….
[December 20th | Release Day of 'Train To Catch']
The line outside the AMC Century City stretched all the way past the outdoor escalator and looped twice around the terrace courtyard.
It was 11:15 AM on Friday, December 20th, opening day.
DJ adjusted his jacket collar, holding three printed tickets in one hand and a jumbo tub of buttered popcorn in the other.
He glanced sideways at the two individuals flanking him.
To his right stood Noel, while Laurence stood on his left.
Just a few months ago, the two of them had just been ordinary, broke film students scraping by on instant noodles and cheap coffee in Room 214.
But then came that fateful, caffeine-fueled night when Noel and Laurence stayed awake for sixteen straight hours dissecting [The Dark Knight] frame by frame. What started as a manic late-night project had turned into a massive Reddit post that exploded into a hundred thousand upvotes, and went so viral it landed directly on the desks of LIE Studios' executive floor.
Instead of just noticing it Simon Lombardozzi and Regal had actually reached out. LIE Studios had flown them down to Burbank, sponsored their college tuition for the entire year, and offered Noel and Laurence future slots in LIE's post-production editing department once their studies wrapped.
Ever since that wild, life-altering ride, DJ, Noel, and Laurence had become an inseparable trio. But even with official studio connections and tuition paid for, the three of them were still film-obsessed purists at heart.
There was no way they were going to wait for an internal studio screening when they could experience opening day with a real audience.
"I still say forty-one days from wrap to release defies every known law of editing." Laurence muttered under his breath, watching the ticket line inch forward. "Principal photography finished November 9th. Today is December 20th. How do you normalize multi-channel Dolby Atmos audio and grade HDR laser prints in under six weeks without someone having a nervous breakdown?"
"Because Zack Barg and Leo Martinez were cutting the dailies live on set while the gimbal was resetting." Noel shot back, taking a sip through his straw. "Did you read the tech specs? They used an Avid station mounted inside an airtight flight case hooked directly to the Arri cameras via fiber optic."
"Will both of you shut up and just be moviegoers for once?" DJ laughed, nudging Laurence forward as the usher unhooked the velvet rope. "You've got jobs waiting for you in LIE's editing bay next year, and you're still standing here auditing Regal's render times like nervous professors."
"Professional curiosity is a virtue, DJ." Laurence sniffed, though he quickly handed his ticket over with a polite nod to the usher.
They pushed through the heavy acoustic doors of Auditorium 1, the complex's premier Dolby Cinema house.
The transition from the sunlit terrace into the cavernous, twilight-dimmed hall was striking.
The room was colossal, seating over four hundred people beneath a towering black ceiling rigged with a ninety-speaker Dolby Atmos spatial sound array.
At the front, the massive curved silver screen rested in the dim blue wash of the dual-laser projection booth.
Every single seat in the house was taken.
Down the aisles, film school students in hoodies, older cinephiles with tote bags, and regular moviegoers were packed elbow to elbow, filling the space with an excited, buzzing roar.
Over the past month, LIE Studios had become an absolute cultural hurricane.
Between dominating the Golden Globes, sweeping eight Academy Awards, the viral video of Regal's wedding escape, and that hilarious roundtable with Rock deadpanned expression, the hype for [Train To Catch] was bordering on madness.
"Row F." PJ said, checking the numbers on the armrests. "Right in the sweet spot."
They slid into their reserved leather recliners dead center, where the curved screen filled their entire field of vision and the surround channels converged with pinpoint accuracy.
DJ set the popcorn tub securely into the center cupholder.
Noel pocketed his phone, taking a deep, anticipatory breath, while Laurence finally stopped fidgeting with his glasses and leaned back into his seat.
Around them, the house chatter dropped off as the auditorium lights smoothly faded to black.
Four hundred people went dead, breathless silent.
The screen flickered to life.
….
Soon after–
The advertisements began to play, and occasional movie trailers too that drew only mild murmurs from the audience.
Then, the auditorium lights went off, turning the room into dead silence. Over four hundred people stopped whatever they were doing at once and focused on the projection in front.
On the massive silver screen, the minimalist white typography materialized out of the blackness:
–LIGHTS. INK. ENTERTAINMENT–
A ripple of murmurs rolled through the crowd.
The screen cut to a desolate, sun-bleached country road cutting through an expanse of dry scrubland outside an industrial biotechnology district.
"Looks so serious right out of the gate." a viewer whispered two rows down from DJ.
