Disclaimer: I don't own Yugioh 5D's.
A/N: Hello again. I keep forgetting what to say about these. But I think that subways and every form of travels bring with them a sort of adventure, because, as long as you have no idea where you're going, you can be one of those romantic explorers of old. Ahh! The excitement! The rush! Imagine it! Or you could be just as disenchanted as Jack would be going under ground to an overcrowded station during rush hour.
Jack was aware of two things as he entered the underground. The first one was that it was exceptionally plain. The second was that it was exceedingly bright.
He only had a vague impression of subways and not even those impressions could prepare him for the rush of the scene. It was nothing like the old subway tunnel Yuusei and his friends resided in- dark, in shambles, ghostly. In this place there were no ghosts, no echoes of the past Domino. They had been covered up by machines and pavement and thousands upon thousands of treading feet.
He stood there aghast at the magnitude of the structure until Carly took the initiative to lead him to the ticketing machines. A few simple clicks and a ticket was shoved into his hand.
"Gah. I pressed the wrong button!" Carly wept about her own ticket. "What am I gonna do with a ¥2,000 ticket?"
She continued to drag Jack until they arrived at the gates. "Umm… just put your ticket in the slot and walk through… oh, and don't forget to grab your ticket again." Carly demonstrated, walking to the other side.
Jack had rather sketchy feelings about the gates. He still remembered getting stuck at one of them. Eventually he had figured it out, but that didn't make up for the embarrassment.
Speaking of embarrassment, a line behind him had started to form and about a dozen impatient people were starting to get annoyed.
"Move it! We don't have all day."
He only had to turn his head, give them all one look and shout, "I'll move when I'm damn well ready!" for them to stop in their tracks, mouths still slacked.
He then deliberately took his time with the machine, getting everything perfect about the movement from one side to the other side. By then most of the people behind him had moved on to another gate.
"Wooooow," Carly enthused, smiling from ear to ear. "Come with me to a video game release." Together they hurried to a subway map.
Carly had taken the subways before, but had forgotten mostly every route. Jack had a good sense of direction, but since the subways were utterly new to him he had no idea how to navigate them. Together the pair made a barely passable commuter.
"Well, I'm really not sure but let's go with this one." Carly stuck her finger on a pink route and before Jack had a moment to object he was hurried to the platform.
He had to admit it, the entrance crowd was nothing compared to the people on the platform. It was every bit of the word packed and coupled with a bit of panic. The panic of course was optional and Carly didn't feel it at all.
"Busy night, huh?"
He didn't know how to answer her, not without disgust, so he nodded. Looking from above he could trace her line of sight just beyond her glasses, as if he knew she was thinking about the multitudes of human beings and where they all were going to. She looked, in stark contrast to her usual behavior, neither worried nor nervous. She had adopted the security of being simply mystified and calm. That was the only way to travel mass transit, he noted. Calmly.
He also studied the people, noticing their behaviors. Only step on the yellow line if you need to, never block the entrances, personal space means nothing- all the unspoken rules of a society completely different from the one on the surface.
The train arrived with rush of underground breeze, cool and a much needed relief from the sweltering mass of body heat. Carly led him in, a rush of "This way, oh wait, no, that way" and eventually he was on the train standing up and uncomfortable. Waves of commuters were still pouring in and he braced himself for the human crunch when the doors closed. People piled next to him on all sides and if he wasn't taller than all of them he would have found it suffocating.
"Ready?" Carly's voice rose above the rest of the chatter.
"Ready for w-"
The subway took off and it felt like the floor had been lifted out from under him. Not just him though, about all the others behind him were forced to move backwards and he felt Carly, using every bit of her strength, to hold him up.
He would have thanked her when he regained his balance but after she apologized to the people in back of him, "Oh no, no, no- wait. It's his first time on the subway everyone, cut him some slack please!" he thought better of it.
"I can apologize for myself."
"You'd better not take your chances in a packed train if it's anything like how you excuse yourself for holding up a line," she teased. He hated how she could use something she herself thought was cool against him.
"I know that!" But really, he wouldn't have said sorry to the people behind him. He wouldn't have even thought about it.
As the train emptied and re-emptied at each stop Jack had the fleeting notion to jump off and get out. He held himself back as Carly assured him, "Only a few more to go."
Upon reaching ground level at last he knew he should have gone with his instincts.
"What? I can't believe they changed the routes on me!"
The hardened faces on the street answered all of Jack's unspoken questions.
*I bought a $20 subway ticket once by mistake. Not fun when it gets demagnetized for no reason. :/
You know what? I think Jack really needs to yell at more people for him to be totally in character. xD Reviews are nice, really, really nice.