will, at any time remotely shock you and paralyze any of you and have you fall to the ground. So, let’s test it out first for everyone. Turn it on!”

Frank instantly falls to the ground in agonizing pain. He couldn’t believe they could do that. He had no control of his body. Shaking but stiff and in agonizing pain but no way to stop it. He was at her mercy.

“Turn it off!” The woman yelled. “Now that you have a taste of that, don’t try anything until we get to the desired cabins. Thanks. Oh, almost forgot. If you do try to attack someone before time starts, I can make those neck braces explode. Okay, awesome!”

Frank hears the doors unlatch. It’s unlocked now he thought. He looked up to the monitor to see where he had to go. Frank was in train car 2 already so he didn’t have to go anywhere. He was thankful for this because that shock really zapped him of energy for a moment. He was nervous now to see the others. Momentarily he should have someone walking in from the front train car and then more people coming in from the rear cars.

Prisoners began to trickle in one by one. Frank didn’t want to chance anything, so he kept his distance and waited for further instructions from the woman on the monitor. He was looking at the various other criminals, sizing them up, trying to determine who they were and what they were in this place for. At the same time, Frank was still wondering why he was here. He had thought there were far worse individuals on death row than he. Frank was deep in this thought about how he had gotten there when suddenly.

*WHACK* *TUMBLING*

“It is you!” A man yelled as he sprinted towards Frank and proceeded to tackle him. “I’ll fucking kill you for what you did.” The man started to punch Frank. He landed one hit before his collar began to shock him and he dropped to the floor. Franks’ collar shocked him as well. Then the monitor turned on and Jess began to speak.

“What the hell, Mitch? I can make your collar explode at any time, but I am trying to be kind over here.” She says on the monitor while in reality Mitch is on the floor shaking from the collar. “Turn it off.” The collar turned off and Mitch began to steady his breathing after that experience. Frank did the same. He really did not like the collar. “In good time Mitch, calm the fuck down.”

Frank scurries backwards away from Mitch. He hadn’t seen him for almost 8 years, 8 long years. It is clear to Frank that Mitch still holds a grudge for what had happened.

Frank had a flashback to the day that everything happened. The day he crossed Mitch. The day he crossed his best friend. Frank and Mitch used to work together in an underground smuggling ring. Well, one day Frank and Mitch pissed off the wrong person and they kidnapped Frank’s daughter. Frank sold out Mitch to them in exchange for his daughter to be freed and unharmed forever. Frank had his daughter back, but he had also lost his best friend. A year later, Frank would end up behind bars himself and wind up on death row for his crimes committed while smuggling.

“Alright, everyone please just relax for a moment so I can explain now. As I said earlier, if you work together, you can all get out of here alive. You can also get out of here with extra cash for your new life, if you get out of here that is, by poaching some bounties. Make that money fellas. So, the fun part and unfair part for some of you, Mitch, is that you might need the person aboard that knows all about trains to be alive to stop the train. I would recommend keeping them alive but please do whatever you want. It’s most likely your funeral.” She began to laugh at what she had said.

“Since this is an opportunity for you to get away and find your peace, we are going to give you a hint. Somewhere in train car 2 there is a written hint to stop the train. Go ahead and find it. You’ll have to work hard to make the train stop.” Jess said with a wink and laugh.

Frank was listening to all of this and was determined to get off this train and begin a new life. He wanted the freedom. He wanted to live his dream and be like his dad. He wanted to see his daughter again.

“Let’s get this show started soon and drop in some fun toys for you to play with. Look, but don’t touch until I say so.”

Small drop chutes in the ceiling opened and weapons fell from above. All melee weapons, there was an ornate, gilded sword that when it fell it stuck right into the floor, a large battle axe style weapon that had a glowing blue light emanating from it through what were tattoo like channels running along it, a small armor sleeve for your arm that looked like it acted as both a shield and also as a weapon with a large protruding blade at the end above the wielders hand. There were even more weapons scattered about on the floor for the prisoners to choose from. It was like they were all kids again with all the fun toys to choose from. People began looking at each other in anticipation. Nerves were about to explode, and weapons would be grabbed.

Lives would be lost. Bloodshed would be had. The government will have won.

“Alright everyone, let’s go over the rules for you all one last time so that we all understand the opportunities you have open to yourselves. Theoretically speaking, you can all get off the train safe before you burn to a crisp in that fiery sun you’re headed towards. However, that’s unlikely given that each kill is 10 million dollars. Weigh the odds fellas.”

The prisoners began to look around and size up everyone. Planning in their minds who they might attack, who they might run away from, who they might want to work with. Anything and everything that results as a possibility for survival runs rampant in your mind when you are faced with death. Kill or be killed. Whatever it takes to survive. Morals get broken.

“Hehe alright everyone, let’s make it a little more fun. Well, fun for everyone but Frank.”

His heart sank. Why was he being called out? What did he do to her? Is their plan to have every prisoner tear him limb from limb to pay for his crimes? He was nervous. He tried to hide his hand in a fist against his side. It was trembling.