A battered pickup truck rattled down the highway, slowing to a crawl before a checkpoint manned by emergency personnel in white hazmat suits and orange biosafety vests.
"What's this about?" the farmer grunted, rolling down his grime-streaked window. "You quarantining my livestock again? Foot-and-mouth was three years ago!"
"It's not foot and mouth, sir." the official replied through a muffled respirator, holding up an electronic infrared thermometer. "There was a minor bio-chemical containment leak at the district bio-tech facility up the ridge. Just a precautionary routine sterilization."
"Leak, my hairy ass..." the farmer scoffed, slapping the steering wheel. "A tiny leak and you've got half the county blocked off? You treat hard-working people like fools, all of you!"
A few quiet chuckles broke out across the theater. Two rows ahead, someone muttered, "Yeah, classic government cover-up already."
The farmer slammed his foot on the accelerator, sending the truck rumbling down the deserted forest pass as the tires kicked loose gravel into the air, while the driver reached down to fumble for a dropped pack of cigarettes on the passenger-side floorboard.
"Eyes on the road, man." a guy a few seats down from DJ muttered under his breath.
THUMP–!
A wet impact shuddered through the vehicle's chassis, and the theater audience visibly flinched.
"Jesus!" the driver gasped, locking the brakes.
He climbed down from the cab, cursing as he walked back, and ten yards behind the truck lay a young white-tailed deer, its body twisted unnaturally in a pool of dark, viscous blood, its limbs bent at wrong angles.
"Man, at least it's just roadkill." someone whispered, letting out a relieved breath. "I thought he hit a person."
"Yeah, but I'm gonna feel real bad if that thing gets back up." Noel murmured, leaning forward. "What if the blood is infected?"
"...why is he checking his truck before checking the animal?" DJ muttered. "Realistically, make sure if it's dead or not!"
The driver kicked the dirt, disgusted. "Damn waste of good meat. Should've watched where you were jumping, you stupid thing."
He spat on the road, turned on his heel, climbed back into his truck, and drove away.
The camera lingered or cut away.
"...something sus, why is it staying on the deer?" Laurence whispered, leaning closer. "Don't tell me..."
In the eerie silence of the highway, a sickening sound began to leak through the Dolby speakers; the wet, snapping crunch of broken cartilage and resetting bones.
Beside DJ, Laurence stopped breathing.
On the screen, the dead deer's front leg twitched.
"Is it adrenaline?" Laurence whispered.
With a series of joint-popping snaps, the carcass jerked upright. Its neck snapped around at a sickening ninety-degree angle, limbs locking into place.
The camera pushed into an extreme macro close-up of the creature's face.
Its eyes were completely clouded over; milky, white, cataract-blind, and dilated. It let out a hiss, its nostrils flaring as it caught a scent on the wind.
"Holy shit!" a teenager in the front row blurted out. "That thing's undead!"
"Look at the eyes!" Noel whispered feverishly.
BAM–!
The screen slammed to pitch black.
A synth blast from Ludwig Göransson tore through the auditorium's subwoofers.
Stark, cold white letters punched onto the screen:
[TRAIN TO CATCH]
"Damn..." a kid two rows down whispered, clutching his chest. "Here we go."
….
The scene cuts sharply to the clinical, monolithic expanse of a prestigious investment firm in downtown Los Angeles.
Keanu Reeves appeared on screen, and a collective cheer swept through the theater before being instantly swallowed by the tense atmosphere of the scene.
Keanu played Arthur–
–a high-level fund manager.
This portrayal completely sheds the warm, charismatic familiarity of his public persona, discarding even the stoic, righteous, vengeance from [John Wick].
Even though he wore a similar slate-gray suit to Johnwick, except for the top button undone, he looked completely different.
Arthur stares fixedly into a traid of monitors bleeding a crimson cascade of market deficits.
"Liquidate the position."
His junior analyst, Mark, standing nervously beside his desk, swallowed hard. "Sir... if we dump our entire holding in that biotech firm right now, the secondary market will bottom out. Thousands of individual retail investors will lose their life savings–"
Arthur finally turned his eyes toward him. "Mark, remind me who signs your paycheck."
"Sir, I am just saying that–"
"Do you work for the retail lemmings, Mark? Or do you work for this firm?"
Mark hesitated for half a second.
Arthur's expression hardened into stone. "Dump every single share. Before the opening bell."
