Night Train

by David Quantick

  “Excuse me,” she said to the dead soldier and unscrewed the top of his water bottle. She sniffed it, decided that whatever killed him probably wasn’t in the water, and took a swig. It tasted fine, if a little bit stale.

  “Thanks,” she said and just managed to stop herself offering him a swig. She put the lid back on, stood up and looked around the carriage at her fifteen dead companions.

  “Sorry to do this,” she said, and began to loot their corpses.

  * * *

  The fifteen dead gave up few surprises. None of them had any wallets or purses, and there were no identifying labels in their coats or shirts (she considered looking in their underwear but decided against it). There were no photographs in their belongings: in fact, very few of them had any belongings. She found no small items, either: no keys, no coins, no sweet wrappers, nothing that could be called a clue. For train travellers, they were surprisingly lacking in train tickets.

  The only personal possessions she found, oddly, were phones, and even then the only people who had them were the two teenage girls, their mobiles placed carefully in their laps like precious dolls. The phones themselves, despite being fully charged, were no use to her. There was nothing in or on them, no call records or applications. They were not receiving a signal of any kind and even the photo folders contained nothing but generic background swashes. As an experiment, she pressed “call” on each phone and tried a couple of random numbers, and got nothing but silence. Still, she pocketed the phones (and a charger she found in the soldier’s kitbag, which she checked and found compatible) because, while they might have been nothing, they were all she had.

  Not really knowing why, she rearranged the fifteen dead as she found them, finally putting the kitbag next to the body of the young soldier. She was about to decide on her next move when she heard a click.

  She turned, a second late, to see the compartment door ahead of her open and something hurtle at her, a massive forward-moving blur. Before she could see what it might be, it was on her. A blow to the head and she was on the ground. Something was keeping her down. Sprawled on her back, eyes closed from the pain, she held her arms in front of her face to prevent more blows.

  None came. She opened her eyes, and saw that her attacker was – she could not say. It looked, and felt, like a giant torso was on top of her. Then she became aware that the torso had a head, quite a few metres up from where she was lying. Two arms and two legs framed the torso, each arm with a clenched fist at the end.

  The head was shouting at her now from its massive mouth, and at first the shouting was so loud she could not make out what the head was saying.

  “I can’t hear you!” she shouted back, which struck her as an absurd thing to say to a head shouting at you from a few metres away.

  “Who are you?” shouted the head.

  She was about to reply when a fit of laughter struck her. The head stopped shouting and the fists dropped as she laughed uncontrollably. Finally she managed to stop and, wiping her eyes, said to the enormous figure sitting on top of her:

  “I don’t know! I don’t know!”

  And this set her off again.

  * * *

  The torso got to its feet and, without asking, pulled her up. Now she saw that the man who’d attacked her was not quite as big as she’d thought, just very tall and very thin.

  He pushed her, not roughly, into a seat and looked down at her. His face was creased by a bony ridge where his eyebrows should be, and his nose was squat between two large brown eyes. His head was bald and his big pink ears looked like someone had stuck two gigantic slices of bacon to the sides of his head.

  This thought set her off giggling again. The giant leaned in and studied her.

  “Who are you?” he said.

  “Please don’t start that again,” she replied, and managed to control herself. She looked him in the eye. If she didn’t think of the bacon ears, she was all right.

  She said to the giant, “I don’t know who I am. Who are you?”

  The giant frowned at this. He pointed at his chest, and she saw that he was wearing the same green uniform as her, just more generously made. He pointed at the strip of writing over his pocket.

  She shook her head.

  “I can’t read that,” she said.

  “BANKS,” said the giant, making the words big in his mouth. “I am BANKS.”

  Banks pointed to the strip on her jacket.

  “And you are garland.”

  She looked down at the writing. Now, bizarrely, she could read the letters without pain. Looking at them now even upside-down, she saw that the giant was right. Her name, if the words were to be believed, was Garland.

  She shrugged.

  “I’m Garland, then,” she said. “Hello.”

  “Banks,” said the giant, and extended his enormous hand.

  She looked at it for a second, then took it.

  “Pleased to meet you, Banks,” she said.

  Then Banks winced and suddenly grabbed his arm.

  She looked at his sleeve; it was bloody. Without asking, she grabbed the fabric and began to roll the sleeve up. Banks said nothing as she peeled the stiff fabric back. Underneath the cloth, the massive arm was reddish brown with dried blood.

  “Wait here,” she said. She had seen a door with an image of two stick figures on it. She went to it, and it was unlocked. Inside there was a toilet, a washbasin and some thick tissues. She turned on the tap and hot water flowed out: soaking as many tissues as she could find, she took them back to Banks.

  “This may hurt,” Garland told Banks.

  “Everything hurts,” said Banks as she began to wipe the blood from his arm. He looked to one side throughout the cleaning process.

  Garland got through six or seven tissues before the arm – hairless, like a wax dummy’s – was free of blood. There was a deep cut, healing but still raw.

  “How did this happen?” she asked Banks.

  Banks looked at her and smiled.

  “I don’t know,” he said.

  He looked round, and took in the fifteen dead.

