3AM Read online

  “What time is it?” she asked suddenly.

  “Time?” He checked his watch. “It's... Uh, it's three.”

  “I should go,” she replied, tilting her head a little so she could look down at her ruined body. As she did so, a crunching sound came from her neck; moments later there was another crunch, as she tried in vain to pull her twisted limbs out from under the wheels. “Can you help me?” she asked. “I'm stuck. It's like... I can't get free. You have to help me. He might come through tonight.” She pulled again, this time managing to dislodge part of her shoulder, only for blood to erupt from the wound and splatter down onto the tracks.

  “I...” Stephen began. “Just... wait here... Wait here, alright? I'll get help.”

  “Don't leave me.”

  “I'm going to get someone,” he replied. “Everything's going to be okay, you're...”

  His voice trailed off. He knew she wasn't going to be okay.

  “Please don't leave me,” she continued, sounding weaker as more blood flowed from her shoulder. “Don't go, I don't want to be alone. I'm scared. He might come through and try to hurt me! He might come back!”

  “I'll be right back,” he mumbled.

  Turning, he began to hurry back toward the front of the train.

  “Come back!” the girl called after him. “Please, I need you! Don't leave me alone! Come back!”

  Ignoring her, he began to run across the gravel until he reached the cab's open door. Looking up at Bob, he saw the older man's smiling face.

  “All clear?”

  Stephen shook his head.

  “What did you find?”

  “A girl.”

  “A...” Bob stared at him for a moment, before sighing. “Jesus fucking Christ, are you serious?”

  He nodded.

  “A girl?” Bob asked. His right cheek twitched again. “Has she... gone under the wheels?”

  He nodded again.

  “I'll call it in. Fuck, we're gonna have to wait out here for a clean-up crew, and then there'll be an investigation and people are gonna starting asking why we -”

  “I talked to her,” Stephen said.

  Bob stared at his phone for a moment, before slowly turning to him.

  “I talked to her.”

  “You did what?”

  “She's... She's awake,” he stammered. “She's hurt real bad, she's under the wheels back there, under the B car, she looks... She's a right mess, but she's... She's talking.”

  Bob stared at him.

  “She's awake!” Stephen said again, almost shouting this time as the panic began to take over. “I swear to God, she's awake down there and she's talking like... like...”

  “Are you tripping?” Bob asked finally. “Seriously, my friend, if you're -”

  “Do I look like I'm tripping?” Stephen shouted, with wild, staring eyes. “Go and look for yourself! If you don't believe me, take the torch and go fucking look for yourself!”

  “Alright, alright,” Bob replied, “calm down.” He paused for a moment, before rising from the driver's seat with a sigh. “Something's not right here,” he muttered.

  “I'm sorry,” Stephen said, taking a deep breath. “I didn't mean to... I... I...”

  “I am not going to be a laughing stock,” Bob continued, jumping down to join Stephen on the gravel and then snatching the torch from his hands, “and I am not calling this in unless...” He turned and looked back along the length of the train, his right cheek twitching almost constantly now as his fearful eyes scanned the darkness. “Carriage B, yeah?”

  “Carriage B,” Stephen replied.

  “Fuck,” Bob said as he began to make his way down to take a look.

  “Should I come with you?” Stephen asked.

  “Get in the goddamn cab,” Bob replied. “Jesus, this is what I get for coming out with newbies.”

  “I'll wait here then,” Stephen said, watching for a moment as Bob walked away. “Okay?”

  No reply, although he thought he could hear Bob muttering something under his breath.

  Climbing up into the cab, Stephen walked over to the driver's seat and took his phone from his pocket, waiting for Bob to get in touch. His hands were trembling and he felt as if he might faint at any moment, but at the same time he was too nervous to sit down so he simply paced back over to the door and waited. Bringing up his wife's number, he considered calling her before realizing that there was no point waking her, even though he wanted desperately to hear the sound of her voice. As each second passed, however, he found himself replaying the conversation with the girl over and over again, reliving every excruciating moment of her strangely passive, blank-faced expression.

