Chapter 4

I looked at the stack of papers over and over again, fighting the need to sleep as the light of the train faded. Someone had managed to install electricity on the train, so this was more like a dorm then camping in a car, for me. The bottom article told me answers to questions, but raised even more as the light . It was a weird bit from some Buddhist magazine from the 70's:

"Reincarnation, possibly one of the oldest ideas of Buddhism, has spread to places beyond our religion. Disappearing students at Miami University have created a legend.Our subscribers inform us that these abducted alumni are those selected for reincarnation."

I stopped there and ran down to the dining car to show Andre. "Is this why I'm here?" I demanded. He said nothing, but the others near him left, as if it was time to Andre to tell me someone had died-well, I had, but that was beside the point. He put a hand on my shoulder and walked me back to my train car.
He paused, then sat down and spoke. "You know George Bush? the old US president?"
I raised an eyebrow and nodded.
"Our fault. We took this guy, some failing student here about 70 years back. We thought he was okay, turns out, he wasn't. Proved it once he got turned-the war, the ugly wife, the political choice.... "
"Turned? I asked.
"Killed. Reincarnated. Whatever. Basically, we wanted your hot girlfriend to be an actual success...but our calculations were incorrect, and you were the one to cross the tracks and get picked up by us."
I lowered my brow. He was serious.
"but you're keeping me here anyway?"
"Uh....pretty much."He shrugged. "But we've never been able to get anyone back. Even if we wanted to."
"Do you?"
He shrugged again, but I had never seen him so indecisive. I always thought leaders like himself always knew what they were doing. I guess I was wrong. He stood up as someone else entered. "Sir, we're about a mile from the grounds."He stammered. Andre grinned. "Fantastic." He turned to me. "We're getting you off in about an hour. Be at the front of the car." He commanded. I nodded, at this point it was a bad idea to disagree, mostly because of the foreshadowing that I was going to be important. After all, they wouldn't keep me here just to keep me here....would they?

I ran to the caboose, and grasped the rail on the edge.The people didn't seem to notice there was a train with several "dead"passengers.

Chapter 3*UPDATED-LOOK*

Over the next few days, I realized that I would never regain the ability to see color. I didn't especially care, as outside of assorted elementary schools, there was nothing worth seeing with color. The group on the train called themselves Ghosts, although it was unlikely that they actually were ghosts. But seeing I had survived getting abducted by a train, anything was likely.Andre kept telling me I was picked up on accident. They had meant to pick up Lillian with the sharp, metal implement they picked me up by, which was the cause of the long gash along my shoulder. Strangely enough, it healed in a few days. Conversation was few in number, but when it occurred it was very confusing. So here I am, on a train that isn't really a train, for a reason that completely deifies all faith in god. Fun.
"Um...Josh?" Andre waved a hand in front of my zoned- out face like some impatient 10 year old.
I looked up. He was carrying a large stack of newspaper. "You might wanna see this. It should explain some things." He set them down on the wood floor. On the top page, heavy ball-point pen boxed around article about reincarnation:

"The lush quad and neat lecture halls may be misguiding, but if you look at the corners of Miami University, you'll see it's no normal school. Students have been disappearing periodically for several years. Alumni Julia Wilde says its likely because of a local legend. "The train tracks over here are supposed to be closed, but I've heard rumors of an old-fashioned train going by that doesn't go into any station." She says, 'they' being older students, "But maybe its just a way to creep out the freshman."
It could be a prank, but this odd local legend is becoming an odd local crisis. Classes are getting smaller and smaller, and worried parents are pulling their college kids out of the University for safety. The staff of the school are-"
It cut off, then in small type read, "continued on page 3b". I shuffled through the papers for page 3b, with no luck, and looked up again to question Andre. He had gone to another part of the train.

