Ray had carried it ever since, a heavy pendulum ticking against his chest, keeping the time of a ghost.
The violently vibrating rail dragged him violently back to the present. The shadow of the train fell over them.
The same mark Ray had spent twenty years staring at in the dark was hanging from the collar of a terrified dog trapped in front of four thousand tons of rolling steel.
He shoved the watch back beneath his vest.
“Whatever this means, buddy, we're figuring it out somewhere else.”
Ray abandoned trying to pull the leg straight up. He slid his left hand entirely beneath the dog's hindquarters, bearing the animal's weight, and used his right hand to grip the paw. Instead of pulling upward, he pushed the paw backward along the V-shaped gap, following the descending angle where the steel rail met the wooden tie.
The dog struggled wildly, jaws snapping at the air.
“Easy! Hold still!”
The locomotive burst around the distant curve, a massive wall of yellow and black iron chewing up the distance. The engineer was leaning on the horn, a continuous wail of impending death, and the screech of emergency brakes sparked like fireworks against the rails.
People behind the crossing scattered backward, throwing their hands over their ears.
Ray pushed harder, ignoring the tearing of his own skin against the rusted spikes.
The paw moved an inch.
Then another.
The dog's leg suddenly slipped free with a sickening pop.
Ray didn't think. He didn't check for broken bones. He hooked both of his thick, tattooed arms around the animal, hoisted the heavy shepherd against his chest, and threw himself backward. His steel-toed boot caught on the loose gravel between the ties, nearly sending them both crashing down onto the opposite rail, but he contorted his body in mid-air, taking the brunt of the fall on his shoulder as he tumbled down the steep, weed-choked embankment.
Seconds later, the locomotive thundered past.
The sheer force of the displaced air slammed into Ray, pinning him against the dirt. Wind, hot dust, and the stench of burning brake pads rolled over him as he curled his body entirely around the frightened dog. The ground shook so violently his teeth rattled, and the deafening roar of the train cars swallowed every voice, every thought, every ounce of oxygen in the air.
It felt like it took hours for the train to pass.
When the final freight car disappeared around the southern bend, the sudden silence of the mountain town seemed unnatural, ringing in Ray’s ears like a gunshot.
Ray remained on his knees in the tall grass.
He was breathing hard, staring at the dust settling in the sunlight. The dog was alive. Whimpering, licking its freed paw, but alive.
So was he.
People began scrambling over the crossing barrier and running down the embankment toward them, but Ray barely noticed the commotion.
He was staring at the metal disk again.
One of his riding companions, Marcus Hale, reached him first. Marcus was sixty-two, built like a brick wall, with a gray beard and a booming laugh. He was a man normally incapable of remaining silent for more than ten seconds, usually filling the air with complaints about his joints or the price of premium gasoline.
This time, Marcus slid down the embankment and stopped, breathless, looking from the train tracks to Ray. He said nothing.
Ray turned the metal disk over with a shaking thumb.
Nothing was written on the back. No name. No phone number. Just the deep scratches of a dog running through brush.
Marcus crouched heavily beside him, waving off a concerned woman who was holding a cell phone. "Give us a minute, folks. He's alright. Just winded. Give him a minute." He turned back to Ray. “You know that symbol?”
Ray reached into his shirt and pulled the silver pocket watch out by its chain.
Marcus leaned in, squinting in the bright mountain sun. He looked at the dog's collar, then at the heavy silver casing in Ray's hand.
His expression changed from relief to profound confusion.
“What am I looking at, Ray?”
Ray swallowed hard, tasting dust. “Something that shouldn't exist.”
Marcus knew about Thomas. Everyone who rode with Ray, everyone who shared a beer with him for more than a few months, eventually learned the name. Thomas Mercer wasn't just a story; he was a permanent, heavy gravity in Ray's life. He was the standard by which Ray measured loyalty.
They had met at nineteen, two angry kids from nowhere towns thrown into the meat grinder of basic training. Thomas had been the kind of man who laughed during rainstorms while everyone else cursed the mud. He was the mechanic who could repair a humvee engine with nothing but a multi-tool and sheer stubbornness, and the kind of friend who somehow remembered the names of your parents and the birthday of a girl you dated in high school. They had spent nearly a decade serving together, bleeding together, covering each other’s backs in places that didn't exist on standard maps.
Thomas had planned to open a vintage motorcycle repair shop after leaving the Army.