  And then he realized:

  Her name.

  He hadn't even asked her name.

  What kind of person, he wondered, doesn't even ask someone their name in a situation like that?

  “Fuck,” he whispered to himself. “Fuck, fuck...”

  Suddenly his phone lit up and began to ring, and he saw his wife's name on the screen.

  “Jacqui?” he said as he answered.

  “Hey,” she said, her voice sounding a little distorted over the line. “Am I disturbing you?”

  “God, no,” he replied, taking a deep breath and silently thanking God. “You have no idea...”

  “Sorry to call you at work,” she continued, “but... I woke up a few minutes ago and I'd had this really horrible dream, and you were in it, and... I know this is going to sound silly, honey, but I wanted to check you're okay.” She waited a moment. “Are you?”

  He looked over at the open door.

  “Babe?” his wife continued. “Is something wrong?”

  “Nothing,” he replied, swallowing hard. “I'll... I'll tell you in the morning, when I get home.” He paused. “What was the dream about?”

  “You'll think I'm silly,” she told him.

  “Tell me.”

  “It was you on one of your trains. Just you and this woman, and she wouldn't stop screaming and screaming, and you kept trying to calm her down but she was screaming her head off and it was getting louder and louder, and then I woke up and I just...”

  Stephen waited for her to finish.

  “See?” she said finally. “I told you it was silly. I just felt weird, so I wanted to call and check on you.”

  “I'm glad you did,” he told her.

  “But everything's okay, isn't it?” she asked. “I can hear something in your voice, babe. You sound weird.”

  “No, I'm fine,” he replied, feeling as if he might burst into tears at any moment, “I just... The thing is, a few minutes ago, I...” Pausing, he realized how horrified his wife would be if he told her everything at that moment.

  “It wasn't like my dream, was it?”

  “No,” he told her. “It was...”

  Hearing a beeping sound on his phone, he looked at the screen and saw that Bob was trying to get through.

  “Hang on,” he continued, “it's a work call.”

  He hit the button to switch connections.

  “Is she -”

  “There's no-one here!” Bob said, sounding angry. “I've checked the whole goddamn train and there's no-one anywhere. You bloody idiot, what the hell's wrong with you?”

  “Carriage B,” Stephen stammered, “she's under carriage B.”

  “I'm at carriage B right now, and there's no-one here. Seriously, kid, do you think this is funny? Did someone at the depot put you up to this, eh? Did they tell you to pull one over on me, 'cause if they did...”

  “No, I swear -”

  “There is no-one here,” Bob said firmly. “I'm telling you, a mangled body isn't exactly the kind of thing you can miss, is it?”

  “But...” Hurrying to the door, Stephen jumped down onto the gravel and hurried through the darkness, racing to the spot where he could see Bob's torchlight up ahead.

  “You've got one sick sense of humor,” the older man said, before cutting the call and putting his phone in his
pocket.

  “I've got to go,” Stephen told his wife. “I'll be home late.”

  “Okay, but -”

  Cutting the call, he slipped his phone into his pocket.

  “She's right here,” he stammered as he reached Bob. Grabbing the torch, he shone the light under the wheels, only to find that there was no sign of the girl. “She's here,” he continued, hurrying along the side of the carriage to check for some sign of her, only to stop as he realized that she'd somehow vanished into thin air. He kept checking, over and over, but the torchlight picked out nothing except the metal of the track and the train's wheels.

  No girl.

  No blood.

  “Right here, huh?” Bob said, putting his hands on his hips. “Okay, kid, you got me, but the joke's over. I've gotta give you credit, it's not easy to pull one over on me, so you did good. But give it a rest from now on, okay? You're gonna give me a goddamn heart attack.” Sighing, he began to make his way back toward the front of the train. “Bloody rookies.”

  “She was here!” Stephen shouted, starting to panic as he ran along to carriage C and double-checked that the girl hadn't simply begun to crawl away. She'd seemed so badly hurt, he knew it was impossible for her to have even moved an inch but he was grasping for explanations that didn't involve him losing his mind. It was almost as if two completely different realities had slammed together, and he was slipping through the crack.