The cold, ruthless precision of Keanu's performance sent a subtle shiver through the auditorium.
"Man..." DJ murmured, leaning back in his seat. "He really knows how to play a corporate scum to the core when he wants to."
The film wastes no time softening him.
Within three minutes, the narrative laid Arthur's broken personal life bare.
In a modern apartment, Arthur attempted to celebrate his young daughter Maya's birthday.
Maya, played by a remarkably expressive young actress with soulful, sad eyes, sat quietly at the dining table.
Arthur handed her a brightly wrapped box with an awkward smile.
She unwraps the box to reveal a video game console.
Maya looked down at the console, then looked up at him with a heartbreaking gaze.
"You gave me this for Children's Day three months ago, Dad." she said quietly.
The entire auditorium lets out a collective, sympathetic groan.
"Oh no, that's so bad!" a woman behind DJ winced. "He bought her the exact same thing twice! Father of the year right there!"
"He had to ask his coworker what kids like." Noel muttered. "He doesn't even know his own daughter."
Maya didn't yell or throw a tantrum, she simply stared at him with the quiet disappointment of a child who had grown up far too quickly.
"I want to go to Seattle and see mom tomorrow." she said softly.
"Maya, I have the restructuring audit next week." Arthur sighed, rubbing his temples. "I can take you after that."
Her expression fell.
"You said that before." she murmured. "I am tired of waiting for a day that never comes."
Arthur started to respond, but she lowered her gaze. "I will take the train myself. You can stay here and finish your work."
Arthur stared at his daughter, guilt finally breaking through the cracks of his carefully controlled exterior.
Late that night, alone in his dark living room, Arthur played a video recording of Maya's elementary school recital on his phone. On the tiny screen, Maya stood on stage, singing Aloha 'Oe.
"Sounds like an American country song." a viewer whispered softly. "Like She'll Be Coming 'Round the Mountain."
Halfway through the verse, Maya froze, scanning the crowded auditorium seats. Seeing her father's seat empty, her small voice trailed off, tears welling in her eyes as she stood silent on stage.
….
[5:30 AM | Union Station, Los Angeles]
The visual scale expands dramatically.
The camera swept across the grand ceilings of the historic transit hub as the first pale blue light of dawn filtered through the tall arched windows.
Commuters were shuffling through the gates: business travelers in trench coats, families hauling luggage, and a boisterous high school baseball team in blue varsity jackets, laughing and swinging their wooden bats over their shoulders as their teenage cheer squad teased them from behind.
"Keep those baseball bats close, boys." Laurence joked quietly. "You're gonna need 'em."
"A train is a terrible, terrible place for an outbreak to happen." Noel muttered. "It's like a Snakes on a Plane situation."
Among the crowd walked a man in an expensive three-piece Italian suit, carrying a briefcase with a brass plate:
–Richard Evans | Chief Operating Officer, Continental Transit Lines–
Arthur and Maya boarded Carriage 4 of the sleek, high-speed commuter express: Pacific Trans-Continental 101, bound north for the fortified coastal port of Seattle.
The interior of the train was a masterclass in claustrophobic staging, with a narrow twenty eight inch wide aisle and low-hanging overhead luggage racks that compressed the visual space.
The camera glided between passenger seats on an ultra-low skate dolly, making the viewer feel physically wedged between the commuters.
Across the aisle, two elderly sisters share boiled eggs and mandarin oranges, their weathered features radiating a maternal warmth.
A few rows back, the baseball boys were horsing around, while the teenage captain, Kyle, shyly avoided eye contact with the lead cheerleader, Jenny, who was teasing him about his lucky socks.
Down near the restroom vestibule between Carriage 4 and 5, a disheveled, trembling man in a dirty jacket sat huddled on the floor, shaking violently, muttering into his knees:
"All dead... everyone's dead... they're all dead..."
A train attendant approached him, asking for his ticket, but the man only shuddered harder, burying his face in his dirt-caked fingers.
"Something's wrong." DJ muttered.
Then came the moment the entire auditorium had been waiting for.
Arthur guides Maya down the corridor toward the washrooms when their path is abruptly obstructed by the locked door of Carriage 8's private restroom.
Standing outside the door, was a mountain of a man.
He wore carpenter pants and a dark henley across his massive chest and broad shoulders. His forearms are thick, crossed loosely over his chest.
The entire Century City theater erupted into an immediate wave of delighted cheers, whistles, and applause.
