Judgment Night Express
Four coaches, Four Seasons, For Eternity
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I.
Leon Morel’s consciousness returned to him slowly like someone passing smelling salts under his nose. Only what he smelled and tasted was not sweet or floral; instead, it was the pungent stench of copper. He tried to open his eyes, but they were held shut by something he could not determine. Any attempt to move his arms to free his eyes was met with stiff resistance that affirmed he was bound and gagged.
As Leon struggled against his restraints, the velvet seat cushion he was laying upon felt coarse to the touch; he assumed it was a couch of some sort. His senses could pick up on the faint traces of coal burning, and his body almost flew off the couch when the room around him strongly lurched forward.
The movement of the room startled him. At first, it was extremely slow, but then it picked up some pace. He could hear the faint chug of a train engine followed by the metallic scrape of the wheels against the tracks. The click-clack of the wheels grew louder as the train departed its station.
But how did he get on a train? And why was he bound like a prisoner?
“Free him,” came the booming sound of a deep voice.
At that point, Leon was unaware of anyone else in the room. But at the command of the voice, the shuffling of feet descended upon him. Small hands worked quickly to free the wrist and feet restraints and then set to work on what bound the eyes. Leon could feel the sting of stitches being wrenched free from the skin around his eye sockets; he wanted to scream, but his mouth gag had yet to be removed. Instead, tears welled and crashed from the weighed-down lids. A slight sense of relief washed over him when weights finally were lifted from his eyes.
Leon blinked rapidly, trying desperately to focus. He wasn’t accustomed to being kidnapped and thrown on some ancient train that still ran by coal or steam or whatever the hell they used back then. As his vision focused, he could make out three children, two girls, and one boy. Their skin was chalky white, their hair bleached to match, but their eyes startled Leon. The children stared at him with coal-black eyes that were void of any emotion.
“Don’t forget his gag, my sweets,” the voice beckoned the children back to action.
Leon Morel took that as a queue to scan the room to find the voice’s owner; only after he saw it, he wished he had never looked. Sitting in a high-backed wing chair was the figure of a man who, if standing, would easily have topped seven feet. His frame was thin but trim, and he wore a long overcoat and grasped a silver cane with one gaunt and bony hand. The man’s face was blackened, but he wore a mask made from skeleton bones across his cheeks, eyes, and forehead. Red-ringed eyes glowed from under the mask, and a set of perfectly white teeth sneered a half-smile at him. Adorning the man’s head was a black velvet top hat, ringed with a band of tiny skulls that looked all too real.
Being free of the gag and restraints, Leon could roll up into a sitting position. His vision had returned to full strength, and he saw one of the children bring three copper coins to their master. From a distance, the coins looked unusual, like some sort of antique large copper penny. Leon assumed that the third coin was bound in the mouth gag, which is why he could taste the copper when consciousness first aroused him. The children’s master took the coins with his free hand and shook them around in a semi-closed fist.
Summoning up some courage, Leon could stammer out his first question, “Where am I?”
The skeleton-looking man’s grin widened. “My son, you are riding the Judgement Night Express. You are on the black locomotive.”
The man stated the facts ever so easily, and though it didn’t register anything in Leon’s mind, he was scared to death. He ransacked his memory for any knowledge of this train but came up short. He had never heard of it, never bought a ticket, and certainly had zero clues as to why he was there.
“But what am I doing here,” Leon questioned. “And who are you?”
The man with the skeleton mask closed his eyes and shook his head from side to side. “Many have heard of me, yet many do not recognize me when we meet. You’ve heard the stories since you were young. Your grandmama told you bout me. The scripture lessons you slept through taught you about me. And yet, Leon Morel, you pretend not to know me. Tsk, tsk.”
Leon started to respond, but the man cut him off.
“I’ve kept watch on all the children of the world, and I keep score in my book,” the man in the chair continued as he patted a hefty tome on the table next to the chair. “And when your day has come, when judgment time has drawn back its curtain, you see me.”
“I’m sorry, but I don’t understand what any of this has to do with me,” Leon fired back.
“They seldom do, Leon Morel.”
“And that’s another thing, how do you know my name,” Leon insisted.
A look of disappointment crept onto the man’s face. “You haven’t been listening, Leon; I know all the children of the world’s names. They are written right here in this book,” he stated again as he resumed tapping the book’s cover. “I know your name fits you well. You have the heart of a lion and yet are consumed by darkness. You gave in to your basest desires time and time again, which is why I suspect you sit before me. Someone wanted you here as you weren’t due to visit my train for many more years to come.”
Leon made to get up, part in protest and part in the need to seek escape.
