Edge of Schwarzerblitz - Jackson's Express

June 2089. 20 years after the epilogue of Schwarzerblitz, Ann-Kasumi, Vincent Jackson's and Kia Takara's natural daughter, muses about her place in the world after a failed academic career. There is always another story ready to unfold at Jackson's – even for those who think they hit a dead end.

Green. My eyes are green, this morning. I love when that happens, it’s my favorite color. Shame that it doesn’t last that long, like, never. I’m pretty sure they’ll already be brown or blue after lunch. Maybe gray. I hate when they turn gray, but what can I do? It’s not for me to decide. Dying my hair, though? That’s easier. No matter which color it turns to, I just need to paint them black to be the best version of myself. So, here I stand, in front of the mirror, adjusting my make up for the day. My nose is a little shorter than usual, but still within my average. Good, the doctor was clear: I’m stabilizing. Slowly but surely. My features don’t change that much anymore. My skin color is always the same. All that changes are my eye and hair color, plus some minor detail like the shape of my ears, the tip of my nose, the thickness of my eyebrows… you know, not very important stuff. At least, I can be me without someone mistaking me for someone else. I open a little red box, a gift from daddy dearest. Emerald contacts shine from inside it, the exact shade of green I crave the most. Dad had them made by one of his pals, name Jakall. My high-school graduation present—artificial irises that feel like a gentle membrane and can be removed without any pain. A marvel of science, apparently. I don’t like wearing contacts, but it’s a necessity in a way. Without them, everyone would notice my eye color shifting every few hours. My hair too—and that’s why I dye it—behaves like a technicolor reel. Had already some trouble with the cops, you know?

“This on the ID card ain’t you, gal.”

No, no, it’s very much me, ‘kay? It ain’t my fault if I was born a face-shifter. Ask my dad and his blurry messy thingy he has for a face. Look, I’ve known him for twenty bloody years and still cannot even say what the color of his skin is. That’s my dad, though, and I love him for what he is. Even if he’s a smartass, sometimes rude, sometimes too direct, I can’t really be angry at him, not too much at least. Of course, he does what every dad do to his freshly of age daughter: annoy her to no end and monitor each and every interaction she has with the opposite sex. Who was that guy? Did he ask you out? Should I kneecap him with a crowbar? Should I send Shaz to his house? Let me quickly book the fishface mafia…

Dad, I love you, but… go a little less ballistic, okay? I’m fine. It’s fine. Let your Ann-Kasumi gal deal with it, I’m not new to this ride, alright? Uncle Mirto (or was it Joe, this week?) would agree with me. Aunt Lalli would side with me too, yes? So, why can’t you be chill like them, dad? You’re fine with Uncle Mirto (Shaz? Gaetano? Timperio? Ronny?) and his antics, you’re fine with Aunt Lalli and her absolutely abysmal taste in fact of clothing (even if she can definitely afford it—God, I hope I’ll look as fine as her, when I get into my forties. She’s certified smash material, much like Aunt Cyphy). But you ain’t fine with me seeing guys?

Well, sucks for you: I swing both ways, like a pendulum. Guy. Girl. Guy. Girl. Guy. Girl. I mean, if you swing just one way, you lose half the fun, right? Okay, okay, I copied this from a novel Aunt Lalli lent me, one about hot foxes and hotter gals, plus robots. Anyway, my current premium swinger is probably already sitting in the carriage, browsing idly through the menus like she always does. I quickly gaze at the clock. Six sharp. Yep. That’s it. Preparation time’s over. I wear my contacts, put my yellow fedora on, smile at the mirror. Good, all teeth are there. None of them is shifting. None has been shifting for the past five years, right, but you can never be sure enough. So, with my most perfect gloves, shirt, suspenders and yellow pants combo, I exit the restroom and stroll towards the counter.

Of course, she’s already there. I push my elbows on the wooden counter, smile at her while still unseen. Gosh, she’s gorgeous. Dyed, oxygenated hair with black tips at the end, deep blue eyes, a koi tattoo on the right side of her chest, a rebellious tail wagging out of her back, ending in a black spot… and those fluffy, soft cat ears too. Kanny, o Kanny. I’d eat you with my eyes every day, if I could. The world has never seen a more perfect neko.

