Tom woke up just before 1 p.m. that day. All the events of last night came back to him as though he were suffering from a hangover. Physically, he ached all over, his left knee and leg hurting a little. Mentally, he still could not believe what had happened: the tube stopping in the disused station, the girl screaming, and then the creatures! The unbelievable bloody creatures out of a horror story. And at the end the policeman not believing a word he was saying. What a night!
He kept his eyes closed and turned over onto his chest, not wanting to get up yet. The questions, however, would not go away. Did it really happen? Was it not just a bad dream? How could such things happen in north London in the 21st century? Who or what were the creatures? He had never heard of any such things before. They looked human but maybe they were not. Or maybe in the poor light he had not seen what he thought he had or the two beers he had had affected his brain. He just did not know what to think.
Then he thought about why the tube had stopped in the first place. He knew that the tube did sometimes stop in the tunnel before Golders Green station but that was usually during rush hour, wasn’t it? And why were the doors open, and where was the driver? Was he involved? But how could he be involved with such creatures?
The questions went on. Had the girl been on the tube when it had stopped? Or had the driver seen something and stopped to investigate but could find nothing? But Tom had heard the screams, and so the driver must have, surely. Also, why had the creatures not followed him from the fenced-off area? Did they only stay underground?
Then the most important question came into his head: was the girl still alive?
A wave of negative emotions came over him when he thought of this question. Whether or not she was alive when he last saw her being carried down the tube tunnel by the creatures, he doubted she was now. After all, they had taken her for a reason, and what could the reason be for such creatures other than - he could just about finish the thought – to kill her for food?
He then felt that he should have done more. He was bigger than they and he could have fought them. He should have at least shouted at them. Perhaps they would have panicked and dropped the girl. Maybe she would have gained consciousness or woken up while he was doing so and escaped and...He left the thought unfinished. He knew he should at least have gone back and tried to save her instead of going home to sleep.
He told himself to shut up. There was nothing more he could have done. He had been tired, disorientated, and in shock at what he saw. Anyone else in his situation would have done the same as he and no more. It was easy to say in hindsight what he should have done. He had tried to help by responding to the screams, and had even attempted to follow the creatures down the tunnel. But he did not want to die as well - he gulped, as well as...He left this thought unfinished as well. For God’s sake, he had even tried to get the police to help. What more could he do? he wondered.
He angrily forced himself out of bed and put some jeans and a t-shirt on. He then went down the stairs of the big four bed-roomed 1930s semi-detached villa in Hoop Lane, Golders Green, where he lived. On his way down he refused to think anymore about what had happened and reassured himself again that he had done all that he could. He went into the kitchen and made himself a black coffee and some toast. He then went into the lounge and switched on the tv. He looked at the time: it was 2.14 p.m.
He flicked over the channels to see if there was anything good on to distract him. But it was no good: apart from there being nothing worth watching at this time, he knew that what happened last night did happen and he could not just forget about it.
He turned off the tv and went back to his bedroom. His body still ached as he climbed the stairs. He thought again about trying to contact the police but decided against it. They simply would not believe him, just like the policeman did not last night. It was crazy what had happened to him and no one could possibly believe it unless they saw it for themselves. He also did not want anyone to judge him harshly for not having done more. But what would be the point anyway? he wondered. The girl had to be dead by now.
Instead of going back to bed he went to his computer and turned it on. He decided he would try to see if there was anything on the internet about the disused station and possibly but unlikely its strange inhabitants. The thought of doing this made him feel better.
He typed in ‘disused station on Hampstead Way’ in the search engine. It came up with over 12,000 results. He clicked on one of them and read through it. ‘North End Tube station’ was to have been the deepest station on the tube network at 221 feet deep. It would have been between Hampstead and Golders Green. Work on it had begun after 1903 when the platforms and its lower levels were excavated. However, this stopped in 1906 when the then Northern line’s owners thought that there would not be enough passengers using it.
At this time there were no shafts to the surface or indeed any surface building. This changed in the early 1950s during the Cold War when North End was to be a flood control centre for the rest of the tube network. The surface building was disguised as a sub-electricity station with a lift and some stairs leading down to the bottom. Tom found this last bit interesting because that was exactly what he had thought it was until last night.
The site he found went on to say that the station was now used as an emergency exit from the Northern line and was apparently called ‘Bull & Bush station’ by London Underground staff because it was so near to the pub of the same name, a pub Tom knew quite well.
There were links to other websites on this site, and Tom searched them in the hope of finding anything about any creatures. But as he predicted there was nothing, only pictures and descriptions of the disused station, which he now remembered with no fondness.
He had been on the internet for over an hour and his eyes were getting tired. He was also hungry and went downstairs to get some food. In the kitchen he got a half-eaten pizza out of the fridge and reheated it under the grill. He then went into the lounge and ate it. It was 4.46 p.m.
While he was eating, he checked the phone for messages. He remembered now that his mobile phone was not working and he was sure that he had heard the phone ring a couple of times while he was on the internet engrossed in his research. There was a message from his mother asking if everything was ok. Tom was an only child and there was just him and her: his parents had divorced when he was ten, and he could not remember the last time he had seen his father.
There was another message from one of his friends from college, mentioning some party at the weekend. He put the phone down and finished his pizza. He did not take much notice of the messages: he just could not stop thinking about what happened last night. He returned upstairs to the internet, still feeling that he should have done more for the girl.
This time he typed in the keywords ‘ghosts and creatures on the northern line.’ He was successful. He found one site giving details about some kind of mythical creatures living in the tube system and sewers, who evolved from humans a long time ago. They were either outcasts or were originally trapped underground. They apparently no longer spoke English, and lived off the scraps left at tube stations, and – Tom swallowed with fear – unfortunate humans in the form of tramps, drunks, and isolated late night travellers.
Bloody hell! he thought. These mythical creatures were real and he had encountered them.
He carried on searching for information on them with a greater interest. However, he did not find much more. There was only a 1970s film based on these myths called ‘Deathline’ and a 1990s tv series about some weird humans living a parallel life underground called ‘Neverwhere.’
He continued to search using various keywords and phrases until his eyes and brain had had enough. He could not find anything else of any substance. He looked at the time: it was 10.32 p.m. He switched off his computer, feeling with relief that he was too tired to think anymore, and went to bed.