The Train That Only Runs for the Missing

The train station wasn’t on any map.

I found it by accident, following a shortcut home after a late shift, cutting through a street I’d walked past a hundred times but never down. The air smelled wrong there—stale, like rain trapped underground. At the end of the road stood a narrow platform lit by flickering yellow bulbs. A rusted sign hung crooked above it, blank except for peeling paint.

No schedule. No ticket booth. Just tracks disappearing into darkness.

I would’ve turned back if I hadn’t seen the people.

They stood quietly along the platform—men, women, a child holding a stuffed rabbit with one eye missing. None of them spoke. None of them checked their phones. They stared down the tunnel with the same empty patience, like they had nowhere else to be.

A cold unease settled in my chest.

“Is this the last train?” I asked the woman nearest to me.

She turned slowly, her eyes dull and glassy. “It’s the only one,” she said.

The sound came before the light—a low metallic hum that vibrated through the ground, through my bones. Wind rushed out of the tunnel as the train emerged, old and black, its windows dark as sealed mouths. It screeched to a halt, doors sliding open with a sound like something tearing.

No conductor. No announcement.

People boarded without hesitation.

I don’t know why I followed.

The inside smelled of dust and iron. The seats were worn thin, fabric torn as if picked at by nervous fingers over decades. I sat by the window. The doors closed. The train lurched forward.

Only then did I realize something was wrong with the passengers.

No one blinked.

Their eyes stayed fixed ahead, unblinking, unbreathing. A man across from me had dried blood beneath his fingernails. The child’s shoes were soaked through, leaving dark puddles beneath his feet.

The train accelerated, plunging into darkness.

“Where does this go?” I asked, my voice echoing too loudly.

No one answered.

The lights flickered. For a brief moment, the windows reflected our faces—and then something else. Behind the reflections were shapes pressed against the glass from the outside, faces stretched and distorted, mouths open in silent screams as the train tore past them.

My phone buzzed.

One new message.

From my sister.

Where are you? Mom’s asking.

Relief flooded me. I typed back quickly.

On a train. Long story. I’ll call you soon.

The message failed to send.

No signal.

The man beside me suddenly inhaled sharply, like he’d been underwater too long. He turned to me, eyes wide now, alive with terror.

“I remember,” he whispered. “I wasn’t supposed to forget yet.”

Before I could respond, the lights went out.

The train slowed, screeching as it pulled into another station—identical to the first, but emptier. The doors opened.

Something was waiting outside.

It stood just beyond the platform lights, tall and thin, its body blurred like heat rising from asphalt. Its face was a smear of features, constantly rearranging, as if struggling to decide who it was meant to be.

The man beside me screamed.

The thing reached in and touched his forehead with a finger too long, too jointed. His scream cut off instantly. His eyes went blank again. Calm.

He stood and walked off the train.

The doors closed.

I stared at the empty seat, heart hammering.

“What was that?” I asked.

The woman from the platform finally spoke. “That’s the forgetting.”

The train moved again.

She turned to face me fully now. Her face was wrong—not monstrous, just incomplete, like someone had erased details over time. “You don’t belong here yet,” she said.

“What do you mean yet?”

“You still have people who remember you.”

My phone buzzed again.

No notifications.

No signal.

Just a blank screen.

The train lights flickered, and memories began to slip—not all at once, but gently. My mother’s voice softened in my mind, losing clarity. My childhood home blurred, rooms rearranging themselves incorrectly.

Panic clawed at my chest.

“I want to get off.”

“You can’t,” she said. “Not once you’ve boarded.”

The train slowed again.

Another station.

This one was crowded.

The platform was packed with people pounding on the train doors, screaming silently, their faces contorted in terror. Their mouths moved, but no sound reached us. I recognized one of them.

My sister.

She slammed her hands against the glass, eyes wild. Her mouth formed my name.

I screamed back, pounding on the window.

The doors didn’t open.

The train lurched forward, leaving her behind.

I sobbed until my throat burned.

When I looked up, the passengers were watching me now.

Really watching.

“You’re almost ready,” the woman said softly.

The lights went out again.

When they came back on, the train was empty.

Just me.

And the thing.

It sat across from me now, folded into the seat like a broken marionette. Its face shifted constantly—my sister’s eyes, my father’s mouth, my own reflection staring back in horror.

“You exist because you are remembered,” it said, its voice layered with dozens of others. “When memory fades, so do you.”

“What happens when no one remembers?” I whispered.

The train slowed.

“Then you belong to us.”

The final station appeared ahead.

The doors opened.

The platform was blank—no lights, no signs, no people. Just darkness and a soft, welcoming pull.

My phone buzzed one last time.

Unknown Contact.

Who are you?

I typed with shaking hands.

Please remember me.

The message failed.

The thing stood and extended its hand.

Behind me, the train doors began to close.

I stepped onto the platform.

As the train pulled away, my name slipped from my mind.

And somewhere far away, a family felt a strange emptiness—like they’d forgotten something important, something they could never quite recall.

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