Outside of the windows, the metallic noises, the bumps on the rails, accompany this silent dawn with very nice vibes. The carriage is still empty, aside from that gal, from that magnificent presence of her that fills the entire train. Her biker suit, her fashionable bandaged bra… I can’t take away my gaze from her. She’s still browsing the menu, without a hint of having noticed me. Of course she has, though. Two can play this game: you can’t expect an Igarashi to make things simple. Her dad Gattonero was clear about it: don’t mess with the Igarashi family. Don’t. Simply don’t. I remember that once he even said something like ‘cut your cock instead of bedding an Igarashi woman’, but that sounds a little exaggerate. Kanny-chan is definitely pure dynamite, I get it, and her mom is even worse. Rumors about Frida ‘walking wave of destruction’ Igarashi have reached the farthest corners of the UK, causing the government to ban her on sight if she’d ever show up at the border. I think I’ve even seen an old fashioned paper poster with her face and a large, fat red cross on it in Folkestone. Wanted. Dead or deported. What a way to enter the collective zeitgeist, isn’t it?

A yawn exits my tired lips. 6AM. The early morning shift, for people who spent the whole night out. All of them craving for a coffee. All of them with eye bags reaching the floor. Kanny-kitty is no exception, really. She’s clearly barely hanging on. So, maybe I should do the first move. Maybe I should serve her a coffee or two on my tab, while we travel through the Nerifumo bridge.

Because this what Jackson’s Express is—a traveling cafe on rails, an automatic train that serves New Langdon and stops at every station with parking tracks. It stays there for just twenty minutes before departing again, every time with new guests on board. Monday to Sunday, six in the morning to up to two in the night—depending on the day. This train is a microcosm of life, of stories, of faces and struggles, of unrequited feelings and unsaid truth.

And I’m its manager—Ann-Kasumi Jackson, Aki for friends and potential love interests, Annika for dad and mom, and Ms. Jackson for that idiot Ange and his cronies.

This is my place, my life.

This is my story.

**

“Mr. Jackson, I’m not sure what to say about your daughter.”

I remember that day as if it were yesterday. The headmaster’s office was cramped and dusty, filled with counterfeit paintings and low quality pictures. The man was as dusty as his room, with a gray beard and glasses that wouldn’t have felt out of place in a black and white movie. His bone-like fingers browsed a printed file, with my name and picture on it. The difference was my eye and hair color. My eyes, that day, were brown. My hair pale blond. The photo showed a different Ann-Kasumi, one with black hair and green eyes—my favorite steady unsteady state. And, huh, the other difference was that I had a patch on my cheek and eyebrow, while my picture didn’t. My face still hurt. The face of that bastard Mark hurt more. I think I saw one tooth or two blasting off, after I sent him flying the day of the results. Well, he started it.

“Who did you fuck to pass the state exam, Anny?”

Well, I fucked his face, hard, with my bare knuckles. In tears. Because, sorry, but to hell with it. I gave my all, I did my best, and still barely scraped a 60%. One point less and I would have been forced to repeat the year. I legit cried when I saw the results out. Cried like a dumb baby. That’s when Mark picked on me with that oh-so-sharp joke. Ann-Kasumi, the air-headed bimbo with shifting eyes and hair color, who can’t even solve a stupid equation. So, here I was, in the headmaster’s office, trying to keep my cool and not burst into tears. I didn’t want to repeat the year. I didn’t want to be a failure again. But that ship had sailed, right? What was done was done. So, my dad was there with me, with his ever-changing, unseeable face. His eyes were always a mystery to me. They looked white, without a pupil, even if somewhere there had to be one. Still, I could ‘see’ it, if I focused enough, even if just for an instant. Vincent Jackson, my father, the man who brought me into this world, was a freak—a bizarre oddity of nature, something that shouldn’t exist. But I’m glad he did, because otherwise I wouldn’t be here to tell the tale. Praised be the day he met my mom.

However, for him to be forced to interact with people, it had to be an emergency of sorts. What better emergency than his daughter being held hostage by the school because of almost sending a fellow classmate to the ICU? I could see his discomfort, feel it deep in my bones. His annoyance gave me the chills. I knew he was going to scold me later, as he always did. So, in my mind, I was already getting prepared for the worst—knowing mom would have scolded me twice as much afterwards.