  “Good job I checked before I called it in,” Bob replied. “We'd have been laughing stocks. We'd never have heard the end of it.”

  “She was here!” Stephen said firmly. “I swear on my life, she was right here!”

  Bob turned to him with an exasperated look in his eyes.

  “She was here,” Stephen continued. “I talked to her.”

  “A girl who'd just been hit by a train? You had a nice little chat, did you?”

  “I... Yeah... I mean no, but...”

  “Well then you need to see a shrink,” Bob said, “or a doctor, 'cause I'm telling you, there's no-one. And this game or whatever it is, it's gone far enough. Alright, mate?”

  As Bob walked away, Stephen stood next to carriage B and stared down at the spot where, just a few moments earlier, he'd seen the girl. He was certain he hadn't imagined the whole thing, that she'd really been there, but as he continued to check under the carriage, he couldn't deny that the girl was now gone. He looked over at the line of trees, but there was no sign of anyone.

  “Are you coming,” Bob shouted from the front of the train, “or should I just leave you out here? Either's fine by me.”

  “I'm coming,” he whispered, taking one final look down at the tracks before turning and hurrying back toward the front carriage.

  “Three in the morning,” Bob muttered as he resumed his spot on the driver's seat, which creaked a little under his weight. “Fuck me, this night is just dragging along, isn't it?”

  “I'm not an idiot,” Stephen replied, climbing up into the cab and pulling the door shut. “I know what I saw.”

  “And I know what I saw,” Bob replied with a sigh as he started the engine again and the train began to ease forward. “I saw a bit fat nothing back there. Come on, it was a good wheeze but there's no point playing the joke out for too long. You have to learn when to let it go.”

  Stephen watched him for a moment, before taking a seat and turning to look out the window. The train's electric lights picked out the snaking line ahead, just as the hulking vehicle reached a junction and bumped across the switcher. As the cab shuddered, Stephen stared into space, still trying to reconcile everything that had just happened. He was seriously considering the possibility that his new asthma meds might have begun to cause hallucinations.

  “Huh,” Bob said, looking down at the notes on his clipboard. “They switched tracks on us, moved us from South A onto North B. It's a reversible track round here, but...”

  “What?” Stephen asked, turning to him. “Why would they do that?”

  “Probably 'cause of the go-slow. Traffic's probably all over the place, but still...” He watched as they passed a green light. “Looks okay, but maybe you should check in, make sure nothing's wrong. I don't like being changed without being told first.” He reached out for his phone. “Call the -”

  Before he could finish, a red light began to blink on the dashboard, accompanied by a beeping sound.

  “What the fuck?” Bob whispered.

  “What is it?” Stephen asked.

  “It's the -”

  Turning, Bob looked back at the door that led through into the first commuter carriage.

  “What is it?” Stephen asked again, trying to stay calm.

  “It's the alarm in carriage B,” Bob said after a moment.

  “You mean the passenger alarm?”

  “The one they're supposed to hit if there's a problem back there, but...” He paused, before turning to Stephen as the train continued to trundle along at walking pace. “There's no-one else on the train.”

  His face white with fear, Stephen turned to look at the door.

  “Someone must've jumped on when we stopped,” Bob continued, trying to sound unconcerned even though the panic was evident in his voice. “We've got ourselves a stowaway.”

  “Why would a stowaway ring the alarm?” Stephen asked. “Wouldn't that kind of defeat the purpose of stowing away?”

  “Well, yeah, but... Maybe it's a faulty button, then.”

  Both men sat in silence for a moment, staring back at the door as the train continued to roll slowly forward.

  “You're gonna have to go and take a look,” Bob said eventually.

  “No way.”

  “I'm the driver, I can't do it!”

  “Don't you think I've spent enough time going to take a look at creepy shit?”

