Bella pushed through the crowd and stepped alone into the engine cab.
The previous conductor had already gotten off with the others, and now the driver's compartment stood empty.
Better to drive it herself. She didn't trust anyone else at the controls.
Operating the train was simple enough. She just didn't know the timetables and had no idea how to reach the control center — but running the thing was no problem. Automatic brake, independent brake, power handwheel, control lever, and then a bank of gauges, every label printed in both Korean and English. A little study, and she eased the whole train forward a good hundred meters or more.
Cars 11, 12, and 13, plus the passengers up in the ten forward cars who'd refused to get off, came to a little over a hundred people all told.
The rear cars were wide open and empty, yet everyone still chose to pack themselves in like sardines up in Car 1. If Bella hadn't been so busy figuring out how to drive, they'd have crammed straight into the engine cab with her.
"I don't even know if my family's all right…"
"I want to go home! I want to go home! I don't want to be stuck in this godforsaken place!"
"Pick up, Su-hyeon, please, please pick up the phone!"
Voices of every kind rose from the crowd. Now that they were safe for the moment, their thoughts turned naturally to family and friends.
The adults were holding together well enough, but the high school students Bella had saved were closer to breaking. They clenched their fists and fought it down, and still the tears slid one by one down their cheeks. They'd been sent to represent their school at a baseball tournament in Busan, and now they couldn't reach a single classmate from their school. Not one.
Seok-woo was doing his best to comfort his daughter. "Mommy's going to be fine. Mommy will absolutely be fine. She's safe in Busan — there are even more soldiers there to protect her."
Watching his daughter cry without a sound, and knowing full well the timing couldn't have been worse, he still steeled himself and came to Bella for reassurance. "Busan is safe, right?"
Bella was in the middle of studying the gauges on the control panel and paused a beat. Meeting the little girl's hopeful eyes, she gave a firm, heavy nod. "That's right. Busan is definitely safe. Armies from many countries are there now. This whole ordeal will be over before you know it."
Seok-woo's emotions ran high, and he bowed to her deeply. "Thank you. Thank you."
The little girl stood there mumbling, not sure what to say. Bella waved it off. "Take her to rest. The train's safe now."
Not five minutes later, a chorus of shouts erupted from the passenger car, and Bella spun to look outside.
She was just in time to see Sang-hwa charging along at the front like a wild boar, dragging a scrawny conductor who looked to be in his fifties. Seven or eight passengers ran behind them — and behind them came a black, roiling mass of zombies.
"Run! Run!" Sang-hwa's wife was frantic, but with that big belly of hers there was nothing she could do to help.
Seok-woo, though, had real nerve. He set his daughter down inside the car, ran out himself, and started shouting directions to Sang-hwa's group.
"This way, get on, hurry! Hurry!"
The female attendant Bella had rescued was shouting too. "Conductor, run! Run!"
Of course, there were the clueless ones as well. A few older women hollered, "Just get the train moving! Those monsters are catching up, can't you see them?"
Bella swung her muzzle their way, and the old women who'd been screaming to drive off promptly vanished back into the crowd.
"Hmph." She let out a snort and raised the pistol, dropping the zombies at the front of the pack.
"Come on!" Seok-woo hauled the burly Sang-hwa aboard, then the old conductor, half-dead and gasping, and after him the remaining six passengers. Even with Bella's covering fire, the survivor at the very back was swallowed by the horde.
More than two hundred passengers had gotten off at Daejeon Station. Eight came back.
"You okay? Don't scare me!" Sang-hwa's wife went to hold her husband up, but she didn't have the strength, and Sang-hwa was too big besides; two tugs and she couldn't budge him. Thankfully Seok-woo pitched in, and between them they finally got the winded wrestler back on his feet.
The old conductor, who looked to be in his fifties, was in even worse shape. He lay flat inside the car for a solid two minutes before he caught his breath. Watching the familiar train roll forward, a question suddenly struck him: if he was lying here, then who was driving?
"That FBI woman? She's driving the train? This… this can't be regulation, can it? Does she even hold a Korean locomotive license?" The attendants were all his subordinates. Several of them exchanged glances and shook their heads in unison — but who had the luxury of worrying about that right now?
The old man got up and walked into the driver's compartment. Bella glanced at him without the slightest trace of guilt over having taken his seat.
The conductor was in his fifties, close to retirement, and plainly spoke no English; the moment he opened his mouth it was a torrent of Korean that made Bella's head throb. She flashed her credentials again — meaning, in effect, I've taken over here.
As the train pulled out of Daejeon Station, Bella glanced back and saw a mass of zombies in Korean military uniform surging after it. She couldn't read Korean insignia and had no idea what unit they'd been — she only felt these young soldiers had died a bitter, undeserved death.
The old conductor was a diligent, dutiful man. Even with his driver's seat commandeered by Bella, he faithfully carried on with his job — which now meant answering the phone.
As it happened, Bella's own cell was nearly dead, so she used the train's phone to stay in contact with the outside. The conductor, too, kept in touch with the command center, which guided the train onto different tracks as needed.
The two of them made a wretched team. Neither spoke the other's language — the old man had not a word of English, and Bella not a word of Korean.
That was when the train's more capable passengers made their entrance. Three interpreters, Seok-woo among them, squeezed into the cramped cab. Eager to prove their worth, the three kept translating the old conductor's words for Bella and passing Bella's messages back to him.
A soft "thunk" caught Bella's attention.
"Did any of you hear that?" Bella asked. They all shook their heads — none of them had.
She hesitated a few seconds, still certain something was off, and handed the driver's seat back to the old conductor. Gun in hand, she headed for the rear cars.
"Aaah—!" A scream reached every ear.
"Something's happened. Stay put — I'll go check the back." Bella broke into a run toward the rear.
"That's the bus company executive we left behind!" Seok-woo hesitated, then, remembering his duty as interpreter, followed after her.
Sang-hwa the wrestler and a few of the high school students came along too.
They entered Car 11 and all frowned as one. The middle-aged man in the suit, whose hands and feet had been bound earlier, now lay in a pool of blood, while a young man savagely bit and tore at his neck.
"Deputy Kim? What are you doing here?" Seok-woo asked, stunned.
The young man lifted his blood-soaked face and gave him a deranged smile. "Manager Seok-woo. I'm guilty. We're all guilty! We're the ones who doomed Korea!"