“You coming?” he asked.
The alien inspected the area beyond and shook his head. “Not my reality,” he said simply, and gripped the door’s edges.
Whereupon he slammed the door shut from the other side.
There was a curt clap of metal, and a pink line up the middle winked out into darkness. Then, nothing.
Nathan stood there, watching that rectangular portal with unease.
“Shut it,” Mackenzie urged.
“Huh?”
“Shut it before those things can come through.”
Nathan thought about the silver aliens. He slammed the door shut.
“And don’t open that damn thing,” Jimmy warned him. “Unless you forgot the last time.”
The tentacles. Nathan remembered.
With a weary look about the interior, which was indeed empty of people, Nathan wandered to an empty berth, checked the seats, and planted himself. The others did the same, with Gilbert facing the rear of the train, while Eli took it upon himself to watch the door they’d just come through.
The train car was lit up by four lamps, their light weak but burning. Nathan held up the silver locket the man in black had given him. Now that they were clear of the saloon and its Vem gas, his head was clearing by the second.
He hooked the tiny clasp with his fingers, peeled open the locket… and stared.
“What is it?” Mackenzie asked, watching him from a nearby berth.
“It’s a face. Of a woman.”
A particularly striking Chinese lady, in fact, with long hair tastefully done. A dress shirt was frilly in the front, with a high, buttoned-up collar. Her high cheeks were unblemished, her smile faint but there, all captured in black and white.
“Fine-looking lady,” Jimmy noted.
Which brought Eli and Gilbert in for a peek. They all agreed. She was indeed a fine-looking lady.
“So why did he have it?” Nathan asked after they’d all had their look.
No one could answer.
“Maybe that’s why… he helped us,” Eli said in an unusually thoughtful tone.
“We ain’t ladies,” Gilbert scoffed, screwing his nose up at the suggestion.
“No, we ain’t,” Mackenzie said. “But, we resemble her. ‘Course, there are subtle differences, but when looked at from, say a distance… we’re pretty much the same.”
“How did he get his hands on it?” Nathan asked.
“I don’t know.”
“I know,” Eli said, getting their attention. “How else could anyone have a piece of jewelry like that in their goddamn possession? I’ll tell you how. It was either given… or it was taken. And seeing how that black pajama’d bastard bought us some time back there, time enough for that other pleasant enough so-n-so to lend a goddamn burning finger—and who the hell has a light at the end of their nose picker anyway? Where was I? Oh right. I’m thinking it was given. As a gift. For reasons we’ll sure as hell never know.”
“So… he was repaying that gift?” Mackenzie asked. “By helping us?”
“I don’t know, Mack,” Eli groaned. “You’re the goddamn educated one. I’m more smart for other shit n’ stuff.”
The train rattled on, gently rocking them where they sat.
“I wonder…” Nathan said, looking at the closed door. “If they’re all okay back there.”
No one offered an opinion on that.
Until Gilbert said, “Hey. Listen.”
They did.
“What, peckerhead?” Eli asked.
“The train. Sounds like that music in the saloon.”
Nathan met Mackenzie’s eyes in a shared look of holy shit. They remained seated then, listening, waiting, feeling their still wet clothing, yet not suffering from it. Nathan thought of Channy, then Nex, and hoped to God above that they were all right back there.
Especially Channy.
The train rattled on, and Nathan’s attention drifted from the locket in his hand and the face there to the dark window on his left. He saw his own face looking back. Ragged. Bearded. And tired beyond words. Still, he shuffled to the glass and pressed the edge of his hand up against it, to shield against the nearby lamplight. There, he stared at an empty landscape, and the stars shone above with a purity that momentarily lifted his worries, and made him think of his mother.
And those memories eventually spread a smile across his face. Sometime later, he remembered to close the locket and tuck the piece away in his inside pocket.
The train continued to rock back and forth, lulling the men to sleep, one by one.
They woke up some time later.
Nathan came awake with a lurch, scratched at his neck and chin, and looked out the windows. Clear-headed as well, as if the saloon’s noxious fun gas had cleansed him entirely.
It was daylight, with a green sun shining through the dusty glass.
Nathan sighed at the picture, wondering where the hell the train was, and where the mechanical beast was going. He stared at that rising sun and realized it was coming up over a plain of tall flowers, miles long and wide, and of a bright shade of pink.
“Pretty, ain’t it?” Jimmy Norquay asked quietly.
Nathan glanced over at him, sitting across the way in the other berth. The others weren’t in sight, but their snores were easily heard.
“Yeah.”
“Been watching it most of the night.”
“Most of it?” Nathan asked.
“In and out,” Jimmy’s eyebrows shrugged. “Somebody had to keep watch. Might as well be me.”
“You didn’t sleep at all?”
“Slept a little, but when that thing started to rise,” he indicated the green sun with a nod of his head, “not a wink after that. Look at that, Nate. Just look. That’s a green sun. And… an ocean of flowers the likes I’ve never seen before in my life. Which makes me wonder where we are, and I don’t have a clue.”
They shared a morning silence then, only their eyes moving, looking past each other, to the window just behind the other. The only sounds were snores and the moving train.