Chapter 2

I looked up at him. His name was Andre, as I had later found out, and he was the leader of the group he had welcomed me into. His words still echoed in my head, and they were being called out from the depths of my mind by an enormous mass of questions. "Welcome to the group?" I repeated his greeting in question form. He looked at me with a raised eyebrow. "Yes, that's what I said. This is a group, and not a mob of assassins around me, right?" He joked. I nodded, laughing a little as I got up from the bed. I stretched and looked around. The room looked a lot like a train car, similar to the one that had nearly run me over. Speaking of which... "uhhhh....How did I get here again?" I questioned, demolishing one of the questions that attacked Andre's first words to me. "We snagged you from the tracks over at the campus here.” Andre said coolly as the people crowded around me went away. “We almost ran you-uh….are you still there, Josh?”I ignored him and studied the room again. On the ceiling was a square of blue sky, similar to that on an old fashioned train. A room that looked like a train? Really, Josh? You obviously knew what you saw, didn’t you?I thought. A room that resembled a traincar was an understatement. This was the train that had run me over. I looked at Andre again. “Yeah, I’m fine, sorry.” I stammered. “Geez, you’re all jumpy.” A girl next to Andre laughed. I took the Coke she shoved in my direction and tried to piece it all together.

Chapter one

In my head was nothing. I was blank. I didn't any color as I arose, though last I checked I wasn't color blind..perhaps it was an aftershock of nearly getting hit by a train. I was on a bed of soft something, although my back stung as if I had been snagged by a piece of metal. I reached at my shoulder and found a small cut. Last I remembered, I was joking around with my best friend Lillian after graduation. I remember taking my shoes off and walking along the tracks with her. Although I recalled having bare feet and a graduation gown over a AC/DC shirt and jeans, I was clad in a white t-shirt reading "security" and torn shorts...which happened to be in my backpack I brought along with me to the tracks. I laid down again, wondering if I was where I remembered last, and looked just ahead of where I was. In front of me was a group of people about my age, perhaps a year older. One was looking at my drivers license. Instinctively, my callused hands snatched it away. He looked at me in disgust, and his fists clenched. A man held him back by the arm and smiled at me. "Welcome to the team, Josh Harrison."

Prologue

Dammit, it happened again. I was getting so very hopeful that he could have anything close to immortality, and yet, whoever decides when we die, had to do it to me. honestly don't think whoever this person is really cares about my welfare, nor anyone else's on this stupid planet. If that were a lie , we would all be more overpopulated then we already are, and Josh's remains wouldn't be lying in a box near the train tracks that may or may not lead him to a world after this one. He thought it would give him acess to such a world, although I was screaming at him, in tears, that he had no proof that he could go to any kind of afterlife. That being said, I had no idea of what his whereabouts might have been, other than the box I buried him in. So yes, I do mean 'Dammit'.

As I'd mentioned, it happened before. I had expected myself to burst into tears, and learn some valuable lesson on losing someone close to you. My mother insisted that I did by bawling so hard she had cried all of her mascara off. Her words still replayed themselves over and over in my head. "Lillian, your granpoppy's gone. Are you sad, Lill? Honey, come cry with me please." I had an attempt at acting, and I made myself cry with her. I remember that it was the death of my grandfather. But I hadn't genuinely cried until the second time I witnessed death.

He was sitting on the tracks, his head back in laughter and his gown soiling by the second. I had just called him Joshiffany- a mix between his ex-girlfriends name and his own- it seemed funny at the time. We were there after graduation, because all the others in our class we thought were idiots. He was sure that no train had crossed in year, but he was wrong.

He crossed the tracks onto the grass. The red, faded cars sped past me. I told myself he was on the other side, unharmed. The last traincar went by. He wasn't there. I cursed at the train, throwing my shoes at it, no tears streaming down my face, but I was sobbing inside. All I had left of him was his hat and diploma. I was too selfish to bury his picture with those items.

I ran into his parents on the walk home from the party, and they asked me what happened to Josh. I lied and told them that he had gone home to his apartment. They believed me, and I went home myself.So at last, I lay here, on the bed, afterward, thank god (or whoever makes us die), crying.