I wrote a similar story...

I wrote a story that's only somewhat similar to this, and it's pretty good. It has a few differences, but I think it's worth reading. I call it "Train 13" Let me know what you think.

April 15, 2006. 7:25 PM. Union Station, Dallas, Texas. Two Western Rail P42 Genesis diesel locomotives sat idling on Track 5. The locomotives were white with a huge orange W on each side. The number was located underneath the cab window on either side of the engine in two-foot-tall lettering. The lead engine was W-13 and the helper was W-151, which had a long passenger train behind it. The cars looked like Amtrak’s well-known Superliners, but these were all white with WESTERN RAIL on either side between the upper and lower levels. There was a number on both side ends of the cars, about the same height. Outside the station, in the parking lot, a silver Nissan Murano pulled in, the back full of luggage. The driver was 32-year-old Dave Moreland, who was taking his fifteen-year-old son Kyle and his eight-year-old brother Jeff on a trip to Los Angeles for a week. “Come on, guys. Grab your suitcases and backpacks. Our train leaves in half an hour.”, said Dave. They all got out and grabbed their bags. He locked the SUV after they had gotten their bags and everyone was out of the car. They went inside the big brick building, bought their tickets, and had their bags checked in about twenty minutes. They grabbed their bags and were on their way to the waiting train. When they reached the platform, people were already boarding. They walked a little ways until they found their car, sleeper number 219. The Morelands got on the train and had gotten comfortable in their compartment. Kyle was sitting in a seat by the big window, and was listening to his black iPod Nano. Jeff was in the top bunk, beginning to watch his favorite movie, Balto: Wolf Quest. Tom was on the bottom bunk reading a Dean Koontz novel. The horn was honked as the train slowly pulled out of the station. An hour later, at 8:55, as the train was speeding along, they decided to take a look around. They had dinner in the dining car on the way back to their compartment. By the time they all got back, it was nearly eleven o’clock, so they got ready for bed, hopped in their bunks, and were asleep five minutes later.

In the cab of the lead engine, engineer Mike Holtz was at the controls, along with the fireman, Gus Canton. The desert and tracks ahead were illuminated by the train’s headlights as it sped through the night. Suddenly, a small baseball-sized meteor crashed through the left windshield and landed on the floor of the cab, steaming as it sat. Mike said “What the hell?” as he and Gus stared at it. Just then, the meteor split open, and a pile of dark red goo spilled onto the floor. In a flash of red light, the goo turned into a six-foot-tall creature that closely resembled the Aliens from the movie AvP: Alien vs. Predator. It used its tail and slashed their heads off, splashing blood onto the windshield, cab walls and floor, even the controls. No one heard their screams. The creature yanked the side door off its hinges, and made its way over W-13 and W-151 to the following baggage car, number 437, knocking bags off the shelves as it went. Two cars later, it was in the dining car, number 095, where it eliminated the chefs and most of the diners. The remaining five made it into the next passenger car, sleeper number 225.

