Chapter 20

Carl's group encounters a swarm of babababoons suffering from withdrawal symptoms in the transit station and fights them off before boarding the Nightmare train. They then reach the switching station and discover a two-way portal leading to a massive train yard filled with zombies, where another steam engine emerges before disappearing into the tunnels.

Carl receives messages from Elle and Imani reporting they've found a secret tunnel beyond the robot rooms with train tracks. Upon waking, Donut excitedly reveals she now has enough spell points to read the Minion Army spellbook—a mass-charm spell with a five-minute cast time and only a two percent conversion chance at level one. Before they can leave the saferoom, Donut senses dozens of fast, human-sized mobs in the transit station. Carl discovers babababoons—primates with disturbing human-like faces, wearing various t-shirts—suffering from stage two withdrawal (DTs), which doubles their strength and removes their ability to reason. These mobs attack indiscriminately and have somehow breached the normally safe transit station. Carl, Katia (in her She-Hulk form), Donut (riding Mongo), and a resurrected babababoon fight off approximately forty creatures, with Katia discovering she can manipulate metal inside her body to create defensive spikes. After looting, they board the Nightmare and race toward the switching station. During the journey, Carl notes his message system is flooded with reports of DT-suffering mobs, all in stage two, which now breach saferoom terminals. Elle and Imani still haven't reported back. At Terminus Station, Carl examines the massive portal and discovers it's a two-way gateway controlled from the other side, with a complex track system diverging like roots. As he investigates, a red steam engine identical to the Nightmare emerges, switches onto different tracks, and vanishes. Carl realizes they can either use Station Repair or follow the Auxiliary Tracks without passing through the portal, though the latter means being stuck on the track the last train used. When Carl returns to the cab, Fire Brandy is conversing with Donut and Katia about motherhood, revealing she has two children and just bore another. She expresses concern about Carl damaging the train.