Null Pointer

CWE6 1206, Go Faster

At least this should be an easy day, Matthew Wheeler thought as he read down the profile. Of course, that depended on who his engineer was. The older guys all seemed to hate him, and he hadn’t quite figured out why. He’d studied hard and he knew everything. They still didn’t take him seriously. Admittedly, it was probably hard to take anyone forced to wear neon yellow as part of their uniform seriously. How many more months did he have to wear the rookie vest, anyway? Of course, the younger engineers weren’t always better. The young ones didn’t always know what they were doing. Not all of them had studied as hard as he had and learned as much as he had. He had a job – he was the conductor – he wasn’t supposed to have to do their job, too!

Spotting a guy who didn’t immediately pull a face at the sight of him, Matt asked,”Hey man, you know where I could find James Frayne?” The guy nodded to where two old guys were shooting the breeze over their morning coffee.

Great. The easy day now looked less appealing. An engineer as seasoned as Frayne could do today’s haul in his sleep. Which meant he’d have his full attention available to letting Matt know just how little he thought of him. Maybe I’ll at least get out of him what they all have against me.

With a sigh, Matt walked over to the pair. “Excuse me, I’m looking for James Frayne?”

The redhead—or former redhead, now more gray than not—looked up. “You found him.”

“I’m Matt Wheeler. We’re working together today on train 1206.”

“1206,” James echoed.

“That’s the one,” Matt confirmed. Was Frayne old enough to be losing his hearing?

“That’s the profile?” Frayne asked, reaching for the paperwork Matt was carrying.

“Yeah, want to take a look?” Matt handed it over.

He tried to make small talk with Frayne and his coffee buddy, but only got the usual old guys’ cold shoulder.

“Is there a problem?” He finally asked, exasperated.

“No problem,” Coffee Buddy said absently. “I just don’t like working in a damn daycare center.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t like working at a retirement home,” Matt snapped. It was going to be a great day, he could tell.

“Alright!” Frayne said, sounding amused. “I’ll tell you what. I’m gonna finish my coffee. I’ll meet you on the wagon.”

“Sounds good,” Matt said grimly.

Behind him, as he stalked off, he heard Coffee Buddy say, “You know that punk’s Union, right? Heard they just made him a shop steward at the UTU.”

“In his first year?” Matt didn’t ask the union to make him shop steward. And it wasn’t the sort of thing you said no to, when it was offered, even if you didn’t think you’d earned it yet.

“You know how he got hired? His name’s Wheeler. His two uncles are running things over at Thornwood…and his brother’s a lead welder at Deacon. The whole family’s from White Plains.”

So, his whole family made a living railroading. How was that a problem?

“Now, that figures,” Frayne muttered.

“Here, they’re shit-canning guys every day, but you got the right last name and a rookie’s pay grade, you got a job.”

As soon as he and James were in the van heading to 1206, it became clear what kind of day it was going to be for Matt.

“So, what’s our day?” Frayne asked as if he hadn’t seen the profile.

Matt sighed but it was too early to pick a fight. “They got us going on light power,” he answered. “We’re supposed to pick up freight just past White Plains... then it’s pretty much a straight shot through Albany.”

“Any slow orders?” Frayne quizzed him.

“No.”

“You sure? They’d be highlighted in red,” Frayne informed him, like he didn’t know that. He was a rookie, but he’d finished training, dammit.

“No, no slow orders,” Matt bit out.

“Alright...” Frayne said indulgently, like he was a kid who’d brought home a deformed art project that was still going to get hung on the Christmas tree, no matter how awful it was.

As they walked from the van to 1206, Frayne spoke up again. “I only got one rule. One rule only. You gonna do something, you do it right. You don’t know how to do it, you ask me, alright? Likewise, if you need anything from me, you better speak up, because you’re the conductor. Once we get our freight, it’s your train. I’m just the guy driving it. How long you been out of training?”

“About four months.”

“Four months?”

Damn, Frayne’s habit of echoing back everything he said was going to get really old really fast. “Yeah.”

“Wow. Full-on yellow vest rookie.”

Matt suppressed the urge to roll his eyes. “How long have you been railroading?” He asked instead of saying something less polite.

“28 years. November 13, 1981. 28 years.”

“What did you do before that?” Maybe they could find enough common ground somewhere to survive the day?

“Oh... I don’t know, a bunch of different jobs.”

“Yeah?” Or at least maybe Matt could get him talking about himself and he’d leave Matt to do his job in peace? “No railroading?”

“No, just looking to do something different.”

“Something different?” That was a new one for Matt. Everyone he knew in railroading was a lifer. “What do you mean, something better?” He still remembered the first time one of his uncles sat him in their lap in the conductor’s seat. They just chugged around the yard, never even got on the main, but Matt had known right then that he’d end up in this seat twenty years later.

“No, no. Just... Different. Just different.” There was something there, but it felt too personal for Matt to press. He did wonder, though, what had happened twenty-eight years ago to drive Frayne from whatever he’d been doing with his life before this.

“James, the stop blocks are up. Is there a problem?” Matt radioed his engineer. He’d done his job; why wasn’t the man who’d been on him all morning doing his?

“No, there’s no problem except you got it backwards. Turntable house goes on my end. You’re on the ballast. On my end. Other than that, no problem. No problem at all.” Matt fixed the issue and got back on board with James. “Like I told you... if you don’t know something, just ask. That’s all,” Frayne advised.

“I got it,” Matt grumbled.

“I hope so.”

“Whatever.” Not Matt’s most professional response ever, but Frayne was trying his patience and they didn’t even have freight yet.

“Excuse me?”

“This shit, this ‘Let’s make the new guy prove himself’ bullshit. I gotta tell you, I’ve heard it before and it gets old real fast.”

“Well, that’s how it is at the retirement home,” Frayne replied icily. “Company wants to get rid of us old heads. They give all the jobs to you new guys, you yellow vests.”

“I’m not trying to take anything from anybody,” Matt said firmly. He was wearing the atrocious neon yellow vest, wasn’t he? He was here to earn his place, not to steal it from anyone else!

“As reassuring as that is... a lot of guys don’t see it that way,” Frayne replied, as if he wasn’t one of them.

After a minute, Frayne apparently decided to extend an olive branch. “You from White Plains?”

“Born and raised,” Matt answered with pride. He loved his hometown.

“Yeah?” The echo wasn’t as annoying this time, more encouraging Matt to go on, like Frayne was actually interested.

“My whole family’s from White Plains,” Matt explained.

“Married?”

“Yeah,” Matt answered and then grimaced. “Well, sort of. It’s a long story.”

“We got a long day.”

Olive branch or no, Matt wasn’t going to get into why he was living in a hotel room and hadn’t been home in weeks with James Frayne. At least not yet. If the lawyer called to tell him the judge lifted the restraining order, then maybe he’d share the happy ending.

“How about you? You married?” Matt asked instead.

“Short story. Once. No kids, but I got a nephew that I practically raised most of his nineteen years, and he’s got a wife, just eighteen. Both trying to work their way through college.”

They picked up the freight cars and headed out to the main to finally get their day properly underway. Frayne’s brows scrunched. “How many cars are we supposed to cut in?”