The dusty voice of the dusty headmaster kept ringing like a off-tune bell. Grating to the ears, annoying to no end.

“See, your daughter… she’s clearly not lazy, but she lacks… manners. And talent. Like, none of her teachers wanted to have her repeat the year, yes? Even if her results were… lackluster at best.”

I bit my lips, trying my best not to cry. Lackluster. My whole existence was lackluster. So much for becoming a rocket scientist, an astronaut, or even a robot engineer like Jake. Lackluster. Yes, that was the best way to describe me, Ann-Kasumi, the youngest and least gifted of the Takara siblings. My father, though, didn’t seem concerned by those words. He sat calmly on his seat, wearing his traditional white shirt and lemon yellow suit combo—fedora included. Smiling. He was smiling. Now, I know what you think, I know what you’re going to ask me—but yes, I can see his reactions, in a way. He’s a blur, right, but somehow I can recognize what his face does under that veil of fuzziness. So, I know he was smiling, or smirking at least. Which, if possible, made me even more uneasy.

“Huh-uh. So, what impressed her teachers so much, if she’s so bad at it?”

“Her determination, Mr. Jackson. Look, read this. This is the report they handed over to me.”

His skeletal finger moved again on another file, one written in a small serif font. Several lines were blanked out and redacted, but most were clearly readable. And, of course, the headmaster started reading them himself.

“She never gave up and always submitted all of her homework on time, putting tremendous effort in it. Unfortunately, her results don’t match her passion.”

His finger moved one line down.

“Despite a clear propensity towards hard work and having a great way with people, the student seems to be unable to learn anything above a basic level in a way that sticks to her brain.”

Then, one line more.

“While she doesn’t seem to have any deficit or handicap that prevent her from learning and despite showing maybe the greatest effort I’ve ever seen in twenty years of teaching, the student fails at every basic task that doesn’t require dealing with other people.”

My father was still smiling, in a way. He turned towards the headmaster, pushing his hat down his forehead.

“I don’t see the problem, Mr. Crawshaw. My daughter managed to pass the state exam, even if with a minimum score. So, she’s settled. It’s a success.”

“Success?”

Silence fell into the dusty office of the dusty headmaster. His voice turned even more grating.

“Success… being barely able to pass an exam a donkey would manage to?”

Dad nodded, in that slow way he always does when he wants to feel more mysterious. I started shaking. Trembling. Trying my best to keep my tears at bay. I have no dyscalculia. I’m not dyslexic. There isn’t anything wrong with my brain. I just… I just don’t get it. It’s like having a wall in front of me that I know I can jump over, yet my legs are stuck with glue to the ground. I can only peek on the other side of it, see the greatness that awaits for me behind it, but I can’t climb it. For the life of me, I can’t climb it. While everyone else does, with half, one quarter, one tenth of the effort it takes to me to even get closer to get my foot on the first brick. I was shaking, yes, on the verge of crying. That’s when I felt his hand. His hand on my shoulder. Bringing me close. Keeping me warm.

“Numbers and statistics can’t make me not proud of my daughter. She passed. That was all she had to do. And she did it. Now, if that was all what you wanted to talk to me about…”

“She almost sent another student to the hospital, after the results went public.”

My father shrugged, tipped his hat as he always used to. I’ve seen that reaction hundreds of times. It never gets old.

“See, that’s an almost too much. If an idiot implied I had sex with a teacher to pass an exam, I’d have kicked them so hard they would have prayed to be sent to the hospital. Ann did what she had to do. If anything, she was too soft.”

The look of the headmaster was priceless. He could barely articulate his words, barely emit a sound. It was as if his subroutines stopped, if his brain went into full shutdown. What is this faceless man saying? That was what his mind was lost on. Why did he say that? How can a father say something like that?

You and I both missed something back then, headmaster of my ass: my father is not just a normal man. My father is the guy who stood before an eldritch, world-ending abomination and won. My father kicked my brothers’ father down a skyscraper when that bozo tried to harm them. My father fought and bested bloody wrestling legend Klaws “Evilobster” Aberdeen, before he even started his career on the ring. My father has a dumb buff ex-mafioso sharkman as his best friend. My father is a drinking buddy with the head of Crossbones and worked for them. Because my father is Vincent Jackson, one of the most badass men alive. And, as such, he’s not someone who is bound by logic or even common sense.