"ROCK!" someone shouted from the back row.
On screen, Rock looked down at Arthur and little Maya with a look of irritation.
"Taking a bit, kid." He rumbled. "My wife's in there. Use the other one down the hall."
Inside the restroom, a woman's muffled voice snapped through the door: "I heard that, you big ox! Keep complaining and you're sleeping on the porch!"
Rock's face didn't change, but his eyes softened with a tiny affection.
He tapped the door with a knuckle. "Take your time, honey. Just telling the neighbors not to crowd the door."
The whole theater broke into laughter.
"Man, I love this guy already." Noel grinned. "He's a badass, but he's totally whipped by his pregnant wife."
….
Outside on the concrete terminal platform, the warning chime for departure echoed:
"Final boarding call for Pacific Express 101, non-stop service to Seattle. Doors closing."
The camera cut to the far exterior platform.
A young woman's movements were erratic, jerky, her breathing a wet, ragged gasp. Blood was soaking around her calf, bite marks clearly visible through the torn fabric.
"Look at her leg!" a girl two rows ahead gasped. "She got bitten! Close the doors!"
The girl threw herself through the closing doors of the rear carriage just as the latch engaged with a heavy hiss-clunk.
She collapsed onto the floor, unnoticed by the commuters seated inside Carriage 12.
In the rear car, a young female attendant walked down checking overhead bins. She stepped into the vestibule and gasped.
"Miss? Miss, are you okay?"
The wounded girl was lying on her side, her back arching violently. Her limbs began to twist in sickening rhythms, her fingers clawing into the floor until her fingernails tore.
"Carriage 11, medical emergency." the attendant spoke frantically into her radio, kneeling beside the girl. "I need assistance, she's having a violent seizure–"
The convulsing girl stopped.
Completely.
The silence lasted for two agonizing seconds; then, the girl's spine snapped backward with a CRACK.
She whipped her head around.
Her veins were bulging black against gray skin, her eyes milky white, snarling with animalistic ferocity. Before the attendant could scream, the infected girl lunged, tackling her to the floor and sinking her teeth straight into the attendant's throat.
A fountain of blood hit the glass.
The auditorium collectively gasped, and several people in the front rows instinctively leaned back in their seats.
Laurence breathed, his eyes wide. "That's a hard R. Regal didn't hold back a single frame."
The attendant lay twitching for barely five seconds.
Then, her joints popped, her jaw unhinged, and she scrambled to her feet like a spider on hot coals, eyes milked over, charging through the sliding glass door into Carriage 11.
"They turn that fast?!" someone in Row G whispered in sheer terror. "That's like rabies on steroids!"
What followed was two minutes of pure sensory terror.
The infection spread like an explosive chain reaction. One bite, five seconds of convulsions, and another predator stood up. Commuters screamed, climbing over seats, throwing briefcases, hurling hot coffee into snarling faces.
"Fast zombies!" a voice called out in the dark theater. "I hate fast zombies! Look at them running!"
"They're doing some speed ramping and frame cutting." Noel pointed out, gripping his knees. "It makes their movements look even less human!"
In Carriage 4, Arthur was on his cell phone, trying to reach his corporate contacts about rumors of martial law breaking out in downtown Los Angeles.
Through the rear window of the passenger carriage, a lone commuter came sprinting down, his face pale with horror.
"RUN! GET OUT OF THE CAR! RUN!"
Behind him, the frosted door of Carriage 5 shattered into a blizzard of tempered glass.
A tidal wave of thirty contorted, snarling bodies tumbled through the breach, piling over each other.
"Dad!" Maya screamed.
Arthur dropped his phone.
Without a second thought, he snatched Maya off her feet, and turned to bolt down toward the front cars.
Down in Carriage 8, Rock had just helped his pregnant wife, Claire, out of the restroom.
The screaming hit them first, and a wall of human terror vibrated through the metal walls.
"What the hell is that noise?" Claire gasped, clutching Rock's arm.
Rock pushed his wife behind him.
Around the corner came two snarling infected, their faces smeared with blood, sprinting on all fours along the armrests.
"Stay back, baby." Rock said calmly.
The first infected launched itself through the air like a missile.
Rock didn't flinch, as he stepped into the strike, his right arm swinging in a brutal, short-arc that caught the infected directly across the sternum.
CRACK.
The infected bounced off Rock's forearm, flipping backward and smashing into the metal trash receptacle with enough force to dent the frame.