“Think we’ll ever get back?” Nathan asked.
Jimmy thought about it for a long time before slowly smiling. “Don’t know. But I know one thing. Orange sun. Green sun. Any sun I get to see over a plain of flowers as fine as that, then all I need is a cup of coffee, a chair, and a porch. Maybe a smoke. Then… life is good.”
Nathan smiled back. “Easy to please, ain’tcha?”
“The easiest, I know.”
A mighty yawn interrupted them and Eli asked, “Anyone got any tobacco?”
Jimmy and Nathan exchanged amused looks.
“No tobacco, Eli,” Jimmy said.
Eli’s head and shoulders popped into view from a berth as he struggled into a sitting position. He was looking haggard like them all, but instead of swearing about the lack of cigarettes, he took a deep breath and stared at what the morning had brought them.
Nathan thought the man looked right thoughtful.
“We should get moving,” Jimmy suggested.
“Anything to eat?” Mackenzie asked, still out of sight.
“Wasn’t supposed to be that kind of trip,” Jimmy said. “All the food is back with Milton.”
“Wonder what Milt’s doing right now?” Nathan asked as Gilbert roared out a yawn, and earned a dirty look from Eli.
“Milton’s probably on his way to Big Mud Valley,” Jimmy answered. “We’ve been gone way too long.”
“Suppose,” Nathan said and rubbed his sleeve before patting down his shirt and pants. Dried to a clingy dampness, but certainly not the ton of water weight they carried before.
Eli stood up and lifted his rifle. He gave it a quick check and frowned before inspecting the overhead compartments. Without a word, he started searching them.
“The lamps are out,” Mackenzie noticed.
“So they are,” Jimmy said.
“I wonder who lights them at night?”
That question stopped them al
l.
“We should get moving,” Jimmy repeated. “I have a feeling… we’re in for a long day.”
As expected, Eli didn’t find a thing in the overhead compartments, and neither did anyone else as they walked through the aisle. They left the door they came through well alone, not wanting to see what lay beyond, and the plan of reaching the end of the train still made sense to them.
So they gathered up their weapons, their wits, and got to marching.
The next car was a passenger one, empty, with that green sun shining in from the eastern side, coloring the interior in a hue that resembled summer leaves along Lake Huron. The men walked along the aisle, strung out in a watchful line, inspecting the berths as well as the overheads.
The car after that was identical to the previous ones.
“How many cars you think we’ve been through?” Nathan asked Mackenzie’s back, who walked behind Jimmy.
“I don’t know now. Maybe two dozen or so?”
“Not that many,” Gilbert said from behind Nathan. “Surely not. There was that desert place. With the crabs. That was…”
“That wasn’t a car,” Mackenzie said. “That was a world. Same as the saloon.”
“But we were still on the train.”
Jimmy reached the next door and opened it. No vestibule, like before, just the next deserted car, and a smell of dust. The sight of the empty berths was a little disappointing, but also a relief. Nathan wasn’t sure he’d want to meet any passengers now. Not after what they’d been through.
The plain of flowers lay on either side of the windows as the train sped along, and the green sun lifted itself clear of the horizon.
They continued onward.
The train was moving fast, speeding along at five or six times the normal pace, but the familiar chumpchumpchumpchump remained constant.
The next door they opened revealed yet another empty passenger car, without a connecting vestibule.
The next dozen cars were the same.
The men marched along, aisle after aisle, door after door, the steady sway of the locomotive as regular as a pulse. No one spoke during that time, perhaps weary from the night before, and the sights, and wondering just what in God’s creation they’d stepped onto once they boarded the train.
“Feel like using some of that dynamite?” Eli asked at one point.
“On what?” Jimmy asked back.
“On one of these windows. Or the next vestibule. Maybe blow a hole outta this iron pig and jump for it. Take our chances.”
“You ever jump from a train moving this fast?” Mackenzie asked.
That quieted Eli.
“He was only sayin’, Mack,” Gilbert muttered.
“I know. But jumping from a train moving this fast will only break your neck if you’re lucky. Your legs if you’re unlucky. Besides. Look at it out there. There’s nothing but flowers. No animals, nothing.”
And he was right.
Another dozen cars, and Mackenzie was at the front. Marching through and pulling open doors like a soldier tending to boring guard duty. After he’d opened a dozen more, Nathan took his turn, not even bothering with pulling out one of his Colts. There didn’t seem to be a need. The train was empty, and the sun… the lower edge of the sun could only be seen when he dipped at the waist.
Nathan pulled open a door and stared at the enclosed vestibule before him.
“Well, now,” he said, “haven’t seen you in a while.”
The space was different however, as there were two doors on the right and left walls, each with a small square window at eye level. Mackenzie moved to check on one, couldn’t see a thing, so he went to the other.
“Anything?” Gilbert asked from behind, his rifle at the ready. He was the only one.
“Nothing.”
“Haul it open then,” Eli said.
Mackenzie didn’t see no harm in that, so he drew back his duster, not so damp at all now, and drew one pistol. He took hold of the handle and, with a ready nod at the others, opened it.
“Well, thank you Lord,” Eli exclaimed in wonder.
