Chapter 15: The Wreck of the Sunset Limited

October 9th, 1995, 1:40 AM MST, Mile 2525, Desert, AZ

“Ok, pack up. Everyone, as fast as you can. Try to not use lights and face them away from the track whenever you actually need them! We don’t want anyone to see us here. We failed on the train, let’s try and save our own asses!” Cigar yelled, “Finger and I will stay behind, I want every one out of sight before the train gets here! We are going to fall back on our excuse of a terrorist attack! MOVE OUT!”

This was Cigar under pressure, thinking clearly. One of the most important aspects of any business is the exit strategy - when to get out, under what circumstances, and how to ensure you make out the best you can when you manage to do so. In this case, they were exiting the business of this crime understanding that the best they could hope for was not to go to jail. Not going to jail was a much more preferable exit strategy than the alternative.

Once again, the site was a buzz of activity, with everyone moving equipment as best as they could back into the trucks. They all worked their asses off this time. They didn’t want anyone to have any clue what kind of operation this was. If they knew for sure it was a failed robbery, they’d have a much better idea of where to look. If it looked like a terrorist attack, they’d have much more opportunity to deflect suspicion.

Cigar was known throughout the state as one of the best planners and managers of large-scale crimes around. Nobody ever managed to get anything on him personally, and the bribes didn’t hurt the unsolved status. But that was when they weren’t dealing with mass murder. All of those bribes would mean nothing if they figured out he did this, and justifiably so. It is one thing to turn a blind eye to somebody stealing a bunch of computers; another to turn a blind eye to killing innocent civilians.

Cigar ran around barking orders, as he was the one who best knew how to do this stuff. Every man there respected and listened to him. He had gotten where he was by being exceptional- and never getting caught. Being organized, cool, collected, and above all more than a little risk-averse. If he had thought there was even a 5% chance of accidentally derailing the Sunset Limited this job would have never happened.

Men hoisted the articulation dollies back onto the trucks, got the trucks started, and picked up all their tools and equipment. They were anxious to get the fuck out of there. By the time the rescue helicopters and patrol off-roaders were on the scene, they wanted no evidence of their having ever been there. Fortunately the nature of the disaster was actually on their side; crime scene preservation would take a back seat to rescuing the passengers. So even if they didn’t do a thorough job covering their own tracks, the rescue operation would probably do the rest.

They worked with a dejected silence. They all knew there wasn’t a chance to stop the train before the derailment. Most of them distinctly did not want to have blood on their hands. Stealing was one thing, but killing many innocent people was another thing entirely. Besides, thinking practically, they had put a large investment of time and even money into this operation; and it wasn’t going to pay out.

Whether they were caught or not, they were going to be responsible for a passenger train derailing and most likely people dying. Most of them knew they’d have a hard time going home and facing their wife and kids. They had to, but it was going to be very difficult. They were not enjoying their work tonight, and they were going to regret this mistake for the rest of their life even if they weren’t caught. The sheer weight of the responsibility for what was about to happen weighed them down as if an actual, palpable weight was atop their shoulders.

As they worked they all prayed silent prayers that the disaster would be as small as possible. They knew for sure the train was going to derail, but maybe the death toll wouldn’t be so high. Maybe the whole train would make it over the bridge. Slim chance, sure, but they were hopeful. Maybe not too many people would be hurt; maybe not too badly. Maiming people was, in some ways, even worse than killing them.

Alone among those was the Espee man who had done this, who had given the people the information on how to commit this atrocity. He had an entirely different attitude altogether.

No! THE MONEY! he screamed inside his sick little head, I’m not going to make the money!

“Charley, you promised me the money!” the Espee man yelled at him, “I want my fucking money!”

“Jesus, you sick prick!” Cigar said, “People are about to die. That train is carrying hundreds of people and they are about to die, and all you can think about is money? Do you have any idea how serious this is? We could get the fucking chair, man!”

