The Conductor

Conductor 009 fears that he and his "passenger" will die a few miles north of the Mexican border.  Above them, searchlights from silent Confederate airships aid the ground forces pursuing them. The conductor remembers his duty, helping up the weak, silent creature next to him; they travel south.

They don't get far before having to fall to the ground again. James can hear the soldiers' movements and whispered orders.  A few feet away, a lone, careless trooper decides to enjoy a cigarette. The conductor considers his options.

James looks into the vacant red eyes of the thin, green-skinned human/Martian hybrid. He had rescued the creature (was it proper to consider his passenger a creature and not a person?) yesterday from a research facility in Texas. The hybrid's existence confirms the information gathered by the Underground Railroad's spy network — the Confederacy is experimenting with Martian DNA, in preparation for its conquest and colonization of the neighboring planet.

Swiftly, silently, James springs to his feet and snaps the soldier's neck, lowers the body to the ground, then strips it. Despite the years, the uniform triggers James' past anxieties as a teenage U.S. soldier in the Philippines War, fighting Confederates in the jungle.

The uniform fits; James slings a rifle strap over one shoulder, his light passenger over the other, then treks forward, hoping the uniform and the darkness will help them elude capture. The irony is not lost on James — he wears a Confederate uniform in his attempt to rescue a creature with the blood of another hated enemy; James was orphaned during the failed Martian invasion of Earth, and has no love for aliens.

"Halt!" commands an approaching sergeant from horseback. "What have you got there?" The sergeant points to the hybrid.

"I found it," says James, placing the creature on the ground for the sergeant's inspection. The sergeant dismounts as James hoped; the conductor knifes him in the throat. But the sergeant surprises James, firing a gun in its holster, the noise drawing attention to their position. The sergeant dies on the ground while James and the hybrid mount the horse and ride towards the border.

Nearby Confederate cavalrymen give chase, firing their sidearms. James sees Mexican military in the distance, no doubt interested in the commotion. There is no love lost between the Confederacy and the Mexican Empire; the Mexican government is always willing to help the Railroad rescue slaves and other Confederate fugitives.

Their horse falls from a gunshot. Picking himself up, James grabs the hybrid and slings him over his shoulder. He runs; the Mexican soldiers yell encouragement. James crosses the border checkpoint just as a bullet enters his leg. Mexicans run to assist; they point their rifles towards the Confederates, a warning that the chase is over.

The Mexicans are shocked to see the hybrid; James has some explaining to do, but is joyful that the Confederacy's taboo experiments will soon become public knowledge.

The End