The Beast on the Tracks

by Amy Cross

  “There could have been people like that at the party,” I tell him, “or in the cemetery, watching you while you're working at the gas station. If you think like that, you're never going to have any fun.” I pause. “Of course, there are some strange stories about the forest. The cemetery doesn't have full claim on the weirdness around here. For one thing, the railroad that -”

  Before I can finish, his cellphone starts ringing. He has some generic ringtone that I've heard a million times before, and after a moment I see him reach down toward his pocket.

  “Are you seriously gonna answer that right now?” I ask.

  “It might be something important.”

  “So might this,” I reply. “I don't invite random guys out into the forest every night, Richard. Don't you think that means something? I like you, you seem cool, and I want to have an adventure with you. Now, I promise, I've been out into this forest hundreds of times, including on nights like this. I know the forest like the back of my hand, and I wouldn't be inviting you out with me if I thought there was even a sliver of a chance that something bad might happen.”

  His phone's still ringing.

  “Don't you want to live a little?” I continue. “You're new to town. Don't you want to explore?”

  “I guess,” he replies, but I can hear the caution in his voice.

  A moment later, his phone falls silent.

  “Now come on,” I add, gripping his hand tighter and leading him between two large, dark trees that loom high on either side of us. “This is actually a shortcut to Eden Hills, by the way. It means we avoid having to go all around that long, winding road that goes past the trailer park. Doesn't that sound like a good idea?”

  His phone beeps, which I guess means that someone just left him a voicemail message.

  “This forest goes on for miles and miles,” I explain, holding one hand out to make sure that I don't walk face-first into a tree. That's how dark it is out here tonight. “It's protected or something, so no-one can knock it down to make houses. I don't know the ins and outs of it all, but it's like sacred land or something like that.”

  “Sacred land?”

  “I don't mean Indian burial grounds,” I continue. “It's just... I don't actually know, to be perfectly honest with you. All I do know is that people tend to stay away from the place. They might dare to go to the edges, but most people wouldn't even risk coming as deep in as we are already.”

  “Really?”

  “Which doesn't mean that we're making a mistake,” I point out. “Instead, it means that we're almost guaranteed to be left well alone. There's no -”

  Suddenly my right shoulder bumps hard against a tree, and I let out a little 'oof' sound as I come to a halt. Richard stops right next to me, and his shoulder nudges against mine.

  “My phone has a flashlight,” he says. “I'll -”

  “Where's the fun in that?” I ask.

  “A flashlight? It'd just be useful so we don't walk into anything.”

  “Are you addicted to your phone, Richard?”

  “No, but -”

  “Then leave it in your goddamn pocket,” I continue, still trying to get him to join in with the spirit of this adventure. “When was the last time you were out in the wilds of nature?”

  “I don't know. A while.”

  “So embrace it.”

  “But -”

  “Have you seen the stars?”

  “Huh?”

  Smiling, I reach out and touch his chin, and then I gently tilt his head up. I look up too, and I'm amazed as soon as I see the beautiful, bright stars shining beyond the treetops above us.

  “We almost never see the stars here in Sobolton,” I tell him. “There's way too much light pollution. Somehow it's different tonight, though. I read something online about some kind of weird atmospheric thing happening this weekend, or meteorological, or something. Is that the same thing? Anyway, they said one side-effect might be that the stars would be more visible for a while. I didn't pay that much attention, but they really weren't kidding, were they? Don't you think the sky looks absolutely stunning tonight?”

  “Uh, I guess,” he replies.

  “You guess?” I turn to him, and for the first time I start to wonder whether he's a little crazy in the head. “Don't you see it? Don't you feel it in your heart?”

  “They're really beautiful,” he says, although now I'm suspicious that maybe he's just saying what he thinks I want to hear. “I've never seen them so... twinkly... before.”

  “Yeah,” I say, staring at his head even though the darkness is hiding his features, “you're right, they are twinkly. I never thought of it like that before.”

  I watch him for a moment, before turning and starting to once again fumble my way through the forest.

  “Stay close,” I call back to him. “We don't want you getting lose out here, do we?”

  “Do people get lost in this forest?” he asks.

  “Probably. It's pretty big, and there's not much cellphone coverage once you get in deep. Why? Does that worry you?”

  “No, of course not,” he replies, but I can hear him falling back a little. He must be at least five paces behind, and that's pretty much perfect. In fact, as I make my way between more trees, I'm starting to think that it's time for me to make my big move.

  I hold my tongue, preferring to listen to the sound of my own footsteps, and now I'm entering the phase where I start trying to find the right moment. Richard was super easy to lure out here, and he still seems super gullible, so I'm pretty relaxed about the whole thing. That's not always the case, of course. There are times when I'm a bag of bones, but tonight the stars seem to have aligned for me. Not that I want to get over-confident, of course, but I keep walking for a few more paces and then – once I'm sure that the right moment has arrived – I take a step to the side and stop dead.

  I listen to the sound of Richard's footsteps coming closer, and then he stops too, just a short distance from me.

  For a moment, I hear only silence.

  “Uh, Milly?” he calls out finally. “Hey, where are you?”

