“Alright, Jay, you can do this.”

He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t nervous. And this bullshit conversation with Ash about whether this is the right thing to do and maybe we shouldn’t follow through with this and all that crap really didn’t help. Not that he doesn’t want to do his job—the job given to him by the Boss no less—but Jay must admit that Ash got to him. Bill, too, with his constant doubting and nagging back at the restaurant.

What’s with these two, anyways? Can’t they see what a fan-fucking-tasting opportunity this is, after all?

And yet, stowed away in the back of the train (or at least as far as he can go without requiring keys to the crew-only sections), he can’t help but wonder. The bag sits before him, half unzipped. The device is poking out between the zipper, unassuming. Innocent, almost. Like a perfect little thing, not wanting to do any harm to anyone. Sleeping beauty, if the beauty was a bomb, and the kiss was Jay arming it to explode with the turn of a key and press of a button.

Jay’s always been good at hyping up others. Bill and Ash had their reservations about this job, but he got them back on track. Even now, Bill’s driving his car to the next train stop to pick them up. And Ash is in charge of the detonator, which, far as he could tell (and he’s good at reading people), gave her just the boost of confidence she needed. But hyping himself up is a different story. This job is huge, the real deal. His one chance to make it big, prove his worth. Besides, he owes it to Bill and Ash to get this done, seeing how much they relied on him to stay locked in.

He rubs his hands together, taking a deep breath. Now or never—

The train takes a sudden turn, knocking him off balance and sliding the bag just a few inches to the left.

“Shit, shit, shit.” Jay braces himself against the wall. Then he waits, his heart pounding in his ears in step with the rumble of the train wheels on the tracks. This is a fucking bomb, man, he mentally yells at the train as if it would or could care.

The last passenger section of the train is utterly empty. They’re in the middle of nowhere, not many people take the train from here to anywhere. Who wants to be stuck on a nearly two hour long ride when a car can get you there twice as fast? Still, Jay keeps looking over the seat of the very last booth toward the front of the train, just in case the loud rattles and rumbles of the train make him miss someone entering this section. He’s glad no one else is sitting in here. Truth is, the fact that people could be close to the bomb has not escaped him, but he got so wrapped in what this job means for him and his career within the organization, he managed to successfully ignore it until now. Still, people will get hurt.

Maybe, if he can place the bomb even farther in the back, it’ll do less harm?

Jay gets up to check the door at the back of this section. There’s a small window, through which he can see that the other side is just an open platform, a small gap for the train car coupling, and the door to the next car. The door’s locked, the window painted with big, red letters: AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY. If he could get through this door, he could set the bomb on the other side, just outside the door of the next car. Far as he knows, that’s the real target anyways.

Good thing he knows a thing or two about unlocking doors he’s not supposed to open. A decade working street-level jobs for the mob will get you that kind of experience. Jay goes down on one knee, takes out some basic tools from his coat pocket, and gets to work.

True to his own confidence, the lock isn’t all that complicated in the end. He claps his hands, grins, and reaches over to take the bag. It’s only after he opens the door, that he realizes what a stupid idea this really is.

The train’s moving at top speed, shaking and rattling with every little bump and weld on the tracks. The car across from his sways, pulling to and fro as compared to the platform he stands on. The coupling, of course, has a small space for variance, allowing both cars to move within some degree of freedom. Jay would have to jump the gap with the bag and bomb in hand, if he wants to set it on the platform outside the other car.

Maybe Ash is right. Or Bill. Or literally anyone else who would see what he’s about to do. This is fucking crazy.

The wind’s howling around his face, a world of trees and snow and distant mountains rushes past him. His nose and ears freeze with the lashing of winter air at this speed; crystals of frost collect around his eyes. Every beat of sweat freezes on his forehead, and the chill bites deep to his bones.

Jay lets out a deep grunt, clutching the bag to his chest with both arms, like the potential energy in the form of the bomb inside it could give him warmth and strength. He dares to look around the corner to the front of the train, instantly regretting it. A wall of wind and cold hits him in the face with the force of a thousand high school bullies. Worse yet, he sees yet another curve in the track ahead, maybe a few minutes out. He has to jump now, or risk getting caught in the turn and being thrown ass over bomb off the platform.

One deep breath, which hurts like sucking in an icicle directly into his lungs, and Jay takes the leap.

He lands with not so much grace on the other side, tumbles over, hits his head and shoulder against what passes as a railing. The bag slips his grip, and takes all of his luck and prayers to keep at a hold of it with but his middle finger. The pain of its weight ripping on the nearly frozen digits is almost worse than that time he caught his dick in a zipper.

Jay grabs a hold of the rail with his other hand (the cold metal burning on his skin), maneuvers the bag carefully to sit on the platform just outside the door, and pulls himself upright. He wraps the strap of the bag around the outside hand of the door to keep the whole thing in place during the upcoming turn in the tracks, then opens it up to arm the bomb.

What he sees inside the bag nearly makes him piss his pants. Some part of the device came loose and is just hanging off its side by one of two wires. The other wire ripped out from somewhere. Jay’s no expert on explosives, but this definitely shouldn’t be like this.

The turns coming up, and if he’s still on the platform outside the car, he risks getting thrown over. His hands are too frozen now to get a proper grip on the railing, and his whole body shivers and stiffens with the cold. What choice does he have but to arm the bomb anyways? Maybe the loose piece wasn’t that important, right? Looks like it’s just the little display showing the status of the bomb. A phone still works with a cracked screen, right?

He was told to enter a four digit number into the small keypad on the side of the device, which will arm it for remote detonation. Easy enough. With a number fingertip, he punches in the code and hits the enter key. There’s a beep, and some red light comes on. It should blink three times, then become steady. That’s how he knows it’s armed and ready. That little display (the one hanging by one less wire off the side) should read, “Armed.”

The light blinks three times. Then it stops for a second, before blinking three times again. And again, and again, and again. He fumbles around the bomb to get a hold of that hanging display, see what’s going on.

It doesn’t say “Armed.” With one wire missing, it doesn’t show much of anything.

“Well, that can’t be good.”

No time to troubleshoot this thing, not that he would know what he’s looking at. Some lights are blinking anyways, so something’s going to happen.

Jay jumps across the gap and falls face-first into the car just as the train takes the turn. Everything hurts as frozen hands crash against the hard floor. He takes a look back and sees the bag still tied to the door, even after the sharp turn. Good. Good.

He jumps to his feet (which are starting to get some very painful feelings again). Time to collect Ash, head to the nearest door, and get off this damn train.

Problem is, when he returns to the private cabin he shared with Ash, she isn’t anywhere to be found. Jay looks around, searches up and down the car. He even opens the adjacent cabins, in case he got mixed up somehow. Some old couple looks at him confused and slightly outraged.

“Sorry, guys. Wrong door.” He slams their door shut again.

Ash is nowhere to be found. She just disappeared—and with her, the detonator. So much for trusting her.

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