“Twenty, why?”

“Twenty cars. Okay. See the switch stand, up ahead of us? The switch stand, yeah?”

“Uh-huh,” Matt confirmed. Frayne’s tone was back to the one Matt had categorized as “abuse the yellow vest.” He didn’t particularly want to engage.

“Take a look in the rear-view mirror, there. You see the one behind us? Way back there. You see it?”

“Uh-huh.”

“There’s exactly twenty-one cars between the two stands. Don’t ask me how I know. So, why is it, that there’s still more than four and a half cars that are yet to clear?”

“Because I...” was distracted by my legal drama and didn’t pay attention to what I was doing, and Frayne was rushing me because he’s an ass but also because I was taking too long, and I screwed up.

“Excuse me?” Frayne demanded when he didn’t finish the sentence.

“Because I cut...”

“Because what?” Frayne pressed.

“I cut in too many cars,” Matt bit out.

“Cut in too many cars, huh?”

“Maybe if you weren’t on my ass, the whole time, I might be able to think straight and do my job.”

“Now, what do you mean ‘Maybe if I... ’”

“You been on my ass this whole trip!”

“You’re blaming it on me?”

“I’m just saying pick a goddamn job!”

“I got my job! You pick one.”

“Then I pull the throttle,” Matt said. If Frayne wanted his job, he’d take Frayne’s.

“I pull the throttle!” Frayne insisted.

“It’s one, or the other!” Matt told him.

“You’re supposed to pull the pin. You’re five pins too many. Pull the pins, you’re right. Pull the pins.”

“I’ve had my training, alright?” Matt snapped. He’d messed up. He knew it. Did Frayne have to be a dick about it?

“Yeah, but we’re out here in the real world. This ain’t training. In training, they just give you an ‘F’. Out here, you get killed.”

“I screwed up, okay?” Matt admitted.

“Yes, you did.”

“Stop and roll back, and I’ll cut the empties.”

Frayne actually laughed at him. “Roll back? Oh, Lord... we can’t stop out here on the main. We’re more than a mile out on the main, more than a mile to the next stop. You don’t take a consist this size that distance, in reverse.”

“Fine, then we’ll make the turn at the next siding.” He wasn’t wrong. Especially with the extra five cars. They were too much train and not enough engine to run for any length of time in reverse.

“The next siding’s not for ten miles. We do that, we’re late. I don’t run late. Just green-sheet it and we’ll move on.” Frayne looked practically gleeful.

“Come on, we green-sheet it, it’s my ass! Cut me some slack,” Matt pled.

“What do you mean, it’s your ass? You’re a Wheeler.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“That means you can call your uncle and they’ll take care of it.”

Matt stared at him. Is that what this was all about, all the old-timers hating him? His uncle would be the first in line to rip him a new one for screwing up as simple a thing as a cut in. “Is that what this is about?”

“No, it’s about the five cars too many.”

“We’re gonna stop, roll back and cut those empties!” Matt declared. “This may be your engine, but it’s my goddamn train.”

“Yes, it is your train!”

“I’m the goddamn conductor!”

“That’s true!”

Matt could feel a headache coming on. This was turning into a playground argument where to win you eventually argued against yourself to force your opponent to agree with you that you were right, because they were being contrary to be contrary, not because they were right.

Fortunately (maybe?), the radio crackled to life. “1206, check in.”

“Alright, I’ll write you up and green-sheet your ass,” Matt decided.

“Will you? How about that?” To Matt’s dismay, Frayne didn’t seem any less gleeful.

“1206, this is dispatch. What’s your location? Over.”

Frayne should really answer that, Matt thought. Matt was in no mood to deal with anything, especially because Frayne was laughing at him. “Something’s funny?” He growled.

“No.”

“What the hell are you laughing at? What are you laughing at?”

“Because it’s funny. You’re a funny guy. Well-trained, but funny.” Finally, he grabbed the radio. “Yeah, this is 1206. We’re 60 miles from Albany. Forty minutes out of Fuller Yard.”

“Negative 1206, clear your train at the next siding until further instructed, over.”

That wasn’t a normal directive coming from a usually even-keeled dispatcher. Matt might only have four months to his name, but even he knew that.

Frayne got serious. “What’s up?”

“There’s an unmanned train out of Fuller on the northbound track, over.”

“On our track? A coaster?”

“1206, we don’t have all the details, yet. Just proceed to the next siding and hold tight, over.”

“Next siding’s not for 10 miles.”

“Affirmative, 1206. Just get in that siding and sit tight until we give you the all-clear, over.”

“Affirmative!”

Matt found himself leaning forward, as if he’d be able to see the train coming at them. “It’s coming right at us.” He couldn’t see another train, but he spotted the news chopper, so this wasn’t a drill.

Frayne hadn’t said anything since dispatch ordered them to head for the siding, but Matt couldn’t miss that they’d picked up speed and, well, that Frayne hadn’t said anything. At last, Frayne reached for the radio. “1206 to dispatch, over.”

“What’s wrong?” Matt demanded. Tone alone told him there was trouble.

“What’s wrong? We’re not gonna fit in that siding, that’s what’s wrong. 1206 to dispatch, over.”

“1206, are you in the siding yet? What’s your location?”

“No, we’re not in the hole. We’re not gonna make it. Can’t do it. Too much train. I’m gonna need you to realign the switch, so we can proceed to the next siding.”

“1206, you have to get off the main, over.”

“I understand that, but you gotta understand this. We’re not going to fit.”

“1206, stand by.” That was not a good sign, either.

“That siding’s a good 3000 ft, end to end,” Matt protested.

“Check your timetable. It’s gonna tell you the siding is 4111 feet, but that’s signal to signal. In reality, it’s more like 2500 feet. You add those five cars that you picked up...”

“We can fit.” They had to fit. There was an unmanned train coming straight at them. It wasn’t like a wrong way car on a one-way street, where you could swerve. Trains didn’t swerve. Two trains in opposite directions on the same track only ended one way.

“No, we won’t fit,” James said stubbornly. “Dispatch, this is 1206. Can you tell me where the nearest rip track is?”

“1206, there’s one in 6.2 miles. How fast are you going?”

“55 miles an hour.”

“1206, go faster, over.”

“Why? Is that coaster still on the main?”

“1206, 777 is not a coaster. I repeat, it is not a coaster, over.”

“You’re telling me it’s under power?” Frayne clarified.

A head-on with another train was bad enough. A head on at speed? “Get in the damn siding,” Matt ordered.

“1206, stand by. 1206, if you’re going for it, that rip track is confirmed vacant. It’s your call, James. We need to throw the switch if you’re staying on.”

“We’re not staying on!” Matt yelled. He had a wife and life left to live after today! “Pull the brake, James!”

“We pull the brake and side up. I crash. I know what the hell I’m doing.”

“Bullshit! You’re gonna get us killed,” Matt accused, reaching for the brake.

“Hey!” Frayne yelled at him, stopping him from yanking it.

“1206, I need an answer, over,” dispatch told them as if it wasn’t a life and death decision they were making in the cab of 1206.

Frayne at least had the courtesy to look Matt in the eye as he sealed their fate. “Realign the switch. Over.”