That’s what I loved about him. That’s what I hated about him. Such a difficult man to deal with. Nevertheless, that time I was happy he was there with me. I was happy he stood by my side. His voice felt soothing, cleansing every single one of my heartstrings, making me feel at ease.

“Look, I get it. The parents of that kid will sue us, right? Well, let them come. I have plenty of lawyers and friends in Yard that would help me. I’ll pay the fine and the hospital bill, in case they want to settle… provided they don’t stomp my Annika’s feelings ever again.”

He stood up soon after, pulled me up too, started to walk away.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a cafe to open.”

That’s when the headmaster’s dusty voice erupted.

“That girl can’t go to any university, Mr. Jackson. She frankly won’t be able to do anything there. She might be a hard-working student, like everyone of her teachers says, but she will never be able to pass a single exam.”

My father turned around, glared at him with what looked like disgust in my eyes. Then his voice sealed it. Disgust it was, for real.

“Trust me, Mr. Crawshaw… if every school is like this cesspit here, I don’t want her to get close to any of them ever again. Now, I wish you a pleasant day… very far away from my cafe, possibly.”

**

I couldn’t get it. I couldn’t understand it.

I expected dad to be livid at me.

I expected him to scold me. To swear at me. To punish me.

Yet, we were eating a hamburger. Together. At a drive-in. With extra chocolate muffins. Bottles of soda. And even a small surprise gachapon ball.

“Why are we celebrating?”

“Because you passed your exam, why else?”

It still felt unreal. My dad. Praising me. For passing an exam with the minimum grade? That had to be a veiled insult. He was playing with me, I thought. He was mocking me, I was sure of it. But he felt… genuine. No, that couldn’t… that didn’t match. I was still almost to the verge of tears, grinding my teeth, shaking my knees like a blender. Despite that, all I could see in his fuzzy eyes was pride. Pride in me.

“I… barely scraped a minimum score.”

“You still passed. Congratulations for finishing high school, despite being my daughter.”

“What?”

Then, I see it, that strange look in his eyes again. Guilt. He feels guilty, in a way.

“Your face… it’s not as weird as mine, but its also changing often, right? Your eye color shifted six times from this morning. Your hair color five. Sometimes I wonder if… well, if your brain shifts too, even barely, messing up what you learn. Actually, I think that’s it, after talking with your headmaster. If that’s the case... well, it’s my fault, really, if things are hard for you, Annika. So, seeing you succeed despite a handicap that nobody could diagnose… makes me proud of you. You are the strongest Jackson in the family.”

That floored me, of course. A hidden handicap. One I didn’t know of. One I didn’t know about. One he didn’t know about. Because that’s what I read in his eyes. No contempt. No childish retorts. Simple regret. For not having grasped it before.

“When did you…”

“Look, I didn’t. I suspected there was something weird behind your struggle to get good grades, but that was it. I saw you study at Jackson’s, take notes, churn numbers for whole days while everyone around you drunk their soul out. I’m not blind. But I never… connected the dots. And the doctors never did either. I simply thought, you know, that you lacked talent and that your issues came from my side of the family. After all, your mom birthed Hiro and Jake first—two of the brightest minds I’ve ever met on this planet. So, if anything, it must come from me.”

Yay, so it wasn’t my fault? Nah, to good to be true. Dad was coping. Doctors tested me for every bloody known learning disorder and found none. The one he said sounded like mumbo jumbo to me too. So yes, hard cope. Still, it was nice that he tried his best to make me feel better, to make me proud of passing with a bloody 60%. All while my brother Jake was quickly becoming the rising star of robotics under the tutelage of Dr. Vladenek frickin’ Mavelius and Hiro was managing a whole sushi chain on his own. I’m the dumb sister of two geniuses—good only at all the stuff I don’t care about. That 60% as my final grade had a lot of annoying implications, including that I wouldn’t be able to attend any premium university. Nobody would have admitted me, just maybe some backwater institute with a tuition that would bankrupt a small European state. No further studies. The academic life of Ann-Kasumi Jackson was over before starting. That made me want to sink further into the darkest corners of my mind.