  I'm about ten feet from him. I can just about see his silhouette now, since he's standing close to a patch of moonlight, but I'm pretty certain that he won't be able to see me at all.

  “Milly?”

  He doesn't sound too worried just yet.

  “Hey, Milly!” he yells. “It's me! It's Richard!”

  I can't help rolling my eyes.

  “Hey!” he continues, turning and looking around but still not spotting me in the darkness. “Is this some kind of joke? Come on, I don't like jokes. Can you just call out so I know which way to go next?”

  He waits, and then he reaches into his pockets. After a moment, I see a light in his hands as he unlocks his cellphone. He won't have any luck, though. There's no carrier that gets coverage this far into the forest, and sure enough after a moment I hear him muttering some curses under his breath. He holds his phone up, searching for signal, but even that won't work.

  I hear him sighing.

  “Milly!” he shouts louder than before. “I've fallen behind!”

  He takes a few steps to one side, and now he's closer to me. I briefly worry that he might be able to see me, but I still think the darkness should keep me hidden. Richard seems like the kind of guy who'll panic fairly easily and, as I reach into my pocket and carefully take out the spray can, I watch him turning and looking all around.

  “Milly!” he yells, and I can hear the fear in his voice now. “Milly, come on, this isn't funny! Where are you? I'm going back if you don't say something!”

  Back?

  I'd like to see that.

  He'd end up walking around in circles and eventually he'd collapse. I have to admit, there's a part of me that would quite like to observe that happening, but I'm afraid I really don't have time. Maybe I can do that to the next guy.

  “Great,” he says, before letting out another sigh. “Thanks a lot. I guess I've been dumped out
here in the forest. How nice.”

  He turns to walk away, but at that moment I step toward him. He stops and looks toward me as I raise the spray can.

  “Milly?” Richard asks cautiously. “Is that -”

  Before he can get another word out, I spray his face. He mumbles something and steps back, and then he reaches up and puts his hands on his face as he turns and head over to a patch of moonlight.

  One.

  Two.

  Three.

  “What was that?” he gasps.

  Four.

  Five.

  Six.

  “It stinks! I feel...”

  Seven.

  Eight.

  Nine.

  “I feel kind of...”

  Ten.

  He drops hard, slumping down against the forest floor and then falling still. Ten seconds was impressive and speaks to a strong metabolism. Most of them succumb within five or six seconds, but good old Richard actually managed to put up something of a fight. As I head over and take my cellphone from my pocket, I must admit that I'm somewhat surprised by his resilience. I buy the cans online and mix them with a few homegrown ingredients, in order to create the perfect knock-out gas. I activate the flashlight and aim it down at Richard's face, and I smile as I see that he's completely unconscious.

  “Oh, Richard,” I say with a smile. “Did you mother never warn you about following strange women into the forest?"

  Chapter Six

  Milly

  Five years ago...

  “Isn't this a goddamn thing of beauty?” Dad asks as we stand in the clearing, staring at the – admittedly very large and rather impressive – wood chipper. “Now this is a proper piece of machinery.”

  “Isn't it kinda big for what you need it for?” I reply, glancing at him.

  “It's a multi-purpose tool,” he replies.

  “Yeah, but there's not that much junk on the ground,” I point out. “Why do you need something that looks like it could chew up a whole tree?”

  “You do not understand,” he says as he heads over to the panel on the side of the chipper and starts peering at the various buttons. “Why get different machines for different sizes of job, when you can just have one machine that does them all? You kids these days are so fiddly with everything, it's like you don't want to understand.”

  I watch as he examines the control panel, and after a moment I realize that he's muttering away to himself.

  “Do you even know how to operate this thing?” I ask.

  “Of course I do. Don't be so rude and arrogant.”

  Me? Arrogant? Okay, maybe sometimes, but I can't help rolling my eyes. If I'm arrogant on occasion, then there's only one place I get it from.

  And then, before I can think of anything else to say, Dad presses a big red button and the innards of the chipper begin to stir. There's a deep rumbling sound, followed by a protracted metallic rattle, and then something starts grinding on the other side of the machine. At the same time, a long conveyor belt starts up, and smoke rises from a pipe high up on the machine's rear section. The noise is pretty overwhelming, and I have to resist the urge to put my fingers in my ears. After all, it wouldn't help much, and Dad would laugh at me.

  “And that's a machine,” he says, taking a step back and putting his hands on his hips. “It's machines that make the world go round, Milly.”

  “It's literally not,” I reply, although I immediately realize that he won't have heard me. That chipper is so loud, I can barely even hear myself think.

  The machine cuts out, coming to a spluttering halt.

  “Is that supposed to happen?” I ask.

  Mumbling something under his breath, Dad steps back over to the panel. He peers at the buttons, clearly trying to work out what's wrong, but a moment later the machine starts up again.

  “Just a short somewhere in the circuit,” Dad says, turning to me. “See? It's fine now.”

  “A short somewhere in the circuit?” I ask, raising a skeptical eyebrow. “What does that even mean? You don't know, do you? It's nonsense.”

  “I know plenty.”