  “It's probably just a malfunction,” Bob told him. “It's cold tonight, the mechanism more than likely froze. Just go and give it a tap, it'll be fine.”

  “How can the mechanism freeze?”

  “I don't know, just go and take a look!”

  “But -”

  “What are you, some kind of chicken?”

  “Fuck my luck,” Stephen muttered, getting to his feet and heading to the door. “Are night-shifts always this crazy?”

  “Nope,” Bob replied, turning back to look at the track ahead, “you're just lucky.”

  “I swear,” Stephen continued, opening the door and heading out into the corridor, “this is the last time I get a ride back on a night-train.” He made his way through the first carriage before pushing open the door and stepping into the second. “Next time I'll just stick it out in the tea-room 'til morning. There's no way I'm -”

  He stopped as soon as he saw her.

  At the far end of the brightly-lit carriage, sitting on one of the seats and staring straight at him, was the girl from before, except this time she looked totally unhurt, as if all the damage and blood had disappeared. As she made eye contact with Stephen, she opened her mouth a little, as if she was about to say something.

  “Oh no no no,” Stephen said, taking a step back as ice gripped his heart. “No fucking way -”

  “What's up, man?” Bob called out from the front of the train.

  “No no no,” Stephen continued, unable to stop looking at the girl's dark eyes. He wanted to turn away, to run and warn Bob, but he felt as if somehow the girl was forcing him to stare at her. He watched in horror as slowly she gripped the headrest of the seat in front of her, and then she began to stand up. As she did so, her body creaked and rattled, as if broken bones were jostling against one another beneath her pale white skin.

  Suddenly the train juddered for a moment and all the lights blinked off, leaving Stephen staring into a pitch-dark carriage. His eyes desperately scanned the darkness, looking for some sign of the girl, and a moment later he realized he could hear the faint shuffling, creaking sound coming closer. Taking a step back, he watched as the girl's face began to emerge from the shadows, just a few
feet from him.

  Her gaze was fixed on him.

  “What do you want?” he asked.

  She took another creaking step toward him.

  “You're not allowed on here,” he told her. “Not at night.”

  Another step.

  “Don't come any closer!”

  With her eyes still fixed on him, she raised her left arm and reached out to touch his shoulder.

  And then she screamed.

  “Fuck no!” he shouted, turning and running back into the cab before slamming the door shut and sliding the bolt across. He paused for a moment, struggling to catch his breath as he listened to the sound of the girl approaching the other side of the door.

  “The whole bloody power system's failed,” Bob muttered, as he leaned under the console. With the train slowly grinding to a halt, he used his torch to examine the wiring. “What was that noise back there?”

  “We have to get out of here,” Stephen said, taking a step away from the door.

  “Hang on,” Bob muttered, “I've almost got it sorted. No need to abandon ship just yet.”

  “We have to get out,” Stephen said again, turning to him. “The -”

  Spotting a blindingly bright light in the distance, he realized that another train was heading their way, rounding the curve of the track up ahead. He told himself that it was going to pass harmlessly on the adjacent line, but suddenly he saw that it was speeding straight toward them.

  “The airport express train,” he whispered.

  “You what, mate?” Bob asked. “What's wrong, are you -”

  He stopped as the whole train began to shudder. Beneath them, the tracks were starting to hum as the speeding express train got closer and closer.

  “What the fuck is that?” Bob said, starting to get to his feet.

  “Run!” Stephen shouted, lunging for the door.

  Before he could move another inch, the two trains collided head-on. The faster train ripped through the cab of the stationary vehicle, scattering carriages across the tracks and finally careering to one side and smashing into a power-line, which crashed down amid a shower of sparks. Upturned carriages skated into one another as they rolled through the gravel, and the sound of screeching metal filled the air. Huge, heavy chunks of steel were sent crashing through the darkness until they slammed into a nearby embankment, knocking down trees and sending up showers of dirt. The express train's engine had already caught fire, burning bright in the darkness until it came to a halt and exploded, lighting up the scene with a rush of fire that began to spread to one of the other carriages.