Matt wasn’t the religious sort, but he was really wishing he was right then. This was insane. They were playing chicken with trains. He jumped when the dispatcher spoke again.”1206, this is dispatch. 1206, we ran the math. At over 2000, you wouldn’t have fit. Good call, over.”

Frayne glanced his way, just to make sure Matt knew that he knew that Matt knew that he’d been right, because that was clearly the most important thing in this situation. “Thank you, but I need to know where that oncoming train is. How far away is it?”

“1206, we’re not exactly sure.”

Matt felt his eyebrows climb and – not that he’d say it to the man – was impressed Frayne’s response was delivered in a mostly level and absolutely polite tone. “You’re not sure? Well, find out!”

Dispatch did not find out. Their next hint on the whereabouts of the runaway train came in the form of a fireball blossoming above the trees down the track ahead of them. “Holy shit!” Matt breathed. “Maybe it derailed.”

Frayne didn’t respond, and Matt had a nagging feeling the experienced engineer did not attribute the same cause to the explosion.

When they passed the next milepost, Frayne reached for the radio once more. “Fuller Yard, Fuller Yard. This is 1206. We’re passing milepost 52, heading northbound on the Main 1.”

Matt started when a woman’s voice responded. There were few enough women in railroading, and for one to be high enough up the chain of command to be involved in cleaning up this mess, even if it was her yard’s mess? It was impressive.

“1206, who am I speaking, with?” She demanded.

“James Frayne, the engineer.”

“This is Margery Trask, yardmaster at Fuller.” Well, the title went along with Matt’s thought that low-ranking employees would have been instructed to sit down, shut up, and stay out of the way until the crisis was resolved. “Why are you still on the mainline?” She asked.

Why indeed?

“We were directed to a siding, that’s a no-go. We’re heading to a rip track just past milepost 5-0. We need to know the location of your yard’s train.”

“It just passed milepost 47.”

“Holy shit!” Matt repeated. They had two miles to go to safety, the runaway only three miles from beating them to it.

“They tried to side it, but it jumped the switch and derailed the lash-up.”

And it’s moving fast, if it jumped the switch, Matt realized. At least as fast as they were, but maybe faster.

“Lash-up? Who was driving?” Frayne demanded anxiously. Matt frowned. He hadn’t considered that. Aside from his own family, he hardly knew anyone yet. Someone with Frayne’s experience? He knew the engineer. Might have been a friend, even. And engineers didn’t walk away from derailing. The lucky ones lived, but given the fireball they’d seen?

“Sam Elliot.”

“Elliot? You said Sam Elliot?”

“Sam Elliot, an engineer from Brewster.”

“You know him?” Matt asked, but it was a stupid question. The answer was written all over Frayne’s face. He knew him.

“What’s your power on the point?” Margery Trask asked Frayne calmly.

“5,000 horses; she’s not a hotshot, but she’s still got some life left in her, over.”

“Give her all you got.”

No shit, Matt thought, anxiously looking out the window, wondering how long they had before they’d see the other train and if it’d be long enough.

It was not reassuring at all to Matt that the next thing Frayne did was pick up his cellphone and place a call. “Winthrop, listen, don’t hang up. Don’t hang up.”

Frayne, who was probably old enough that he only used his cellphone at work, still having a landline at home, had his volume all the way up. Matt could hear, barely, “Winthrop”‘s responses.

“Uncle James, I’m busy, okay?”

“Okay, I understand.” Frayne actually sounded defeated. Matt wondered if maybe his relationship with his nephew wasn’t as rosy as Matt had assumed. “I just…”

“Uncle James?”

“I just wanted to tell you that I love you. That I’m proud of the man you’re becoming.”

“Uncle James, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing, nothing. I just…”

“Uncle James, what’s wrong?” Apparently repeating things ran in the family.

“Just tell your wife I love you both, okay. I got to go.”

Matt thought he heard a last “What’s wrong?” before Frayne ended the call.

“1206, how are you holding up?” Yardmaster Trask asked over the radio.

“About a half a mile from that rip track, over.”

“Chances are, you’re going to see 777’s nose, any minute now.”

That wasn’t reassuring.

“Affirmative!” Neither was Frayne finally pulling the brake like Matt had wanted six miles ago at the siding.

“Why are you braking?”

“Trust me, if we head into this hot, we’ll tear right off the track.”

Matt was going to have to trust, because, sure enough, he could see the oncoming train. “Oh, damn.”

“Get her down to 40 and brace yourself. You need to get at least ten cars into the siding.”

She was definitely not reassuring. Calm, professional, kind even, but not reassuring, Matt decided as he braced himself as best as he could. Trains weren’t really designed for crashes, not like cars, because this sort of thing wasn’t supposed to happen!

Matt braced himself, knowing he was likely bracing himself for death, not life.

The roar of 777 going past the engine on the main was loud, but the impact was deafening. Everything shook around Matt and he wished, again, that he had something to pray to in that moment. And then everything stilled and went almost unnaturally quiet.

They were still gathering their wits when the radio came alive. It was Brewster dispatch again, not Margery Trask at Fuller Yard. “James, go to 6. James, go to 6.”

James obediently tuned to the correct channel. “Yeah, I’m at 6, go!”

“They’re evacuating Croton.”

“They’re going to derail the train,” Matt concluded. They had to.

“What are they using?” James asked and Matt didn’t like his tone. It was the sound of the other shoe dropping on his miraculous survival.

“Standard DRE.”

Matt nodded almost to himself. “Yeah, a portable derailer.”

Frayne hurried out of the cab, Matt following in his wake, trying not to think too hard about how many cars had been essentially vaporized by 777 without any obvious ill-effects to the flying train. “What are you doing?” Matt demanded.

“I got a look at that train’s last coupler knuckle. It was open. We take off right now, we get back on the main. We can chase it down in reverse,” Frayne answered matter-of-factly.

“Chase? Whoa, wait a minute.”

Frayne shook his head. “The only way to stop that kind of power, grab it by the tail. Boom, gun it in the opposite direction.”

“We can’t just chase it down. If it goes down, we’re gonna be a wreck on a wreck,” Matt protested. Did his engineer miss the part about how they were putting a derailer on the track?

“Doesn’t matter, there’s a good chance the derailer won’t work,” Frayne said, unhooking their engine from what was left of their freight.

“It’s called a derailer, for crying out loud! That’s what they do!”

Frayne shook his head. “A train that size, going that fast, it will vaporize anything that gets in its way.”

Just like it had their freight. Still, Matt felt compelled to argue, “Bullshit! They wouldn’t use it if...”

“They’re wrong, alright? They’re wrong. Are you in, or are you out?”

“If you want to get yourself killed, you do it alone.”

“You know what? Ask your wife what she thinks,” Frayne offered as a parting shot, grabbing the rail to step up into the engine.

That hit Matt. Frayne had been right about everything all day. “Wait! If you’re right and that derailer fails, what are the odds it makes it to White Plains?”

“You saw the train, what do you think?”

I think I’m going to die, Matt didn’t bother to say, climbing back into the engine.

“1206, this is Margery Trask. Are you there?”

“1206, over.”

“Just wanted to see how you boys are doing.”

