Stewie had been hoping it was going to be a straight run out to Norwich. Two more hours and then he was done for the day. The train finally lurched to a halt, and he picked up the radio controller. “Stewie on the nine from Liverpool Street. Dave, what’s the red light for? I thought you said it was an all clear ahead for me?”
The speaker crackled beside him. “All right, Stew? Sorry, mate, I thought you were still back at Manningtree. I was just about to call you.”
“Call me about what?”
“Obstruction on the tracks.”
“Where?”
“Hold on…” The line was left open; Stewie could hear other voices in the background, somebody sneezing, then apologizing. “OK…you’re waiting at signal N32, right?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s right up ahead of you, then.”
Just up ahead was an overpass. Stewie closed his eyes and sat back. Please…not another jumper. He’d had one last year. Seen the mess on the tracks, then made the mistake of finding out about the woman…her story. Discovered what chain of events had led her to do such a pointless and tragic thing. Big mistake.
He’d ended up with a name, a face, enough to haunt him for years to come.
“Dave, please tell me it’s not another jumper.”
“Relax…someone just called it in. Looks like an animal.”
He sucked in a deep breath. “Thank Christ for that. How long are we going to be waiting here?”
“Not good news. I’ve called section maintenance and they said it might take an hour to get someone down there to clear it off.”
“Shit.” Stewie tapped his fingers on the console for a moment. “Dave, how big is it? Are we talking cow big?”
“The caller said it might be a dog or sheep or something.”
“Well for Christ’s sake. I’ll just kick it off the tracks.”
“Uh…Stew, come on, mate. You know you can’t do that. Union rules. Health and safe—”
Stewie switched channels. “Ladies and gents, this is the driver. Sorry about the temporary stoppage. We’ve got a red signal up ahead. Apparently there’s an animal on the tracks. I’ve been advised we should be on our way soon.”
He unclipped his seat harness…
Damn health and safety.
…and opened the door to step down onto the gravel bed.
Stewie’s dad had been a driver back in the good ol’ days of British Rail. How many times had he booted a dead dog or deer off the tracks…and survived to tell the tale?
Flippin’ ridiculous health-’n’-safety managers these days.
The train’s headlights illuminated the rails and steel ties clearly for a hundred yards. His shadow stretched out ahead of him in extended sharp relief. He started down the apron of track, gravel crunching noisily beneath his boots.
Health ’n’ bloody safety. Stewie was amazed anybody got anything done these days. Just a small dose of common sense was all that was needed. They could sit here like a bunch of Muppets for an hour waiting for some “qualified” external contractor to kick it aside. Or he could just get off his arse and do it himself.
He could see it already—a small, pale carcass. It looked like a lamb or a sheep.
Small enough to grab by its hooves or trotters, or whatever damned thing you called its feet, and swing it aside. He closed the last few dozen yards and then squatted down in front of it.
Stewie curled his lips in disgust. It looked like the train before his had gone over it already and pulverized it. Turned it into raw kebab meat.
“Lovely,” he grunted. He pulled the cuffs of his high-visibility jacket down to cover his hands, then grabbed the animal’s hind legs. They came away from the carcass with a sucking sound, like loose drumsticks pulled from a well-cooked roast-in-a-bag Sunday chicken.
“Ugh.”
He swung the legs and tossed them away into a clump of nettles beside the tracks. The rest of the body looked like a mess of minced meat and fluff. Its head was caved in like a deflated balloon.
He stood up. “Right. Good enough.”
The carcass wasn’t an obstruction, certainly no danger of derailing him. He turned around and headed back up the tracks toward his waiting train. A minute later, he pulled himself back up into his compartment. He clipped his safety belt back on and picked up the mike.
“Ladies and gents, the obstruction on the tracks is clear now…just waiting on a green signal to go.”
He switched channels. “Dave, it’s Stewie. I just kicked the thing off. I’m good to go.”
There was no response from Dave. Unusual. “Helloo? It’s Stewie again, mate. The obstruction’s been cleared. You can cancel the maintenance lads. Can I have a green, please?”
Another minute waiting, then the speaker finally crackled. “Sorry, Stew, did you say you cleared it?”
“Yup. What’s going on there? Did I catch you having a dump?”
“No…we…uh…we’re getting a lot of traffic from above.” The young lad sounded harried. Distracted. Stewie had never met Dave. Just knew the voice from five years of running Norwich to London. He had a mental picture of some gawky, pale bloke with a pronounced Adam’s apple and thick glasses.
“Problems?”
“I don’t know… Something about terrorist action in London, maybe? I dunno… It’s all mixed messages coming down from the controllers.”
“Terrorists? What, like a bomb or something?”
“I dunno. Looks like they want to shut down all the London stations immediately.”
“Well I’m out of London, thank God, so any chance I can have my green light?”
“You said you cleared the obstruction?”
Stewie nodded. He caught sight of his face reflected in the dark windshield. “Yeah, it was just a bunch of mush. Decomposed sheep, I think. Must have been there for days.”
