Sherrie A. Bakelar

Sneak Peek – A Dragon for Darius

Created with Portraitworks

The morning maglev train out of the city rushed past the station with a hair-raising hum and a rush of displaced air. Along the platform, a couple of children howled with glee at the press of sound and wind, but otherwise its passage went unnoticed. The small crowd on the platform was waiting for the other one, the one that would be stopping here on its way deeper into the city. Along with a handful of suits–middle-management types in three-piece suits and thick, well-made coats, the waiting passengers included the two children and a harried woman that didn’t seem old enough to be their mother, a handful of students going away from the university, and a few street people. 

One of them, a young lady dressed in white lace and knee-high, chunky boots, rooted through the heavy green canvas bag slung across her shoulders, digging for the last of her change. She’d used half the money already this morning, claiming a shower and a private changing room at the bus depot below Bryne Circle. She just needed another dollar to get up and out of the Mire. Up into the sunshine. On one of the rooftop gardens, she’d be able to collect more change, maybe even visit a church for lunch.An automated voice came over the loudspeaker announcing the arrival of the train to Queen of Heaven. Darius fished the last quarter from her bag as the train pulled into the station. She scanned the platform and moved toward a door alone, stepping quickly in when it slid open. Up and down the car, others filed in quickly and spread out, claiming seats and tables along both sides of the train. Stepping from the dreary Mire platform into the crisp interior, the young lady found herself in a different world, full of clean lines, smooth surfaces and brushed fabric. If her lace corset had been a bright, clean white instead of a dinghy off-white, she might have fit in a bit better. She turned toward the back of the train and scanned the handful of seats. Near the door she’d just entered, a young man sat hunched in his seat. Her skin crawled when their eyes met and she quickly looked away. Clenching all her muscles, ready to run if necessary, Darius hurried past the guy and took a seat at the very back of the car, opposite the door she’d entered. From there, she could keep her eyes on the creepy guy and see the entirety of the train car in front of her, keeping an eye out for breakfast.

The maglev started forward, rocking slowly on wheels as it sped away from the platform. Here in the city, it wouldn’t reach a speed over sixty miles an hour, slower than some of the SD cars that rushed along the overcity highways. Darius had two stops before she reached the Cathedral of the Flame. As they pulled away from Bryne Circle, she took stock of her car-mates. One of the suits had opened his briefcase and pulled out a thin laptop and a homemade breakfast sandwich. No one else looked interested in eating. He isn’t going to leave a single sandwich, Darius thought. With a sigh, she sat back, her eyes falling on the creep near her. She looked away quickly, but not before deciding he was quite nondescript, the type you’d forget after you got off the train. If anyone needs to describe him as an attacker, they’re going to fail. With that thought, she made a point to remember something about him. Three-piece, navy pinstripe suit, and a fedora.  

The door beside her opened and the conductor entered with a swoosh of air from the outside. Sighing inwardly, Darius dropped her quarters into his outstretched hand. He counted them before confirming, “Two stops?” She nodded and held out her hand, waiting for her ticket. He moved up the car without comment, stopping first at the creep, who showed him a paper ticket, and then the suit with the sandwich, who shuffled around a bit before producing a transit pass. As the train pulled into Ogilvie Transit Hub. Two of the suits left without even talking to the conductor. He paid them no attention, greeting the new riders instead, requesting proof of payment as they boarded. 

Next stop, Wolf Point.

The conductor moved away from the door and allowed it to close. Out the reinforced glass of the windows, Darius noted a couple of street people watching the train disappear, a man and a woman both too skinny and too scraggly to be healthy. They’ll be jumping on the next one, she thought, hoping to make it to the Flame before a conductor rounds them up and throws them off. She watched the conductor reach the other end of the car and exit with a swoosh of air. Good, I’ll have the platform to myself for a while. There was nothing worse than sharing a platform with someone who obviously wasn’t going to use the change for food.

There was a sudden jolt, the entire car shivering, as if they’d hit something, run over it, and kept going. Darius tensed and sat up straight, ready to run. Gasps and startled swearing traveled up and down the car. In front of her, the creepy guy stood, talking to himself under his breath. He looked around and caught her eye again. Bright blue eyes, alight with fear, topped a feral snarl on a pale, thin face. He threw a small cloth bag at Darius. “They come for them,” he hissed. Darius caught the black bag instinctively. As she did, the window to her left burst inward, followed by a Priest, who landed near the creepy guy, awkwardly strewn across a row of seats. Another window burst in on the right, slightly closer to the door, and a second Priest touched down more gracefully than the first. 

Priests, fuck. Darius slithered as far from them as she could, shoving the black bag she’d just been handed into her canvas satchel. As she sank to the floor, the creepy guy launched an ornate wooden box out the broken window nearest him, past the Priest who was just disentangling themselves from the seats and rising to their full height in the aisle near Darius. She crouched, dropping to the floor, watching the shiny, dark leather boots the Priest wore step away from her and toward the creepy guy.

“Serosh,” they said. “We see you.” Cultured voices and impeccably tailored suits didn’t hide the rot that filled the Priests. The Overcity elites lauded them, of course, but the street people and the folk of the Mire knew better.

“You are fallen, Serosh,” a second cultured voice said. “Die Asbeel, and be done with you.” As they spoke, the second Priest’s voice grew closer. shrinking the distance between where they’d entered the car and the creepy guy. “Return them, and your death will be quick.” 

A feral laugh–a high insane twittering–erupted through the car. “Am I to believe you, Rashin?” the creep said.

“He threw them from the train,” the first Priest informed the second. “We have nothing more to do here but pass judgement.” A sudden flurry of movement, grunting and a high scream filled the car before ending abruptly. Darius waited, eyes on the aisle’s floor where the creepy guy fell. His bright eyes, rimed with blood, dulled as she watched. She swallowed hard, not daring to move.

A tone sounded and an announcement broke the silence, “Next stop, Wolf Point Riverfront.” The dead creepy guy disappeared from Darius’ view as one of the Priests picked him up from the floor. The train stopped, the doors opened, then closed. An eternity passed before the train started again. “Next stop, Heart of Flame Cathedral, Overcity Hub. Darius dared to move then, first scanning the floor for fancy boots. She saw none, she could hear the others in the car starting to recover, to murmur to themselves about what they’d just witnessed. Priests carrying out justice on a train, nothing to see here, folks.

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