We're back with some more heavy scenes. Hold on tight, everyone. You're in for a bumpy ride.
Grace dreams, and as a result she sleeps badly. She dreams of nameless, faceless ghosts vying for her undivided attention. Small hands grab hers in a tight grip and urge her forward while others clasp themselves around her middle and desperately hold her back. A third pulls her ear and commands her to listen. A fourth doesn't even bother to touch her but seems content to stand in the dark and scoff at all the stupidity. Their touch is soft and wispy like cool air—but terrifyingly familiar—and this waxing realization jolts Grace like ice sliding down her spine. Grace doesn't recognize these people, these things. She shouldn't know them, and yet… In her dreams Grace keeps her eyes closed as she is afraid of what she might see if she opens them. Small round green things…
Not again, Grace tells herself, but she already feels the multiple points of ten little nails scraping along her forearm, pulling…pulling…sinking—dragging her down to-
It's worse than I thought. You're going to be stuck like this forever.
No, never again, Grace repeats. Grace Monroe is stronger than some phantom of her subconscious. If her metaphysical hands weren't preoccupied at the moment, she would blindly give that dark voice both middle fingers. Grace has seen many things on the train—broken bones, concussions, people turned into wood, a close encounter with all five rows of a lava mole's flaming teeth, people turned into stone, the ruination of a small girl's eye socket—this is but another trial she must endure. She is not crazy. Grace sucks in a slow breath between gritted teeth and tries to will herself awake. This is only a dream, Grace. Pull yourself together! It's only a dream-
You're really good at lying to yourself, Grace. Well, almost very good.
This is just a dream. Whatever nightmare trick this damned train is trying to pull, you're better than it-
Alright, I'll take it back. You're not good at lying to yourself at all. The unnerving disembodied voice snickers to itself, leaving Grace stunned. Never before has it shown any hint of an actual personality.
Just a dream! Just a dream! Wake up! Wake up! Wake-
"-up!" Grace nearly tumbles out of bed as she is jarred awake. For a few minutes she lies there, sweating, staring at the faux cedar ceiling—Grace had chosen the mountainside villa that night—and simply breathes. The sweat beading along her forehead and sliding down her neck has a strangely calming effect; her heart rate gradually slows, and the world comes back into focus. There are no ghosts clinging onto her here, no dark voices mocking her; Grace is okay.
No. No, she is not okay. She then hears the clacking of numbers rearranging themselves along her arm, and Grace doesn't need to look down to know that her number has gone down again—because of course it has. Because nothing has gone right for her ever since she woke up in the hospital wing. Grace is not the type to wallow in self pity, but she allows herself a few silent tears in frustration. She takes a deep breath and lists all the things she needs to accomplish this day: take shower, talk to Apex, talk to Simon, fix whatever that has happened to her, figure out some sort of game plan for the future. She remains a leader, and highest number or not, Simon isn't the best at leading. Everyone, including him, is no doubt still very upset from yesterday's events.
Last night and her accompanying dreams are frightening and more distressing than she'd care to admit, but Grace has a responsibility. She is needed. Grace kicks one leg out and drags herself out of bed towards her personal shower that she and Simon had rigged up together long ago, showers being rarely found in the back of old furniture stores.
Simon. Grace bites her lip in thought. No, he isn't the best leader, but…handling the Apex in her "absence", treating her no differently than before in spite of the large difference between their numbers, actually listening to her when she refused his suggestion of the hospital wing… Though it would have ended with his butt on the ground, Simon could have fought her on that one. Grace appreciates that he didn't. Perhaps…he is not the best leader, but he is a good…something. Partner? Grace is ill-used to the concept of self-reflection, but as strange as it may sound—and Grace would have never expected in a thousand years would she ever consider a situation like this—she is grateful to wake up screaming alone in her own bed instead of one where a bunch of terrified children are watching over her.
The Apex children are all like Grace—in Grace's opinion—once upon a time. She and Simon never tread upon the subject of parents or family or life before the train very often, but at least on the surface Grace suspects that Simon's home life was analogous to hers. The Apex need someone to guide them like she had needed as a child, like Simon as well. Perhaps all of their parents are similar to hers as well; how else would they have found the train? It would have been wonderful for Grace to have found something like the Apex when she first boarded, her fateful encounter with The Conductor notwithstanding, instead of wandering alone for months on end with no idea of what the train is and why she is on it. That would have saved her a lot of sleepless nights, tears, and pain, before realizing the extent of the opportunity the train had given her, before she realized life is better on board the train than it is back home.
To Grace, the person responsible for saving these children before the train convinces them to get their numbers down and leave, the person who helps the Apex become the people they want to be, cannot be seen weak and injured in front of them. There is no way she would have entered the hospital wing and frighten them all any further than they most likely were already.