In sleeper number 158, immediately behind 225, actor Kent Davidson, who was tall, forty, clean-shaven, with black hair, a Family Guy T-shirt, blue Levis, and white-and-blue Nike tennis shoes, was alone in his compartment, reading an article about his rise to stardom in an issue of People magazine. His agent, Don Harvey, was one of the unlucky ones back in the dining car, so he wasn’t ever coming back. Kent was wondering why his agent wasn’t back from dinner yet. “Man,” he said as he dog-eared the page and closed the magazine, stood up, and set it on his seat, “What is taking him so long? He should be back already.” Kent checked his watch, which said it was 11:43 PM. As he stepped into the corridor and closed the door behind him, two people, a man and a woman, came running toward him from the end of the car, with an expression of pure terror on their faces, obviously running away from something. They went into his compartment and hid as Kent made his way to the dining car to check on Don. When he reached the dining car and opened the door, what he saw both frightened and appalled him. Bodies and blood were everywhere, even the white tablecloths on the tables. “Dear God, what happened?!” he almost shouted. Kent almost tripped on Don’s bloody, motionless body. His face was barely recognizable, as if it had been eaten by something. A left arm had been ripped off, his chest cavity sliced open. A big bloody hole was in the middle; the creature had eaten a few of Don’s organs, and intestines were trailed on the floor, which was now a dark shade of red. Plates were still on a few of the tables. Drinks had been spilled, dying some of the tablecloths light brown. All of the bodies were near the exit, which meant that they were trying to escape when they were killed. Kent went back to his compartment.
On the way, he noticed several compartments with the door broken down and the interior covered with blood, and barely recognizable bodies lay on their floors. When Kent reached his compartment, his door was open, and the body of a woman lay not far away. The man was still in Kent’s compartment, a look of terror on his face. “What the hell is happening here?”, asked Kent. As Kent slowly walked toward the man, the man’s face relaxed slightly. He said “I dunno, man! Did you see that thing?!” “I didn’t see anything but blood and dead bodies in the dining car. Did you come from there when you and the woman were running down the corridor?”, said Kent. The man replied, “Yeah, I did. Damn, that thing was freakin’ creepy! It looked like those things from Alien.” “Who are you?”, Kent asked. “I’m Jim Brighton. I’m an auto salesman in Los Angeles. Sell Fords all day. You?” Kent replied, “Kent Davidson. I’m an actor.” “Wow, man! You for real? ‘Cause I’m a big fan of your movies!” said Jim. “Uh, thanks.” replied Kent. A hissing and an abruptly-cut-short scream brought them back to their senses. It came from the end of the train car, near the front. Jim freaked out. Kent asked “What the hell was that?” Jim replied “It’s that thing, man! Let’s get outta here!”. Jim and Kent left the compartment and headed toward the end of the car. Another person, a woman, ran up behind them, and ran ahead, so they sped up to catch up to her. The group moved into the next sleeper car, number 219, in which Dave Moreland and his kids were sleeping. As they ran down the upper-level corridor, Kent asked the woman, “What was that hissing back there?”. She replied, “I don’t know, but it’s weird and pissed off, whatever it is.” They went into an unoccupied compartment, locked it, and hid. Kent found out that the woman’s name was Judy Dunn, and was a Western Rail employee, more specifically, a stewardess. “Now that we all know each other, let’s get out of here and find stuff we could use as weapons. We should also warn the remaining passengers.”, said Kent. Both Jim and Judy agreed. Kent opened the door, and looked both ways down the corridor. Nothing came from either end. They all filed out and warned the passengers that remained in this car and all the others. Not many people believed them, but others did when they saw the terror on Jim and Judy’s faces. Terror like that couldn’t easily be faked. Kent and Jim ran into the dining car to get knives, skewers, and other assorted sharp objects from the kitchen. Judy rounded up more people and gathered crutches and other things that could be used as weapons. Unaware of the fact that there was an alien loose on the train, the Morelands went back to sleep.

