We push through the door into the engine car.
It's the last one. No door at the front—just the curved nose of the locomotive, plated in the same pearl-white metal as the hull. The car is shorter than the others. Half the length. What it loses in size it makes up for in equipment.
Control panels run the length of both side walls. Blue crystals sunk into circuits that pulse on a slow internal rhythm. Levers in dark metal, polished smooth at the grips. Runic dials turning at speeds I can't read—some clockwise, some against, some in patterns that don't fit either. In the center sits a main console, a flat surface of black glass set at waist height. No buttons. No labels. No interface.
The traffic light 237, passes the window.
A line of text drops onto my HUD.
[Penalty: The Engineer has accelerated the train.]
The train seems to know what we're doing.
It probably learned the trick when my father came through here.
I shake the thought loose. Useless right now.