Someone is knocking on the glass of her storefront by the time Grace is done showering.
"Hold on!" Grace yells. Already, huh? She slips into fresh clothing and fastens one earring, and then the other, before giving her reflection a reassuring grin within the mirror. Knock 'em dead, Grace. They're beating down your door. They can't live without you. And indeed, someone is still knocking on the glass.
"Keep your pants on, will you?" laughs Grace. Only one person in this entire car could be so persistent. He's probably still worried from last night. Oh, Simon… Grace gives her hair a toss and works a few locks around until she styles her hair just so before leaving her mirror and walking around the corner to press the button which unlocks her automated doors. Simon knows to let himself in when the doors open, and as if on cue, Grace hears their familiar swish. Grace plans to pop the question concerning what really happened two weeks ago preferably in private and after grabbing some lunch, but if Simon wants to do this now… Well, Grace is willing to oblige him.
"Hey Simon, are you-" Oh!
Oh.
"L-Lucy?" Grace cannot hide the stammer in voice as she walks out of her bedroom expecting to see a tall blond, but receiving a tiny brunette instead.
"Miss Grace!" Lucy gives a brief, awkward bow. "I've brought you lunch." Indeed, her slightly trembling hands are holding a plastic tray containing a slightly smashed but edible hoagie, a bag of chips, an apple, and a pint of milk. Adorable, but Grace might pass on this one.
Grace sighs. "Thanks, Lucy. You're the best, really, but… I really don't need you guys bringing me lunch." Jeez, does the entire car think she's an invalid now?
"B-but how else are you gonna get food? You can't just walk into the food court anymore. I-it'll make you ill!" The longer she speaks, the more Lucy is trying—and failing—to hold back tears. How great. Was Lucy one of the ones present at the fiasco yesterday? While pondering just how many traumatized children she's going to have to reassure before the nightmare is over, Grace is already on her knees and lifting the tray out of the small girl's hands.
"Hey, hey, come on now…" Grace takes Lucy's hands in hers. "Who told you that?"
And this is how Grace learns that she is banned from the food court and banned from leaving The Mall Car in general and the children have all been encouraged to keep her company—in case she has another fit again. Worst of all, Grace learns that the stinky yellow haired weasel—how on earth had she been singing his praises in her mind just minutes ago?—who had delivered these divine proclamations is not even here right now. Oh glorious tyrannical leader isn't here, of course, because of course he isn't. Because nothing has gone right for Grace ever since she woke up in the hospital wing. Because she has no scrawny stubbly necks to wring. How dare Simon order her around when it is Grace who saves his skin every other mission and hundreds of times in-between? In the end Grace only outwardly calms down when Lucy mounts enough bravery to squeak that Grace is slowly pulverizing her bag of chips between both hands and spilling deep fried potato dust all over the carpet.
Lucy, who in another life would discover that she has a preternatural sense of always selecting the correct wire to cut when defusing a bomb, reaches for Grace's arm. "Don't be mad, Miss Grace, really. We all just really want you to be okay…"
And so it is. Behind Lucy, three other Apex children arrive, and they all join with Lucy in pushing her to eat the food on the tray. Grace obliges, if only to stop their badgering—and perhaps, out of personal guilt. She won't allow them all to run roughshod over her, but Grace cannot help but feel awful about last night; how terrified they must have been. She is the one who is responsible for them, after all. Little does Grace anticipate that four children quickly becomes nine, then eighteen, then twenty six as word spreads through the car that Grace is awake and talking, and soon almost the entire population of The Mall Car is camped out in her room, shiny little faces all turned to her. Their obvious concern, their clear adoration of her would usually make Grace feel good; it still does in a sense, but now their adoration also fills her with a bit of unease.
The children casually argue among themselves who will to be the one honored with the task of providing Grace food—after all, an integral area of her home is now for all intents and purposes verboten—and they promise to work even harder to bring the best spoils from raids back home to her. Because if she can't go outside then how will she be able to find cool stuff from raiding? They are all so casual about discussing Grace—with Grace sitting amongst them and gradually becoming more and more alarmed as she begins to understand the terrible depth of the situation she's in. Until now, a large part of her had been worried about being replaced and then ignored and forgotten by the very group she'd help start—the Apex always appear to obey Simon's orders more stringently than they do her own—but now she recognizes that she's been upset over nothing. The children love their Grace; they adore her. Grace is trapped in a gilded cage crafted by so many concerned little hands.
"If you go outside and get sick, what if you fall off the train? Or get eaten? Or get really hurt?"
"We love you, Grace. You don't want to leave us, do you? You take care of us."
"You're the best leader around, maybe even better than the Conductor, even!"