The theater audience erupted into a cheer:
"YEAH! HIT 'EM AGAIN!"
"KNOCK HIS ASS OUT!"
"This guy is a freaking tank!" a teenager roared, clapping his hands.
The second infected lunged for his throat. Rock caught the creature by the collar with one hand, shoved him hard against the window pane, and threw a palm strike directly into the center of its chest, hurling it backward into the corridor.
"Run, baby!" Rock barked. "Go to the front! Move!"
They sprinted down the narrow corridor, joining the stampede of surviving passengers desperate to reach the safe haven of Carriage 3.
Arthur was already there, pushing Maya through the sliding door into Carriage 3.
Behind him, Rock and Claire were barely ten yards away, sprinting down while fifty infected surged behind them.
Arthur reached for the sliding glass door handle.
His eyes were wide with terror. He looked at Maya, huddled trembling behind the front seats. Then he looked at the approaching horde.
Arthur began to pull the door shut.
"WAIT! DON'T CLOSE IT!" Claire screamed, running as fast as her pregnancy would allow.
"HEY! ASSHOLE! HOLD THE DOOR!" Rock roared.
Arthur refused to let go, his jaw tightening into a cold, ruthless expression of survival as he continued pulling the heavy tempered-glass partition shut until the latch finally clicked into place with six inches to spare.
The entire theater hissed in outrage.
"You bastard!" a woman in Row D yelled at the screen. "Open the door!"
"No way!" someone else shouted. "They're right there! Don't lock them out!"
"Is this really our Keanu's eyes?" Noel whispered, gripping his armrests so hard his knuckles turned white. "There isn't any hesitation in his selfish action."
At the very last fraction of a second, Rock slammed his shoulder into the sliding door frame, jamming the metal track with his fingers.
He shoved Arthur backward, dragged his wife through, and slammed the door shut just as forty infected hit the other side of the glass.
SLAM-CRACK.
The entire partition rattled under the impact, the glass spider-webbing across its surface as the deadbolt held firm.
Milky white eyes pressed flat against the glass. Blood-streaked teeth gnashed inches from their faces as snarling mouths smeared red streaks across the clear panel.
"How is that glass holding?!" a viewer muttered anxiously. "It's a slider! If you bump that latch, it'll pull right open!"
"He turned it to manual." Laurence noted. "You have to push and pull it now."
Inside Carriage 3, forty survivors huddled in terrified silence, staring at the horror locked on the other side.
Rock stood chest-to-chest with Arthur.
His breath was heavy, his jaw clenched with murderous fury.
Rock reached out, grabbed Arthur by collar and lifted him two inches off the floor, pinning him against the partition wall.
"You got something you want to say to me, chump?" Rock growled. "That door got slammed right in my wife's face."
"I was protecting my daughter." Arthur rasped, his eyes remaining defiant even as he dangled helplessly from Rock's grip. "Your family wasn't the only one in danger."
"What a piece of work." Rock muttered, his dark eyes burning. "I ought to throw your ass out that window and feed you to them myself."
"Stop it! Both of you, stop!" Rock's wife cried out, pulling on Rock's arm. "We're alive! Everyone's just terrified!"
Rock held Arthur's gaze for a few seconds before letting go, shoving him back against his seat.
"Check the glass." Maya's small, trembling voice broke through the silence.
Everyone turned.
On the other side of the partition, the snarling horde suddenly stopped scratching. Their heads tilted awkwardly, their milky eyes wandering aimlessly through the glass.
Rock's wife stepped forward slowly, picking up a discarded newspaper from an empty seat.
She peeled a wet sheet of paper and slapped it against the glass, covering the transparent window.
The moment their line of sight was broken, the infected became dormant, standing motionless in the vestibule like statues.
"Is sound the only thing triggering them?" Arthur whispered, realizing that the moment the noise stopped, the infected became completely still.
A sigh of relief rippled across the entire theater.
DJ let out the breath he hadn't realized he was holding, wiping a bead of cold sweat from his forehead.
He looked at Noel and Laurence.
Both of them were completely frozen in their seats, their popcorn untouched.
"The pacing is insane, man..." Laurence whispered, his voice trembling with sheer awe.
"Yeah. It doesn't give the audience a second to breathe." Noel replied, pointing toward the screen as the train rocketed across a vast desert bridge at ninety miles per hour.
.
….
[To be continued…]
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