A herd of feeders, lured from the forest by the wailing of the locomotive, stumbled into the path of the rolling mass of metal. Three of them were pinned underneath the roof as the vehicle came to its final resting place. The rotten corpses were pulverized in a sickening crunch and a cloud of dust, combined with a chorus of hungry cries, settled over the air.
Franklin groaned as he wiped a streak of blood from his chin. He fumbled around for his lost weapon as the snarling of dozens of feeders grew louder.
"Go get Jesse!" Jacob slurred. His battered body hung suspended from the driver's seat, held in place by a red stained seat belt. Blood flowed from his temple, and his left arm hung lifeless in space. "Leave me," he choked, as foaming blood oozed from his mouth, and all the blood in his body rushed into his head.
In his dazed state, Franklin didn't argue. He grasped his gun and crawled out of the mangled vehicle like a rabid dog. He tripped and stumbled his way towards the train, as it slowly picked up speed. As one feeder lunged for his throat Franklin calmly shoved the barrel of his pistol in the putrid creature's mouth and squeezed the trigger. A fine mist drifted ten feet behind its skull as Franklin continued stumbling on.
Jacob, as if sensing Franklin struggling to escape the encroaching horde, began making as much racket as his devastated body could. Using his one good arm, he reached in his pocket and pulled out a pocket knife. He sliced the seat belts holding him in place and landed hard on the ceiling of the truck. Groaning, he crawled his way out and pounded on the metal skin of the vehicle. Between coughs he hollered, "Come on and get me you cowardly bastards! It's feeding time!"
The large majority of the nearest monsters were drawn to the infernal racket, giving Franklin the ability to bolt for the fleeing train. As they closed in on Jacob, he staggered to his feet. In a last desperate measure to fight until the very end, Jacob gripped his pocket knife firmly in the palm of his hand and waited for the nearest feeder to attack. As it did, Jacob grimaced as he plunged the sharp metal blade deep into the attacker's temple, assuring forth a torrent of coagulated blood. Another feeder came in from Jacob's left, but he was powerless to fend it off. Jacob struggled to free the knife from his first kill and jerked away as the feeder’s teeth clamped down on his flannel shirt, failing to grab any skin.
"You filthy son of a bitch!" He cried out, still struggling to regain his knife. The feeder's mouth opened again to try to clamp down on the flesh it so desired, but just then a loud train whistle pierced the air. Distracted for a second, the feeder looked away, giving Jacob the moment he needed to extract his knife and plunge it deep into the rotter’s eye socket. The other rotters, also distracted by the whistle, moved away from Jesse, as his battered body struggled to breathe.
"I hope you make it, buddy,” he whispered as he watched Franklin hurry towards the train with the feeders in tow.
Franklin finally reached the makeshift loading platform leaping onto it, followed by his undead entourage. He ignored the pain of large wooden splinters embedding themselves in his hands as he stumbled forward, barely catching his fall.
"Must... Go... On!" He cried, summoning up more energy to propel himself after the moving train. Franklin stood to his feet, and without hesitation, removed any sense of pain from his body. Resembling an Olympic athlete he took off from the platform in a mad sprint. It was man versus machine, and Franklin was determined to beat it.
He reached the edge of the platform, and his left food launched his body into the air. Franklin sailed through the air, rather ungracefully, as he watched the train slide away beneath him. As gravity overcame his upward momentum, he stretched his arms out in front of him and tried to mentally prepare himself for the pain he would soon experience.
Franklin's flailing palms made contact with the warm steel railing and his quick reflexes gripped it with the desperation only capable of a madman. As the jolt of the sudden stop caught up with his body, and he suddenly matched the train's drive, searing pain spread through his arms and down into his upper chest. Every nerve told him to let go, but Franklin held on, willing himself to pull his body into safety.
With one last final cry he pivoted his torso and swung his legs around to lock them between railing supports. Ever so gingerly he drew his body behind the safety of the railing and finally collapsed on the metal platform. He had made it; barely.