  “Then explain it to me.”

  “No!”

  “Because you can't?”

  He stares at me, and for a moment I worry that I've gone too far. Sometimes, when I push Dad like this, he gets real mad and his moustache somehow starts twitching. I've never quite understood how that works, except that getting angry seems to make his upper lip start vibrating somehow. When I was younger, making him mad was kind of a sport, but these days it's generally not worth the hassle.

  “Sorry,” I continue, raising my voice so I can be heard over the din of the machine, which seems to have a mind of its own when it comes to working and not working. “You were in the middle of telling me what we're supposed to be doing out here.”

  “You see all the chunks of wood around here?” he replies firmly. “We're gonna put all those into the machine and it's gonna spit them out the other end, into the container. That's called chipping. It's not the hardest job I ever do, in fact it's one of the easiest, but it'll be tough for someone like you who doesn't have any muscles.”

  “I've got muscles,” I reply.

  “Well, we'll see about that. For now, any wood you find on the forest floor, you put it on that belt and let the machine take care of it. Is that clear?”

  “Oh, I'm not sure,” I say, with barely-disguised sarcasm, “could you maybe run it past me one more time? It does sound kinda complicated.”

  He stares at me for a moment longer, before mumbling something and turning to stomp around the machine. To be honest, I don't quite understand what point he's trying to make today. I get that he wants me to drop my dreams of becoming a teacher, but I don't see how messing around with a wood chipper is going to achieve that, unless he thinks that I'll magically develop an overwhelming passion for manual labor. Which, I have to say, is pretty unlikely.

  I watch as he starts picking up fallen branches and placing them on the conveyor belt. Figuring that I should probably help out, I make my way around the side of the machine, just as the belt delivers the first of the logs into the huge, grinding wheels of the chipper. I wince slightly at the sound of wood getting ground to dust, and then I'm momentarily mesmerized by the sheer, immense power of the machine. Dad puts another chunk of wood on the belt, and I watch as it's relentlessly driven to its doom. Even a head-sized chunk is quickly ground down.

  “Are you just gonna stand there?” Dad asks, and he already sounds a little out of breath.

  “No, of course not,” I reply, turning and heading over to start helping.

  I grab a particularly large piece of wood and haul it over to the belt, and then I watch as it's conveyed to the wheels. I can't honestly believe that a chunk that big could get ground down, but it slips effortlessly into the machine and there's only the faintest extra whirring from deep inside the motor. And then the wood is gone.

  As I wipe my brow, I honestly believe that this machine is like a black hole. It could destroy anything. It's a god.

  Chapter Seven

  Milly

  Today...

  “Come on, you goddamn son of a -”

  My hands slip and I let go of Richard's feet. I fall back and land hard on my butt, and I let out a pained gasp. I'm by no means the strongest woman in the world, but I'm not a weakling either. I've dragged people through this forest before plenty of times, and I've never really had a problem, but something's different tonight.

  I think it's the air.

  Looking up at the night sky, I can't help but marvel at the stars. At the same time, I'm starting to think that something pretty freaky is going on with the atmosphere. The air feels thinner somehow, and when I hold my hands out in front of my face I swear there's a kind of emptiness, a void that seems to have spread out between me down here on the ground and the stars up there in the vast and endless sky.

  This isn't the first time something like this has happened, either.

 
; As I get to my feet and brush myself down, I can't help thinking back to the three or four other times that Sobolton has had strange nights. The basic set-up is always the same, with the stars being more visible and the air seeming thinner and the universe just seeming that much closer. Sometimes I think that, for all its squalor and poverty, Sobolton is actually quite special. I mean, do all towns have these weird nights, or are we just 'lucky'?

  I reach down and grab Richard's ankles, and I resume pulling him through the forest. After just a few more seconds, however, my feet bump against something solid and I turn to see that I've reached the railroad. I don't know how many towns in the world have a railroad that runs straight through the heart of a forest, but I guess that's maybe another way that Sobolton's special. The line isn't used these days, although sometimes I swear there's the sound of something rumbling through the forest.

  I look both ways along the line, but of course there's nothing to see except the tracks heading off in each direction.

  “Sorry about this,” I tell Richard as I redouble my grip on his ankles, and then I start dragging him roughly and awkwardly across the rails. His head bumps against the first rail, and I feel a little bad about that, but I figure I don't really have time to stop and get all delicate.

  And then I stop as I hear a distinct banging sound, as if something hit one of the rails a little further along. At the same time, I feel a vibration under my right foot, which is resting on the second rail.

  I turn and look to my left, which is where the sound seemed to come from. I know there shouldn't really be any trains out here, but I figure it's better to be safe than sorry. There's no sign of a train, which would be pretty obvious from a distance along this very straight stretch of line, but it's a little dark for me to be able to see too far. I wander through this forest at night a lot, and I've never just bumped into another living soul, but something sure as hell just bumped the rail and I'd really rather know if there's a wolf or some other animal – or even another human – out here with me.

  I wait, but all I hear is the distant howl of some creature or another. I'm not good with animal noises. A wolf, maybe? A racoon? Some kind of bird?