Episode 1x05: Unbeknownst to its many passengers, train number 51644 reaches Goodge Street at last
London, December 12th, 2009
Magick howled in Lou’s ears, or so she thought, before it actually erupted in the physical world.
It began with a tingling, the usual sensation of Reality being reshaped against its will, in such a violent way, though, that the structure of the world itself creaked and moaned under the assault. By the time the energies gained actual, tangible existence, by the time everything was in place for them to unwind, Lou was already down on her knees between the two benches, Layla’s bag held tightly against her chest.
The man in front of her gave her an astonished look that she did not see, before the intense howl reached its apex. A deafening explosion shattered the carriage, its windows, its roof, tearing itself a way through the metal panels and the walls of flesh made up by all the passengers. Scream of pain and terror arose for a few seconds, quickly covered by the screech of steel against stone and concrete as the train left its rails to crash at random in the tunnel, carried away by its own speed. Lou let out a long wail too: the shock rippling through the shell had caught up to her, and broken glass fell down in countless fragments in her hair and on her coat, wool cap and scarf. She was going to die; there was no way she could remain unwounded; the crash would claim her life as well as that of all the others, and this time there would be no small miracle, no waking up in a white room, no second chance for her.
I don’t want to die!
Her body tense, her eyes shut on burning tears, she curled up on herself on the ground, knowing that there was not enough time for her to do anything. In the end, what use was there to be who she was, if she could not react? Layla was here, between her arms, ready to obey under her fingers, receive command lines and rewrite Reality on the push of a key—but she would never be able to take the laptop out of its bag in time to do something, anything. Even reaching for her phone would be useless now.
Someone help me! Please! I don’t want to die!
The broken train was still sliding on its rails, bringing down a whole piece of the wall with it, when it emerged in the tunnel at the newly refurbished Goodge Street station. Lou never heard all the new screams it caused, all the commotion that ensued, just as she never saw all the new victims it made. Around her, that world plunged into agony ended up collapsing at last; something wrapped around her, something as solid as iron, yet also comforting. When silence fell, it was even more deafening than all the noise that had preceded it.
The acrid smell of dust and rubble filled her nostrils, causing her to sneeze twice to get rid of it. Blood trickled down her forehead, from the root of her hair, where a piece of glass had drawn a long, though shallow line. Lou was still curled up in a heap, holding her two bags close against her chest; the carriage now rested on its side, and what lay under her knees was not its floor anymore, but the sharp edges of broken stones from between the rails, biting through her skin. She did not mind: pain, at least, meant that she was still able to feel, and thus, still alive.
She blinked dirt from her eyes, and raised her head to look at the remnants of the tube, and see if other people had been as lucky as her. Her hopes died within her heart as fast as they had been born. This heavy silence around her was that of death, only troubled by the sound of pebbles trickling down here and there, and by faint echoes from the station the train had left behind. She was crouched in a world of corpses, stones and shards, a world of darkness, too, for all the lights in the carriage had gone out after the initial shock, and the following ones had destroyed the nearby safety lamps of the tunnel as well. The smell of blood floated everywhere, blood and other fluids expelled from bodies that could not sustain the cost of life anymore, and the dust slowly settling down only made it worse. Before tonight, she had only read in books about people soiling themselves out of fear or when dying, and was not sure if this actually happened for real. Now she wished she never had had to find out the answer, especially not that way.
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