In the Heart of the Iron Conundrum: Part Seven

This is Part Seven of a short sci-fi story.

“Oki doki. Got a plan?” Trixie whispered, nervously edging past some of the androids who were bent over along one side of the guest carriage. She almost toppled over when the hem of her beautiful ball gown got stuck on the outstretched fingers of one of the androids – a handsome but slightly dishevelled-looking young man. Luckily, Jonah was there, quickly stooping to grasp Trixie’s shoulder before she dragged down the stationary man.

“I need to find three of my friends. I came here with them: Trucker, Custard, and Pickles. We – I – said I’d look out for them,” Jonah replied, shaking his head slightly at the terrifying thought that he’d been programmed to arrive with the other homeless androids.

“What kind of names are those?” Trixie asked, before bringing a finger up to her lips as if silencing herself. “Actually, don’t answer that. They didn’t choose them.”

“I last saw Trucker in the kitchen, which is up this way. As for the twins, Custard and Pickles, I know they were tasked with laundry, which is-”

“Back where that man is.”

Jonah nodded grimly as he brought up a hand to a touchpad to open the door to the next carriage. It slid open seamlessly, allowing gaudy gold light to pool into the graveyard-like guest carriage. Beyond the door was an exquisitely decorated carriage, finished with a golden fountain in the centre of the room. There was no one in the carriage, although evidence that people had been there could be found amongst the discarded caviar bowls and half-finished champagne flutes, some of which had red-stained lip prints on the rims. Jonah and Trixie slowly entered the carriage, each trying to decide what to do in the likely event they would meet some of the armed androids programmed to eliminate anyone outside the perimeters of Dr. Bardot’s experiment.

“Trixie, find some hairpins, something small and thin, or anything that might be useful. I’m going to open the help point and see if I can learn anything.”

The pair spread out. Trixie crept towards the furthest door, peering through it to check for possible danger coming their way, before moving to tear up pillows and cushions. Jonah moved to a large gold-filigreed picture frame that framed a large touchscreen displaying the Obscura Labs logo and began clicking on various maps, mentally noting the layouts of the carriages. One of the maps he brought up was for the catering carriage, which was two carriages away from where they were currently. Laundry was three carriages back. Jonah’s mind was racing as he thought about his friends and whether they’d even be ‘online.’ Frustrated, he began tearing at the gold frame, breaking large chunks of it off.

“Woah, calm down!” Trixie hissed, coming over to the frantic-looking man and trying to pry him away from the help point.

“Need to access the wires. Trust me. I’ve. Got. A. Plan!” Jonah grunted, tugging at the help point with each word until it swung open, revealing a panel of wires and blinking lights. “Did you find a pin?”

“Ugh, right, no! But I did find this!” Trixie said, holding out a nail file. Jonah took it, glanced at the pointed edge, and nodded.

“It’ll do.”

With that, Jonah began fingering the wires, recalling when he had to access a switchboard during his bodyguard job to turn the lights back on during an especially bad storm. He was at least grateful for his programming giving him wiring knowledge. He ignored Trixie’s whispered questions, instead choosing two yellow wires and breaking them with the nail file. He narrowed his dark eyes with concentration before looking up as the lights around him began to flicker.

“Darkness. Always worked better without these awful glaring lights in my eyes. Never did understand why the future decided that neon lights were the way to go.”

“How are we going to see in the dark, exactly?” Trixie sighed.

“I worked for a guy once. He was a big deal. Had to get him out of plenty of strange situations, sometimes during the night. I know what I’m doing. The lights are off in this carriage, the one before us, and the one in front of us.”

“Fine. Let’s just get to your friends and get off this train.”

With the lights off, Jonah took Trixie by the hand, manoeuvring her behind him, just like he did for his old boss. He stalked like a predator through the darkness, using only the occasional flickering emergency light to navigate to the next door. The door slid open, revealing a darkened lounge with a few flickering candles struggling to stay lit as their flames reached the bottom of their wicks. Jonah immediately noticed that the opposite door leading to catering had opened at the same time, light pouring into the darkness. An armoured figure stepped out, baton unsheathed, and was slowly walking down the centre of the carriage, occasionally weaving around chairs. Jonah pulled Trixie down to the ground, bringing a hand up to her mouth as she squeaked from his sudden movements, and dragged her against the back of a sofa.

“Someone’s here,” Jonah whispered, his words barely audible. He kept his hand on Trixie’s mouth as footsteps approached the pair. Jonah moved Trixie so he was holding her close to his own body and faced down, holding his breath as the footsteps approached the sofa they were hiding behind. Trixie and Jonah listened as the footsteps passed them and stopped. Neither dared to look up to see the person responsible for their potential demise, instead just staring down at the plush floor, allowing the darkness to envelop them. And then, the footsteps walked away into the next carriage, away from the hiding pair. Jonah slowly moved his hand from Trixie’s mouth, glancing over his shoulder, the darkness making it impossible for him to see where the guard went.