Maybe there is such a notion of being the recipient of too much attention... The Apex find nothing wrong in keeping her here within this car until she gets better—if she gets better—the additional clause is not stated, but Grace feels the weight of it. They all agree with Simon, and try as she might to persuade them into an alternative, the Apex has zero intentions on defying his orders. He has the highest number, after all.
Simon… As badly as Grace wants to wring his neck, she understands the asinine thought progression behind all of this. Simon obviously cares about her deeply. In prime reductionist Simon fashion, he would think he's protecting her; he wouldn't consider this to be overbearing at all. Because… Grace scans her crowded room as she comes to a conclusion… Because if Simon had admitted to her that he was thinking it is better for her not to be roaming throughout the train, Grace would immediately shoot his idea down without much thought. Grace is not the type to allow anyone to decide what's good for her, though she and Simon are equals—in her eyes at least… She sighs. And yet, here she is grounded in The Mall Car while Simon is out doing…doing…doing what, exactly?
His best friend is apparently in a precarious condition, and right now of all times Simon Laurent is missing? Hmm... And so, Grace then asks her first truly productive question of the day. She frames it almost innocently, smiling. "Apex! Guys… Did Simon ever tell you what he's doing outside The Mall Car?" Grace hates that she is reduced to asking. Grace hates that she even has to ask.
"Simon says he's gone to get help!" The response is immediate.
Help.
Grace takes this moment in time to perform a sanity check. Grace Monroe is eighteen years old. Her best, and only, friend of the past eight years is Simon Laurent. Besides each other, all they have is the Apex, and they don't communicate at all with outsiders unless those strangers are kids who want to join. As she hears the word "help", Grace's brain pauses for a brief second. Simon knows no one besides her and the Apex; who would he go to for help? This has to be false, but…Simon doesn't lie. He just doesn't. He hates lies. Grace knows Simon like the back of her hand. She knows everything she needs to know about him, and nothing about that "help" statement smells right. Who on the train does Simon trust enough to leave her in such a fragile condition—or so he claims—and run to for help? That is a tall order for one as standoffish as Simon. He would never leave her side in the best of times… In fact, he regularly makes excuses just to remain in her presence.
Grace recalls the evening before. Her pulse steadily rises as she remembers the scene as clear as day—Simon's more neatly combed hair, his new number, his suddenly upgraded sense of fashion… Just who is he seeing? And why doesn't he come out and tell her? Though Grace has kept many a secret, namely small ones, from Simon, the notion that Simon can keep one from her is…uncomfortable.
It is a mystery that she must uncover.
Instead of wasting her energy further in trying to change the Apex's collective minds about her pseudo-imprisonment, Grace decides to change tactics. She leans into the coddling, as sick as that makes her. They make her tea when she claims that she's cold. They promise to come back and regale her with stories about their adventures while raiding when Grace puts on a sad face and moans that she is going to miss all the fun for a while. When Grace purposefully gives a large yawn and claims to be sleepy, the none of the children think otherwise. They walk out of Grace's quarters reassured that they've done their very best to make Grace happy. When Grace's bedroom light switches off, they are already debating among themselves who gets to deliver Grace's breakfast in a few hours—ultimately Marcus C. wins.
Little do they know that in bed Grace awaits, with both harpoon gear and tennis shoes equipped, a determined scowl plastered across her face. It's time to unveil whatever her friend is hiding.
Every train car is a concept or a world contained within a moving metal box. Simon and Grace are split upon whether all of this is either magic or science or a mad mix of both, but on what they do agree is that the train is akin to a video game, and if one discovers a particular train car's glitch, one can transverse that car how one likes—without having to play the game by the train's silly rules. Sadly not many outside the Apex know this fact. When presented with a problem, most passengers either give up, despair, or end up pressing onward in a manner in which the train wants them. Grace, however, knows that when faced with a seemingly insurmountable problem, whether induced by train or thirty plus children and one sullen teenager, there is always a way around it.
There is always a workaround, Grace thinks as she partially slithers on her hands and knees across smooth wooden crossbeams, completely invisible from the other side of the ceiling above everyone else's heads. She keeps her face low as close to the wood as humanly possible and breathes slow and carefully—there is no need to rush and no need to panic, unless she wants to fall through the ceiling of The Mall Car. There is hardly any oxygen in this dark interstitial space above the stark white tiled ceilings of The Mall Car and that great, black airless void that exists above it—and above that possibly the roof of the train car itself.