Still, I bit my burger, munched some fries, gulped down some soda. An empty stomach never helped anyone. Let alone managed to keep my tears at bay. So, comfort food it was, slowly, surely, tasting the sauce, the textures of those fried potatoes. Opening my gachapon of Magical Starlight Knight Eyuen to see which keychain I got. Squeeing like a little girl when I found out it was Black Knight Gyrian. Biting my burger again, while dad did the same.

“Look, Annika. I know I haven’t been the best dad.”

Yes. Right. You weren’t. But no dad is best dad. They all have some flaws.

“I also made a lot of mistakes as a parent.”

Yup, you did. But, again, every dad makes mistakes—like letting Uncle Mirto (was it Shaz, back then?) babysit me and almost having me fall into the Nerifumo channel due to an accident involving his pal Lazor, a cormorant, and a dog leash. I was five, I don’t remember the details—just that Lazor fell from the bridge and remained stuck in the beams until the police came to free him. Your main mistake was trusting Uncle Mirto, dad, but not the only one you made. Killing my brothers’ father with the helps of the cops was a good mistake, mind me, if all what mom told me about him is true. Aside from that, though, you pestered me when I tried to smoke just once, you almost kicked me out of house when I accidentally totaled my moped against your car, and you always kept tabs on all the guys I got along with.

“Still, I love you with all of myself. You’re my baby girl, no matter what happens.”

Aww, dad. Please, stop. Not at a Van Douglas. I sunk into my chair, trying to hide my discomfort. I was nineteen. Not a baby anymore. An idiot? Yes. But not a baby.

“Now…”

That’s when he dropped the atom bomb on me.

“…would you like to manage a Jackson’s cafe?”

I looked at him, blinked at him.

What.

The heck?

I could not reply immediately, I must have stuttered a lot in that moment. Still, what. The. Heck?

“…what?”

“See, I was thinking about it this morning. You can’t go to a university, that much is clear. I could afford the tuition, if you wanted to try, mind me. If you’re dead set on it, I’ll let you go for at least two semesters. But, if you want to start earning some money instead…”

Okay, now he was talking my language. Becoming independent. Earning my salary. Getting on my two legs. That awakened something in me, a will to listen to him more.

“…Lejl had a dumb proposal. Except, it’s not dumb, not at all. I like it, in fact.”

“That is?”

“A traveling train cafe. Let’s call it ‘Jackson’s Express’, for the sake of discussion.”

Jackson’s Express. A train cafe. Alright, yes, that was definitely an Aunt Lalli idea, if anything. She’s a weirdo, a cool weirdo but still a weirdo. I’m surprised Uncle Mirto and her get along so well. Dumb shark here, horny gremlin there… these two must have had a long story together—best frenemies and the likes. Nevertheless, dad seemed serious. Which is, usually, when disasters happen. I nodded at him, signaling that he could go on. So, he started waving his hands, as if he was picturing everything in his mind.

“Imagine this: a small train, two carriages, traveling around the New Langdon regional rail network, stopping everywhere where parking tracks lie, from morning to night. One carriage for customers, one split between a warehouse, changing rooms for the waiters and bartenders, and a private room for the manager.”

“With a comfy queen-sized bed?”

“…a single bed. For one person. Not to be shared.”

Oh, yeah. Dad playing hardball as usual. That’s the Vince Jackson I know. I munched a little more of my burger, leaving just some scraps of fries behind, already aiming at the muffin. I craved chocolate. I needed chocolate.

“…why me, dad? I just got shafted and I suck at everything I try.”

“No, you bloody don’t. I’ve seen you working shifts at Jackson’s to fix your moped. You were good at it. Good with customers. Good with Lejl, even—which, frankly, is an achievement. That horny gremlin gives a hard time to basically everyone not called Vincent, Shaz, Cyphr, Paddy or Chai.”

“I like her urban legends. She tells them well.”

“If only that was the problem.”

He shook his head, bit what was left of his burger, stole a fry from my plate. He always did that. Steal one fry after finishing his portion. Typical dad behavior. I let him do it, without slapping his hand away as I usually did. I let him continue.

“But… well, I want to launch it next year. I’ve started getting the paperwork done and I need someone trusted to run it. As much as I like Lejl, trusted isn’t an adjective I’d use to define her. She messes up rarely, but when she does? My lawyers tremble at the chance. All of them. I had to take additional insurance to keep her employed. Same goes for Shaz. If I hire him again, my insurance premium will shoot up tenfold, due to an old accident involving a limousine, kerosene, and a sheep. No, don’t ask. I won’t answer.”

