The Tattooed | Completed | ✔

Chapter 18 - Tram and Train

The sun was setting, casting shadows in the tram and making them dance with every bump and turn of the road. Eddy was leaning against me, her head drooped forward slightly and a soft snore escaped her mouth. We'd been riding already for a hour and with another two to go, I was tempted to wake her so that she could sleep tonight while flying. Then again she might have to be awake for that, I didn't really know what was going to happen once we reached the train that would take us to the edge of Central. There might be Officials there and we'd have to make a run for it, we might have to fight the Government experiments.

I admit was I scared for us, I had no idea what was going to happen now. No idea what the outcome of any of this would be and that truly terrified me. I could only hope and do the best in my power to protect her and the baby. My hand moved to my stomach, I had to protect them with everything I had in me.

A drop hit my hand, I simply stared at it. My face was warm with tears and they were falling to my hand. I cried to much, I was so over emotional about everything and I just couldn't stop the silent tears as they fell. Rolling my head back to lean on the window, I stared out to the sunset. The clouds were orange and pink and deep shades of purple, I was sure my face was lite up red and orange in the glow of it. Eddy was still snoring softly next to me, covered in the shadow of my body. The rivers that flowed from my eyes were beginning to dry and disappear.

What am I going to do on my own with two children? How was I going to be able to do this? How was I going to handle raising them? Where would I raise them? We certainly weren't staying around here. Maybe Staci Lynn's Settlement really was a good idea, it's actually on the ground so there's that. And there's grass and actual animals to see and birds and flowers that weren't only on someone's skin. It was just so much...

"Ladies, this is the last stop."

Jumping awake, wiping the drool away and catching Eddy before she fell onto the bench, I stared up at the man. Nodding, I quickly gathered up our bags and a groggy child and pulled them from the tram. It had been a shorter ride than I thought, we'd made it here in just under two and a half hours. The sun was just disappearing behind the massive wall. I'd forgotten about the wall, it wasn't viable from our Ward. The street lights above us buzzed to life as we pulled our very tired self's from the tram stop. The train station was around the corner.

Our bags bumping each rock along the sidewalk as we made our way to the darkened and nearly abandoned station. Eddy tripped and stumbled over every crack , the backpack she was carrying sliding off her shoulders every time.

"Careful." She was going to trip and actually fall down and we didn't have time to doctor up fake wounds. If we didn't hurry then we'd have real wounds and I wasn't going to have her hurt.

The train would arrive in fifteen minutes and we were nearly the only ones waiting, there was an older man slumped on a bench at the other end of the platform. I wasn't sure if he was really waiting or if he was just homeless and had found a reasonably quiet and dark place to sleep for the night. For all I really knew he could be both, either way I kept Eddy on the other side of me, out of the man's view if he happened to take an interest in us. Eddy sat on the bench next to me playing on the mobile port I had smuggled from Fuga all those months ago. She let out a giggle and I turned back to her to see what was amusing.

That's when the smell hit me, both something I knew well and yet didn't know at all. Blood and...rot, the unfamiliar smell was that of rotting flesh, rotting life. Only one person had ever carried such a stomach turning smell, my father. The hot breath was there, tickling my neck, the scent of wet dog and rot filled my nostrils. Hot, sticky liquid dripped down my neck, blood. Before Eddy could look up and see the hideous beast that was cursed to live out it's existence with my father, I pulled her to my chest. The mobile port fell to the ground as I stood and turned to face them.