“We should keep going,” Trixie whispered, holding her chest like she was trying to stop her heart from jumping out. Jonah put a finger to her lips again, silently shushing her, and stood up, staying stooped and moving Trixie around him so he was always the closest to any possible danger. If the lights were on, he’d see both frustration and gratitude plastered on her cherubic face. The pair silently scurried through the carriage, blinking back the light coming from the kitchen. Jonah left Trixie behind a chair as he moved forward, pinning himself up against the door and peering around the doorframe to look for danger. He immediately saw two androids, two males in chef’s attire, slumped forward, motionless, over a countertop, still holding kitchen utensils, paused in the middle of their duty. The kitchen carriage was split into two, with one half dedicated to a walk-in freezer and the other an amply supplied kitchenette. Beckoning Trixie over, the pair stepped into the kitchen, Trixie stopping only to put her hand to the touchpad to slide the door shut. Jonah immediately moved around the kitchenette, checking underneath counters.

“Trucker!” Jonah whispered through gritted teeth. “It’s Jonah. We’ve got to go!”

The silence that followed each of Jonah’s whispers was deafening. Trixie moved to the next door, again to look through the window to see if there was any danger, squeaking slightly when she spotted another armoured figure standing with their back to the door. Sliding down the wall, she crawled away, back to Jonah, who’d crouched behind a counter as soon as he heard Trixie’s squeak. Trixie felt bits of debris on her knees as she crawled towards Jonah and almost jumped out of her skin when she saw a person stuffed into a small gap between two fridges. The person was incredibly pale and was dressed in waiter’s attire. Their eyes widened when they saw Trixie had spotted them and tried to scrabble backwards further into the gap until Trixie put up a comforting hand.

“Hey! It’s okay! Don’t be scared! We’re just looking for a friend,” Trixie whispered, glancing back towards the guarded door.

Jonah had started to crawl over then, stopping in his tracks when he saw the individual stuffed between the tall fridges.

“Trucker. I am so glad you’re safe,” Jonah sighed, sitting back on his heels so Trucker could properly see his face. Trucker stopped shuffling backward then, their dark eyes softening, an expression of relief spreading across their handsome face. Jonah gestured for his friend to come towards him, putting a finger to his lips. Once Trucker had pulled themselves out from their hiding place, with some help from Jonah, they grabbed hold of Jonah’s shoulders and shook him slightly, an expression of anger melting the relief from their face.

“Hey, he’s good. He helped me out of a jam! I’m Trixie,” the cherubic woman said, pulling the hem of her dress out from underneath her heeled shoe as she pulled herself to her feet. “You’re Trucker, right? Like, for sure? You know who you are?”

Trucker looked up at Trixie with an impassive expression, standing up and taking measure of the journalist. They focused on the open wound on Trixie’s wrist from where she’d snagged it on the vent, looking at the two blue wires that had poked out from beneath her tanned skin.

“I’m an android, like you. Oops. Yeah, sorry, you’re probably not real, like, a real human,” Trixie grimaced, covering her wound with her hand. Trucker simply stared, silently.

“Trucker doesn’t speak much, and probably can’t see much without their glasses,” Jonah explained, looking back towards the guarded door. “Let’s move back. We need to get to the twins.”

Trucker looked towards Jonah and nodded, moved to one of the kitchen counters, and pulled a knife from a metallic rack that hung above the counter. Trixie gaped at that.

“Woah, okay, you’re not going to use that on us, right?!” Trixie whispered, moving to stand behind Jonah. Trucker shook their head and moved to peer into the darkened lounge room, gesturing for Jonah and Trixie to follow.

“You might need to use your words, Trucker. We’ve got to work together,” Jonah whispered, coming up behind his friend.

“I don’t think they can talk, Jonah,” Trixie said, looking towards Trucker’s sealed lips. Trucker stared back, blinking their dark eyes, and squinting slightly as they tried to focus on Trixie’s face. They then moved their fingers to their mouth and tried to pry open their lips. It was as if they were stuck together with glue. Jonah put a hand on Trucker’s shoulder, trying his hardest not to let his anger break his calm demeanour.

“It’s okay. I’ve got you. I’ll get you a voice as soon as we’re away from this place,” Jonah whispered, taking both Trixie and Trucker by the hand and pulling them into the dark lounge.

“And you should know, we’re going to have to get past guards and possibly a madman who is trying to kill us. So, sorry about that!” Trixie whispered. At least she couldn’t see Jonah’s rolling eyes or Trucker’s unnerving smile at her words.