“We’re doing about 60 mile an hour, Margery.”

Matt snickered. Once you accepted the insanity, Frayne wasn’t terrible.

“Sorry? James, I don’t understand.”

“We’re going after your train.”

“1206, I’m not hearing you.” More like couldn’t believe anyone was this crazy.

“The rear knuckle was left open. So, if we can catch up, we can tie it on to our locomotive. Try and slow down 777.”

“James, you can’t.”

“We already are. Portable derailer’s not gonna cut it, Margery.”

“Who said anything about a derailer?” Margery asked, sounding genuinely puzzled.

“Dispatch, they said that they’re evacuating Croton. Two plus two is four.”

Someone on the Fuller side spoke, close enough to the radio to come across. “It’s Crimper. He said he’s still following—”

“No, no, no. Tell him I’ll call him back. Get me Riker, now!” Margery Trask returned to them. “James, that train’s carrying 30,000 gallons of toxic chemicals. They had a window before but that train’s going into populated areas. There’s no way they’d derail it now.”

“Are you sure about that?” Frayne asked, sounding like he would believe her if she said so.

“Look, let me make some calls.”

“Make some calls, please,” Frayne agreed. Matt did, too. They had to stop 777. If they couldn’t derail it, either because of the population or because a portable derailer wasn’t enough, like Frayne claimed, and they’d already tried lashing-up from the front… maybe Frayne was right? Maybe they did have to chase it down from behind? That didn’t mean it wasn’t a horrible plan. He was all for a better plan, and hoped Margery Trask’s next radio call would confirm they could fall back.

“What’s the fastest you’ve taken a single engine like this?” Matt finally gathered the courage to ask. They were going to have to haul it to catch up. 777 was a bigger, faster, more powerful engine, apparently going at full power.

“Unattached?” Frayne asked.

“Yeah.”

“Fifty, 55.” Normal freight top speeds. “Of course, I was going forward.”

Was it too late to put his head in his hands and cry? Given their current speed was more like “sixty, sixty-five”, and probably needed to increase further to pull this off?

“1206, you there?” Margery Trask asked.

“This is 1206, over.”

“James, you’re right about the derailment. They’re planning an attempt outside of Croton.”

“Tell them idiots, it ain’t gonna work. That portable derailer, it’s worthless.”

“She already told us.” Matt hadn’t heard that voice before, and by the looks of it, neither had James.

“James, this is Alan Riker, VP of Operations, patched in at his request, open mike.”

“Yeah, we’re derailing 777, James. It’s a done decision. Like it or not, it’s our best option, at this stage. There’ll be less collateral damage in Croton. It’s already being evacuated and we can’t let 777 make it to White Plains.”

That Matt agreed with.

“Look! Mr. Riker, with all due respect, I’ve been railroading 28 years. I’m telling you, we got a real chance to stop this thing.”

“No, we already tried.”

“That was from the front. We’re long hood, lead back. It’s a different situation. We got more control, now.”

“What if I cancel the derailer and you fail, James? That train will be doing 70 miles an hour into that elevated s-curve, in White Plains. The damage will be a hundred times worse.”

“Right! I’m just telling you, the portable derailer is worthless. You got too much train traveling entirely too fast.”

“Maybe 1206 should just stay on it, as a backup,” Margery offered diplomatically.

“Look, I am not jeopardizing more personnel and more property just because some engineer wants to play hero. End of discussion! That train is our property, it’s our decision! Now you stop your pursuit, or I will fire you!”

Frayne sputtered, but Matt immediately got the feeling it wasn’t because he was cowed by the threat. “Fire? You already did.” Matt’s head snapped up. Who was he riding with?

“Already did, what?”

“You’ve already fired me. I received my 90-day notice in the mail, 72 days ago. Forced early retirement, half benefits.”

“So, you’re going to risk your life for us with three weeks left.”

“Not for you. I’m not doing it for you.”

Matt wasn’t doing it for Riker, either. “James, let me see that thing.”

Frayne raised an eyebrow but handed over the radio.

“Mr. Riker, this is Matt Wheeler, your conductor.” If everyone hated him for his last name, then maybe it actually meant something, even to corporate idiots like Riker? “I’m letting you know, we’re going to run this train down.”

“Maybe you didn’t hear what I just said, Wheeler. I will fire you!”

“Well, that’s too bad. I was just starting to like this job.” Riker wouldn’t fire him. If this went wrong, Matt would be dead before he could be fired, or, if it went right, public opinion would call them heroes. It’d be even worse press than the runaway train to fire them. He handed the radio back to James. There was nothing more to say.

“God damn it, you listen to me, you punk-ass rookie!” VP of Operations knew who he was. Maybe the name really did mean something. “You will be fired!”

“You’re breaking up. Sorry, you’re...” Matt was reasonably sure that radio signals didn’t break up like cell phone signals did, but he wasn’t going to call Frayne on it, especially if a corporate type that spent all day in an office didn’t know the difference between a radio breaking up and cell phone doing so.

“This garbage is not...” Mr. Riker was still fuming when Frayne replaced the radio on its holder and smiled at Matt who was laughing as silently as he could to not give away the ruse.

Frayne waited two full minutes, which felt like an eternity when they were pushing 70 chasing down a train full of toxic chemicals that, if they failed, would almost certainly derail where both their families lived and worked, before he reached for the radio again. “1206 to Fuller Yard. Margery, are you there, over?”

“James, I’m real sorry about Riker.”

“That’s okay. Listen, listen. Is he off?”

“Yeah, he’s gone.”

“Okay, listen up. I’m going to need you to do us a favor. I need you to keep us posted on the speed and location of 777. Location and speed, over.” She didn’t answer immediately, probably aware that her job was also threatened if they stayed on. “Margery?”

“James, 777’s nine miles out of Croton. You got some catching up to do.”

“Nine miles out of Croton,” he confirmed, setting the radio down. He turned to Matt. “What did you say your wife’s first name was?”

“Maddie.”

“So, what was the long story you didn’t want to make long?”

Given what they were getting into together, Matt couldn’t find a good reason not the share his tale of marital woe. “I come home from work, two weeks ago, and she’s texting on the phone. I ask her, who with? She says, ‘Nobody’. I say, ‘Let me see the phone’. She says no. This goes on, about five or six times.”

“Wait, you’re losing me. She’s texting...”

“There’s this guy we both went to school with. He’s a cop. He’s always had a thing for Maddie. Going way back.”

“1206, where are you?” Margery interrupted.

“1206 here, Margery. We’re just passing milepost 5-7.”

“You’re about a mile and a half behind.”

“How far out of Croton is 777?”

“Seven and a half miles. It picked up speed, you better step on it.”

“I’m stepping on it, in it, around it, and through it, Margery.” And he was. Matt wasn’t sure they were exactly friends yet, but they were both resolved not to let this thing get to White Plains. “Thank you, over.” He looked at Matt expectantly.

“She’s texting on the phone. I keep on asking for it, she keeps on saying no, and she starts to walk away and I grab for it.”

“You hit her?”

