The heavy mahogany door of the Library slammed shut with a thunderous boom that vibrated through Kashem's very marrow. He stood in the narrow, dimly lit corridor connecting the carriages, gasping for air. His lungs burned as if he had been inhaling coal dust, and his hands were trembling so violently that he almost dropped the leather-bound ledger he had risked his life to retrieve.
Behind the door, he could still hear the muffled, metallic screeching of the Conductor and the sound of thousands of crystal cubes shattering. The library was collapsing, and with it, a portion of the world's lost history was being erased forever.
"I can't keep doing this," Kashem whispered, sliding down against the cold metal wall. He looked at the glowing lighthouse mark on his arm. It was pulsing with a sickly, pale light now, as if it was exhausted from the effort of protecting him.
He was a man who spent his days looking at spreadsheets and SQL queries in a temperature-controlled office in 2026. He wasn't a hero. He wasn't a time-traveler. He was just a guy who happened to be at the wrong station at the wrong time. Or was he?
The words of the veiled woman echoed in his mind: 'You were born with the Link.'
Suddenly, the entire train shuddered. This wasn't the normal swaying of a locomotive. It was a violent, bone-jarring lurch that threw Kashem across the corridor. A horrific sound followed—a deep, metallic groan that sounded like a giant beast being tortured.
The Dead Express was slowing down.
"No, no, no! Not now!" Kashem scrambled to his feet, looking out the narrow porthole window.
Outside, the grey fog had turned into a swirling vortex of deep crimson. They were no longer in the void; they were passing through a region that looked like a bleeding sky. Large, jagged shards of reality—pieces of old buildings, broken clock towers, and rusted rails—were floating in the air, colliding with the train's hull.
"The engine is failing," a cold voice said from behind him.
Kashem spun around. The veiled woman was standing there, but she looked different. Her veil was torn, and through the gaps, Kashem could see her skin—it wasn't flesh, but a translucent substance that showed glowing circuits of blue energy beneath.
"What do you mean 'failing'?" Kashem asked, his voice rising in panic. "The Conductor said if the engine stops, we all become fuel!"
"The Conductor did not lie," she replied, her voice devoid of emotion. "The 'Erasers' have clogged the external vents. They are trying to freeze the heart of the 1884 locomotive. If the temperature drops below the critical point, the 'Seal' will break prematurely. We will never reach the 1884 station. We will simply dissolve into the crimson void."
"What do I have to do?" Kashem gripped the ledger. "I have the first Key! Doesn't this help?"
"The Key is for the destination. To keep the vessel moving, we need fire. Not a fire made of coal, but a fire made of 'Active Memory'." She looked at Kashem, her silver eyes glowing through the darkness. "You must go to the Boiler Room. You must feed the furnace."
Kashem felt a cold pit form in his stomach. "Feed it what? You said memories..."
"Go, Kashem. Every second you hesitate, another year of your 2026 reality is being deleted. Look at your phone."
Kashem pulled out his broken phone. Even though the screen was cracked, a single image was flickering. It was a photo of his mother. As he watched, her face began to blur, turning into static. Her name, which was saved in his contacts, was changing into a string of unreadable code.
"She's being erased..." Kashem choked out, a wave of pure, unadulterated rage replacing his fear. "They are erasing my mother!"
"Then run," the woman commanded.
Kashem didn't wait for another word. He bolted down the corridor, heading toward the front of the train. As he passed through the fifth and sixth carriages, the luxury of the Victorian era disappeared, replaced by raw, industrial horror. The walls were covered in thick soot, and the floor was made of iron gratings that looked down into a bottomless pit of fire.
Finally, he reached a door made of solid lead. It was glowing red-hot. Using his jacket to protect his hand, he kicked the lever and threw the door open.
The heat was instantaneous. It hit him like a physical blow, knocking the breath from his lungs. In the center of the room sat the Heart of the Dead Express—a massive, pulsating furnace that looked like a ribcage made of iron. Inside, a core of blue fire was flickering weakly.
Standing before the furnace was a shadow—a creature made of smoke and jagged glass. It was an Eraser that had managed to manifest inside the ship. It was pouring a bucket of black, liquid silence into the fire, trying to extinguish the soul of the train.
"Get away from there!" Kashem roared.
The shadow turned, its dozens of eyes glowing with a hateful red light. It let out a shriek that sounded like a thousand dying hard drives. It lunged at him, its claws made of sharp data-shards.
Kashem didn't have a weapon, but he had the mark. As the creature closed in, he thrust his right arm forward. "Authorization: Zero-One! Purge!"
The lighthouse mark exploded with a brilliance that filled the entire Boiler Room. The blue light hit the shadow-creature, and for a second, the room was filled with the sound of screaming code. The Eraser disintegrated, turning into harmless ash that was instantly sucked into the furnace.
But the fire was still dying. The blue core was now just a tiny spark.
Kashem approached the furnace. He felt a strange pull from the flames. To save the world, to save his mother, he had to give the engine something it could burn.
He thought of his happiest memory—the day he got his first job, the pride in his father's eyes. He focused on that feeling, the warmth, the color, the sound of his father's laugh. He placed his hand on the iron grate of the furnace.
"Take it," he whispered, tears streaming down his soot-covered face. "Take the memory. Just keep the train moving."
A surge of heat pulled the memory from his mind. For a moment, he felt a void in his heart, a blank space where that memory used to be. He could no longer remember his father's face or the name of the company he worked for.
But the furnace responded.
The blue fire roared back to life, turning into a towering pillar of celestial flame. The engine began to thrum with power, the metallic groaning replaced by a triumphant, rhythmic beat. The train jolted forward, accelerating at an impossible speed.
Kashem fell back, gasping for air, his mind feeling lighter, emptier. He had saved the train, but he had lost a piece of himself.
"One memory for ten years of reality," the veiled woman's voice whispered in his mind. "A fair trade, Analyst. But the 1884 station is still far away, and the furnace will get hungry again."
Kashem looked at the ledger, still clutched in his left hand. He had the first Key. He had the fire. But he realized with a sinking heart that by the time he reached the end of this journey, there might be nothing left of 'Kashem' to go back home.
He stood up, wiped the soot from his brow, and looked toward the next door.
"Let's go," he said, his voice now harder, colder. "I have a disaster to stop."