Kathryn drives back to the Palace to take Billy home. Actively participating in the planning still doesn't mean she's letting her in on the dangerous shit. Besides, she needs to cover for her with Henry, Edward, and Caroline, so she's not sure who's more in danger.

Besides, Billy doesn't like all of their little illegal shenanigans. She's had enough of close-ones in her life as is. She doesn't need more. Of course, as she grows closer to the rest of the group, it becomes more arduous. Just like it had been hard to leave her parents, knowing that they might blame Max over it. Billy doesn't fit in that kind of world. And Kathryn agreed, which is why she'd never take her on anything dangerous.

She comes back downstairs to find her dad still on the couch. It's pitch black outside. Neither one of them should be up.

Edward raises his head as his daughter walks in. "Where are you off to?"

She falters a little. She can't exactly tell him everything she's about to do, considering it's bound to turn illegal, knowing their luck. "Um... I'm going to help Pope, with the Cross."

"Oh, right. Tell me if you need help with the police."

She sniggers a little, surprised, before walking to him and sitting down next to him on the couch. She's got time, she thinks. "I can't believe you're so chill about all this. Henry's jumping up and down most of the time."

He arches a brow at her. "Henry has never done anything like that before. And he's scared, ever since I disappeared. Be nice to him."

She frowns. "I am nice to him. I think. I mean, I get where he's coming from, but it's frustrating sometimes." She knows he cares about her, seeing as she's not a complete buffoon.

"No, I know. And then he has those dimples every time you do something bad..."

"Yeah!" she chuckles. "The dimples of discontentment."

They stay in comfortable silence, before Edward turns to her, putting a hand on her shoulder, reassuring.

"You know, kid, once you get the Cross, you could actually have a shot at El Dorado."

Kathryn blinks at him. To be fair, El Dorado is so far from her mind at the moment. With her break-up with JJ, Rafe's return, her dad and the Cross, she hasn't stopped to think about the myth that's apparently not so much one.

"Maybe. I don't know. I kinda don't like being kidnapped and doing all this stuff. I'm mainly doing it for the historical aspect, and my friends." She plays with the ring around her thumb. "I actually started looking for the Merchant's gold to mess with JJ."

Her father covers her hand. "The kid doesn't know what he gave up, okay? You're priceless, Kitten. You could find anything you put your mind to, I'm sure that includes someone."

She shrugs a shoulder. "I'm not sure I want to find anyone else."

Her father smiles sadly at her, and she shrugs again. Kathryn bounces back, that's her whole thing. That's why she isn't under the covers crying as we speak. She always, always bounced back. Besides, she had to. She had to help Pope. She couldn't just take a break from all this, could she? Spreading herself thin was an art, and she mastered it anyway.

Finding anyone else was just out of the question.

"Well," Edward smiles. "You can always settle on finding El Dorado with John B and Big John."

She rolls her eyes. "Yeah, sure, as soon as the dude comes back." She stands up, grinning back at her dad. "I missed you, dad. I'm gonna go now, don't wait for me. Text you if I'm in jail!"

"Have fun, Kitten!"

Kathryn is sure that if her dad knew half the stuff they were planning to do, he wouldn't be as enthusiastic.

🍓

Wilmington's station is deserted, at this hour, which was sort of the point. The hardest part is mostly the fact that it's filled with trains that would take forever to examine one by one before getting the Cross, if it's in one of those trains and not one that's coming. Standing on top of an unmoving car, it really just puts everything in perspective.

"Well, there's like a thousand trains here," Sarah sighs.

"Well," Pope repeats. "We know it's seven fifty X on the track to Raleigh."

"Which just leaves us with the small task of actually finding it," Kathryn ends.

"And news flash," Kie interrupts. "We're not getting out of here unnoticed with a giant Cross."

"We don't have to," Pope tells her. "We can nab it somewhere in the country."

Which means finding the car, then observing which tracks it gets, and then being fast enough to stop it further down. Not to mention actually stopping it.

Kathryn hums. "And we'll be stopping that train with our own personal Superman?"

"Leave that to me."

She stares at JJ. Of course he'd say something like this. "I forgot the part where you shot up radioactives, but that'd explain a lot."

"Ah, ah. Look, I got an uncle in New Bern, right? When he got tipsy, he'd just throw an old chain across the tracks, just for shits and giggles. And that old little chain would stop all the train traffic in coastal Carolina."

"A chain?" Kie repeats dubious.

While it sounds crazy, Kathryn hates to say it: "It's the low voltage current in the tracks. If you put metal on it, you close that circuit. Close that circuit, and it reads as a train, and the crossing lights come down. I'm sad to say that it's science, not bullshit."

"Science. I knew my science."