“Who cares about them, Charley?” Espee said, “They don’t mean anything, who cares?”

Cigar was not a man given to fits of temper, but this disgusting little man enraged him like no tomorrow. He lashed out and punched him in the jaw with a force that sent him collapsing onto the floor.

“Millsy, put him in one of the trucks,” Cigar said.

“Right away, Mr. Croker,” the Finger said. He was scared. He had never seen Cigar lash out and hit one of his men before. Even an insubordinate fool like that one.

They managed to dismantle the entire operation in two minutes flat. He was amazed at how capable his people were. They were some of the best in the business, and it was one of the key parts of their success. They could work together like a fine Swiss watch. On top of that, they were terrified, and it is fear that gives man wings.

He just wished he could stop what was going to happen. People were going to die. He wasn’t a killer. He was just a thief. But now he was going to be responsible for the death of many people and there was nothing he could do.

Wait, nothing?, Cigar asked himself, “Maybe I can ... yeah, that might help.

The train was getting closer and closer, and he saw the trucks falling off into the distance, the brush pickup following to remove their tracks from the soft sand. He hoped his men didn’t get caught. He had made a terrible mistake even toying with derailing a train on a line that occasionally hosted a passenger train. The primary fault for what happened didn’t rest on his men, or on the finger’s misplaced coffee. The fault rested on him, the planner, who picked a job with far too much risk.

He grabbed his flashlight out of his car, an old MAGLITE with the serial number filed off, and removed the lens assembly. He jammed the butt of the flashlight down into the sand right next to the jinked rail and turned it on, then ran back to his car. Maybe the light would attract the engineers attention and he might hit the brakes sooner, stopping the train. Maybe the wreck wouldn’t be as bad.

Charley felt a little better. He was still responsible for this disaster, but at least he had done what he could to prevent it. It was a token gesture, but at least it was something. He just had to sit and wait now. The train was only about 500 yards away now.

Some days, you just have a bad day. You roll out of bed wrong, you have a headache, you feel like shit, and nothing seems to go right. Everyone has those kinds of days from time to time, lets face it. It’s part of life; sometimes life just gets you down. You drink too much, you sleep badly, and on and on.

Engineer Chris Jacobs was having one of those days. He had woken up feeling like he had been run over by a truck. He rolled out of bed with the kind of aching slowness you’d expect of a much older man. He had drunk far too much last night; he might even register a BAC that would get him fired, but he hoped not. His wife, Mickey, had already left the house to go to work. His kids were out of the house, returning to school for Monday once again. He hoped they would manage to secure a college education.

Today, he was particularly glad that he didn’t have to work...

Except around 7:00, just before his wife would get home from work, he got a call from the extra board asking him to come down and take the Sunset Limited to Indio. His wife would have hit the roof, so he quickly scrawled a note, got in the car, and headed down to the station. He needed the work; they needed the money. He’d just have to put up with the fight that would come when he got back.

The train was running ridiculously late and everyone was a bit irritable about it; the operating crew was all extra board, because the timing didn’t fit in with regulars. It was a long trek and he was thinking about the idea of quitting his job. He never got enough time with his family. It was making them all drift apart from each other. He loved his wife with all his heart and this wasn’t worth even the good money he was getting to do this job.

He knew what was going to happen. He’d get down to Indio, at which point he’d detrain and go to the crew base there. He’d get a ride to the local motel that Amtrak used for crew members. It was an ok motel, not great, but not terrible, either. Somewhere along there he’d find a woman of the night and get laid. Tuesday at about 2 AM, he’d take control of the eastbound train and get to Phoenix about 9 AM Wednesday morning with a wonderful little bitch of a hangover.

He’d be exhausted, get to his house by about two in the afternoon, flop into bed, and not get up for a good 18 hours. At which point it would be Thursday morning. Friday night, he’d be out to do it again. That was all the time he would have with his wife. She hated it, and he hated it. And the little time they had together meant they had little time for love making. He’d be tired and ornery the entire two days he was home.

