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Episode 4 of Infinity Train Book 3 is titled “Le Chat Chalet Car”. Not knowing much French, I had no idea what was to come with this episode or what kind of car the group was about to encounter. The episode opens with Tuba and Hazel playing in a snowy car. Simon tries to keep everyone moving to avoid frostbite. He throws a snowball at Grace causing them all to laugh. They all begin having a snowball fight. Grace struggles to make a snowball and Hazel says she has to take her gloves off to warm the snow to pack it. Grace removes her gloves, throws a snowball and notices her number has changed. We saw it change at the end of the previous episode and it looks even lower now. Simon hits Hazel with a snowball and she falls into the snow. Hazel and Grace both laugh hard. We see Grace’s number goes down again. Hazel tells Tuba to make a giant snowball. Simon’s face drops and tries to call for an armistice, but Tuba still tosses it at him, knocking him to the ground.
Simon notices the snow is beginning to get worse. Tuba spots a cabin in the distance and Simon asks Grace if they should go there. Grace, distracted by seeing her number drop, is caught off guard by the question and shyly says yes. As they reach the cabin, the snow has gotten worse, and has started to cover them. Tuba shakes the snow off once they get inside, going everywhere in the cabin. We then see that The Cat (who we first met in Book 1 and see again in Book 2) is inside and gets upset by being disturbed. The Cat sees Grace and instantly becomes confrontational. These two have crossed paths before in Book 2 in The Lucky Cat Car when Grace and the Apex kids raid the car. The Cat then sees Simon and is caught off guard. Simon leans back, also caught off guard. Simon and The Cat clearly have crossed paths before. Simon says they have to go, but when he opens the door, the snow has completely blocked their exit. He slams the door shut and gets extremely angry. Grace says they have to hunker down to figure things out. She goes to look for supplies.
Hazel introduces herself and Tuba to The Cat as she plays with the water, which is made up of Randall (who we met in Book 1 and again in Book 2). The Cat says that Hazel doesn’t seem like the usual Apex kid. The Cat notices Hazel’s number isn’t glowing and asks what happened. Hazel repeats what Grace and Simon told her about One-One. The Cat can’t believe it. Simon sees them talking and grabs The Cat, telling her to stay away. They clearly have some rocky history and unfinished business.
Grace finds supplies and Simon gets upset they have to stay in the cabin. Simon and Grace get into a fight with Grace yelling “Do I need to make every decision for you?” and she immediately regrets saying it. Grace tells Simon to go look for something in the cabin. He paces the cabin and finds a door to a room with creepy toys stored inside it. Simon trips on a toy and storms out of the room. On the way out, he sees The Cat helping Hazel make tea in a kettle on the fire. He gets mad and yells that he told her to stay away. Hazel gets upset and asks why she can’t talk to The Cat. The tea kettle starts to whistle, echoing Simon’s burst of anger with him yelling that she abandoned him. He slams his fist against the fireplace.
He tells everyone that before Simon met Grace, he met The Cat. She was in his first train car before he knew there were more cars. She was his Tuba. After helping and growing close initially, she left him. He says if it weren’t for Grace finding him, The Cat had left him in the car alone to die. Simon then turns his anger at Grace asking what is wrong with her. He tells her it’s been hurting him to be in the cabin with The Cat the whole time and she doesn’t seem to care. He walks out. We saw previously that Simon grew extremely uncomfortable when Grace referenced his first null before. Grace tries to find him out in the hallway. She finds him sitting on the stairs and he tells her that The Cat is collecting again and he seems upset knowing that knowledge. Grace apologizes and says she should have seen what was going on but she was dealing with something herself. She shows him her number and tells him it has been going down. She doesn’t know when it started but she can’t stop it. She didn’t want anyone to see her like that and think less of her for it. He tells her he’s always with her and that they’re a team. They hug.
They hear a whistle and go back to the room as Tuba pours tea for Hazel. After asking The Cat, “Is all the water here Randall?” Grace and Simon realize the key is the snow. Grace opens the door, grabs a pile of snow, and holds it in front of the fire. It melts and it again is Randall too. Randall tells them he saw them having fun earlier with the snowball fight and wanted to join, so the snow got heavier. They tell him they want to get out. They put the melted snow Randall into the kettle and boil him where he turns to steam and goes out the chimney to tell the snow clouds to stop the snow. The sky clears, snow stops and they’re able to leave the cabin. Tuba and Hazel make a snowman with the remaining snow. Grace and Simon go outside onto the porch and she playfully boops him, making him smile again. As Simon goes to close the door behind him, The Cat sees him and sadly says au revoir. Simon also sadly looks back and tells The Cat au revoir and closes the door behind him. You can feel their conflicted sadness radiating in that moment.
This episode was the most emotional episode yet. I love getting to know more about The Cat in each book and especially how she connects to Simon on a deeper level in this book. The Cat’s collecting addiction must be why she left Simon and he finally realizes that’s why she left him. Them both saying goodbye to each other so sadly shows Simon may be able to forgive her but he’s still going to need time, and that she truly feels bad for abandoning him in the car when he was young. Grace also had a lot to take in, feeling weak and self conscious about her number going down. This show is able to tackle what issues are hidden beneath the surface and how the train makes each character acknowledge them at one point. Could this be the turning point for Grace and Simon now that they’ve both begun to open up about their feelings, issues and emotional traumas that haunt them? I can’t wait to find out in the next episode.
You can stream Infinity Train Books 1-2 and Episodes 1-5 of Book 3 on HBO Max now!
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