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Ghost Train
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The day had been going normal for Gerald Johanson, a maitre d' at the respectable Café Faust. The restaurant itself was one of the last sources of income that had survived the Meteor, and a train had been routed to it from the gil-hungry Midgar slums, as well as a road to the town that had always been there. If the café had been anywhere else but Kalm, Midgar would have become poverty-flooded.
Not that it mattered; eyes had turned to the bustling now-metropolis that was Kalm, and Midgar had been left to rot for the twenty years since Meteor.
Gerald had done just as he always did; he woke up in his two-bedroom apartment above Greasy Joe's Chili Paradise and griped about the smell for about five minutes in bed. He got out of the queen-sized bed that he shared with his wife Cheryl Johanson, took a shower, and got ready for work in all the other ways he needed to. He ate a decent breakfast of eggs and bacon, the latter being slightly burnt and the former too runny for his tastes, but it was a good breakfast all the same.
It may be argued that the day changed when he kissed his wife goodbye, running far too late to catch the usual bus, and walked the three blocks to the Sector 7 train station, which was admittedly reputed to be a bit rough on the elderlies. But Gerald was in his prime at thirty-two, with a well-trimmed goatee that made him look younger than he was, and he figured he could handle anything that came at him.
The majority will agree, this was where the day changed.
It's standard procedure, what after the Sephiroth Incident, to go through a bag check when boarding a train from or to the slums. It was water-cooler knowledge that it was also quite common for a transporter to leave a tip to the checker atop any illegal materials. The bag-checker would take the money and let you go through; it was no harm, really, as the most narcotics passing through were calming doses of Mako to inject.
But something that did not look common to Gerald was the man with long, red hair that passed the entire bag-check line, slid between the metal detectors, and flipped the bag-checker off. The checker took this in stride and took Gerald's briefcase, opening it up to find a suit for the maitre d' job he was indeed working. A more thorough search of the briefcase was taken, and a toothbrush with toothpaste was found, for post-lunch break activities.
Gerald was a quietly helpful citizen, however, and once he was cleared, he turned back to the man who was now rooting through a duffel bag held by a torn-up looking young man. The men were both eager for pay, said the twenty gil that the checker deposited into his TIPS jar. "Um, sir," Gerald said quietly. "A man just walked through your detectors while you were checking my bag."
The checker, whose nametag said he was Dallas, was a muscular man that looked as though he could hurl Gerald ten feet. Though the café employee had been trying to say something nice, Dallas didn't look like he took too kindly to having things pointed out to him.
And so, Dallas looked sternly at Gerald. "Your bag is safe, Mr. Johanson," he said sternly, and Gerald was young enough to know he'd been given a second chance to board before he was revoked of his train privileges.
It's not entirely certain how Gerald got there, but he ended up in the same car as the red-haired man. The former was positioned between a slender old man with his coffee and a rotund man puffing a cigar and coughing loudly. The latter, sitting on the wall across from him, had clearance on either side of himself as he lit a cigarette with a butane lighter, looking at the rusty floor from behind his fancy sunglasses. He was wearing a white suit with a red undershirt, tie clipped straight down. He seemed to be very taken with a gold watch that adorned his wrist.
Gerald, seeing an inscription on the watch, leaned forward inconspicuously from his seat and tried to read it. The large man to his right chose this moment to double over and hack up a wad of green goo, which landed on the poor maitre d's briefcase. Sighing, Gerald forgot all about the watch and pulled the kerchief from his pocket, dabbing off the expelled substance that the big man was apologizing for around sneezes. Gerald said it would be fine, secretly wishing he could get off this train, but it was at that moment that the car shook and linked with the rest, starting to move a few moments later.
'Please just let me make it alive,' he thought as he sank back into his seat, wrinkling his nose at the combined stench of cigar and cigarette. The red-haired man was tapping a long rod on the seat beside him now, as though blind, but had not moved his gaze from the rusted, rattling floor of the car.
The attendant's voice floated through an intercom so caked with spitballs that it was muffled. "Welcome to the Midgar Railroad Service. Our destination is the town of Kalm, and we'll be arriving in about ten minutes. Thanks for riding with us on this lovely Tuesday morning." A few mock-thank-yous came from some of the more tired passengers as the box clicked off in a burst of static.
Gerald inspected the car. A steel door barred exit from both ends of it, and the windows looked dual-paned and bulletproof. They seemed to have latches on the top that would open them, but the smokers didn't care. The seats were hard and leather-covered, but not by much. Rats, cats, dogs, and other animals seemed to have been chewing at the coating for eternity, and only in patches was the original, teal color still intact. The car rattled every few seconds, as though it was about to fly off the rails, and the wheels squealed almost too loudly to speak over. There were about twenty people in this particular area, and the majority looked uncomfortably smashed together.
Of course, they all seemed to be staying away from the man in the suit, like scouts huddled around a high-burning campfire. They feared it, but still wanted to keep an eye on it. Tap, tap, tap went the long rod against the seat, some sort of twisted mantra that was the only steady thing besides the unstability of the train car.