“Frank is your number one guy when it comes to trains everyone. He is your best chance of getting off this train instead of being char broiled. But also, Mitch, you were fucked over by Frank, weren’t you?” Jess said this hoping to evoke bloodshed and anger from the prisoners, hoping none of them will escape.

In an instant, with fire in his eyes Mitch glared over at Frank. He wanted revenge. He wanted blood. He wanted repentance from Frank. He wanted him to admit what he did. Then he spoke, “Yes. Yes, I was.”

“Well, I am sure that you two can work out your problems in here.” She said with a sinister chuckle. “Let the games begin!” Jess spoke and then there was silence. Absolute silence. You could hear your own blood coursing through your veins silence. The tensions were high until someone spoke. A small weasel looking man.

“I think we should work together at least until we aren’t on a direct path to the sun. Getting money would be great but we can’t spend it if we roast first.”

Almost instantly, as if he was annoyed by him, a massive behemoth of a man pulled the ornate sword up from the floor effortlessly and gutted the man straight through the middle. The man was quick for his size. Nobody had time to act, not that they would want to. They all watched the spectacle. Some disgusted, some intrigued, some smiled sadistically, and others became aroused by it. Blood had dripped down the blade and glimmered in the lights of the train car. The weasel man’s eyes grew wide, the pure shock hitting his system, what a rush. It felt almost instant that the man died. He gave his look of shock and then went limp. The large man let him fall to the ground with the blade in him. Farewell passenger number 1.

The next attack came from Mitch. He didn’t grab a weapon and instead launched himself at Frank who was focused on the newly dead man in front of him. They both fell and began to scramble. Mitch went after Frank with fists as he began to block them with an arm and reached with his open hand to grab something to hit Mitch with. His hand grabbed hold of something, and Frank swung it at Mitch’s head. He instantly fell off of Frank. Mitch was motionless.

Frank then spoke. “Mitch? Mitch, are you okay?” He crawled over slowly to Mitch’s body not sure if he was faking it or not. Frank didn’t have time to do this though. The large man pulled the blade out of the weasel man on the ground to begin his rampage. The last man began picking up a weapon as a form of attacking but much more defending despairingly against the maniacal rage of this lunatic murderer. No one was safe. No one aboard this train is safe.

The large man started on his rampage. The man who attempted to pick up the battle axe was jousted through his middle and was stuck to the wall. Blood oozing from his abdomen and mouth like a human fountain as he hung on the blade stuck in the wall. Au revoir prisoner number 2.

The large man stood up and looked at Frank. Frank felt fear. He thought to himself, “This is where I die. To this gigantic lunatic.” The large man looked Frank dead in his eyes and then said, “You safe if fix train.” The large man was of few words, but the message was well received. Frank nodded in agreement. The large man nodded back. They were in agreement. Anything was better than being gutted by this large man followed by incineration in the sun. The large man looked at Mitch’s motionless body and assumed he was dead. He left the cabin and moved back to the next cabin for more prey, for more money.

Frank took a moment to breathe. He exhaled deeply just assessing his current situation. He looked around the train car and all he could see was devastation. Blood was everywhere and began pooling on the floor. Bodies strewn across the train car. This was horrific. Then Frank began to hear the screams from the other train car. He knew the large man had probably made his way to them finally. He was running out of time. He looked at Mitch, ashamed and sad, Frank went through the door to the front train car.

“Alright, let’s see what we have in here and what I can do.” Frank said.

He looked around for a while and was trying to remember everything his dad had taught him. It also wasn’t easy for Frank since he hasn’t been to space for many a moon now and wasn’t used to the flying.

“I haven’t seen this shit since I was a kid.” Frank said as he rubbed his eyes in an attempt to wake himself up to his situation and help him focus.

He began working on the navigation system. Seeing if he could take control of the ship or at least reroute their course. He worked diligently trying to find a way to steer them away from the sun. Eventually, Frank succeeds in finding a way to reroute the space train.

“Okay, and a couple more clicks of this and one of these and enter.” Frank said.

*ERROR* *ENTER PIN FOR ACCESS*

Frank was confused and wasn’t sure what to do. “What PIN?” He had said. He was trying to wrap his mind around it, but nothing was clicking. No lights were coming on for him. As he was struggling, he looked down at his suit and remembered he had writing on it. His serial number to identify him. `LTQ4826’ He entered the code into the computer to see if it would work. He figured Jess did say he was important so maybe they did hide the answer in plain sight.

*ACCESS GRANTED*

Frank was feeling extremely accomplished. The train would engage the new navigation at the end of a 5-minute countdown. Frank felt like he deserved a moment so he looked out of a window so he could see the view from where he was. It was just as beautiful as he remembered it being. Frank had a single tear well up in his eye and then fall. He wiped it away as if nothing happened. “I made it back, dad.”

Just as Frank whispered this to himself, he heard the door open. There was the large man, not a scratch on him. He began to walk up to Frank.