He stared at me deep in the eyes. For a moment, a flickering instant, I managed to spot his pupils, his irises, before they got swallowed back by those white shifting lakes of his.

“If you accept, Annika, I’ll have Lejl work with you at first, so that you won’t shoulder everything on your own. Then, I’ll take the horny gremlin back and let you choose your coworkers for the shifts.”

I started trembling. Again. Putting so much trust in me. I didn’t deserve it. Not after getting a 60% at the state exam despite busting my ass on it. I couldn’t keep my eyes dry. I felt every fiber of my body shaking, my teeth clattering too. I needed to ask it. I needed to…

“What if I fail? What if… what if I suck at it too?”

A good dad might have told me ‘you won’t fail’, or some BS like that. ‘I trust you’, ‘I know you’ll do it perfectly’… all things I couldn’t bear. Much more responsibility. Much more weight. My breathe became heavier, faster, much like my heartbeat. That was a lot. Too much to deal with. Too much to…

“Well, in that case, I’ll get a tax write-off and recover part of the money. Then, I’ll give the train back to the leaser. Can’t get higher losses than that. It’s worth a try even if you completely botch it.”

See, dad isn’t a good dad. But he is a good man. I managed to smirk at that remark. That’s so Vince Jackson. Hedging his bets because he doesn’t trust his friends not to cause disasters. He loves them, he loves me deeply, but he is always, always ready to find a way to be absolutely positively sure that nothing can go that bad.

That is, indeed, my dad.

One of the most badass me alive.

The only one who knows how to give me hope.

**

“Hey, beautiful! Coffee with catnip and cream as usual?”

I wink at Kanny-kitty, while showing up right in front of her. First customer of the day and it’s my favorite neko. This morning couldn’t start better. Akane, of course, gives me her usual death glare—the one that triggers whenever she didn’t sleep well enough.

“Aki, that pickup line is as old as your dad. Seriously, who uses hey beautiful as a greeting? Do you listen to CDs too?”

Ouch. That hurts me deep in my soul. And yes, I do listen to CDs. I like them more than vinyls, even if they are less durable and cost more. Her ear twitch a little, her tail waves around nervously. She has prominent eye bags, as deep as the Mariana trench. And, of course, her shining red samurai sword, kept sheathed at the side of the table. I sigh, sit in front of her, start fiddling with my Black Knight Gyrian keychain to ease my mind. There’s still nobody else in here. This is the first station and, usually, we don’t get many regulars here. Outskirts of New Langdon, industrial area. A quiet parking spot, a good place for me to sleep in. Because, yes, this train is also my house, my flat, my nest. I’m so proud of my one room world that I feel so weird when I sleep at my parents’ place in the weekend. Mom comes often to fill my fridge and clean around and dad visits every other week to check how things are going. Even Jake shows up from time to time, with his furry girlfriend. Huh, I should probably try not to say that out loud, but Jill is so strange to me. She looks like a neko, but full-furred like her father Tiger (Tiger? Really? Who calls a large feline mutant Tiger?). I knew that Jake had a thing for catgirls (forgot to clean his internet history), but Jill? Goodness gracious, I think dad had a stroke when my brother introduced her to him. I could see his brain stop working for a second, his eyes turning bloodshot for an instant. No matter that Tiger is a good family friend, something triggered in dad, before he finally managed to convey all of his courtesy in a semi-friendly greeting. Well, it could have been worse—if my brother’s dad were Ange instead of… whoever his dead father is. Still, Jake and Jill drop by often and leave very generous tips. Kanny-kitty instead… ugh, every time she’s here, she tries to pay less than her tab. Once she asked me for a tip, in virtue of being a faithful regular customer. Those are the Igarashi genes, alright. Or the Gattonero genes. Or both. An unholy combination, sitting right inside my traveling cafe. The metal sheet walls have been covered with colorful plastic, pastel pink. The counter is of a nice black mahogany, lacquered. The seats are bolted to the floor to avoid having to chase them during turns and bumpy tracks. A variety of leaflets and poster adorn all corners of the main venue, surrounding eight tables and several stools. This. This is my microcosm. This is my kingdom, the fief I’ve been holding power on for the past year and a half.