A few men and women were left without seats and stood nearest the door on the side headed toward the front of the train, holding into leather straps suspended from the ceiling and reading newspapers casually. A sickly old man sat in the corner with a bottle of booze, but the alcohol had been long-forgotten. His green eyes were fixed upon the man in the suit, whose tapping had not slowed nor increased in pace. Every so often, he still checked his watch, an unnerving habit.
With a glance around, Gerald saw that not one eye was somewhere other than that man's face or a newspaper. No one spoke, no one slept, no one batted an eyelash. No one dared to ask him who he was and why he was there, simply because they all were afraid of him for some unknown reason. An infant belonging to a teenage mother two seats to the cigar-smoking cougher began to wail, and the tapping stopped abruptly.
Maybe the fact that nineteen people inhaled like they'd all been pitched off of a cliff was what irritated him so, and maybe not; either way, it happened.
The man with red hair shoved his sunglasses into it and looked up, directly at Gerald. He stood up and walked slowly to the middle of the car, then thrust out his arm and pointed a furious, shaking finger at him. "Why're you starin' at me, kid?!" he shouted, and everyone noticed it was strangely quiet now. Maybe that was because the car had stopped.
Gerald looked to both of his sides, and the men were both staring at him. Coughy-Hacky didn't even smoke or sniff anymore, just stared at him like this was all his fault and doom was fast approaching. When Gerald saw this, he turned back to the man and said, quietly, "You're just dressed to nicely, and that's hard to find down here in the slums. That and you walked by the bag-check with your middle finger up."
The other seemed puzzled, then barked a laugh. "Bullshit!" he spluttered. "Yer starin' at me 'cause of my hair, aren'tcha? Just like those fucking teachers at school! 'Reno, go sit over there, you're disturbing the other children!' 'Reno, you make this school look bad!'" He laughed again, clutching his stomach with the hand he wasn't holding the rod in. "'Reno, you're a god-awful fucking mistake!!' It never stops with you people, does it? Yer always pretendin' yer better than somebody just 'cause you've got the good shit and the families, don'tcha?!"
Gerald stuttered, but he didn't get a chance to compose himself. Some of that was attributed to the fact that Old Man Newspaper on his left had just urinated on himself, but the rest was because he was being attacked verbally for pretending he was above someone who looked much better than he did; a crime he, admittedly, hadn't committed.
"Speaking of families!" the man in the suit said -- they assumed he was named Reno by now -- quite loudly. He turned and started walking furiously over to the teen with the baby in her arms, reaching out and snatching it from her. He walked over to the windows and flicked his rod at the latch atop one, holding the infant round the leg in a position that surely did some harm. "I fucking hate children!!" His voice doubled in volume and he turned, smashing the baby against an unopened window and watching its two-month-old, fragile head pop like a grape under a tire.
He seemed to laugh even harder as he threw the dead body out the window, but it stopped when the mother of the child screamed and lurched forward to do something presumably horrible to the man. The intent was never seen because he turned again, just as quickly, and brought up his rod. Twisting his arm, he thrust it down the poor girl's throat and skewered her right there. One press of a button and she was convulsing on her spike, slowly burning from the inside out until her vitals exploded from the heat and bits of teen-mom went everywhere.
Reno, who looked something like a dark messiah to the occupants of Car Four, looked at the largest piece of the girl and scoffed, spitting on her. "Try to hit me, will ya, bitch?! Your screechin' baby pissed me right the fuck off! Now you went'n made it worse by tryin' to punch me or somethin' -- it's your own fucking fault!!" he spat at the woman who could no longer listen. Then he rounded on the others, flashing a wild grin, before looking at the man with the drink in the corner. He cocked his head to the side, opening one eye wide and squinting the other. "You!" he yelled. "Gimme yer whiskey! Now!"
Drunkard, obviously not seeing the pleading look from Gerald, shook his head and let his open mouth sway with it. He clenched the bottle tightly to his chest, as if he were going to just say "no" and get away with it. The poor old man with the bottle was enclosed in a magical, golden pyramid that fired off the end of Reno's rod and was kicked from the outside until he gave up the bottle of whiskey. Of course, that was after Reno had kicked his head against the wall a few too many times and simply had to take it away from his cold, dead hands.
Reno took a swig from the bottle, then slammed it against a window in disgust. It bubbled and ran quickly down the glass, as if it wanted to run away, too. "You all fucking disgust me," the man said quietly, clicking his tongue. "If I had the time, I'd stand here'n pick all yer asses off, one by one. But I've got somewhere t'be in half'n hour, so yer lucky."
Gerald sighed, thinking this meant the rest of them would be spared, but it was only the turnpoint. A shroud fell over the outside windows and the car began to rock back and forth, the lights flickering -- once, twice, three times -- and then going out. The only things that were visible were two lenses perched in Reno's hair that seemed to be illuminated from within. He slipped them down and his eyes seemed to be amplified by them, two floating spheres of decision in the middle of a crowded, death-filled train car. "I'll take this fucking city to the ground if that's what it takes to get my revenge!!" he screeched.