This stale, airless, oppressive void is a somewhat common feature in cars—and why Grace rarely volunteers to be the person who explores above ceilings solely for this reason. It's incredibly suffocating to exist in this space though none to her knowledge has ever actually succumbed—but she can't exactly be seen creeping through the car at night, especially after she'd declared herself to be so tired thirty minutes earlier. Out there is also her greatest obstacle aside from thirty odd traumatized children—all assorted fourteen locks and bolts on Simon's door. They may have called Grace a thief in her earlier life, but she is no burglar. She does, however, make for a very beautiful and talented spy.
Now, just what is Simon hiding? As she lifts up a ceiling tile and allows herself to drop lightly into Simon's living area, landing in a controlled crouch, Grace is fully prepared to find out. Simon's rooms are a weird mix of the typical teenager's abode as depicted in younger Grace's Saturday morning cartoons, a woodworker's hobbyist shop, and a small, but thriving library. Her nose picks up the familiar scent of musky cologne and old clothing and dried paint, and against her better judgement, Grace relaxes just a little bit. Even in dim lamplight and its long master gone, she feels comfortable here. Her shoes leave grimy footprints on his wooden veneer floors, but what right would Simon have to complain when he pulls stunts like earlier? When Grace finally finds him, he will be lucky if he still draws breath. Apex leader or not, Grace knows that he once owned Batman underwear—the socks and shoes fashion disaster wasn't even the half of it—one should never mess with a person who holds dirt as poisonous as Grace does over Simon.
Thankfully, Simon's obsession with neatness makes it much easier for Grace to search—every section of his rooms are dedicated to a singular purpose—his reenactment table in the center of the room, display cases off to the side for easy access, writing station offset in front for convenience when recording imaginary battles. Very efficient. Dorky, but efficient. Almost immediately Grace makes a beeline towards his writing desk, as Simon is a creature of habit and tends to jot down his daily thoughts at random times of day. If he's been sneaking out and having clandestine encounters with strangers, it is likely he would record his plans here. After all, who is breaking into the man whose room has fourteen locks on its door just to read random writings? No one in the Apex, that's for sure—or perhaps, no one in the Apex until now.
Simon's desk is unusually cluttered for one so usually organized, as if he'd left in a hurry. A small stack of mostly blank papers are scattered across its wooden expanse, along with a couple of wooden figurines. How curious… His writing is even more abominable than usual—another sign of haste—and Simon's handwriting resembles normally resembles scribble on the best of days. Grace has long since given up trying to decipher Simonese years ago—if she isn't so positive that he is working extra hard on proper handwriting while working on his fantasy book, Grace wouldn't have bothered to even promise to read it in the first place. Even so, Grace leans over the writing desk and tries her absolute best to parse words together.
'Ho-rse.' '-ncess.' 'Journey to the-' Bleugh. More Esmoroth stuff. Grace makes a face and tosses the offending sheet to the floor.
The next sheet of paper is underneath a wooden toy soldier. This one has a funny little black beard. Not bad. Grace picks him up and respectfully sets him on his feet and away from her snooping. The next sheet is where Grace finally strikes gold. Her breath shortens and her eyes widen as she reads. What on earth? No. What the hell? 'Tape.' '-aman-.' '-lia, at le-ast once-' These must be names and dates and just who is-? For the first in a very, very long time, Grace loses her balance. Her hand slips off the desk, and she accidentally knocks several objects all over the floor. Who is this blank-lia? What is a tape of…memories?
"What's going on with you, Simon?" Grace has no idea what to think. Her best friend is not the type to keep any sort of secret, much less humongous ones like these seem to be, but… In the face of such overwhelming evidence… She has to read more. Grace bends down to gather up Simon's spilled papers when something small catches her eye. Oh… Huh, if you look at that… So he's kept it after all of these years…
Grace bends down to pick up a chunky wooden figurine—one that is much older and notably less polished than the others. Simon has not always been as talented at whittling as he is now. Grace remembers when he had first started—or resumed rather, according to the blond himself—after lifting a knife and a block of wood from a car. One of Simon's very first completed pieces is a carving of Grace—and it was, is, absolutely atrocious. She recalls laughing at him when he had finished; surely he didn't mean for that hunk of wood to be her, right? Simon had flushed bright red and exclaimed hotly that of course it wasn't—in fact, it's a rendition of the Duke of Wellington—but even at twelve years old Grace had been quite certain that whoever this duke had been, he had never worn purple and pink.
Its uneven paint is old and chipped now, the happy hot pink faded into a dull rose; its smile, however, is as bright as ever. Grace wonders what Simon thought as he sat here the days and nights before and holds this figure and wrote these words. Some unknown emotion inside of her twists, and Grace suddenly feels as if she's stepped into waters too deep for her liking.
Grace stares down at her happy wooden doppelgänger. "I think it's time you and me catch up with your creator."
Aaaand they're off! Grace is on the chase!
Thanks for reading!