He could see a small, dark spot on his left cheek. He swiped at it and looked at his finger. A smear of blood. Oh, lovely. He picked up the napkin that had come with his Starbucks coffee and vigorously rubbed his cheek clean. He looked at the pink-stained paper for a moment, then tossed it out of the window.
“Dave? Come on, mate. Just flip that switch for me.”
“Yup, sorry. There you go, Stew. Green light. You’ll have a good run back. Looks like you’re going to be the last train up to Norwich tonight.”
The light up ahead changed to green. “Cheers, mate. Catch you again on Monday.”
Chapter 16
As the train began to roll forward, clanking and clattering over bolted joints, Leon’s phone vibrated. He looked at the screen. “It’s Dad.” He looked at his mom.
She nodded. “Might as well.”
He swiped his phone. “You OK, Dad?”
“That you, Leon?” He mustn’t have heard him answering. The line was rustling with interference.
“Dad? What’s goin—”
“It’s here, Leo! It’s right here in the city!”
“What? In…New York?”
“Yes! There are people dying in the goddamn streets!”
Leon’s mom grabbed his arm. “What’s he saying?”
Leon ignored her. “Dad…where are you? Are you safe?”
“Leo…listen to me, Son! Listen! Stay inside! Do not go outside! It’s in the—”
“Dad, you said we should try and get out of London!”
“Listen to me! This thing is airborne! They’re saying it’s like flakes. Stay inside! Stay at home. Tape up your windows and doors and stay inside!”
“But we’re on a train, Dad. You said get out of London. You told us to—”
“I know. Shit…shit…”
Leon could hear voices in the background, the familiar echoing wail of a NYPD siren.
“Are you close to Mom’s family? Are you near to Norwich
?”
“I don’t know. Train’s about halfway, I guess.”
“OK, soon as you get there, you tell Mom, you tell Mom’s parents, they gotta stay inside. Do you understand me?! Stay inside, close the windows. Don’t go out again!”
“OK, Dad.” He could hear his father’s labored breathing on the end of the line. There were other voices in the background, car horns beeping, more sirens joining in the chorus. “Dad? Are…are you outside?”
“Yuh…I’m just… Shit… Gimme a second…”
Grace reached out for the phone. Leon shook her hand off.
“Is Dad OK?” she asked. “What’s happening?”
He answered her question by pulling the phone away from his ear and putting it on speakerphone. They all listened to the crackle and rustle of the call, their father’s panting breath, distant screaming voices. A gunshot.
Grace’s eyes rounded. “What’s happening?”
“Dad?” shouted Leon. “Dad! Was that a gun?”
“Listen to me.” The noises were suddenly muted. He must have stepped inside somewhere and closed a door behind him. He was panting heavily. “Listen… This thing’s in the air. You can see it, like…like flakes. It’s fast! It’s killing people everywhere…touching their skin then they’re dying and melting…”
The phone signal began to break up.
“—on’t let it touch you…the flakes! Don’t—”
“Dad, your signal’s going out. We can’t hear what you’re saying!”
“…liquid… There’s lines of it all over the… Do not let it…you… Do…understand? Do not…”
“Dad?”
“…love you…love…both… God…I… Hey! Get out of my goddamn way—”
The call disconnected. Leon looked up from his phone, at his sister, at his mom, at the old man sharing the table with them, at the three commuters sitting around the table across the narrow aisle. All of them staring at him, wide-eyed, as if he were the messenger delivering news of the apocalypse.
“That call… Your call just then? That was from New York?” asked a woman sitting at the opposite table.
Leon nodded.
“Oh God. My daughter lives…” She didn’t finish her words. Instead, she reached into her bag for her phone.
“Was that about that West African virus thing?” asked one of the two men sitting across the table from her.
Leon nodded again as he quickly tried callback, but there was nothing but a flat digital tone. He tried again and got the same thing.
“Miriam?” The old man sitting opposite Leon was already on his phone. “It’s Ben. What? I know… It’s getting rather worrying, isn’t it? Look, call the children!…What?…I know! Call them anyway and tell them…”
A minute ago, their car had been silent, save for the ticking of a heater, a few murmured conversations, the hiss of a young woman’s headphones, and the occasional irritated sigh from the woman sitting next to her trying to read on her Kindle. Even the three drunk young men farther up the car had finally managed to settle down and were sleeping off the alcohol. Now, all of a sudden, the car was filled with the gabble of one-sided conversations. A ripple effect rolled down either side of the aisle: a murmured question from one commuter to another, a whispered answer, the answer evolving, mutating, as it passed from mouth to ear to mouth again. Unrest turning into concern, concern turning into alarm, phones coming out, and calls being made home.
“Mom,” whispered Grace. “Dad’s in real trouble, isn’t he?”
