Chapter Text
The story starts like this:
Min-Gi Park is being assailed by the docent of the art gallery car as Ryan Akagi slams in vain on the car’s exit door from the exterior. Although he has no way to re-enter the car due to its specific door makeup, he declares that he would never leave in-Gi Park beind. In that moment of bone-deep panic, he means it with every fiber of his being, and his number diminishes to Zero.
An exit door appears. Ryan Akagi is quick to take notice and realizes what it is: a way home. In the span of just a few seconds, he realizes that he can finally go home, and is filled with a soul-quenching relief. In that rush of relief, he takes a few unbelieving steps forward.
He then remembers Min-Gi Park is still in the car.
He hesitates. He takes no action, and his eyes train on the Art Gallery car door, unsure if he is waiting and praying for Min-Gi Park or making sure Kez isn’t looking. For a fraction of a moment, he considers the idea of leaving Min-Gi Park behind, and his number is subsequently recalculated.
This process takes three seconds.
The story starts like this:
Amelia Hughes loses the man she loves most in the world, and is brought onto the Infinity Train as a way of allowing her to cope and grieve in a way that would be impossible in her home. Eventually, she makes it to the engine of the train, and meets the conductor, One.
One allows her to stay in the engine.
Amelia Hughes always had a problem with authority. She begins to observe One’s actions and methods up close, and finds them to be lacking. She begins making suggestions for changes to offer a more human touch to the train. She also begins to understand the raw scope of what the train is capable of accomplishing; entire cities could be built within a car, so why not a specific one? Why not a specific one, including a specific person?
She questions One about using the train to recreate Alrick Timmens, and is soundly shut down.
She knows, in that moment, the Conductor must go.
The story starts like this:
Two trains on the same track are headed towards one another.
A pair of young men ride in one, trying to learn a lesson about one another, about trust, and about love.
A young woman rides in the other, all out of love, and all out of trust, with no one left to learn lessons from.
They collide.
Amelia Hughes launches a coup on One for the title of the conductor. In the chaos, a lever is pulled without fully understanding what it is. The lever is designed to accelerate the train, overriding the automatic stop that a exit door appearing should trigger. The train jerks with the increase in momentum, and speeds on for ten seconds before it can be rectified. In the process, the train's speed nearly doubles.
A warning blares that a passenger is exiting the train, and a second lever is pulled. The lever is an emergency stop.
Fundamental laws of physics remained unchanged when on the exterior of the train. Inertia has its day, and Ryan Akagi’s forward momentum continues on as the train jerks to a sudden halt, throwing him forward exactly 1.836 seconds after recalculation of his number begins.
With his recalculation unfinished, his number is treated as the last recorded recalculation: Zero.
His exit door remains open.
The story starts like this:
As Ryan Akagi is flung through his exit door he knows in that split second, he does not want to leave Min-Gi Park behind. He has never wanted to leave Min-Gi Park behind. He had only ever convinced himself that he had to. Ryan Akagi never wants to leave Min-Gi Park ever again. He understands this in full.
Ryan Akagi has learned the lesson that the train had determined he needed to learn. His number is recalculated.
He tumbles out onto the other side of his exit door, to Powell Lake, British Columbia, at 4:11 am. His momentum skids him across seven feet of asphalt, scraping his hands, arms, face, fracturing his wrist and two ribs, and breaking one lens of his glasses before he comes to a stop.
He turns back to the direction he was flung from just in time to see the view the oscillating center of the portal provides: Min-Gi Park stumbling out of the Art Gallery car. Ryan Akagi calls out to him as loud as his voice can muster. He does not know if his voice reaches through.
His exit door closes and disappears.
The story starts like this:
Ryan Akagi, all alone on the road in front of the Dumpty's Diner in Powell Lake, British Columbia, checks his hand. Though broken glasses, he watches as his number spins in place.
It settles on zero, and disappears.