  “This is a bad room,” he said. “I know a good room.”

  She was about to ask him what he meant when he smiled. It was a smile full of teeth, and they were extraordinary teeth. For a moment she thought that no two of them were alike: there were gold teeth, silver teeth, big teeth, broken teeth and even, she was sure, a glass tooth. She wanted to ask Banks about the glass tooth but decided that it could wait.

  “Are you hungry?” asked Banks.

  Garland nodded. She was very, very hungry.

  “Come on, then,” said Banks, and almost dragged her out of the seat.

  He strode up to the connecting door. Garland hesitated.

  “Come on,” he repeated.

  “I don’t know what’s through there,” she said.

  “I do,” he said. “I live there. Been living there since – since I got there. It’s a good room. Got food.”

  “Food is always good,” Garland admitted. Later she would regret this remark.

  Banks pushed open the door between the two carriages and held it for her, a gigantic gentleman.

  “Wait,” she said. She went back down the carriage and, stopping in front of each of the fifteen dead, closed their eyes for them.

  She walked back to Banks.

  “I don’t know what else I can do.”

  “Nothing anyone can do,” he shrugged, and stood back to let her pass into the next carriage.

  The next carriage was the buffet car.

  “Of course,” said Garland. “Where else would food be on a train?”

  It was quite a nice buffet car. There was even a table with four fixed chairs beneath it. There was a counter, and a coffee maker, and a refrigerated display cabinet, which was empty. Garland felt her stomach tremble, as if with disappointment.

  “I thought you said there was food here,” she said, slightly sullenly.

  “There’s food,” said Banks. He
reached up and opened a door in an overhead compartment above the counter, and then pulled down a plastic crate, which he set down with a thud on the table. Inside the crate were about twenty small tin cans, each fitted with a large ring pull.

  Garland picked one up. The label had no writing on it, just a drawing of a large green circle.

  “Apple,” said Banks. He picked up another can, this one with a purple circle on it.

  “Plum,” he said. The next can had a yellow circle on the label.

  “Banana?” asked Garland.

  Banks shook his head.

  “Cheese,” he said. He pulled the ring and showed the inside of the can to Garland. It appeared to be a solid, rubbery piece of cheese that had somehow been got into the can.

  “Is all the food in cans?” she asked.

  Banks looked away. “No,” he said.

  “What is it? What’s wrong?”

  Banks opened a door below the refrigerated cabinet. Cold steam billowed out from a small freezer compartment. Garland went over and stuck her hand in. She pulled out a cold package, vacuum-sealed and opaque.

  “Have you got a knife?” she asked Banks.

  “Don’t!” he said. There was fear in his voice.

  Garland rubbed the outside of the packet with her finger. Then she dropped the packet and stepped back in alarm.

  Inside the packet, set into a flat piece of flesh, was an eye.

  “I told you,” said Banks, as he picked up the packet and dropped it back into the freezer compartment.

  “What the hell is that?” she said.

  “Same as it says on the packet,” Banks said. “Eye.”

  “Is it a medical specimen?” she said, disbelieving. “Is it – food?”

  Banks shrugged. “Buffet car,” he said. “Must be food for someone, if not something.”

  “Jesus,” said Garland, and sat down. “Is there anything to drink here?”

  Banks shook his head. “Don’t know,” he said.

  “Shame, I could do with a drink,” said Garland (do I drink? she thought) and got up on a chair. She reached into the compartment and pulled out another crate. It slammed onto the table.

  “Same as the first,” Banks said. “They’re all the same. Apple, plum, cheese, other food. You want drink –” and he indicated the counter, “– look under there.”

  Under the counter was a metal box. Someone, she presumed Banks, had prised it open. Inside were a few small cardboard cartons with tiny straws taped to them. These also were decorated with green circles and purple circles (but not, Garland was relieved to notice, yellow circles). There were one or two small cans of what Garland guessed was soda. And there were several tiny bottles, each labelled with a word. Garland couldn’t read the words without her head hurting, but she recognised the colours of the liquids inside the bottles.

  “Thank goodness,” she said, and unscrewed the top of the first bottle. She drank the contents down in one sudden gulp.

  “Good?” asked Banks.

  A puzzled look appeared on Garland’s face, which was then replaced by anger.

  “The fuckers,” she said, slowly.

  “What’s wrong?” Banks said as Garland snapped open a second bottle and downed it.

  “I can just about cope with not being able to read,” she said slowly and with fury in her voice. “But this is an outrage.”

  She opened a third miniature. This time she spat out the contents.

  “Is it unpleasant?” Banks asked.

  “Unpleasant?” she said. “If it was that, at least I’d be getting something from it. This – this is nothing.”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “That’s because you don’t drink. This stuff – there’s nothing to it. There’s nothing in it. Nothing I can taste, anyway. The one thing in this stupid place that I could really do with right now and it doesn’t work.”

  She grabbed a handful of bottles and threw them at the wall.

  “It doesn’t work!” she shouted.

  Banks looked at Garland as she hunched her shoulders and began to cry.

  “I think you have a drinking problem,” he said.