"Except we don't have a chain, dipshit. Loads of help that science gets us."

"I'm just tryna help."

"Try harder, bestie." He makes a face at her. Then, realisation hits, and she closes her eyes. "But on the way here, Josh told me he keeps jumper cables, in case I decide to bust his truck without even driving, which, rude."

"Would that work?" Cleo asks.

Pope nods. "Yeah." JJ rolls his eyes.

"I heard my name!" The group turns around to Josh, leaning against his car. "Not that I don't like the view, Kat, but could we hurry a bit?"

She gives him a thumbs up. "In a minute!"

They turn back around. JJ has about the flattest look on his face. "Did he just say he liked watching your ass?"

Kathryn sighs deeply. "Don't be mad just because you can't stare at it anymore."

"Woah, we never said anything about that–"

"Guys!" Cleo cries out. "We don't have time for this. Look, you all wait here. Me and Pope will go look for it and send a signal once we find it."

Pope nods. The conversation ends awkwardly, the group not exactly used to that sort of preparation, not in the slightest.

Sarah looks back and forth at them. "Do we actually have a plan right now?"

"We might," Kathryn lets out slowly.

"That's impressive."

"Don't jinx it, Cameron. Come on."

They wait for what seems like forever, until Pope climbs up a car, forever away from where they are, still crouched on a train.

He shines his light at them. Kathryn flashes her phone's flashlight back at him.

"That's it," Kie says. "We're green."

Which of course, means that a sudden train horn blares in the distance.

"What's happening?"

"You hear that?"

"You jinxed it, Kie!"

With a rattle, the train Pope is currently balancing himself on starts moving. Cleo jumps on in the nick of time. New plan, they're taking the train.

"Shit."

"Train's moving, train's moving!"

"We can fucking see it, JJ!"

Kathryn is quicker to come down the top of the wagon, skipping a few steps on the ladder to make sure she doesn't freeze because of her own vertigo, Josh catching her as she comes down.

Her brain is going a thousand per second. Not only do they have to stop the train to get the Cross now, they actually have to stop it to get Pope and Cleo back.

"Is everything alright?"

"Don't have time to explain, we need those jumper cables."

He follows her to his truck. "Okay, just wanna make sure you're not crashing my car."

She nods, opening the truck herself. "Sure we won't."

"And also, are we going to federal prison?"

"If we have to," JJ tells him dryly. "But we wouldn't want you to get your hair messy, Jasmine."

"Stop talking," comes a certain British accent.

Kathryn turns JJ around by the shoulder, opening his backpack and shoving the jumper cables in. "Why are you manhandling me?"

"Because you're acting like a toddler."

"You manhandle toddlers?"

She takes in a shaky breath, equal part annoyed and holding back a laugh. Why did he have to be so funny? It's not even the right time to think that.

"Kat?" Kie starts.

"What?"

"We don't have time to argue."

"I can multitask."

"No, we know that. She meant you're going with JJ," Sarah tells her.

The two turn to her, eyes wide, sharing faces of obvious shock.

"Nah, I don't think that's a good idea..."

"Like hell I am?"

"Look, you get the science shit of the jumper cables, okay?" Kie tells her. "He gets the illegal part."

"Illegal?" Josh echoes quietly.

"Sorry, Josh," Sarah tells him, contrite. "You'll have to rain check that ride with Kat."

If there's one thing that Kathryn hates more than being forced to do something, is being forced to do something and knowing that it's the right thing. Kie and Sarah are also the best person to leave with Josh, considering Sarah is nice to him and Kie knows how to behave when the blonde is around.

Josh looks dejected. "It's fine."

Kathryn looks back at JJ. "If you say a single wrong thing–"

"You're crashing the bike, I get it."

JJ gets on, and hands her his backpack to put on, so it doesn't come in the way. She grumbles as she puts it on, and sits on the bike. She trusts him with his life, but she swears, this thing is meant to kill you.

Josh seems a little pathetic, hanging back around his truck, the girls already climbing on. She makes a face at him. "Sorry."

"Yeah, we're real sorry, Jill." She could swear he's smirking.

Kathryn pinches JJ's side, and he winces as he starts the bike. Kie's right, they don't have time to argue.

They start down the road tracing the railway, the car following them a little of the way before JJ swerves left and takes dirt roads. Kathryn holds onto his middle for dear life, ignoring the way his abs tense up against her fingers, or the way her heart hammers in her chest at the proximity.

He stops the bike, hurriedly, and climbs off, Kathryn following.

He falls face first, stumbling back on. She can't even help her snort.

"You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine."

She scrambles for the jumper cables, handing them to him. "Do your shit, Einstein."

"All right." A train horn blares in the distance. "Oh god, you can hear it coming."