Akane yawns again. Her eye bags tell a story I’m curious about. So, while the autopilot starts moving my home again, directed to the next station, I gently smirk at that disaster cat sitting there.

“Bad night?”

“Family reunion in Italy. I just came back from it.”

“Oh?”

Akane buries her head in her arms in front of me.

“…all the children of Reno Gattonero. All fifty-three of us. My half-sis Claire organized it in Euterpe. So many nekos, goshdarnya. Dad must have been very active in his days, even if ninety percent of us exist only because of defective condoms. Fuck those bastards who made them. I’m happy they went bankrupt after the queen sued their ass.”

Oh right. That nekondom scandal. I read something about it years ago, but I don’t know a lot. Still, that doesn’t seem like a good question to ask now. I’ll let Kanny-kitty vent a little more first.

“By the way, guess what, Aki? There was so much talent there I could puke. Myadeline fuckin’ Heargreaves, yes? She won, what, two Academy Awards as best actress? And Bea Gattonero, frickin’ five time European judo champion! And what about Prince Stephen of England? Bloody heck, I tell you what—my dad was an idiot not to marry the queen when he was given the choice! He always said age difference too large and nobility ain’t my shit, but fuck it, he could have been prince consort of Queen Vivian instead of a perpetual single dad! Yeah, good luck being a single dad with fifty-three recognized children and God only knows how many around that we don’t know of! See, Aki? You have all this bonanza of money and bright futures… and then you have me, a girlfailure that hunts werewolves and bloody ROPES at night with an even bloodier samurai sword. Slicing things is the only thing I’m good at, so mom made me responsible for the British branch of Igarashi Supernatural Investigations agency, leeching funds from Yard for every ‘successful extermination’. She said it’d be good for me to be abroad for a while and that I should ‘cut some lampposts to get fat checks’, while I was at it. Talk about picking the short straw.”

I pat her ears, caress them, slowly. I know that it calms her down. I like to hear her purr. She reacts at first with the usual nervousness, then she slowly allows me to go on, to comb her hair, slide my fingertips on her fur. Then, she pushes my hand away, gently.

“Not now, Aki. This ain’t something for six in the morning, yes? You ain’t getting me purr so early, not even for your sorry ass.”

“But I love when you purr!”

“Well, I don’t. Makes me feel like a cat more than a gal. I only like to purr when lying in a bed, possibly not mine and possibly not alone—if you catch my drift.”

That’s the moment where her glove caresses my cheek. I could melt right here, right now. I always do, when she does that. Her voice warms up, as she licks the tip of my nose, as she looks deep into my eyes.

“Green eyes, today? Lucky you—ain’t it your favorite color?”

“Contacts. They have already shifted probably.”

“Oh, fuck that. You look good anyway.”

Our lips touch, our tongues tangle, dance, twist together, for several, interminably long seconds. When we stop, when our mouths leave the comfort of each other’s, our eyes meet again. We’re both smiling. Two failures looking for their luck. Two weirdos out of this world. Kissing on a train cafe, the stupidest yet coolest idea ever, in the first lights of the dawn.

Kanny stares at me, kills the thread of saliva that still hangs among us.

“I’ll have that catnip cafe, Aki. Extra strong, no sugar, double cream.”

Then, she rests her cheek on her glove, smirking at me with her usual sass.

“…and, huh, about that purring thing-y?”

“Yes?”

She kisses me on the cheek, pushes my hat down my head, almost covering my eyes.

“This night, after closing time. Wait for me, alright? Gotta hack a lamppost or two, but I’ll be here at latest at midnight.”

I push it back up, smirk back at her.

“Not gonna start without you.”

Akane winks at me, smiles in all her feline charm.

“Good gal.”

I walk back to the counter, giggling from every pore of my skin, ready to start the coffee machine.

Yes, this is Jackson’s Express. This is my kingdom, my fief. This is the place where a failure found peace and a meaning to her life. This is my nest, in this crazy, noisy, bizarre world, a nest that I share with an obnoxious neko girl my age. This train is a microcosm of life, of stories, of faces and struggles, of unrequited feelings and unsaid truth.

So, welcome on board.

I hope you’ll enjoy the ride.