“No. No, no, no, no. I mean, I scared her, but I didn’t hit her. Anyway, I drive to this guy’s house and tell him we need to talk. ‘Let’s take a ride.’ He jumps in my truck and starts in with, ‘You got it all wrong; we’re just friends’. Then he stops once he sees the gun I got sitting on the dash.”

“Oh!” Well, yeah. Not his finest hour.

“I look him in the eye and I say ‘She’s my wife, you find a new friend.’” He’d felt completely justified in the moment, too.

“You pulled a gun on a cop?”

Matt nodded, but Margery interrupted again. “James? James, 777 just passed milepost 61.”

“Thank you, Margery.”

“You want to hear the kicker?” He asked Frayne.

“Yes, I do.”

“It wasn’t even him that was texting her. It was my sister-in-law. Anyway, by the time I got home, his buddy’s waiting for me. Just waiting to serve me with this restraining order. Maddie wouldn’t even look at me. So, I’m living out of a hotel. There was a hearing today. The judge ordered a 30-day extension. It’s like one day everything’s going okay and then the next, it’s all falling apart faster than you can put it back together.”

“Yeah, never too late, though,” James tells him sagely.

Unless we die today, Matt thought grimly.

“1206, Margery. We’re just passing milepost 6-2. Milepost 6-2, over.”

“Still a mile gap, maybe more,” she answered helpfully.

“We’re not gaining on her, James,” Matt observed.

“Hold on.” Matt held on, but 1206 wasn’t meant for a highspeed chase.

“We’re not gonna catch it before Croton,” Matt pointed out the next time they checked in with Fuller Yard.

“James, you’re closing the gap. You should cut your speed. Allow yourself some stopping distance, just in case.”

That sounded like such a reasonable idea to Matt that he knew immediately what Frayne’s response was going to be. “No can do, Margery. If we slow down now, we’ll never catch it. Not before White Plains, over.”

“It’s your call.”

Everything Matt had ever learned in training said it was actually his call, but common niceties like chain of command had abandoned them about the time 777 left Fuller Yard, and it wasn’t like he really wanted to make this particular call.

“You’re 100 percent sure that derailer won’t work?” He had to ask.

“Yes. 100 percent? No.”

“Which one is it?”

“50-50,” Frayne said with a smirk.

“Pretty funny,” Matt replied with a roll of his eyes. You’d think he wasn’t asking what their chances of surviving the next ten minutes were. “And if it does?”

“If it does then, we’re a wreck on a wreck,” Frayne said grimly.

“James, do you copy? James?” It was Margery. Matt couldn’t quite interpret what the mix of relief and concern in her voice meant. Had 777 derailed, thus sentencing them to a gruesome fate, or had 777 not derailed, saving them, and condemning White Plains?

“This is 1206, over,” James replied.

“You were right. It barely bumped.”

He’d have agreed with James’ vindicated exclamation if it wasn’t such bad news. He’d really wanted Frayne to be wrong about the derailer, wreck on a wreck or not.

“Hot damn,” Matt whispered. He’d seen demos of a portable derailer’s function in training. The things were literally designed to force a train off the tracks. 777 apparently had so much momentum that it didn’t even need tracks anymore. And if it didn’t need tracks to run, then the derailment on the White Plains s-curve wasn’t the most terrifying possible outcome. The most terrifying possible outcome was that it wouldn’t stop there. How much of the city could this train plow through after it left the tracks? If corporate executives like Riker were running the show, they’d provide evacuation perimeters to local authorities for the derailment, not the possibility of the train continuing on. What if Maddie didn’t evacuate far enough? What about Frayne’s nephew and wife? What about the rest of Matt’s family in White Plains?

He couldn’t think about any of that. They’d catch her; they’d catch 777 before White Plains.

To distract himself, he asked, “So, what’d you mean about being married once?”

“Nell, my wife, she died of a copperhead bite. Happened in the summerhouse on our property four years ago. Win—my nephew—he made us get a snakebite kit back when he was in Scouts, made sure everyone knew how to use it. But I wasn’t sure where it was anymore and it didn’t have antivenin anyway, so I thought it’d be better to just take her into the doctor’s office in town. We live out a fair bit, so it’d be faster than waiting for the ambulance or digging around for the kit. Car broke down, and she… she didn’t make it. Win blames me, barely talks to me, can’t look at me.”

“I’m sorry,” Matt said and meant it. He’d gotten himself into his current mess with Maddie. James had just had terrible luck and lost the woman he’d clearly loved.

“Me too. Me too. Every night I’d come home, tell her about my day. Where I’d been, what I hauled, who annoyed me.”

“Guess I would have made the evening report, huh?” Matt said a genuine smile, one of the few he’d had this terrible day.

“Yes, you would have made it, definitely. You should call your wife.”

“I would, but it’s her day off. She’s probably sleeping.”

“Don’t make excuses. Wake her up.”

“Been calling for the past two weeks. She still hasn’t called me back.”

“She won’t, you got to call her. Don’t you know how that works? You quit too easy.”

Did he? Was he being weak, or cowardly? Or was he finally doing right by Maddie? If he died here today, wouldn’t it be easier for her if she hated him, if he went with her not wanting him? Wouldn’t that be easier than calling her, telling her he loved her, and then letting her watch on the news – the news helicopter was still right over top of them, so he had no illusions that he and Frayne would get to die in private – as he died trying to give her a chance to live?

“Okay, you’re getting close. The gap’s at a mile and 777 is six miles to White Plains,” Margery reported. Like them, her voice sounded tenser each time they talked, but, like them, she remained collected (or at least like James; Matt didn’t feel particularly collected at this point). “Now listen, James. I got a guy here named Lynch, from the FRA. Now, I’m inclined to defer to your judgment here—” About damn time someone did, Matt thought. James had been right every time. Every insane decision and pronouncement that flew in the face of standard procedure and everything else he’d learned in training, James’d been right. “But he—”

James interrupted. “Alright, put him on. We could use all the help that we can get.”

A new voice came on. “It’s about slowing 777, once you’ve tied on. I know conventional wisdom says to just gun it in the opposite direction. But you’ll have a better shot alternating full throttle with dynamic braking.”

“Yeah, but we can’t afford to lose counter-thrust.”

“Well, what you’ll lose in counter-thrust you’ll compensate for in tractive force.”

“Are you sure about that?”

“Well, it’s more of a hunch based on some quick calculations.”

“It’s a hunch,” Frayne announced to the world at large. “I’m 70 miles an hour and he’s giving us a hunch. Okay, thank you. Put Margery back on, please.”

“It’s me, James.”

“Yeah, Margery. Does this guy know what he’s talking about?”

“In a perfect world... yes. I’d say yes.”

James met his eyes as he responded to Margery. “In a perfect world, okay.” Matt understood the message. They’d left the perfect world behind when they picked up their five freight cars too many.

“Passing milepost 7-6, Margery, over.”

“You’re only a half mile away.”

“Half a mile, out,” Frayne repeated, finally sounding a little bit like he was trying to settle himself with what it meant to be half a mile out from 777.

“James, running in reverse how are you gonna gauge our gap distance? I could go out there. I could signal you by hand.”

“At 70 miles an hour?”

It was an insane plan, but they’d left sane back with “a perfect world”. That argument wasn’t an argument anymore. “I’m asking, would it help?”