Franklin, still clutching the railing with a death grip, allowed himself a moment to catch his breath. He watched the Kentucky countryside disappear around him at a faster pace, and tasted the noxious fumes emitted from the ancient steam engine ten cars ahead.
Franklin finally hobbled to his feet, and for the first time since the crash, realized he had no weapon. Nevertheless, he thought. I'm just going to beat the living hell out of Jesse.
* * *
Jesse eased his weary body into a black leather chair and barked an order to one of the men in the rail car with him, "Get me some whiskey!" The man rummaged around in a nearby cabinet and handed a bottle to Jesse. He hastily uncorked the bottle, took a big swig, and began dousing his wounded leg in the fiery liquid.
The alcohol worked its way around the pieces of shrapnel and made contact with the damaged tissue. Overwhelming pain shot up each nerve ending that caused Jesse to holler and throw the bottle fiercely against the wall. The glass shattered as he cussed up a storm. The expensive spirits were quickly absorbed by a lavish Persian rug splayed out over an oak hardwood floor.
As the massive wave of pain slowly began to subside he tore an old cloth into strips in an attempt to tie them around his leg and stem the flow of oozing blood. He popped some strong painkillers from a bottle, and tried to relax.
* * *
Franklin crawled his way across yet another boxcar roof and peered over the edge. He was relieved to see he was getting close; just the two luxurious ones left. His raw and splintered hands gripped the rust covered railing and he shimmied down until his feet touched the metal catwalk.
He cautiously peered in through the smudged, small rectangular window recessed in the mahogany door. He glimpsed two men sitting in wooden chairs, smoking cigars, and playing a friendly game of poker on a mismatched ottoman. One of them wore a holster containing a .45 caliber handgun, while the other seemed much more relaxed and secure without a weapon.
Franklin gently tested the door knob and was shocked to find it wasn't locked. These guys are confident, he thought. Surveying the room one last time, he took a deep breath and opened the door with enough force to snap the door stops.
"What the hell!" The two men cried in unison. They sat in stunned disbelief as Franklin barged towards the one carrying the .45. He resembled a charging rhino bent on protecting its turf.
"I hope you're ready to meet your maker!" Franklin bellowed. His one hundred eighty pounds of mass made contact with the much smaller man and sent him flying backwards, chair and all.
The other man, having quicker reflexes, managed to at least stand to his feet and make a feeble attempt to flail his fists against Franklin's torso. However, he would have done better trying to douse a forest fire with urine.
Franklin, adrenaline and revenge coursing through his veins, picked up the fallen wooden chair, raised it above his head, and swung it against the standing man's face. Cartilage, bone, and wood cracked in the same instant and a fountain of blood gushed from broken nose and lacerated skin. The man crumpled to the floor, immobilized.
By that point the first man had arisen back to his feet and was in the process of withdrawing his weapon from its holster. Franklin anticipated the gun's movement and dove to the floor, into a tucking roll. His body made contact with the man's knees, causing him to lose his balance and fire a round through a window.
Franklin landed a punch upward, driving his fist against the man's wrist. The sudden blow caused him to relax his grip on the weapon as he fell to the floor dazed.
"I'm going to kill every last one of you!" Franklin cried, his voice filled with angry resolve. He rolled over and pinned th
e man on his back. He grabbed the .45 and pressed it to the man's temple. Without hesitating he furiously pulled the trigger and snuffed out the man's life.
Franklin proceeded to the opposite end of the rail car and opened the door. As he moved to enter the final rail car a shot rang out, followed by the instantaneous shatter of glass. He winced as he felt a jagged glass fragment embed itself in his scalp.
As Franklin dove for cover below the window he caught a glimpse of Jesse holding a revolver leveled at the window. Though badly bloodied the kid was still fighting on, though what for Franklin couldn't deduce.
"There's no way I'm getting in through that door," Franklin muttered to himself. He tried to think, and pull his mind away from the fresh wound on his head.