“I don’t know, love.” She was on her phone, dialing her parents. “It sounds like we might all be in a bit of trouble.” Leon stared out into the dark night as the clattering train picked up speed. It all looked so normal out there. The railway embankment had sloped down now, to give him a view of small office complexes, tidy rows of businesses with trucks parked in the back of each, and asphalt bathed in the ever-present, fizzing, sodium-orange blanket of urban lighting. In contrast to this, his imagination was filling in details of downtown New York. It would be midafternoon over there. Leon knew what it would normally be like—Manhattan, tourist-busy right now; a couple more hours and it would be commuter-busy. How many times had he taken the train under the Hudson River to Manhattan after high school for a couple of hours to hang out with his friends? Coffee in a Dunkin’ Donuts, talking gamer stuff, grabbing free Wi-Fi and a view across Times Square.
What he was imagining right now was all that normality replaced with a Roland Emmerich disaster movie: burning cars, rampaging crowds, police roadblocks, cops firing their guns into the air to keep order, and some action-movie hero hustling his kids through all that chaos.
And Dad’s stuck in that movie…somewhere.
He wanted his dad over here with them. They needed him. He noticed Grace was crying beside him. Quietly, privately. He actually hadn’t seen her cry for a long time. Not even when the big bust up happened. She kept that kind of stuff under wraps, probably because she thought it made her look childish. He could hear her breath hitching, saw wet streams of tears rolling down her cheeks, past her curved lips, and onto her dimpled chin.
He felt an instinct to do the whole big-brother thing, to tell her it was going to be fine, that a week from now the news would be all about how social media fueled an overnight global panic. How easy it was for hysteria to spread—a virus far more quick acting and communicable than any real pathogen.
He was about to give her a whole load of bull like that to think about when the clattering of the tracks beneath the train suddenly changed to a deafening metallic scream.
Leon jerked forward, the hard edge of the table slamming painfully against his sternum. His phone flew across the table into the old man’s lap. Someone farther down the car yelped, briefcases and laptop bags skated along overhead storage racks and began to pile up and spill out onto passengers below.
The shrill metallic scream increased in volume and pitch, and everyone in the car was pulled forward in unison by the braking force—those facing forward bent over their tables, those facing opposite pushed back into their seats. Everyone’s faces were stretched and crinkled into the same expectant grimace, awaiting the sudden and catastrophic impact.
Instead, the braking force began to tail off—the screaming of brakes died down to a dull whine, and, finally, the train lurched to a halt. Everyone in the car lurched with it.
For a moment, the entire car was completely silent, except for the sound of someone’s can of soda rolling all the way down the center aisle and the continued soft ticking of a heater.
“Good God!” gasped the man opposite Leon. “What was that about?”
Leon looked at his mother. She shook her head. She had no idea. “Maybe something else is on the tracks?” Her voice had a tremble in it that she was trying to hide for Grace’s sake.
He looked around at the other passengers nearby—the two men and the woman at the table opposite, the three younger men farther down, the young woman wearing the hissing headphones, the older woman beside her who’d been trying to read on her Kindle—all of them now looking at each other wide-eyed and waiting for some kind of an announcement over the intercom.
Finally, the car’s speakers crackled. They heard the rasp and rustle of heavy breathing. Then the train driver’s voice:
“Help…me…”
Chapter 17
“Mom, it’s gotta be the virus!” said Leon. “Maybe he’s got it? Maybe he’s sick?”
“Leon!” she snapped at him. “For God’s sake, just calm down. We don’t know what’s happened yet—”
One of the passengers sitting across from them stirred. “That poor sod sounded like he was having a heart attack or something.” He was in his midthirties Leon guessed, smartly dressed in a way ex-soldiers looked. He peered down at his phone, shifted in his seat, shuffled across the empty one next to him, and stood up in the aisle
. “Does anyone here have a phone signal?”
“I do,” said a woman farther down.
“Dial 999, then. Call an ambulance!” He headed up the aisle toward the car door. It hissed and clattered open for him.
“Where are you going?” Leon’s mom called out.
“I’m an ex-medic.” The door hissed and clattered shut behind him.
“What do we do now?” asked Grace.
“We just sit tight for the moment, love.”
“What about Dad?”
“He can look after himself, Grace. He only needs to take care of himself.”
Leon shot her a look. That sounded like an unnecessary dig.
“Your father…” said the old man. “I’m sure I heard him say, on your phone, something about this virus breaking out in New York?”
“Yeah.”
“Uh-huh…and I heard that too!” A head popped up over the top of the old man’s seat. A black woman with long turquoise nails. She stared at Leon. “Was that your phone, love?”
Leon nodded.
“Sounded scary. Like loads of people rioting.”
“Panic,” said the old man. “Nothing quite like a good old-fashioned medieval plague to get people running for the mountains and screaming blue—”
The woman tapped the top of his head with a nail to shush him.
He turned and looked up at her irritably.
“That your husband who called, love?” She didn’t wait for Leon’s mom to nod. “Is he right, do you think? Do we all need to be worrying about this?”