Killing Chris

The Night Train

I examined the stitched wound that reminded me of the stitch job on Frankenstein. The sutures were all over the place. I could already tell the bleeding had slowed. I wrapped the wound tight in gauze and clipped it with one of those metal clip things. A sat in my blood for a few hours trying to find the will to live.

A quite common struggle these days I imagine.

I pulled my arm close to my body and pushed off the ground with my other arm. My head pounded and I battled the worst case of fatigue I had ever had. I limped through that old freezing barn looking for something to quell my hunger pains. My feet scraped against the hay lining the ground as I checked each room of that barn

It appeared as If the owners of the barn hadn't come to it much. While I stayed in the barn for around four nights, I hadn't interacted with anyone at that barn. Consequently, since they hadn't come often, there was nothing edible in the barn. When the darkness of night set in it brought with it the chilly winds from the north. It made the nights long almost never-ending.

At this point in the story, I'm questioning if my time on the run is important to write about. My killer interactions were limited, the death and dying happened behind closed doors. Not even I was a witness to the deaths on the run.

I would like to think that the despair on the run is crucial to understanding the end of the story. Although it reads as if it is adjacent to the main story it is not, I can assure you. You can call it story building I guess...Or maybe rising action is better. Well...anyway my point is that I believe it's worth it.

All the things I went through before my journey had finally ended. To understand why I did what I did when the time came. It's the whole point of this book...To tell my story the way it happened, the way I slowly died. But the timer is ticking. As the hour of my capture approaches, I sit in a new random city writing down the beginning as fast as I can.

Where I was forced to go, what I was forced to do.

For now, we must go through the whole story. Ill skip the parts with little significance if it means you get the important part of the story. All the way to the bitter end we go.

I walked into the tool room of the barn and over to the workbench. Call it a last-ditch chance at finding food or something. I pulled the drawer open and a stack of papers filled the drawer. I pulled them out and set them on the bench. I spread them out and looked over them in awe. It was one of those maps where you stick a pin in the location you've been.

Only whoever made this one had a postcard for each city they had visited. I briefly examined the map and then the stack of postcards. The postcard on the top of the pile was from Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Clarke... I thought to myself.

Finally, a destination. I was eager to finally be going toward something instead of just plain away. As we covered earlier in the story running away from something is a sure way if colliding with the problem again at a higher velocity. A crash and burn type of problem.

I left the barn with a limp and a half-eaten arm. In my other hand, I clutched the travel map. For some reason, I had always been good with maps. I trekked down the road until I found a road sign which I used to guide me to the nearest city. I searched the map of the local city for the little dotted lines. The railroads.

How effortless it would be to ride a train as close to Louisiana as I could get. I made my way to the nearest railroad crossing and I waited. Days went by before I felt the rumbling of rails.

Snow-covered the railroads but as the train got closer the snow shook off the rails. The evening sun reflected off the glistening snow and the air was clean. The Cyprus trees stripped of their leaves lined the rail.

Suddenly the light from the train emerged as it rounded a slight corner in the distance. I slowly began walking down the side of the rails. The train roared past me squeaking against the rusty metal rails as It went. I stopped and turned to the train looking for a train car I could jump on. An orange car hummed in the distance the car door wasn't open but latched with a chain I could open. I broke into a sprint running parallel with the train.

My feet hit the ground hard running as If my life depended on it because It might have. As the front of the orange car passed, I jumped for it landing on the small little metal platform right below the door. I unhooked the little metal chain and slid the door open falling into the metal box. The train car was filled with nailed wooden boxes.

The sort of boxes that antiques get delivered in to like museums. I didn't pry any open I just sat on the train eager to be with Clarke once more. The train bumped and squeaked against the rails as it traveled. The sunlight shining through the slit in the door had faded into a silky moonlight. I moved to the corner of the train car and I laid down curling up.

The exhausted feeling you get when you're in a car set in and I felt tired. Which actually wasn't that abnormal. I've been tired for a while now. Tired of being someone I wasn't. Tired of traveling alone. Tired of being alone in general. It never got easier being alone. Ever since the deaths of my friends I've felt as If I was living someone else's life.

I woke to a loud banging noise. Metal on metal. The low chatter of two people sounded from outside my train car. I woke up in a panic. I let my guard down and now I was too far in the lion's den to escape. I walked over to the train door and looked through the crack. We were in some sort of warehouse now, the artificial yellowish light buzzed loudly above us.

I moved right and left trying to find the perfect angle to see the train inspectors. I spotted a woman looking into an empty train car to my left. She was talking to a man who must have been in that train car. I tiptoed to the other side of the train car to the other door and lid it open slowly, careful to avoid the creaking noise. I lowered myself through the little opening in the doorway and stepped onto the ground.

I quickly scanned my surroundings. Both ends of the trainyard where the rails had been were cut open exposed to the outside to allow the train to enter and leave. I heard a group of people at the front of the train no doubt inspecting the smokestack and purring engine.

I made my down the side of the train careful to make no noise, if I drew attention to myself here I wasn't in the physical shape to escape them. As I approached the rear end of the train I heard talking as I got closer. I laid on the ground and crawled under the train looking to see if the other side had been any less populated. Through the open space in the train between the rail and the train itself, I saw no legs.

With my one good arm, I pulled myself from under the train and stood up. I was unsure of where to go now. Out of options, I continued to move toward the end of the train. At the end of a train I stood and peaked my head around the train and saw two guys standing next to each other smoking. I waited for a few minutes and the men turned and walked toward the train car and started to unload the boxes.

In an instance, I slipped through the back door opening and into the darkness. The ground wet with melted snow which was a step up from the blizzardy state I had just escaped.

As I walked under the starry night sky I thought of my desire for forgiveness. You know that saying that goes "it's better to ask for forgiveness than permission" Ya, well that's just not true. I wonder if you'd forgive me if you knew how the story ended.

If you'd even be reading still.

Would you forgive me if I said I was both the executioner and the victim?

Chris Logged Off