“Take a seat, Mr. Morel. We still have a business to discuss.” The man with the skeletal face motioned with his cane for Leon to resume sitting. “Since you asked who I am, I will tell you. I have gone by many names, but you may know me more as Saint Peter or Papa Legba. You see my presence in guarding the gates to the afterlife transcend religion, for I am eternal.”
Leon could hardly believe what he was hearing. ‘This has to be a dream,’ he tried to convince himself.
“Now listen to me, son. You have a choice to make. You can choose to accept your fate and be doomed to hell, as it is written in my book, or can you earn a shot at heaven. Choose.”
The two men locked eyes. Leon wanted to call the man’s bluff, but there was something in the redness of those eyes that cautioned him otherwise.
“No, no, no! This is insane. I don’t want to go to hell! No, I mean I’m not going to hell. Let me off this train!”
The sinister grin splashed on Papa Legba’s face once more. “No, I don’t think I will. Either we go by express, or you get a chance at redemption. But just so you know, the moment I let you walk through that door behind me, you will face four challenges marking the seasons of your life. As you pass each challenge, this train will speed up. It will rush to your original fate. Beware, you will need faith, fortitude, resilience, and strength of character to survive. You will have one hour to complete the challenges to change that fate. Fail and to hell with your soul.”
Papa Legba let out a haunting bellow of a laugh.
“Be gone with you,” Papa Legba commanded as he thrashed his cane upon the wooden floor. On the third strike, the door behind him flew open, and Leon Morel proceeded through the door.
II.
The train's speed picked up as Leon crossed the door’s threshold. The first coach he entered smelled of a sweet springtime evening, and the entrance to a springtime fair’s hall of mirrors was laid out before him. He had faced a similar experience in his youth; only then his fear of never making it out caused him to demolish glass walls as an alternative way out.
Knowing that he had limited time, he urged his feet forward and entered the building.
Inside, the air was heavy and smelled dank. Mirrors surrounded him on all sides, and each one was made up like a door. Wishing he had luck, he tried the first few handles unsuccessfully. He knew that it wouldn’t be that easy. His feet shuffled slowly along the first couple of corridors, and with each step, the mirrors became more disorienting. The building was laid out like a maze, and he was confident that all he had to do was find his way through it. Leon’s mind even thought it was some sort of life lesson – life is full of twists and turns, one never knows where it will lead, but one must try each path until the right one is found.
Leon froze when he saw the creature before him. It was the body of a large man, like a bodybuilder, with the head of a goat. The beast stood at the end of the corridor and seethed back at him. Leon shut his eyes hard, wiped his brow, and prayed as he re-opened them. It was no use; the beast was still there blocking his path, looking like Satan himself was waiting to take him away to hell.
The muscles in Leon’s body tensed. He scanned the corridor looking for a way out. Taking a few steps, he tried the mirrored doors to either side of him, but none opened. He could feel his heart quicken as he scoured the corridor for any sign of a way out. He shook the handles of nearby doors violently, hoping for a miracle, but the only saving grace was the beast did not move – it just waited, scraping its thick nails gratingly against the glass.
Re-examining the hallway, Leon saw a break in the door patterns. So far, all doors had the knobs to the right-hand side, but one, just one, was on the left. Unfortunately, that one door was right next to the satanic beast.
With time ticking, Leon inched closer to the door, hugging the right-hand side of the corridor. He anticipated the beast to drop the statue routine and charge for him, but it remained steadfast. As he got within four feet of the intended door, the beast's head moved to track Leon’s footsteps, its hands reaching and meeting his skin. The beast had maneuvered to block Leon’s path.
The satanic-looking creature eerily began to grab Leon’s arm. It was trying to pull him in close, looking to devour him. The creature’s belly grew translucent like some hellscape void was opening. Leon screamed and threw himself to the ground to avoid being collected. He dodged and rolled away from the beast. As he stopped, he could see the tip of a handle on the floor where the beast had once stood. Wasting little time, Leon reached for the handle and pulled but met hefty resistance.
The beast had pivoted to stand, lurching over Leon’s prone body. It let out a loud snort and growl, and Leon could feel the presence of it getting closer. He worked diligently with both hands on the handle. The thing would not budge. He cursed at it and clawed with every ounce of strength he could muster. A fingernail tore itself free, and blood poured out and coated the floor.
Still, Leon could not make the handle budge.
The creature knelt beside Leon and placed a hand on his back, holding him down, and preventing him from moving. Leon resigned himself to his fate; he had not even made it past the first coach. He muttered an earnest prayer for the first time in a long while.
The beast straddled and brought its torso to meet Leon’s. The smell of rotting flesh enveloped its prey. Slimy tentacles reached out and encircled Leon’s body. The beast’s belly opened wide and slowly devoured Leon.