"Yeah, so hurry it along!"

In the darkness, he plugs the jumper cables to the crossing light. "Let's fry this fucker up. Okay, now, all you have to do is change the current."

He jumps over the rails, Kathryn gasping, hands reaching for him. "Be careful. It might be low voltage, but the tracks are electrified. I'd hate to not be the one killing you."

"Yeah, me too." He puts one claw on the rail, then hovers the other one over it. "Three, two, one... and red."

They stare up at the post. The light keeps blinking green, as the train draws closer. There's no change in sight.

Kathryn waits five more seconds, because if JJ has to be wrong today, it better not be about this.

"Come on, man, come on..."

"Talking to it isn't gonna make it work," she lets out, frustrated. "You have to have done something wrong."

"That's what he would do," he assures her. "That's literally what my– so then it'd change red– oh my god."

As he rambles on about blockading the track – with what? – Kathryn stares at the track, head tilted. It's a circuit, right? With positive and negative charges. If they put both cables on the positive charge, that's as good as not doing anything. That's why there are two tracks, why the train touches both. So...

"...Maybe put a tree?"

"Hey, before you uproot a tree, Clark Kent," she says, taking a cable, and clasping it on the other rail. "Let's see if I know my science."

The horn blares again. The light blinks. Green, green, green, green, green–

Red.

"Oh, fuck yes!"

"That's what I'm talking about!"

They high-five, keeping the other's hand for just a tad longer than they should.

"You're a genius," he tells her. "Literally the biggest brain."

"You helped a bit."

Keeping her hand in his, JJ drags her away from the tracks. "And now we wait."

About five minutes later, JJ and Kathryn hiding in bushes and not at all holding hands still, as it was still a habit, as it still felt right, the train comes around.

Kathryn tugs on JJ's palm when the train screeches and comes to a halt. "We're so cool," she hushers at him.

"No we are, I agree."

They stay like this, watching as a controller comes out, inspects the train, and then minutes later, as a car drives up to inspect the light, and find their handiwork. It won't take them long to take it off, and start again.

The light turns back green.

Kathryn purses her lips. "They had enough time. Definitely."

"Yeah, no. I hope so. Otherwise we didn't do much."

She hums. "But it was a bit fun."

He laughs a little, quietly. "I knew you liked illegal shit."

She looks back at him, realising how close they are, to hide from the cops, basically smushed together. She tilts her head. JJ's eyes zero in on her lips. Familiarity is not what boils his veins.

"That's not very friendly," she reminds him, with equally as hooded eyes.

He licks his lips. "Don't know what you mean. I'm being very friendly right now."

"Yeah." She holds up their joint hands. "I think that's the problem."

His thumb traces over his ring, on her own finger. "I don't see you letting go."

She leans forward. "I'm not the one who broke up."

Before anything can happen, the horn blares. The train is about to start again, and they're about to make a mistake.

Not to mention, there's a distinct lack of Pogues driving down the road. JJ lets go of Kathryn's hand, perking up. If they're pinched...

"We have to go get them," Kathryn says, standing up already.

He hurries her over back to the bike, stumbling, his things falling to the ground in a clutter. He picks some of his stuff, missing one. Kathryn rolls her eyes at him, and picks it up.

She turns it over in her hand. Stares at it. Gets a proper, hard and long look. Now, she knows damn well that he didn't have her father's money clip. Because she knows for a fact that these last days, he left it in the living room.

Where they were when Caroline was berating him.

Anger simmers in her veins, so familiar, greater than anything she felt when they were hiding.

She holds it in front of him. He winces. "What the fuck is this?"

He looks away, a flash of shame in his eyes as he focuses on starting his bike. "If I'm gonna be accused of being a thief, might as well get something out of it."

"What?" she cries out. "Okay, first off, my dad didn't do shit to you! I can't believe... I knew it was weird that you'd agree with my mum, but to go as far as to give her actual ammunition–"

"Ammunition about what, Kat?" His tone grows softer, sadder. "They're already against me. So who cares?"

She crosses her arms, huffing. "You're seriously just fine with playing into my mum's idea of you? That's so–"

"Who cares, Kat?" he repeats at the same time as she finishes her sentence, earning himself a glare. "We don't have time for this. Get on."

"Don't tell me what to do."

"Get on the bike, Kat."

She's about to fling her middle finger in his face when the truck zooms past, a wooden box on the bed. A better argument than anything he could come up with at that moment, really.

"That's Joyce – and that's the Cross. Get on!"

She climbs on the bike, not mad enough at him to jeopardise everything, including her friends' safety. "This is not the last time you hear about this."

Only thing he can do is scoff before starting the bike and driving off, tailing the truck closely. 

Author's Note: And if I said this was a double-update...