  * * *

  Garland tidied up the mess as Banks put together a colourful meal from the tins. There was a microwave oven behind the counter and he made them bowls of cold plum with hot apple sauce, followed by slices of tinned cheese. It was a surprisingly pleasant and warming meal, and Garland felt better immediately she had eaten it.

  “Thank you,” she said to Banks. “I’m sorry about earlier.”

  “This is a strange life,” said Banks. “It’s OK to react to things.”

  “Let me wash up,” she said, and took the bowls from him.

  There was a bathroom, and when she had washed the dishes in the sink, she used the toilet, which seemed to be amply stocked with toilet paper, at least for a train bathroom.

  “Time to get cleaned up a little,” she said, and ran some hot water to wash her face. It was only then that she noticed the difference between the bathrooms. This one had a mirror over the sink.

  Garland looked in the mirror. She saw a young woman with light-coloured hair and greenish-brown eyes. The eyes looked tired and frightened.

  “So you’re Garland,” she said to her reflection. “Nice to meet you.”

  Let’s hope so, her reflection beamed right back at her.

  “Yeah,” Garland said, “I know exactly what you mean, Garland. Now let’s go.”

  * * *

  When she got back, Banks was sitting at the table.

  “You look a lot better,” he told her.

  “Thanks,” she said.

  “Before,” he went on, “you looked horrible. Dirty and awful. But now you look OK.”

  “Great,” she said. “You look amazing, too. Now shall we get on?”

  Banks looked surprised. “Get on what?”

  “What, you just want to sit in here eating canned cheese all the time?”

  “I have been doing that so far,” said Banks. “Hasn’t done me any harm.”

  “Well, something has done me harm,” Garland said, “and I would like to find out what it is, and why it is doing it.”

  “OK,” said Banks. “I’ll give you some cans.”

  She looked at him.

  “You’re not coming with me?”

  Banks shook his head.

  “I like it here,” he said. “I’ve got light, heat… I’ve got cans.”

  “All the basics,” she said. She looked at Banks. He was sitting in a semi-foetal position, his arms clutching his knees. For a giant, he looked very frail.

  “You’re frightened,” she said, and regretted it instantly. Banks looked angry.

  “I know I am,” he said. “Because this is a frightening place.”

  “But you can’t stay here,” she said.

  “Of course I can,” he said.

  “What about when the cans run out?”

  “There’s always…” Banks nodded at the refrigerated drawer.

  “You can’t –”

  “How do you know?” Banks was getting agitated. “How do you know what I can’t do? Or what I can? Because I don’t know, so how can you?”

  He put his face between his knees and, to her surprise, began to heave his huge shoulders back and forth.

  She was about to ask Banks if he was being sick when a thought came into her mind:

  He’s crying. That’s what he’s doing. He’s crying because he’s very upset.

  Garland went over to Banks and sat next to him. She wasn’t sure if she should touch him or not, so she slid her arm through the crook of his enormous long leg and held his calf. It felt, even to her, like an odd thing to do, but she couldn’t think of anything else and, besides, it seemed to calm Banks, whose heaving subsided like the receding aftershocks of a small earthquake.

  “Where are we?” he said. “What’s happening? Why don’t I know anything?”

  Garland let out a sigh.

 
; “I’ve said it before and I’m sure I’ll say it again,” Garland replied. “I don’t know.”

  Banks wiped his face and she realised she had been right, and he had been crying.

  “When I was… somewhere else, I don’t know,” he said, “I read, or I was told, that not knowing anything was a good thing. Like children don’t know anything, and that makes them better than us, because we know things, bad things.”

  He gazed at her. His eyes were deep and wet from the crying.

  “‘Suffer the little children to come to me’,” he said. “Only suffer doesn’t mean suffer.”

  Garland looked around. She thought of the eye in the freezer drawer.

  “What does it mean, then?” she said, and got up.

  * * *

  Banks watched as Garland collected a few supplies.

  “Where are you going?” he said.

  “That way,” she said.

  “You don’t know what’s up there,” he said.

  “No, but I know what’s back there,” she replied. “Dead people and darkness.”

  “Could be the same the other way too.”

  “I know that. But I’m not sitting here for the rest of my life.”

  Banks looked at her.

  “I’m not a coward, you know,” he said.

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “It’s just – I know where I am here. I know what’s going on. If I go with you –”

  “Sure. I get it.”

  Suddenly the lights went out. Banks shouted in alarm. Garland dropped down beside him.

  “Don’t move!” she hissed and grabbed his arm.

  She had no idea why she had told him not to move, but she remained there in the dark and stayed silent.

  After a while, Banks whispered, “Are we waiting for something to happen?”

  “I don’t know,” she admitted.

  “Then can we –” Banks began, when a screeching noise filled the air, like an entire wall of metal being torn in half. Garland felt Banks curl up beside her, and she wanted to do the same but something inside her would not let her move. Instead she remained half crouched as the screeching got louder and louder.

  The darkness inside the compartment was total, but outside she could see tiny lights, miniature stars exploding in the gloom of the night. The stars burst and vanished like bubbles made of light, illuminating for a second or two and then disappearing back into the darkness.