The last car roared away. April swung her legs out through the opening and dropped down to a slender ledge. The Gutenberg swung her off balance, and she began to fall toward the rail. Norman grabbed her.

“Careful, daredevil,” he said. He pulled her back to the ledge, his other arm anchored to a fissure in the wall.

The almost surreal concrete web of the tunnel curved overhead, looking like something from an eighties sci-fi movie. In the distance she saw the tunnel stretch out into a larger section. A terminal. Maybe a city block away.

“Look,” she said, pointing to the light ahead. “That has to be the Capitol South stop.”

“Don’t move!” a voice shouted from above their heads. Norman turned to see two angry faces staring back at them.

April grabbed Norman’s hand and pulled him off the ledge, down to the track. Ignoring the pain that shot up from his ankle when he hit, Norman rose to his feet and ran with her, hunched over to prevent being punished by gunfire.

A deep rumble shook the ground.

“I thought we’d have more time,” April said.

“I can’t make it,” Norman said from behind, limping.

April seized his arm and dragged him forward. “You’ll never see your grandkids again!”

“They wear me out anyway,” Norman whimpered, breaking April’s grasp and lagging.

Behind them, Norman heard the two men drop down to the ledge. No shots. Maybe they couldn’t balance quick enough to get any off.

The next train was screaming closer, and Norman watched himself gain distance on his own shadow as the headlights intensified.

He pushed his body to its limits, pure dread extinguishing any other thought than reaching the safety of the platform. A few businessmen spotted them and extended their hands to help April up from the track. He heard the screams of the idiot gunmen as they were overtaken by the speeding metro, and the screams of the witnesses, which lasted much longer, and then, finally, the screams of the brakes stopping for the terminal, applied too late for him.

April strained her arm toward an open hand reaching from the platform. She wasn’t going to make it.

“You can make it!” a shrill voice shouted from the gathering onlookers. Others were chanting, “Go! Go! Go!” In that split second, April felt as if she had somehow been transported into some gruesome futuristic sporting event.

She lunged and felt someone pick her up from the ground by her free arm. Her legs continued to spin as the metro rushed past her feet. After a dozen cars flew by, the train screeched to a halt and the harrowed passengers spilled out.

“Norman!” April yelled, searching the growing crowd for his face.

A Metro Transit Police officer broke the circle of people. “You’re coming with me,” he said to April. “It’s against the law to be on those tracks. You could have been killed!”