Behind the door was a wooden toilet, with the seat cover down.
“Holy shit,” Gilbert added. “I was ready to drop my drawers ever since the crabs!”
Smiling, Nathan leaned in and, with the barrel of his gun, lifted the seat cover. A breath of fresh air blew by, and when he leaned further, he saw the ground below, speeding over a blur of railway ties.
“Go on, then,” he said to Gilbert. “Do your business.”
A happy Gilbert stepped inside the cubicle and closed the door. Eli went to the other side and opened the stall there. An identical toilet waited.
“Finders shitters,” he remarked and went inside. When he closed the door, Nathan considered the next passenger car at his back, before turning to Mackenzie and Jimmy standing upon the threshold of the last.
“Who else needs a moment?” he asked.
The two men glanced at each other before raising their hands.
“There’s no paper in here!” Gilbert yelled in horror. “Not a single goddamn square!”
“Then don’t pinch, you dummy,” Eli shouted from the other side.
“I just did, Eli, I just did. Oh God. Oh Christ! It smells, Eli! It smells real bad!”
“Shut up Gilbert and let me shit!”
Nathan drew a hand over his face, but the others didn’t attempt to hide their smiles. And a short second later, Mackenzie started to laugh. Jimmy joined him.
It wasn’t Channy’s giggle, Nathan thought, but it was a good sound to hear all the same.
39
After the men had all relieved themselves, they buttoned up and moved into the next passenger car. On impulse, however, Nathan, who was guarding the rear, opened and closed the last door.
Empty car. Daylight flooding the interior.
He left the door open and walked away, but midway up the aisle he glanced back and saw the door had closed anyway.
Onwards they plodded, car after empty car, expecting to see someone but hoping less and less. When they reached what was perhaps the two hundredth one that day, the green sun was no longer visible outside, but somewhere overhead. They stopped for a rest, marveling at all that empty space outside and in.
“I’ve been thinking,” Mackenzie started and gestured at the interior. “About all this. We boarded the train at night. That’s when we had most of our encounters. It’s daytime now, and we’re not running into anything. Or anyone.”
“So?” Nathan asked.
“So, I’m saying that maybe, when the sun finally goes down, things might start happening again.”
A glance around at the men’s expressions and one could see that the thought had sunk deep into their minds.
“All right,” Jimmy said. “So, if it does, assuming it does, maybe we should camp out for the night. In an empty car.”
“Sounds good to me,” Nathan said.
“Hell yeah,” Eli threw in. “Getting sick of all this walking anyway.”
“We won’t have to do it much longer,” Mackenzie said.
“Why’s that?”
The man shrugged. “There’s no water here. Or food. It’s all gone. If we had water, we might last a week, but without it? No more than two or three days. After that, whatever car we’re in, whatever berth, that’ll be our grave.”
Another tombstone of information they didn’t really need to know. Nathan took in that shit nugget of news and found it distasteful, as did the others.
“You mean we could die on this train?” Gilbert asked. “Just from a lack of water alone?”
“Engine’s got water,” Eli said.
“And how do you suppose we get to that?” Mackenzie asked. “Even if we did walk all the way back there, through everything. If we could get there, how do we get water from the engine?”
Eli didn’t answer.
“We’re in a pinch here,” Mackenzie continued. “And the way I see it, nowhere to go but forward. Maybe with
a little luck, we can find something to drink. If not, we’re looking at dying of thirst. On a train.”
That thought dropped on them like a five-hundred-pound weight.
“Jesus, Mack,” Eli finally said. “You sure as hell can fuck up a nice afternoon walk.”
*
When they hit the two hundred and fiftieth passenger car, they were tired. When they hit the three hundredth one, they took another break, and sat without a word. The day was perhaps two or two thirty in the afternoon, but no one had a pocket watch, so they only had their sense of time to go on.
Regardless, the sun was past its zenith overhead, and sooner or later, it would be sinking into a horizon of unending flowers.
“Flowers,” Nathan said at one point. “Nothing but flowers. Not a hill or mountain or squat.
“Maybe we’re still in Saskatchewan?” Mackenzie asked.
“Not there,” Jimmy said. “I’ve been all over Saskatchewan. It’s flat, but not like this. And not covered in flowers like that.”
Which was true. The pretty plains outside the windows were unbroken sprawls of a single hearty color. An ocean of carnations that covered everything.
They trudged on, hefting rifles over shoulders, but keeping their winter clothing on. Despite all the walking inside, the temperature remained a cool ten degrees or so. Still, the sweat seeped out of them, and that water wasn’t replaced.
“What car is this?” Nathan croaked as he stopped at the door.
Mackenzie had to think about it. “Three hundred and… thirty-four.”
“Don’t ask that question again until it’s four hundred,” Eli warned.
“It’ll be dark then,” Gilbert said.
“Yeah, maybe.”
Nathan hauled the door open. The runners were getting crankier, it seemed, and certainly took more strength.
“We’re gonna haveta stop soon,” he said, gazing ahead into the next car.
Empty. Like all the others before them.
They forged onward.
Hours later, on the west side of the train, the lower curvature of the green sun finally began to show itself, and the sky, still blue, began to wan.
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