Frayne looked him over consideringly. “Alright, radio and hand signals. We’ll combine, okay? And be careful.”

“I will,” Matt promised. Falling off or getting squashed between two trains at these speeds was not on his bucket list. Of course, chasing down a train full of toxic chemicals in reverse just miles out of the White Plains curve at these speeds wasn’t on his bucket list, either, so.

“And, oh, take that vest off, too.”

“Why?” He asked, trying to think like James. Was it a safety hazard? Could it catch on something?

“Just take it off. I don’t want to look out this window and see you in that yellow vest. It’ll freak me out.”

That’s the part of this situation that will freak you out? Matt thought, bemused, even as he shed the vest. Here goes the second stupidest thing Matthew Wheeler has ever done in his life. And it was a close second to getting into it with Sergeant Molinson about Maddie with a loaded gun in plain sight on the dash. He couldn’t even claim he hadn’t thought about how it would look. He’d meant it to be a threat. Which is why it was the first stupidest thing he’d ever done. This ranked second because at least this he was doing for the right reasons.

777 was somehow no less intimidating from the back then she’d been when they were head-on. Matt kept his right hand on his radio, thumb over the talk button, and his left free to signal. They were closing fast. “Ten cars, James!”

“Affirmative, over.”

“Alright, here she comes!” Matt shouted over the noise of the track and the approaching train. He signaled the distance.

“Three cars?” James confirmed over the radio.

“Three cars, steady.”

“Steady, steady!” He wasn’t sure if he was talking to James, or himself, but he signaled the closing gap.

“Two cars?”

“Yeah, two cars.”

“Copy. Steady, over.” James was definitely talking to him.

“Keep it coming, keep it coming! Keep it coming! Steady, steady!” Matt hung on tight. Running into 777 was going to be no less jarring than 777 running into them.

He had his eyes down, focused on the couplers to the exclusion of all else. The noise of a seal on the final car blowing off under the pressure didn’t even make it to his conscious attention. The grain suddenly flying through his field of view did, though.

“Matt, what was that?”

“The grain car blew a seal!”

“Are we tied off? Matt, what’s going on?” The problem was Matt couldn’t tell. There was just grain everywhere, flying around. He’d have to get down there. This might end up being the stupidest thing he ever did after all.

“Are we tied off?” Frayne demanded again.

“No, James, it didn’t work. Our knuckle closed!” The gap between the trains widened.

“Matt, use hand signals! Hand signals!” Matt lowered himself part way, so he could see better and then signaled for James to bring the trains together again before he braced himself for the second impact. “We tied on?”

“We’re good, we’re good!”

“What?” Matt could barely hear himself think, so he wasn’t surprised Frayne was having trouble parsing words out of train noise and grain noise and general chaos and blood drumming in their veins.

“Oh, shit! James, the pin didn’t fall!”

“Say again. The what? Matt, are we tied on?”

Matt gestured the failure. “It’s not gonna work,” he said into the radio. “The pin didn’t fall.”

“What?”

“The pin didn’t fall! It’s not locking!” They were coupled for now, but as soon as they hit the brakes or throttle forward, they’d come loose.

“Alright, well, look. Try and get down there and see what you can do. Be careful! Be careful.”

Matt climbed down, trying to see through the haze of still flying grain. He stepped out onto the pieces of steel that coupled train cars together. They felt so much sturdier in a train yard at a tenth the speed. They felt so much sturdier, and bigger, when he was standing on the ground beside them dropping or pulling the pin, rather than on them trying to force the pin into a hole it didn’t want to drop into. He kicked harder at the pin.

“Matt!” He was apparently starting to grow on his engineer, because James sounded genuinely worried when he shouldn’t have been surprised that Matt dropped out of sight to wrestle with the pin. “Matt, can you read me?”

He could, but he was a little busy hanging on to work his radio and answer. With all the noise, James had barely been able to hear him over the radio. There was no point in wasting breath trying to shout back without it. He just had to get the damn pin to drop. This whole thing started because he left too many pins dropped. Now he couldn’t get the one he needed down.

Finally, the pin dropped all the way, locking 1206 and 777 together. Matt started to push himself up to get back on the deck of 1206, once more ignoring James. “Matt, can you read me? Matt!” in favor of holding on to the trains with two hands.

The trains jolted together just before Matt realized his foot had slipped down into a gap in the coupling. The strong, immovable, steel coupling he recalled from his time in train yards around parked trains reasserted itself with a vengeance, crushing his foot. It pulled him down. He screamed, knowing no one would hear him, and no one could help him even if they did. He either held on until he could wrest whatever was left of his foot free, or he didn’t, and fell to the tracks. He had no illusions. With 777 and 1206 both under power, they wouldn’t bump for him any more than 777 had for the derailer.

He clung to the railing he still had a grip on for dear life until his brain accepted the pain and he could do anything other than hurt. He was hanging, back to the ground, one hand on 777’s last car’s railing, one hand on 1206’s, his foot still trapped in the coupling.

He tried letting go with one hand, then the other, to see if he could sit up, get himself over to one side or the other. It wasn’t easy. He honestly expected to drop beneath the speeding trains any second. Eventually he managed to drag himself back up on the platform of 1206. He lay there for a bit, panting and in pain.

After a minute, he forced himself to finish the job of dragging himself upright. His injured foot touched the platform and he screamed again. It hurt. It hurt more than he thought pain could hurt. It wasn’t important right now. What was important was that they were locked onto 777, and he needed to drag himself back into the cab of 1206. That’s all there was left. There was no help for his foot until they stopped 777, no relief from the pain until then, and his situation was only going to get worse the longer he was out there. His balance was shot, which meant his chances of getting thrown off the trains when they lurched from going faster than the track was designed for had increased exponentially. His arms were already starting to feel the strain, and the adrenaline dump wouldn’t hold out forever. He needed to get back to the cab.

Stubbornly he staggered his way back into the cab and his seat.

“You alright?” James asked with genuine concern.

“I’m great,” Matt said sarcastically, leaning down to see if he could get his boot off and see what he was dealing with. His foot was miraculously intact. There was a slit in his boot where the shoe met the sole and it was pouring more blood than could possibly be healthy, but it was still recognizably a boot, which meant his whole foot, less the blood, was in there somewhere, which was more than he’d expected while he was hanging hammock-style between the two trains.

“Hey, hey, don’t touch that! Don’t touch that boot! Here, just wrap it up with this,” James insisted, throwing him a roll of duct tape. “Wrap it real tight, all around.”

Matt’s foot was throbbing inside his boot and he really wanted the boot off, but, as he kept telling himself, James had been right about everything today. Every single thing. And, as much as he wanted to know how bad it was, there was nothing he could do except freak out, and potentially pass out, about it in the cab of 1206, so better not to know and not to risk making it worse.

“You okay?” James asked when he’d finished taping himself back together.

“I’m alright, I’m alright.” It was a lie. It was such a lie. But given how long it had taken them to get coupled with 777, and their distance to White Plains… he probably wasn’t going to die from blood loss before he died from their derailment on the curve, which meant, in the context of their current situation, he was alright.

James nodded. “Margery, how far we got? How far to White Plains? Over.”

