Somehow he managed to avoid the worst from his parents.
It was a clear night, the stars shining through the black sky above. Halley wandered aimlessly, this time following the railroad tracks in the same direction he saw the train go. His shoes crunched on the track ballast and he didn't entirely know where he was even going. Hopefully he'd hear any oncoming trains before they ran him over.
He couldn't help but chuckle over the ridiculousness of the whole thing. It was hard to lose a train, but probably even harder to find one. The thing was going so fast he could barely even see what it looked like. And why was he so bent out of shape over it? Oh. Right. Because it came out of nowhere and is purple and is a steam engine. It was weird.
Halley lost track of what time it was. He'd left the house at 7 o'clock, but he didn't know how long he'd been walking. Long enough, at least. His parents probably thought he was out with a friend.
He wasn't sure when to turn back and give up, but he didn't even want to. Something inside him kept him pressing onward.
Then he stopped and looked up from his feet.
The rails ahead were glowing.
Halley kept going, faster this time, following the trail the train had left behind. This had to be it. There was no way it could have been anything else. Rails didn't just glow at random.
He rounded a bend in the track and stopped again.
In a siding was a train. He couldn't see the locomotive itself, but its steam rose lazily into the air ahead of the coaches it drew behind it. He had to get closer.
Ducking down into the undergrowth a few feet away from the tracks, he quietly crept closer to the engine, until he could see the rivets in its sides.
Halley watched someone climb down from the cab.
In his hand was a lantern.
The man put his free hand on his hip and looked back up at the locomotive.
"This is not the right place."
His voice was monotonous and oddly loud, and Halley could tell he wasn't even shouting. A second man popped his head out of the cab window.
"Yes it is! I am certain!"
The first shook his head.
"Solano, I told you we passed the millennium threshold several times. Now will you listen to me?"
"How do you know we're in the wrong place? Have you even looked up yet?"
The first sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose.
Halley slowly got closer.
"Luno! I insist this is the correct place and time!" Solano said. Luno huffed.
"It is not."
"Yes it is!"
"No it is not!"
Halley watched Luno climb back up into the cab, saying something to Solano that he couldn't hear.
Once he was sure both of them were out of sight, he quietly left the safety of the woods' vegetation and climbed back up the track ballast, looking up at the coaches making up the train. All of them had the same livery, and on their sides in gold were the words Eclipse Railroad.
That was weird. It sounded made up.
Just as Halley was about to touch the side of the coach in front of him to make sure it was real, he was startled by the light of the lantern shining upon him.