It began as a low chant from beneath them, almost in time with the rocking of the car, as erratic as that seemed to be. It had a definite pattern to it, however, and it grew louder with each repetition. Slowly, the words formed:
"Here they come to steal my soul. . ."
Four shining spheres appeared in the corner and began swaying back and forth as they moved around the room, in pairs; one short, one very tall. No doubt these were more sunglasses, possessed or something to that effect.
"Ghost train!"
It was a harsh whisper from three voices that did not belong to passengers, one that told them they would not be living to see their destination.
"Wait it out until I know. . ."
The six spheres, moving two at a time, came for them, and there was the sound of three guns being drawn simultaneously.
"Ghost train!"
Four whispers this time, one from a pair of eyes in the corner hovering above the glowing strings of what anyone in the car knew as a guitar. It seemed to be perched on the old, drunken man's body, but as it began to play, fingers blocked out a little silver illumination each time. His sunglasses -- or whatever they were -- were also choppy, as if there was hair dropping in front of them.
One chord and the car seemed to explode with music, so loud that a few hearts stopped at that very moment. Combining the intense music with the darkness, many became too dizzy to be afraid, and they were the ones shot first. Gerald could still hear the voices, mainly because four separate ones were yelling "Come on!!" independently as guns blazed. Shots seemed to come from everywhere at once but they didn't light up the car; instead, there was just the music drowning out any scream that may have had a chance to reach the ears of someone else.
Gerald had hit the floor immediately, and he still said it was fate that saved him. Shoes, boots, and bare feet ran over his back repeatedly, forcing yelps and shouts from him. But he was too dizzy to care; all he knew was that music was deafening him and four voices were telling him to come on.
COME ON!!
COME ON!!
COME ON!!
COME ON!!
At the moment he thought he couldn't take any more and his eardrums were surely going to explode with his brain, there was silence. No moaning of the injured, no dying chords of the sadistic funeral tune, and certainly no gunshot to end it all. Gerald cautiously raised his head and Reno was sitting where he had been, smoking a cigarette. No bodies were in the car, and the window was fixed. No mess, no bullet holes.
Just Gerald Johanson and who he was sure was the Grim Reaper.
The train came to a stop a few minutes later, Gerald still sprawled out on the floor on his stomach and feeling no pain in his back, and he still stared at Reno. Even as the car pulled into the station and the conductor announced it, Gerald was still convinced he was about to die. All Reno did was stand up, toss a few gil at him with a pitying look, and walk off the train as casually as he'd gotten on, electro-rod bouncing off the steps as he did.
Gerald Johanson told his wife about the events in Car Four the same afternoon after being sent home from work for paranoid behavior and complaints from the diners. Two weeks later he was in therapeutic treatment with a Dr. Z'davi in Mideel after a swift divorce and relocation. It was maybe a year later when his therapist, a Wutain man with long, black hair and a smile that didn't get any more mischievous, asked a question about the incident they hadn't talked about in months.
"Could you pick this man, Reno, out of a line-up?"
Gerald was taken aback, but that was how it was around Z'davi. Curveballs were thrown at every opportunity. He nodded firmly and clutched the fabric of his shirt, despite the fact Z'davi thought him absolutely crazy. "Definitely. I remember everything about him, right down to what color the suit was. A real monster, that Reno."
The therapist closed his notebook and stood up, an action that was accompanied by a quick chink sound. A moment later, three feet of chain fell out of his sleeve and he swung it around. His patient was already at the door, which had been locked from the inside.
Z'davi walked straight through the desk, chair, and table that stood between he and Mr. Johanson, then swung the chain out and caught him around the throat with it. One quick tug and Gerald sailed a few feet toward him, white as a sheet and blubbering like a child caught fooling with himself. "And yet," Z'davi said quietly, "you couldn't remember one thing about the two other shootists or the guitar player. The one with the long hair that fell in front of his eyes."
For emphasis, the therapist brushed his back with a hand, revealing a small red point on his forehead. Hefting Gerald up in front of him, he smiled sadistically. "And get it right. We're not monsters; we're ghosts."
Gerald croaked around the chain, trying to pull it off to no avail.
He was whirled around and his head thrust forward hard enough to take it off; the edges of that chain were sharp. The spirit of Tseng Z'davi leaned down to the head, laying down next to it. "And we will not rest until that city pays back the blood we spilled for it. It's only right, seeing as how it killed us for the very deed."
Three figures -- one a redhead in a white suit, the next a blonde woman in a navy blue suit, and one a tall bald man -- flicked their sunglasses over their eyes, leaning against the bookcase they had just walked in through. A chord sounded from nowhere and they began humming lowly; humming a tune about their ghost train.
-Fin.