"Franklin!" Jesse's booming voice could still be heard above all the noise. "Franklin, I know that's you! You're not getting off this train alive! You should have left me alone!" Another shot rang out, the lead bullet thudding into the thick wood of the rail car.
Franklin ignored the taunts and scurried up the ladder. He slithered across the top of the car with the silence of a fox and the movement of a serpent until he reached the end of the car. His view was a direct line of sight into the tender and cab. He could see the engineer studying the array of pressure gauges, and occasionally shoveling a scoop of crushed coal into the firebox.
It’s now or never, Franklin thought, as he carefully withdrew the .45 from the back of his pants. He took careful aim at the engineer’s chest before firing off three shots in rapid succession.
The metal slugs shattered ribs and plowed through organs before exiting the body and being stopped by the metal locomotive. Blood immediately stained the greasy coveralls as the body fell, shoving the throttle down. Unbeknownst to Franklin, the action caused an increased supply of steam to be delivered to the locomotive’s cylinders which began accelerating the iron behemoth faster down the track.
Franklin was quick on his feet, and leaped from the roof, into the tender, and down into the locomotive cab. He faced the door of the rail car and shot the window pane, and then pounced upon the coal shovel.
He was overjoyed to see a fresh pile of flaming rock in the fire. Impeccable timing, he thought as he scooped up a monstrous portion and heaved it through the broken window. The coal, burning at over one thousand degrees Fahrenheit, instantly set on fire everything it came in contact with.
As Franklin scampered across the top of the rail car, and back down to the other side he became aware of the increased speed and a looming curve in the tracks ahead. He could feel the car beginning to rock from side to side as the increased speed revealed an instability in the rocketing train. The pull of inertia became evident on his body as he slid down the ladder and positioned himself outside the rear door once again.
“Franklin, you son of a bitch!” Jesse finally called out, as he stumbled blindly in the smoke filled car. With saliva running down his chin, soot covering his face, and crusted blood painting half his body, he finally hobbled out right into the waiting arms of Franklin.
Franklin wasted no time in forcing him across the catwalk and into the second rail car. “As much as I’d like you to burn to death, I want you to look into my eyes as you suffer.” He quickly frisked Jesse and shoved him onto the floor. “And I’ve finally got you!”
Jesse gulped in copious amounts of fresh air and struggled to purge his body of the acrid smoke. Franklin didn’t give him reprieve right away, however, as a firm kick to the gut caused another round of agony.
“After everything I’ve done for you, everything we’ve been through, this is how you thank me?” A raging inferno, more intense than the burning railcar, seethed in Franklin’s eyes. “Putting aside what a scumbag you are for hopping in bed with some Australian woman and ditching a woman who loved you, who was carrying your child,” Franklin delivered another kick to Jesse’s ribs. “You have the audacity to aid in keeping me from my wife, and then leading an assault on the very group of people that took you in?”
The rail car began lifting off the tracks, ever so slightly, as the train continued hurtling into the hairpin turn. The locomotive screamed in protest from the demand of horsepower placed upon it as it barreled down the tracks.
“I could have moved on from what you did,” Franklin continued, kicking Jesse in the face this time. “But then my wife died as a result of your asinine immaturity. So now it’s come down to this.” Franklin grabbed Jesse by the collar, hoisted him to his feet, and pushed him against the wall.
But Jesse wasn’t done fighting yet, as Franklin soon found out. Being forced against the wall merely gave him the opportunity to regain his footing and use his powerful legs to kick Franklin. Blood streamed from his face as he desperately tried to gain the upper hand over Franklin.
“You just don’t know when to quit, do you?” Franklin roared. He pummeled Jesse with his fists, ignoring the blows to his lower torso as Jesse’s futile assault continued.
The rail car lifted again, much higher this time, and slammed back down on the track. Franklin lost his footing and tumbled to the ground. Jesse seized the opportunity and made a bee line for a nearby cabinet.
“Get back here!” Franklin exclaimed, struggling to get back on his feet.