“You fix?”

“It will be engaging in about 4 minutes or so and our course will change trajectories away from the sun.”

“You fix?” The man had asked again clearly not understanding what Frank had said.

“Yes. Flying train fixed.” Frank said, dumbing down his wording. Worried and wondering if the behemoth of a man would be his savior or his executioner.

The large man nodded and said, “Good. You live.”

Frank had been nervous by the large man walking in. He put all his trust and hope in the fact that the large man would keep his word. It paid off for him. Relief washed over Frank, and he became calm.

There was now a sound at the door. It opened. Frank thought to himself before he looked up to hear the door opening, “Who could that be? I thought big man took care of everyone.”

Just then, Mitch walked through the door. Frank’s eyes were wide with surprise. He thought Mitch was dead. Mitch immediately located Frank and started walking towards him. He had grabbed one of the weapons from the other train cars and brought it with him. He wanted blood.

The large man turned around and saw Mitch and without hesitation knocked him down with such force that he slid across the floor until he hit the wall. His sword fell out of his hand and slid close to Frank. He was hurt. He winced in pain but opened his eyes to see his target. The large man walked up slowly to Mitch. Mitch began to speak, “I have no beef with you. I’m after him.”

“He safe. Fix train. Owe him.” The large man had said. “You, not.”

As the large man said this, he was standing over Mitch. He had a sadistic, sinister smile on his face like he enjoyed it. Enjoyed what he was about to do. He wanted to savor the moment. He reached down and picked up Mitch by his suit. Mitch hung there from the man’s arms as if lifeless. It was so easy for the man to pick him up. Mitch looked at the large man and knew what was about to happen. This was the end. He was facing it without fear. He had a stern look on his face as if asking for the release of death. Unafraid of death.

As the large man had Mitch in the air, his body instantly jerked. His eyes grew wide, and his arms fell to his sides, as well as Mitch to the ground. The man looked down slowly, taking in every single detail of the scenario. There was a sword through his stomach. Attached to the other end was Frank holding the handle. The large man turned around and looked at Frank. Frank began to back up, clearly nervous. The large man tried walking towards Frank but fell to his knees. He then fell on to his side as blood began to pool from his body. He was motionless.

Frank then walked over to Mitch who had just opened his eyes and saw what had happened. He was in shock. He didn’t act angry anymore, he was mostly confused. Then Frank stuck out his hand for Mitch to grab.

“I fucked you over. Hopefully, this can make us even.”

Mitch stared at Frank. The two men locked gazes in a long pause before Mitch grabbed his hand. “Thanks.” Mitch said. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

Frank took Mitch over to the navigation system and was explaining in brief description what he had to do. He showed Mitch the countdown which was around 90 seconds before the train reroutes course and they are both home free.

“This train is really advanced with its navigation actually. You can manually fly all of the other train cars from a small panel inside the wall near the doors.” Frank had said. “Believe it or not. The navigation was password protected. That was all I had to do was put in the correct password and make a few clicks and press enter. It ended up being my Prison number.” Frank said this as he pointed to his chest to show it to Mitch.

The two men smiled together as they stared out into space, taking in the view, knowing they were able to get the autopilot reengaged and it will start up in 30 seconds and steer them away from the scorching sun.

“I’m glad we were able to do this Mitch,” said Frank.

“Me too,” said Mitch. “Hey, I’m going to go make sure we don’t have any other threats left in the other cabins. I’ll be right back.”

“Are you sure? Let me come with you. We barely survived that big guy.”

“I’ll be fine. He probably got everyone anyways. I’ll be right back.”

“Sure,” said Frank. Frank smiled and looked at the stars and watched as the timer clicked down on the screen before the autopilot would engage. He felt satisfied and also redeemed. He smiled as the image of his daughter flooded his brain.

5 seconds left until freedom. “I’m coming.”

*CRASH*

A loud crashing noise was heard that shook the whole front cabin. The screen stopped at 1 second left. Frank was confused as to what had happened. The monitor came up with an error warning that said, “train car disconnected.” Now Frank understood everything clearly and had to act fast. Mitch still held a grudge and must’ve detached the front cabin of the train. He then scrambled as fast as he could as the floor from underneath him began to fall. He could feel the floor giving out underneath him as the train car began to drift away losing gravity. Frank was falling and trying to crawl and run all at the same time. He was grabbing anything he could find to have footing on. Frank went up to the door to see Mitch through the window of the door and the rest of the train quickly distancing itself from him and the front car. Mitch turned away with a smile on his face. Frank thought to himself, “this is his revenge.” Frank knew he had no other chance now. He had no other choice. Frank sprang into action and grabbed a helmet near the door. He latched it into place after taking a huge breath and opened the door up to the cosmos. Frank had no time to think. He leapt from the train car with a fiery determination in his eyes as he slowly drifted towards the door to the second train car, his salvation, as the front train car slowly drifted off towards the sun.

fin