A few days later, the end finally came. Train horns blasted one by one like a chaotic symphony all throughout the railyard. Located just a few miles south of the Elizabeth Pond naval base, the train depot made Isaac sweat despite the abrupt end of the late autumn heat wave. As his breath condensed into thin, smoky trails, hundreds of Zhanghai corporate samurai surrounded him; unsurprising, of course, because he stood alongside hundreds of Naval personnel in the Zhanghai-owned facility.
Under a cloudy gray sky, dozens of freight trains rumbled out of the brick roundhouse, tooting and hollering as Arcadian laborers linked up boxcars to the locomotives. Steam billowed out of their smokestacks and beneath their wheels along the tracks. A Zhanghai blimp floated overhead - fortunately, it remained quiet this time around, with no (well, minimal) corporate jingles playing as it plodded along in the sky.
Despite the muddy ground of the railyard, General Stockham dressed in his best suit that day. All of the Navy’s finest stood on a podium with him - Commandant Firmino and Vice Commandant Spinelli of the Naval Police, Admiral Broadhurst of the Combined Fleet, even Secretary Ricci. Though he served as the boss of the entire Navy, a few attendants had to keep the elderly man from nodding off. The leaders of Zhanghai sat near them as well; Dan Turner helpfully pointed out their names and titles to Isaac.
One name stood above all the others - Dai Hong, chairman of the Arcadian branch of Zhanghai Industrial Corporation. He stood tall and lanky, looking much more like a bureaucrat than a cultivator, but even Isaac could detect traces of Circuit 3 within him as he passed by. Both that and the peculiar black cap worn by high-ranking Zhanghai officials - the one they called the Mandarin hat - indicated his status and power. The Navy was about to use his railroads, after all.
Isaac and his fellow cultivator cadets sat in a row of chairs facing the podium. Due to their low rank, they sat farthest in the back; full-fledged marines, corporate samurai, and government officials made up the majority of those in attendance. At the front sat reporters for both the Reed family-allied Narragansett Observer and Cartwright-allied Narragansett World; the bulbs of their cameras went off with dizzying regularity. Reed herself, as a Chief Midshipman, sat on the podium, dabbing her sweaty forehead with a handkerchief (also with dizzying regularity).
The audience clapped when Dai Hong approached the array of microphones at the front of the podium. When the noise died down, he began his speech in the Common language with only a hint of a Zhanghai accent.
“Thank you all for coming today. In times like these, we at Zhanghai want to reaffirm our desire to bring our civilizing mission to Arcadia. Ever since the glorious Arcadian War of Independence, your country has made great strides in joining the international brotherhood of sovereign nations. The trajectory wasn’t always smooth. Your initial advances burned a jealous rage within the hearts of Lawrence, Elysia, and Pedemontium, who all joined hands to ensure their own barbarity would not be threatened by your civilization. They thought they destroyed you, but look around!”
Dai Hong spread his arms wide. “Your country now has railroads! Factories! Dockyards! A vibrant and powerful people, a strong and respected military. Modern rifles, telegraphy and telephony, steamships. We at Zhanghai humbly thank you for allowing us to assist you in restoring your strength!”
The samurai clapped proudly while the Arcadians gave begrudging congratulations. Of course, every facet of modernity mentioned by the chairman was owned, either partially or completely outright, by Zhanghai. And he neglected to mention anything about cultivation, since knowledge of the esoteric arts was Arcadia’s proudest achievement. No nation could boast as many cultivators in their militaries, and the Circuit 6s achieved by Viola Reed, Derek Domino, and Theodore Greylock dwarfed the power of any other individual cultivator from any nation.
“We at Zhanghai are committed to keeping Arcadia safe.” Dai Hong gestured towards the long freight trains assembled in the depot. “When we first received news that the Navy found the remnants of an atomic bomb below the city, we immediately sprung into action and offered our assistance. Our railroads will now carry the dangerous material to Naval depots where your officers can safely dispose of it.”
More camera flashes and claps. Isaac remembered the newspapers from just a few days ago. Thanks to a tip from someone inside the Naval Department of Metaphysical Research, the Narragansett Observer jumped on a story about an alleged atomic bomb found submerged near the naval base. That story was quickly censored, of course, but news leaked and spread across Arcadia like wildfire. The big show and ceremony of today was to soothe the nerves of the average Arcadian - yes, the government was taking care of it. However, to transport something as large and dangerous as that required heavy railroads, all of which were owned by Zhanghai. Multiple trains would go out today, bringing the toxic cargo to safe sites high up in the mountains for disposal.