“Four miles. You guys are doing great. You’re cutting it close, though. How’s Matt?”

James looked over at him, at his propped up, duct taped boot, the grain sticking to every bit of him. “He’s, uh... he’s different, over.” James replaced the radio and put his hands on the controls. “Ready for a little tug-of-war?”

“Let’s do it.” Matt hadn’t come this far to not dance the dance.

“Match our speed with theirs.”

It wasn’t a dance. It was war. James was right again. “James, we’re gonna snap right off.”

“No, we’re not, we’re not. We’re just stretching, that’s all. We’re stretching.”

He’s been right about everything else. He’s been right about everything else, Matt repeated over and over in his head as they “stretched”.

Matt wasn’t sure James even really remembered he was in the cab. He was clear that the engineer wasn’t talking to him. “We should be slowing down... which we’re not. Shoot. Go to the dynamic. Alternate full throttle. Come on, baby,” he cooed to 1206.

Finally, he gave a pleased “Ah” of approval.

“What’s our speed?” Matt asked.

“We’re under 50,” Frayne answered.

Who knew the top speed this section of railroad was rated for could feel so slow?

“Margery, how far away?” Frayne asked.

“Three miles. FRA’s got men on the ground ready to hop onboard as soon as you guys get it under 20.”

“Alright, tell them be ready to hop, over.” Matt nodded fervently. The FRA guys and the corporate guys had screwed up at least three attempts to stop this beast. They’d better not fail this one.

“Shoot!”

“What is it?” Matt demanded.

“We’re gaining speed. Consist is too heavy. We’re being dragged. Margery!”

“I’m here, James.”

“We’re gonna be coming in too hot. Let them know.”

“The limit on that curve is 15. I don’t know if you can take it much faster, maybe 20, 25 max?”

The limit on the rail they’d been on this whole chase was 50, so they had that going for them.

“We may not have a choice. Just tell them it’s gonna be real hot.”

“What about the braking on the freight cars?” Each of the cars had its own brake, to keep it parked in the yard. The problem was getting to them when they were coupled and moving at nearly sixty miles per hour.

“Good, good,” James agreed after a minute’s thought.

“Alright, I’m on it,” Matt said, carefully lowering his bum foot back to the floor.

“No, just sit down. No, no. I’ve got it. Sit tight. I’ll go out. Sit down. No, in fact, here, come here,” Frayne ordered, getting out of his seat. “You sit here. I’ll go out.” Matt plopped down in the engineer’s seat, relieved. As soon as he’d tried to take a step on his bad foot, he’d realized his mistake. “Just keep it at four,” James instructed. Matt nodded, putting his hand on the lever in question. “You alright? Take it easy,” James said.

“Yeah,” Matt confirmed. He could do this. Sit and hold it at four.

“Hold that dynamic at a four. Four,” James reiterated. “Integrate it with the throttle, if you have to. Hold it at a four, integrate the throttle. Burn the block out, it doesn’t matter.”

Matt took a deep breath to say something. James wasn’t going out to do something any safer than what he’d done and he’d almost gotten killed. Given the feeling in his boot, might actually have done so and was just waiting on the final curtain. This might be the last he saw of James Frayne. His last words to the man.

“Hey, don’t get sentimental on me. Makes me think I’m gonna die. Just hold that at four.” James was out the door in a rush of wind before Matt could say anything.

“Come on, James,” he said to the empty cab.

Facing backwards, because they’d coupled in reverse after all, Matt couldn’t see James. Not that he’d be able to see much anyway, once James moved on from the last car. However, someone at Fuller Yard was intermittently opening the channel, and he could hear those gathered there reacting.

“Way to go, James.”

“Let’s go, James.”

“Yes! Come on.”

“Come on! You can do it!”

Matt had been absently listening for long enough that he almost missed it when a real message came from Fuller. “Matt, how fast you going?”

“Thirty-four,” he answered. James was doing it. They were half way there. Just had to get her under twenty. “Alright, we’re dropping, thirty-three,” Matt confirmed to Yardmaster Trask.

Matt should have known better. They didn’t get under twenty.

“Shit! James!” He screeched when the dynamic brakes gave out. He knew in the back of his head that they could. They’d had a whole lesson in training about how to recognize what was happening if it happened to them, and how to coast into a siding or rip track with only the air brake, but the assumption was they had unlimited stopping distance and were going no more than 50, not that they were tail-end fighting a beast at full throttle with just a couple miles of track left to the curve.

“Yeah, yeah, I hear you, I hear you!” James’ voice was reassuring, even though Matt was 95% certain there was nothing the engineer could do. Their plan just went up in literal flames.

“We just lost our brakes!” He reported.

James’ silence confirmed it. James was it now. He’d have to brake each car, and they’d have to hope they could hold on through the curve. “Hot” didn’t begin to describe how they were coming in now. If they made it through the curve, they might have long enough for James to make it all the way up, car by car, braking all the way, to the cab of 777, but that was a big “might” on the tail of an even larger “if”.

They jolted over worn rails. “James! James, you alright?” Matt knew the man had to be climbing on top of the cars to get from end to end. It was risky as hell and jolts like that couldn’t be good.

“I’m here, Matt!” Matt let out the breath he was holding. “What happened?”

“We’re picking up speed, again.” Of course they were. No brakes, the engine block on its last gasp and only however many cars James had reached braking.

“Can you still slow it down? We’re almost at the curve.”

He could probably see it, Matt realized. “James, our engine block’s overheated. I don’t think those hand brakes are gonna have the muscle to stop this thing. We’re creeping up fast.”

“Alright, well, just hang on to the independent. I’ll tell you when.”

The independent was all they had left. Matt couldn’t believe it stood a chance of getting them through the curve but a) James had been right about everything else and b) they would be no more dead for having tried it than they would be for not. It couldn’t do any harm.

“Matt? Matt,” Margery called out from Fuller Yard.

“We’re alright, we’re alright, but we’re picking up speed, again.”

“Matt! We’re coming into the curve! Get ready!” James ordered. Matt visualized the curve he’d lived in the shadow of his whole life. How in the world was he supposed to get ready for a train this size to rip through at this speed? “Matt! Hit that independent! Hit that independent as hard as you can!”

Matt did, but it didn’t stop him from commenting. “James, we’re gonna rip right off.”

“Got no choice! Matt! Hang on!” He hung on, and over, and around, just as James had told Margery earlier in the day. “Hit it! Hit it again! Now!”

Matt wrenched the independent arm back and slammed it into action again, wishing again he had something to pray to as even 1206 started to tilt.

The seconds dragged out, stretching like taffy, until the curve finally came into view for Matt, out the rear of the train. Shaking, Matt reached for his radio. “James, you alright?” The train felt like it had been nearly sideways during the worst of it. Was there any chance James had managed to hang on to the outside of it somewhere?

“We made it, we made it! We’re through the curve,” James celebrated. Somehow, still there. After a second to gather himself, he added, “Good job.”

Matt nodded but didn’t answer the radio. They weren’t okay, not by a long shot. “James! We’re at... we’re at 60, and we’re going to hit 80 in no time!”

