The transition from the underground subway to the elevated "L" tracks usually took a noisy thirty seconds as the train climbed the incline near Armitage.
The Golden Train did it in three.
It broke through the surface like a missile. One moment, Jax was in darkness; the next, he saw the blur of the Chicago skyline. The train didn't rattle. It hummed—a deep vibration that cracked the windows of the apartment buildings they sped past.
"Silas!" Jax shouted over the wind howling through the shattered front window. "We're hitting the Loop! The tracks are ninety years old and covered in rust! We can't take the curves at this speed!"
"The chassis has been reinforced," Silas's calm voice came back. "The structural integrity is—"
"Physics, you copper-plated fool! Physics!" Jax yelled, scrambling over the control console. "Centrifugal force! We're going to fly off the curve at Lake and Wabash and end up in Macy's perfume department!"
He grabbed the manual brake lever. It was no longer black plastic; it had changed into warm amber. He yanked it.
Nothing happened. The train didn't even tremble. It was powered by the new fuel and was hungry for distance.
They were passing the Merchandise Mart. The river flashed by below like a smear of black ink. The sharp right turn into the Loop was only ten seconds away.
Jax looked back at the passengers. They were slouched in seats now upholstered in crushed velvet. The grab handles had turned into ornate silver vines. The whole car looked like a Victorian lounge hurtling through time. If they hit that curve at 110, they would become paste.
"Okay," Jax muttered, his hands shaking. "You want to be a conductor? Let's conduct."
He kicked the front door open and stepped out onto the small, terrifyingly exposed prow of the train.
The wind hit him like a physical blow, tearing at his trench coat. His eyes filled with tears. The tracks ahead looked like a ribbon of steel rushing at him. He could see the curve approaching—a sharp 90-degree bend that no train should take faster than fifteen miles per hour.
Jax didn't try to slow the train down. He knew he couldn't stop the momentum. He had to hold on.
He dropped to his knees on the grate, slamming both hands onto the coupler.
"Grip!" he shouted.
He reached deep into the train's new golden nervous system. He found the alchemical "Vitality" Silas had injected—that desire to move, to be alive—and he twisted it. He mixed it with his own Kinetic power, the mastery of friction and static cling.
He didn't fight the train; he magnetized it.
The screeching sound was deafening. A shower of sparks—blue from Jax, gold from the alchemy—erupted from the wheels as the train hit the curve.
The laws of physics tried to throw the train off the tracks and into the street below. Jax held it down. He channeled so much magnetic force into the rails that the steel began to glow cherry-red. The wheels melted slightly, fusing momentarily with the track to hold on, then ripping free, then fusing again.
Jax screamed as the feedback loop tore through him. His skeleton felt like it was vibrating apart. The Lichtenberg scars on his neck blazed bright.
The train tilted. The right wheels lifted off the track. They were tipping.
"NO YOU DON'T!"
Jax slammed his forehead against the metal deck, grounding the charge. He dumped all his excess energy into the inner rail.
BOOM.
The magnetic pull snapped the train back onto the tracks with a force that cracked the concrete support pillars forty feet below on the street.
They whipped around the corner, shattering the windows of the office building just three feet away. Papers flew out of the broken windows, swirling in the train's wake like confetti.
Now they were in the straightaway of the Loop. The speed was decreasing. The friction of Jax's magnetic braking was finally working.
100 mph... 80... 60...
The train skidded, sending sparks showering down onto surprised tourists on Wabash Avenue. It screamed past the Adams/Wabash station, blowing hats off commuters on the platform.
Finally, with a groan of cooling metal, the Golden Train shuddered to a stop just before the Van Buren turn.
Silence returned to the world.
Jax lay face down on the front deck, smoke curling from his coat. His boots were melted to the floor. He couldn't feel his fingers.
"Mr. Miller?" Silas's voice crackled in his ear. "Telemetry indicates you have stopped."
Jax rolled over, staring up at the orange glow of the city night sky. He coughed, and a small puff of blue static escaped.
"I quit," Jax wheezed. "I'm joining the Postal Service. They have trucks. Trucks have tires."
Behind him, the door to the car opened.
The nurse stumbled out. She looked disoriented. She stared at her hands, then at the velvet seats, the brass railings, and finally at the smoking, glowing boy on the floor.
"Did we..." she stammered, rubbing her head. "Did we miss the stop?"
Jax laughed weakly, a hysterical sound.
"Yeah," Jax croaked. "We took the express."
He sat up, peeling his melted boot from the deck. He looked at the train.
It was beautiful. The grime of the CTA was gone. The exterior was now a matte, burnished bronze. The windows were crystal clear. The wheels still glowed faintly. Silas hadn't just fixed the train; he had turned it into something that didn't belong in this century.
"Silas," Jax said, tapping his earpiece. "You seeing this?"
"I am," Silas replied. "The transmutation stabilized. The alloy is unique. That train is now the most efficient conduit in the city. And Jax?"
"What?"
"The sensor data from the turn shows you hit 4 Gs. You successfully grounded the alchemical reaction." There was a pause. "Acceptable work."
"Go to hell, Tin Man," Jax smiled, leaning back against the warm, bronze railing.
But the victory was short-lived.
Far below them, in the dark water of the Chicago River, something rippled. The massive discharge of magical energy—the "Vitality" Jax had released into the grid to slow the train—hadn't just vanished. It had traveled down the support pillars. It had gone into the earth. It had gone into the water.
And in the muddy depths, something ancient, something that had been sleeping since the Fire of 1871, opened a very large, very hungry eye.