George Right: D

“A fire in this hellish train will cap it all!” Tony thought, turning his head in search of flames. But there was still an impenetrable darkness all around. And the smell… no, it did not contain the caustic bitterness of fresh smoke. More likely such a smell can be produced by something that has burnt out already. Something cooled down long ago… cold…

Logan suddenly remembered the Black man, sitting in the far end of a car. Apparently, it was this car… and he sat somewhere right here. Or on an opposite seat? Tony tried to remember, but he could not. And now Logan had the clear feeling that, just slightly moving his hand, he would touch that person. But he did not want to do it—oh no! Even at the thought of touching whoever was sitting next to him, his hand became as heavy as not even lead but… what is heavier? Uranium? Let it be uranium.

The train began to reduce speed again until it stopped at a station sunk in impenetrable darkness. Or probably in the middle of the tunnel? But if it was the tunnel, why open the doors?

And then Tony heard clatter of heels on a platform. This time without any shuffling. The unknown woman went steadily as if the station and the train were brightly lit. She entered the car through the door nearest to Tony. Heels clattered several more times, approaching. Then the sound ceased. But by almost inaudible movement of air he understood that she had eased onto a seat to the left of him.

So, there had been nobody on the nearest seat before—the Black man had either left earlier, or had been sitting opposite… But that was before. And now…

“She’s simply blind”, Logan tried to convince himself. “So it’s all the same to her if there is light or not. She doesn’t even know about the power failure.” Oh yes, one more almost feasible version. But, even if he believed in such a concentration of sick and disabled people on one night train, Tony had observed blind persons before. In the dark they, of course, are more confident than sighted people—but still less confident than a person able to see in the light. A blind woman would tap her way with a cane and the noise would be audible. She would not go stamping along like a person who knows precisely where she’s going… or who does not care about it at all.

The train again started off.

Tony sat next to the invisible woman without daring to move and almost trying not to breathe. He didn’t know whether she knew about his presence. He didn’t know what would happen if he drew her attention. And, despite all rational hypotheses, he absolutely, definitely did not want to check it.

And then he felt a cold touch on his hip.

Tony didn’t scream. Perhaps, because the fear of betraying his presence was stronger. Or simply because he understood—he wasn’t touched by fingers or anything similar. Not by an object at all. It was a liquid. A liquid had flowed under his hip from the next seat.

“Blood,” he thought. “She’s bleeding profusely”.

However, the liquid was not warm. It was hardly anything… physiological. Perhaps, she simply had a bag and in it—a self-opened can of beer. Or cola. Or any fruit or vegetable juice. Or… even more simple: a wet umbrella and a raincoat. Since the evening sky had been overcast, it could be raining now… However, isn’t it too much water even for a very wet umbrella? Not just individual drops, but a whole pool flowing into the next seat… Tony felt the liquid seeping farther along his leg. Doesn’t she feel that she’s sitting in a pool? And why the hell is he resignedly suffering it? If it is not simple water, his trousers are already spoiled. At least they should be washed… He should express his indignation to this person, whoever she is! Or, at least, stand up and change his seat!

But in this impenetrable darkness he didn’t dare do that either.

The train again began to brake and entered the next station dipped in gloom. However, this time the dark was not absolute. Beyond the car windows, an ominous, dim crimson shimmer shivered and fluctuated. And when the doors opened, Tony saw its source.

Right on the platform a fire burned. As if a cave fire of the Stone Age. Or… the brazier of an executioner in an inquisition dungeon. But no—there was no brazier, no designated border of a fireplace. Probably, some garbage dumped on the platform was burning there—and, judging by ashes around the fire, had been burning for a long time already. The flame gave oddly little light and seemed dense and heavy; it slowly waved, without shooting sparks; streams of a black smoke reached for a ceiling, indiscernible in darkness. The strangest thing was that the fire burned absolutely silently, without any crackling, and, because of this, seemed even more ominous.

Tony, distracted for an instant by this show, not so much heard as felt his neighbor stand up. Heels clattered to an open door. Logan saw her dark silhouette against a flame, and then she stepped outside, turning away from the fire, and was gone in the gloom which absorbed her completely, together with the knock of her heels. Tony could not distinguish any details other than that her clothes, apparently, were really wet and hung sticking around her body.

But he saw something else. The Black man sat directly opposite to him.

However, fire flaring behind Tony’s back allowed him to discern only the general silhouette of a heavy figure. Not a single facial feature; Tony could not even see if the man’s eyes were open or closed. But he, in his turn, Logan understood, should see my face well enough…

Tony did not know what inspired more dismay—the prospect of remaining seated opposite the silent black figure or exiting at such station. Nevertheless he forced himself to rise sharply—and at the same moment almost fell to the floor. His right leg gave way like rubber; he could not feel it. Obviously, it was numb due to sitting a long time in an awkward pose when he did not dare to move near that wet passenger… Having lost his balance, Tony reflexively threw his hand forward while already knowing what would happen next—and indeed, at the following instant his hand stuck the Black man’s shoulder with some force.

Logan not so much heard as felt an unpleasant crunch under his fingers.

“Oh my God,” Tony thought, “I’ve broken his collar bone!”

“S-sorry,” he stammered. “Are you all right?”

Logan was not very much surprised when he heard no answer. But just in case he moved back and to the side.

Doors slammed and, beyond the car window, dirty smoked letters, dimly lit with crimson shimmer, crept: “Worth Street.”

Logan would not swear that he knew the nearly five hundred stations of the New York subway, but was still confident that there was no Worth Street Station among them. Be it in any distant suburb of Bronx or Queens which he never visited, he still could doubt—but not in Brooklyn. In Brooklyn there is no street with such a name. presents in southern Manhattan (how could he appear there again?!), but on it there is no subway station. For this he was ready to be charged by life.

However, at the same moment he thought that in current circumstances it is better to refrain from such guarantees.

The fire passed behind with the mysterious station, and Tony again found himself in a roaring, shaking darkness. He took some steps teetering in the aisle (his leg still didn’t obey him very well), then plopped down on a seat, fortunately, not occupied by anybody. Then his left hand touched his wet trouser leg—no, it definitely was not sticky—and with fastidious care he brought his fingers to his nose.

Definitely not blood and not beer. And not urine. Water, he thought. Simply cold water…

With an oozy river smell which could hardly belong to rain drops.