58

 

WE CLIMB INTO the nearest car, the last on the long chain. David still hasn’t opened his eyes or said a word. But he’s breathing, quick, shallow inhales with even shallower exhales. Dark circles ring under his eyes.

The configuration of the tablet screen has changed. The tablet must have some kind of internal positioning system that sensed the proximity of the train and automatically switched over to that database. More buttons appear on the screen, red circles, blue squares, green ovals. But there’s only one button that matters, and it is the black rectangle MISSION. I press it. Something loud clacks under the long line of train cars. The lead engine car, already revved, lurches forward. We’re moving.

And it is like before, and it is vastly different from before.

It is the emptiness that is most different. Instead of train cars packed with Mission village girls, the train is now hauntingly empty, bereft of any internal movement or sound. Even in our otherwise empty car, Sissy and I sit perfectly still, the only movement being Sissy’s hand stroking David’s hair.

And it is strangely quiet. No sound but the faint rattle of the moving train. No screams, no wails, nothing from above or around or behind us. The train picks up speed and the doors to each car automatically close, yet still no other sound pierces the darkness of the tunnel.

Sissy takes my hand in hers. We grasp tightly, not with fear, for there’s none left in us. It’s all been wrung out.

Five miles from the Palace, we emerge out of the tunnel. The train will be in view of the Palace for only a few minutes before disappearing behind low-slung hills. We stare in silence at the Palace, so small in the distance, as it is overrun like a crumb swarmed by ants. Only the initial wave of the millions-strong horde had earlier reached the Palace. But now the slower yet immensely larger and denser waves pour over it. The obelisk tower begins to wobble, then sway. Just before we round the hills and the Palace is cut off from view, the obelisk tower topples like a matchstick snapped.