Not to mention guilty. He hated it every time he cheated on his wife. But he never got any at home - they were never ready at the same time. Not like that was an excuse. But it was the reason. It wasn’t a good reason, but there rarely is a good reason for cheating on your loved one. Its just a series of bad reasons that built like a snowball rolling downhill until they figure it out and leave you.

He needed to find a new line of work. It was that simple. Even if he made less money, he’d be with his family more. He’d stop doing dumb things like sleeping with whores. He’d help raise his kids, and they could all be happy again. So a new job.

But what? He needed something that would put his kids through college and pay for all the benefits and keep them in the fashion to which they had become accustomed. He got about $700 a trip, and since he did trips twice a week, it meant he made $72k a year, plus benefits, massive retirement package including Railroad Retirement, and all the other stuff that came with being in a strong union.

He would be hard pressed to find a job that supported them this well without a college education.

Suddenly, he saw what looked like a ... flashlight near the tracks?

He strained his eyes at the object that was racing towards him.

It IS a flashlight, he realized, Why is there a flashlight near the tracks? Why ... oh my god, a jinked rail. Oh fuck.

He had been sitting with his feet rested on the front window.

He put his feet back onto the ground.

He grabbed the brake lever.

He jammed it against its stop and then pushed it further, placing the train into emergency mode, instructing the locomotive to dump all the air in the train, causing a chain reaction that would open every dump valve in the locomotive and the cars behind it. With the air gone, the full pressure of the brakes would be exerted as fast as possible.

But it was too late. By the time he was able to actually activate the brakes, they were already rocketing past the jinked rail.

Sharon was sitting on the toilet in the handicap bathroom.

She wasn’t going to the bathroom. She just needed some time to think. She wanted to do it alone, and this was as good a place as any. It was spacious and it was surprisingly clean. She could be alone here and just let her thoughts run without somebody interrupting them or influencing them. Things were happening so fast, and she needed to think on them.

Life seemed to be changing, and changing with almost scary speed. It was less than four days ago that she had a fight with her husband and decided she couldn’t live with him being anywhere near her and her precious children any more. She had done more than just divorce him with incredible prodding from her male friend, and over the objections of her parents. She actually grabbed her things and took off into the night; she had run.

In that time, everything seemed to change. She had sold her house, driven all the way to Texas, picked up a male she might be falling in love with, met some new friends, and became aware of the unusual nature of her middle-children’s relationship. All in less than four days time. It was a lot to process; in fact, it was too much to process. That’s why she was sitting here trying to do it anyway.

She just didn’t know what to do about her life. It was all extremely confusing, all so new, all so contradictory to what she had believed. Her parents had always told her that you meet a man and marry and it’s death-do-you-part. But then David had been so abusive, she concluded that he had broken the contract he had agreed to. He didn’t love or cherish, nor care for. She was just his punching bag and cum dumpster, or she had been until he started calling her an old cow.

She didn’t want to make the same mistake twice. Miguel was acting very nice and being a total gentleman, and all that. But so had David way back when, and he had turned out to be a cheating, drinking, abusive wife-beater;

Well, that wasn’t quite true, she thought.

He had been anxious to turn her on and he was always kissing her, even before she agreed to go out with him. He had gotten her into the sack by the first date. Miguel, on the other hand, had made it clear that a relationship with her would be nice. But then simply remained there, a helpful person and father figure to her kids. He wasn’t trying to push her into places that she wasn’t sure about.

He didn’t possessively put his arm around her. He didn’t try to get her to kiss him. It had been she who had elected to join him in the seat the night before. Didn’t try to convince her of his undying love for her, either. He had been honest enough to say that he didn’t know for sure. She knew that with a lot of women that would be hurtful and seem wrong, but she understood what he meant. After all the lies and deceits from David and his brand of humiliation, she really appreciated the direct honesty.