In the next compartment, 14-year-old Lucy Saltmarsh was sleeping. She was traveling by herself because she had won a recent contest, of which the grand prize was $1 million and a free train trip to anywhere in the United States. She was woken up by a commotion in the Morelands’ compartment. There were screams of terror, screams of pain, and a loud hissing noise. The screams stopped all of a sudden. Then there was scratching at her door. She was freaking out, so she grabbed her Sony radio, and inserted an Avril Lavigne CD. She turned the volume almost all the way up, pressed play, and flipped through the songs until she found “Girlfriend”. As the music blasted out of the speakers, she barely heard whatever was outside her compartment hiss in pain and run off. She opened the door and checked on the Morelands. There was blood all over the place. She felt dry heaves coming on and thought she would lose her dinner, but she didn’t. The bathroom door was closed. She wondered if anyone had made it. As if reacting to her thoughts, there was a sound of movement from within. “Who’s in there?” asked Lucy. A voice from inside replied “K-K-Kyle. Kyle Moreland. Something killed my dad and little brother. I-I-Is it gone?” She replied, “Yeah, I think so.” The door opened, and there stood a handsome 15-year-old boy with a red-and-white My Chemical Romance T-shirt, who had a look of terror on his face, which relaxed when he laid his eyes on her. He came out and grabbed his backpack, which contained his black iPod Nano, a Walkman, a CD case, and assorted books and magazines. Lucy ran out to her compartment, turned off the radio, took the CD out and put it in her CD case, and put it in her backpack, which had a light blue iPod Nano, a Walkman, and assorted books and magazines. She zipped it shut, stood up, grabbed Kyle by the hand, and led him into the long corridor, where they raided the supply closet. They grabbed a couple of wooden brooms and broke the heads off, so they looked like primitive spears. They also grabbed bottles of ammonia, Pine-Sol, and assorted bleaches and cleaning agents. They searched the compartments, except theirs, for an extra backpack or grocery bag. Kyle found a brown JanSport hiking backpack in one of the rooms, so they put the cleaners in there, and Kyle decided to carry it. He slung it over his shoulder, next to his other backpack. It was uncomfortable at first, but he got used to it within five minutes. The creature came around the corner of the far end of the corridor, near the front of the car. Before the creature saw them, Kyle and Lucy had already moved to the next car, lounge car number 502. They ran into a 15-year-old girl named Jenna. She had a Christina Auguilera T-shirt, black shorts, and gray-and-white Converse slip-ons. She had brown hair and brown eyes. Jenna looked scared when she saw the spears. “What’re those for?” she asked. Kyle replied “There’s a killer alien loose on the train, and it already got my dad and little brother. You have family on this train?” Jenna said “Yeah. My parents went to the dining car for dinner, but I haven’t seen them since.” Her parents were among those killed in the dining car, which meant that Kyle and Jenna were parentless, and had no other family member to go to, so they teamed up. Jenna grabbed some nearby crutches, which lay near the unrecognizable body of a 42-year-old man. There were a couple of washcloths nearby, so Kyle grabbed them, and Lucy went to find more behind the bar. Kyle took a bottle of Pine-Sol from the JanSport backpack, opened it, and set it down on the floor in front of the door. Jenna grabbed bottles of beer from behind the bar while Kyle put a washcloth in the mouth of the Pine-Sol. He looked around the car, and found a lighter near the man’s body. There was a hissing just outside the door Kyle was in front of, so he grabbed the bottle, being careful not to spill any on himself or the floor. Lucy, Kyle, and Jenna moved back a few feet, so Kyle could have some throwing room. The door was suddenly yanked off the hinges, so Kyle lit the washcloth and threw the bottle at the creature. It flared up almost immediately, and the creature hissed in pain and backed off, but didn’t run away. Pretty soon, the car began to smell strongly of lemons. Kyle went to the bar and grabbed a bottle of Jack Daniels, and threw it at the fire. The fire increased in size almost immediately as the bottle shattered on the floor. The creature ran off this time, and the group followed it. It went back to the far end of sleeper number 219. There, they assaulted the creature with more detergent, Pine-Sol, beer, and ammonia. They watched as the creature writhed in pain and agony. Jenna started hitting it with the crutches, then stabbed it continuously until its head was barely recognizable. Then Kyle and Lucy stabbed it with the broken broomsticks, and stopped when the broomsticks were broken and splintering.
Satisfied, they moved toward the front of the train, told Kent’s group that the creature had been killed, then told Judy Dunn’s group. Everyone moved toward the lounge car, to see if they were telling the truth. When everyone saw the flaming mass on the floor, they were relieved. Kyle ran back his his compartment, grabbed his brother’s portable DVD player, the Balto II: Wolf Quest DVD case with the DVD in it, and his brother’s backpack, which had Balto and Balto III: Wings of Change. He ran back to the group. Lucy ran back, grabbed her radio, and ran back; she still had her backpack with her CDs and other stuff. They moved to the last car, observation number 295. Kent uncoupled the car from the rest of the train. Kent, Jim, Judy, Lucy, Kyle, Jenna, and the other men and women were glad to see the creature dead. The farther away they were from it, the better. A couple minutes later, the car was almost at a complete stop. When it was fully stopped, everyone got out and walked away from the car. Kyle and Jenna walked around to the front of the car and watched the train speed into the distance. The lounge car was completely on fire, the light fading along with the train. They held hands as the light disappeared from their view, then made out. Then they stopped and stared into each other’s eyes and smiled. There was an explosion in the distance. It was the train. The creature was now wiped out of existence. “Now that that thing’s gone, we can be together,” said Kyle. Jenna replied “Yeah.” Then they made out some more. Then they walked into the distance together, hand-in-hand, with the other survivors.



Balto & Jenna 4ever