Of course, that was the official government line. After showing Isaac the Heart, Stockham let him in on their final offensive to root out the Restorationists. There was no atomic bomb - just atomic material salvaged from smuggling-busting operations conducted by other squads. But when nobody in the entire world had ever seen an atomic bomb up close before, it was pretty easy to fool them. Dai Hong also got a pretty nifty sum from the Department’s discretionary funds in a hidden bank account as well. Once his inspectors finished their job and Dai Hong accepted the project, the die had been cast.
The freight trains carried giant containers of atomic material. However, each train also possessed one particularly oversized container that happened to match the dimensions of the Heart. And that’s where the truth came into focus. The atomic material was just a cover for transporting the Heart out of the base to a high location where it could receive the moonlight it needed to survive. And Stockham wanted to make that truth obvious to the Restorationists. Since Zhanghai owned the railroads, the Restorationists would have easy access to their maps and knowledge, enabling them to find perfect ambush spots. If all went well, the Restorationists would be drawn into the open to seize the Heart by force. It would be a gamble, but the prize would be too much for them to pass up on.
Of course, that’s how the Restorationists were meant to interpret it. The Heart didn’t actually need moonlight to survive, but the rebels didn’t know that. And furthermore - there was one more layer of thinking and deception, one that kept Isaac awake these past couple of nights.
Babs nudged him while Dai Hong droned on. “Isaac, we’re really about to transport a superweapon?”
At a briefing, Stockham told Squad 3 a partial truth - that the trains were a cover for the transportation of a powerful, secret weapon. Nothing about the Heart - just about a superweapon. The other squads would be guarding decoys. Only Squad 3’s train would contain the real one. In reality, they would be transporting nothing but atomic material. But to Reed and Babs, Squad 3 really was in charge of guarding a Naval superweapon during its transport to a Naval facility. The deception made Isaac feel uneasy, but he understood why Stockham set up these elaborate schemes. That understanding made him want to think about other things.
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The ceremony ended with Stockham and Dai Hong shaking hands. Normally, Secretary Ricci would’ve done that, but he simply looked upon the crowd with his milky white eyes and waved. After that, the base turned into a frenzied scene of labor and work. Isaac didn’t even have a chance to speak with the other squadrons - it was immediately off to work under a hail of train horns, whistles, and hammers. Reed, having lit a celebratory cigarette after her amazing (“amazing”) performance of sitting on stage and looking pretty (“pretty”), led Squad 3 to their own freight train. Mud squelched beneath their shoes as laborers rushed by with their tools.
A cloud of steam briefly covered the figure of the man waiting for them, but his red beard soon poked through the smoke. He spread his arms wide in greeting.
“Remember me? It’s Checkers Derry!”
Isaac elbowed Reed in the side before she could let out an automatic groan. She gave him a harder elbow back, then shook Lieutenant Derry’s hand with as much enthusiasm as she could muster (none). “Yeah, how could I forget the guy who beat me ten times in a row?”
“It was actually eleven times,” he teased.
Reed’s eye twitched. “...yeah.”
The squad followed Derry through the cloud of steam and up a ladder into a modified empty flatcar. The freight train included several of these flatcars, dispersed every so often between the boxcars. A squadron of conventional marines occupied each one of them, sitting in makeshift defensive positions. Low steel walls ringed each flatcar, with heavy sandbags provided additional protection. A marine sitting behind a machine gun nodded at Isaac as he arrived on the flatcar; all of the riflemen were packing serious heat.
“A car further back even has a mortar and other heavy weapons,” Derry commented. “Atomic material is bad news. Don’t want any grubby rebels getting their even grubbier mitts on it.”
Isaac could only slowly nod. The marines all thought they were transporting atomic material. Reed and Babs thought they were carrying a superweapon. Only Isaac knew the truth - that this whole thing was just a ploy to get the Restorationists to attack. Isaac made a big promise to Babs that nobody else would die - but it’s easy to say that when looking and thinking about your small group of friends. Could Isaac prevent the deaths of any of the eighty men guarding the train? He looked up at the largest cargo container and then fragmented memories of beating flesh and ancient steel burned in his mind. He just rubbed his temples.
An hour later - an eight more losses in checkers for Reed - the train finally thundered off. It left the rail depot in a huff of smoke; corporate samurai, with their swords at their hips, watched as it departed. Right as it left the railyard, the jaunts and cries of hundreds of people greeted Isaac. Along both sides of the track, State Police officers held back protestors armed with signs and chants.
“Arcadia for the Arcadians!”