Jesse ripped open the doors and fumbled around inside before his fingers grasped a black metal nightstick. He whirled around and swung it with all his might just as Franklin came barreling towards him. The hard steel impacted Franklin’s left arm with a sickening crunch that splintered bone.
An immense upwelling of pain surged through Franklin’s body as he felt his arm crack under the impact of Jesse’s blow. He broke off his attack and clutched his arm in agony, giving Jesse the upper hand. Franklin fell to his knees and Jesse brought the club down again on Franklin’s shoulder.
“You like how that feels?” Jesse scoffed. He prepared to swing again at Franklin’s head, but the rail car suddenly lifted up again, but this time it didn’t settle back down on the track. It continued to rotate as the entire string of cars, and finally locomotive, followed suite.
Franklin was powerless to protect himself as he suddenly found himself airborne, and sailing towards the opposite wall as the train derailed. His left arm hit the wall first and the entire weight of his body pinned it against the wall.
Everything not secured was tossed about in the epic cataclysm unfolding as tons of moving mass came to a destructive halt. Trees snapped and ripped apart rail cars while thick metal plates buckled like they were made of paper. The once luxurious, now burning, rail car left its smoldering debris in a trail as it scraped along the ground.
Franklin prayed for death, if only to end the agony of his broken arm constantly being pummeled as he was thrown about the railcar by every bump and obstacle as friction struggled to bring its momentum to a halt. The bouncing and tossing seemed to last forever, until finally Franklin, in his bewildered state, sensed a decrease in speed. However, just when he thought the worst was over he felt something hot hit the side of his head. In a second Franklin lost consciousness and crumpled over.
* * *
The afternoon sun beat down upon the landscape below, with the dust finally settled and silence seemingly returning to the bluegrass. Save for the billowing smoke from burning wreckage, no one nearby would have been aware of the prolific damage. However, the scene of destruction stretched a quarter mile long. A long line of crumpled, splintered, twisted, and battered railroad property lay strewn across a gorgeous Kentucky meadow, overlooking the heart of the state.
As if that wasn’t chilling enough, thousands of feeders mulled about in the ten square mile clearing. If they hadn’t been distracted before, certainly the immense accident was a cause for curiosity now. The rotten corpses trudged about, converging on the wreckage from all directions. Soon their grotesque growls of hunger filled the crisp air. It was this sound that finally drew Franklin back to his senses.
He opened his eyes and surveyed his surroundings. The once lavish uppe
r class rail car was now a jumbled mess. Shards of glass lay strewn everywhere while splintering wood overwhelmed the view. Nothing kept in the rail car was intact, and at the far end a large gaping hole now resided. It was through this hole that Franklin glimpsed Jesse, still alive, trying to clamor to safety.
Franklin coughed and groaned as the excruciating pain in his arm reminded him of his injury. He tested his other limbs, discovering that other than a few minor lacerations and lots of bruises, he was still in one piece. Still bent on ending Jesse’s life, Franklin pursued him through the wreckage of the car until he stumbled upon the gaping opening.
As Franklin’s eyes adjusted to the bright afternoon light he took in his surroundings, and a wave of desperation washed over him. Stretched out in every direction countless hordes of feeders clambered towards the accident scene. A few dozen of the closest ones, seeing the movement of Jesse a few yards ahead, made a bee line directly towards him. Franklin knew it was only a matter of time until the rest of the masses zeroed in on their location.
Franklin sighed. At this point, he didn’t care if he died as long as he killed Jesse. Sure he had a son back at the devastated refuge; that is, assuming he wasn’t dead. But there was no way out of this one as he saw the wreckage surrounded by the vile monsters.
Franklin resigned himself to his fate and glanced at the ground searching for anything he could use as a weapon and pursue Jesse. In his searching he did notice a small wooden box that had fallen out of a cabinet.
“What the heck,” he muttered, and painfully stooped down to open it up. Inside the box Franklin found a miniature butane lighter and a dozen box pressed cigars. He picked one up, smelled it, and shrugged his shoulders. “Might as well die in style.” He stuffed one in his pocket and followed Jesse.
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