Bullet Train

Fruit Salad

"Oh, look at that." Peach nodded at the young man across the aisle. "He's awake." The three of them slid over to the disoriented passenger. Lemon sat next to him, Peach once again taking a window seat and Tangerine tucking in beside her.

"Where am I?" The man's russian accent broke through his grogginess as he took in his new surroundings.

"You're safe now. Your father sent us." Peach smiled at the Son.

"You idiots work for my father?" He raised a contemptuous brow, creasing his childish face tattoos. Peach pressed her lips together to prevent a retort from surfacing, reminding herself to be professional.

"Technically, we're outside contractors. I'm Tangerine, he's Lemon and that's Peach." Tangerine nodded at each of his associates in turn.

"Like the fruit?" the Son questioned. All three of the "Fruits" sighed. An awkward silence hung in the air for a moment.

"You ever watch Thomas the Tank Engine?" Lemon suddenly spoke.

"Here we go." Tangerine leaned back, exasperated.

"Everything I learned about people, I learned from Thomas." Lemon persisted, sliding a sleeve of train stickers out from his denim jacket.

"Oh yeah, you bring your sticker book did ya?" Tangerine pressed a finger to his eyebrow, his mustache rising in irritation.

"I always bring my stickers with me, you know that." Lemon went on to explain that there are different types of people, just like there are different kinds of trains. Peach checked out of this conversation, as she had heard it many times before. But she nodded and hummed in agreement when Lemon said something along the lines of "Diesels are the fucking worst of the lot." before zoning back out as the two argued over which train Tangerine was.

"Look, it's not important is it?" Tangerine interjected. "What is important is the 17 dead bodies we left getting you back from the triad that kidnapped you with plans to ransom you to your extremely psychotic fucked up father." Peach raised her eyebrows at the number.

"Actually, it's 16." Lemon corrected.

"What's that now?"

"16 kills, mate."

"No, it was 17."

"It's 16." Lemon emphasized.

"You're starting to get on my fucking tits." Tangerine snapped.

"16." Lemon said to Peach.

"I'll smash my fucking head through a brick wall." Tangerine proclaimed.

"Maybe that'd help your memory 'cause it's 16." Lemon snarked back.

"What the fuck is wrong with you, it was 17 goddamn it." Tangerine slammed a gold ringed hand onto the small plastic table that separated him from his brother and pointed his finger at Lemon. "I wanna fucking strangle you right now." Lemon turned to the Son.

"Do you mind if we do this now?"

After a long winded recounting, the Twins finally agreed that their kill count was 17, if you included the poor innocent civilian whose death, Lemon insisted, was not their fault.

"Well what would Thomas the Tank Engine say, Lemon?" Tangerine poked.

"That's really mean."

"He'd say, 'hey, take responsibility mate.'"

"He doesn't sound like that." Lemon told the Son.

"Hoo hoo!" Tangerine crowed.

"Look," Peach, finally fed up with this childish bickering, interjected, "our job is to keep you safe and to recover the briefcase with the ransom money inside." she explained to the Son.

"Exactly," Tangerine got himself back on track, "and I plan on completing my job and...Lemon?"

"Hm?"

"Where's the briefcase?" Both Peach and Tangerine tensed.

"Oh, I stashed it." Tangerine took a breath, trying to get his anger under control.

"The case, Lemon. Go get me the fucking case." Lemon rolled his eyes, but obliged, checking the zip tie around the Son's wrist that trapped him in his seat before rising and heading to the connector between cars 3 and 4.