“Return the railroads!”
“Zhanghai get out!”
Normally, any sort of rally would be fired on by the State Police, but they seemed content with simply holding them at bay. Maybe the Staties agree with them on this one.
The train rumbled away down the tracks, away from the rail depot. All the trains went in different directions - Stockham informed Squad 3 of their destination yesterday. A mountain depot southwest of Narragansett would be waiting for them. It would only take six or seven hours to make it to the bottom of the foothills surrounding it. While Isaac and Babs munched on rations, Reed pulled out another cigarette from her carton. Not pack - carton. How it fit inside her greatcoat, Isaac had no idea.
“I thought you were slowing down on smoking,” Isaac asked. The decreasing amount of cigarettes she smoked seemed to go hand in hand with the increasingly clean nature of her room.
Reed took a long drag. The smoke drifted away into the low-rises on the outskirts of the capital. “I’m trying to be a movie star, Isaac. Movie stars are already cool. But they can make themselves even cooler when they got a nice little stick of nicotine and badassery hanging from the corner of their mouths.”
She stood up; her greatcoat billowed in the wind kicked up by the train’s speed. With a long exhale, smoke floated behind her like a winding river. She unholstered the service pistol on her side and spun it around in her hand. Reed had a look on her face that reminded Isaac of gunslingers or drifters in frontier towns (and dime novels); an amused, resigned sort of expression that says the world kind of sucks but I make my own luck in it. Live by the gun, die by the gun.
“But you don’t use a gun,” Isaac pointed out.
She just grinned. “Reed the aimless, pissed off young girl didn’t. But Reed the movie star does-”
The wind knocked away the end of her cigarette. Reed gave the world a vacant stare as ash splattered across her face. Upon hearing the snickers from Isaac and Babs, she just wiped it off with a sigh and sat back down.
The train left the city for the countryside. Isaac could still remember clearly leaving rural Arcadia and seeing the shining metropolis of Narragansett from the first time. He hadn’t left the capital since that day; the air outside the confines of the city felt easier to breeze, and the rolling, forest-covered hills set him at ease. The gray sky remained its usual, perpetual gray and the chill made him shiver in his greatcoat, but birds sailed across the sky while cattle stared at him from patchwork squares of endless farmland and meadows.
And speaking of cattle - the train suddenly came to a halt. Sparks - normal ones - flew from the rails as the train slowed. When it stopped, Derry swore; simple nature sounds flooded the vacuum left by the departing thunder of the train. Birds called out, trees rustled and swayed in the wind. The marines gripped their rifles and guns tightly. Babs spat out of her gum while Reed unsheathed her sword. A hidden tension filled the air, like when the wind picks up before a storm. Instinctively, you know it’s coming. Everyone on that train did.
Derry called out to the neighboring boxcar, “What’s going on up there?”
In addition to the flatcars, some of the boxcars had machine gun nests on top. The gunner craned his neck and then shook his head. “There’s cattle crossing the tracks up ahead-”
There was a sharp crack and then a splash of blood. The marine slumped over, grabbing the gun with a bloody hand below falling back inside the boxcar.
Cries erupted from the hills, farmlands, and meadows. Isaac peered through a gunhole in the steel wall - men and women, dressed in outfits ranging from ragged military fatigues to worn-out jackets, all of them carrying bandoliers of ammunition across their chests, raised their arms, pistols and guns and knives and clubs in hand, and made a mad dash for the train. Gunshots rang out, with flashes of orange appearing in the trees and among the flowers and grasses.
The train came under attack from all directions. Reed was the first to react - her red lightning of Rddhi activation exploded into the sky, and then sound waves peeled off from her sword. The wailing guitar sound knocked down revolutionaries and kicked up explosions of dust when it collided with the ground. The machine guns and rifles on the train now opened up, with Derry himself firing the first shot.
More and more Restorationists came running. Isaac couldn’t help but take a look around. Dread filled his heart - he knew why they were attacking this train. The final, deepest layer of deception paid off; his heart sank. He swallowed, feeling like a swamp covered him entirely, suffocating him, dragging him down to the murky depths.
But the battle didn't stop simply because of his sorrow. In fact, it had begun to intensify. Marines disappeared in clouds of red mist; wounded revolutionaries cried out for their mothers. The world was a cruel place, but it was Isaac’s world, and he couldn’t just lie down and take it. He’d have to see things through until the end. And besides - he was already doing a bad job of keeping his promise. But he wouldn’t give up on it.
His red lights flashed into the sky as Isaac entered the battle.