Matt wasn’t sure how radio silence could speak, but he understood James understood that he had to get to the cab of 777. It was the only way. They might squeak through curves with the independent, but that wasn’t a solution and there was no help for them until they brought it under twenty and they were headed the wrong way in a hurry, with entirely too much fuel to wait it out.

The silence on the radio lingered for a time, and Matt found himself beginning to hope James could actually pull it off. “Matt, we got a problem here! I don’t think I can make it.”

Matt confirmed he’d gotten the message. So that was it. All this… had saved his wife, but wouldn’t be enough for him.

Matt watched out the windows as they zoomed along through suburbia. It wasn’t the most scenic final journey, but—despite knowing this was it—he found he still loved it as much as he had the first time his uncle had sat him on his knee in the cab of a train.

A pickup barreled down the road parallel to him, the driver honking and yelling at him. “Hey! Come on! Hop in the back of the truck! Hop in the back of the truck!”

Matt grabbed the radio. “Margery? Margery, is that truck for us?”

“Yes, it is, Matt,” she promised, sounding relieved. “You can do this. Matt, you can do this!”

“Come on!” The driver shouted at him.

Matt checked that everything was locked into as much of an auto-pilot as possible, nothing that would make it worse, for him or James, and then hobbled back out onto the platform.

Third stupidest thing I’ve ever done in my life, Matt couldn’t help but think. The bed of the pickup looked awfully small, and the distance between him and it rather large, now that he was here. The driver remained unsympathetic. “Do it! Jump in the back!”

It hurt. It hurt everywhere, especially his duct taped foot. But he made it into the bed of the pickup and got himself sitting upright. He looked up the almost interminable length of 777 and saw James up on top of a car about a third of the way up, in a little hatch that had a railing around it. It was a tolerably safe place, as far as places to ride on the outside of a freight car went. The car ahead of him was open, a pile of lumber headed to the mill strapped together. No wonder he hadn’t been able to proceed.

“James!” Matt shouted. He’d thought his jump was bad, but the drop had only been a couple feet at most. James would drop a dozen or more.

James waved him forward. “Go! Just go!”

Matt understood the message, and so did the pickup’s driver, gunning it. Matt had thought his part was over when the brakes gave out. He’d thought his part was over when they made it through the curve. He’d thought his part was over when he’d thudded into the bed of the red pickup. His part wasn’t over yet.

He swore, even when he knew they were too far ahead for the sound to carry, that he could hear James yelling. “Go, go, go! Go, go, go! Go, go!”

He worked himself into position, standing on his good leg, one hand braced on the roof of the truck, the other reaching for the railing of 777’s engine and found himself yelling, too. “Come on!” He’d missed grabbing on.

“Shit! God damn it! I overshot it!” He heard from the truck’s cab. “There it is, kid! Do it!” He’d lost his rookie vest, but apparently not his age. “Come on, jump! Do it! Jump!”

Matt jumped. Got both hands on the railings. Didn’t get either foot on anything useful the first try, so his whole body slammed into the metal steps. He screamed. No one heard. He focused and got his good foot on a step or something he could pretend was a step on the second. He remembered this feeling, from a lifetime ago at the other end of this monster train. His foot was throbbing as badly now as then. His arms trembling with strain just as they had been then. His determination to drag himself up onto the platform and into the cab was the same, too.

It was anti-climactic, settling in at the controls of 777, easing down the throttle, applying the brakes. It was textbook, exactly like he’d been taught. They slowed steadily, before finally coming to a gentle stop.

His phone alerted him to a notification. He pulled it out. Missed call. Maddie.

He sat back against the seat, letting his eyes close. He wasn’t going to cry. There were still news cameras in the area. Once the edge wore off the hysterical feeling, he shut 777 down for good and hobbled back out of the cab, trying not to slither to the ground as he climbed down.

He leaned against the steps up into 777’s cab, breathing hard and trying to convince himself he’d actually survived it all. Red pickup’s driver came up to him full of exuberant energy. “We did it!

I knew once we got you up there, we’d do it. I’m Earl Crimper. It’s all about precision. Good job, kid.”

About then, someone yelped, “Your foot’s hurt. He cut his foot! I think it’s broken.” Matt couldn’t even track who anymore.

“He cut his foot! Let’s get some medics! Get over here, kiddo.” That was Red Pickup Crimper, he thought.

He let the medics do what they wanted with him. He looked down the length of the train, to where James was still perched atop the one car. They shared a smile and a hand signal for success, and maybe, just maybe, a common understanding of what it meant to be alive on the rails despite it all.

He had to admit, the pain meds felt good, really good. So did the air cast and the medics’ confirmation that all the important bits of his foot were accounted for. Broken for sure. Smashed, more likely. But a cast, maybe some surgery, and he’d walk again. They even gave him crutches, when he insisted on staying for the press conference.

It wasn’t that he wanted his fifteen minutes. He was waiting.

His phone rang. He hoped it was the first thing he was waiting for. It wasn’t. It was corporate. They didn’t fire him. They did fire Riker. He let them talk. He didn’t have to say much. He knew what he’d done. They knew what he’d done. He knew what they had failed to do. They knew what they had failed to do.

He hung up eventually and leaned on his crutches where they’d told him to stand for the press conference. It didn’t take long before the second thing he was waiting for happened. James strolled up. “Just got off the line with corporate, you know.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“‘Debt of gratitude,’ blah, blah, blah.”

“Same here. Felt pretty good, actually.”

“Yeah, it did actually.”

They laughed together.

“What’d they say about your job?” Matt asked. He wasn’t fired but they’d done the right thing and unfired James, too, hadn’t they?

“They said it’s mine if I want to keep it.”

“They’d be stupid not to give it to you.” Matt wondered if he could trade on the debt of gratitude to work with James permanently.

“Yeah, that’s what I told them. Said they better think about giving me a better one, too.”

After a while, a trim middle-aged woman with short, crisp, gray hair, dressed fashionably but sensibly – Maddie’s taste for high fashion meant that Matt could tell the difference between flashy fashion and working fashion – walked up, stopping in front of them.

“Sorry, I wonder if you can help me.”

The voice was different without the radio noise mixed in, but recognizable. “Margery?”

“I can’t decide which one of you I’m gonna kiss first.”

James didn’t hesitate. “Me.”

Matt laughed. “Problem solved. Go get him, Margery.” He didn’t begrudge James the affection of the Fuller yardmaster. Matt was married and still waiting for the first thing he wanted – to talk to Maddie – and it wouldn’t do to have her show up or call and find him receiving that sort of affection from another woman.

Margery did as they said, giving James a kiss on the cheek. She hugged them both, laughing with relief.

Before they could get into it any more, a man with bright red hair and a beautiful blonde beside him hurried toward them across the grass. There was no mistaking the relation between the graying redhead Matt had spent all day with and the young man hurrying toward them. “Your nephew?”

James nodded, a genuine smile breaking out across his face. “Hadn’t been able to look at me since Nell died. Guess this is my second chance.”

“Don’t screw it up,” Matt advised.

James pointed across the area to a brown-haired woman waving at him, trying to get through the crowds. “You either.”

“Copy; over and out,” Matt agreed, hobbling toward his wife as best he could.