4PTG: Not much to say. Inspired by an western story by a friend.
The tracks gleamed blue-silver for as far as the eye could see. Which, in reality, was about three strides. After that the fog took over, and the tracks were nothing but a fuzz of bright underneath the grey.
There was no schedule, and no way of knowing when the next train would come. Ochala stood anyway, ignoring the seats behind her mostly because the seats behind her were filthy. The girl could smell them from here, and the lower half of her face wrinkled in disgust. Not much longer she reminded herself. Half a day at the most, and I'll be out of this hole.
She looked uptrack and down, but still no motion. The train was to be coming from the north, though if they had mixed up the schedules again... Ochala snorted. They were like to do that nowadays, now that they were trying to relocate everyone. Ridiculous, and dangerous besides: half the people were second-generation by now. Men of Earth had made some sort of decision that Msana wasn't safe, but how to get the two and a half thousand people off the planet? That's what they hadn't considered, of course.
And now they were doing so. Yeah, bussing people out is going to help a lot. People who were born here? People who loved the world? They weren't going to move, you could depend on that. They had nothing back on the Home World. They had no reason to leave.
Except...
Ochala remembered the pamphlets that'd come out the past few Msana-days (Forty-four hours, thirty-seven minutes, and two seconds Earth-time. Each.). Warnings? Of what? Who sent them? Why? Msana had never had any trouble. But Earth wanted them back, and so some of the people had begun to move.
Not fast enough. They had sent guards, to oust people, to run them out of their homes with as much as they could grab in half a minute, out onto the trains, the trains down to the south, and from the south? Transports back to Earth, everyone guessed.
Ochala doubted they would be there.
She had been born here, Ochala, five moons ago. Four earth-years each. And some change. She'd moved away from house and family, and started her own home: a blank tower-house, overlooking Msenome Lake. Jay had joined her, half a moon ago, and they'd stayed in the house together. Marriage? That was stupid. It was an Earth-tradition, marriage. They were on a new world, now, and Ochala saw no reason to uphold old customs for the sake of tradition. She loved this world and she did not intend for it to become like Earth.
She had been born here, and she intended to die here, thank you.
Ochala bent over the track, listening for the hum that would signal an approaching train. Nothing. Blast, this was becoming IMPATIENCE DOES NOT SUIT YOU, her mind overrode. CALM.
Ochala squared her shoulders and stood back from the rails.
She was here for a reason; having to do with Earth, of course. The planet had become abhorrant. The air was no longer air but smoke: the seas nothing but salt and dust, combined with acid and oil. A disgusting planet. They had said it wasn't safe here? Don't be idiotic, she responded in her mind. There's more danger in breathing that stuff than in anything that could be found here. Ridiculous.
The whine of the tracks alerted her. Ochala stepped back once more, shoving her sword behind her and tucking her bangs behind her ear. WAIT.
The train came out of the fog suddenly, and Ochala walked forward, toward the engine. The doors hissed open, and two guards stalked out of each, like wasps from a nest. Ochala suppressed a look of disgust and waited for them.
One of the guards finally noticed her. He shifted his gun so that it hung ready, and came closer.
"Girl, what are you waiting for? The train's here. Get on."
"I'm not getting on." Ochala scowled.
The guard looked at his partners, and jerked his head toward her. "No? Then why are you here? I would've thought that if you didn't want to leave, you wouldn't be waiting here to do so."
"You're articulate," Ochala observed. "No, I'm not waiting to leave. I was waiting for you guys."
The guard saw her sword. He laughed, half amused, half disgusted. "Stupid! What d'you plan to do with that?"
Earth-fodder. Ochala smiled and shook her head infuriatingly. "Kill you."
"Really now?" Another of the guards stepped up and hefted his gun. "With us carrying these?"
"Exactly. Because I know, as you don't," Ochala's blade was already out, "that those don't work in the fog."