III.
The wind rushed through Leon’s hair as the train's speed picked up. Coming back to his senses, Leon realized he was not dead, quite the opposite. He was alive and lying on the platform between two coaches. All that was visible were dark stormy clouds rushing by, and he could feel the spray of a warm mist pelting his skin. He was elated that he was still alive but questioned how that was possible. As he regained his feet, he chanced a look back at the coach’s door and noticed an inscription:
With faith, new life springs forth even in the darkest of nights.
The train accelerated hard, almost toppling him over as if to prod him forward. He turned around and grasped the handle to the next coach, and as he opened the door, an immense heat belted him across the face.
A lightning bolt from a summer storm had ignited a brush fire that turned into a raging forest fire. Flames licked up from the chasm below and tickled the small plants adorning sides of the path that spread out before Leon. To his dismay, a long suspension bridge that ran over what could easily be a bottomless pit was blocking his way forward—more than the fire, Leon dreaded heights.
Even more than that, Leon dreaded the memory of the last time he faced a suspension bridge. He was a teen, just clowning around with some friends, jumping up and down on the treads to scare the girls they were with. The tread gave way, and Leon fell through it up to his chest. At the time, he had felt like he would fall to certain death but was saved by a friend’s helping hand. The girl he was with laughed at him and called him a sissy. Leon remembered spitting in her face and storming off. It would be the last time he walked a bridge, but it was only the start of his rocky relationship with the girl.
A fight or flight instinct kicked in, with Leon choosing the latter option. He spun around a hundred and eight degrees to face the door he had just walked through. In his mind, he would have rather gone back to the springtime coach and faced that goat head monstrosity again than have to walk the bridge. He was well prepared to grasp the door handle, throw it open, and return to the walkway between the coaches, but when he completed his turn, the door had disappeared as well as the wall to the coach.
“Shit,” he exclaimed. “Get me the hell out of here!” He hoped this was some sick joke that the man claiming to be Papa Legba had concocted.
Realizing that the man with the skeletal mask was not coming, Leon steeled his nerves and turned to face the bridge. The fire raged in the chasm below the bridge; the thick smoke choked him as he drew closer to the edge. Leon could not see the abyss floor due to the solid ceiling of smoke that was only pierced by flickering flames.
“No, no, no,” he spoke aloud as he paced in circles at the entrance to the bridge. “Can’t do it, just can’t. No, I won’t do it.” He tried to convince his body with the stubborn thoughts of futility. “If I go out there, I’ll die. If I stay here, what’s the worst that can happen? Skeleton man comes and gets me? This is all some sort of prank anyway.”
But it wasn’t a prank, and Leon knew it.
Furthermore, the time within the allotted hour was still moving. Leon flashed back on the warning that if he didn’t complete all the challenges within the hour, he was on the bullet train to hell. It certainly seemed that he was already riding that rail. He remembered the rush of the wind between the train cars and the black nothingness of the clouds whisking by.
He had to move his feet.
The sound of the crackling flames provided a backing track to the creaking of the bridge as it swayed from side to side. The treads were all wood, that much Leon could tell, and the handrails were made of rope. With a fire roiling below and the flames kissing the top of the chasm, how much longer would this bridge hold out?
Leon tried to determine the distance, a quarter mile maybe. It was hard to tell in the smoky haze. With intense trepidation, he could lift a foot onto the first bridge tread; it seemed to buckle slightly from his weight, and the bridge's sway intensified.
“Oh Jesus,” Leon stammered as he summoned the fortitude to press on. Step by precious step, he made his way across the bridge. His mind convinced itself that everything would be okay until a few treads behind him gave way due to the fire.
His fists clamped down on the rope guides with knuckle-white intensity. The pace of his heart quickened to near maximum velocity. If Leon hadn’t already been sweating due to the intense heat of the fire, he would have been soaked from the anxiety he felt. Breathing hard through an open mouth, he willed himself forward. His feet subconsciously picked up the pace, trying to cover the quarter-mile distance as fast as possible.
More snaps behind him, coming faster and closer. Tread after tread fell into the firepit below. The rope guide was beginning to feel warm to the touch.
The bridge was on fire.
Quickening his pace, Leon neared an all-out sprint for the other side. Looming just ahead and a mere twenty feet from the end, three bridge treads snapped and fell. Leon came to a screeching halt right before he fell in as well. His mind was nearing hyperventilation mode.
How far was the jump? Three feet? Four feet? He didn’t know.
Could he make it? Well, there was only one way to find out.
More treads snapped behind him, and the rope began to lose tautness. There was no more time to think. Taking a few steps back, as far as he could go, Leon turned and sprinted to leap over the missing treads. The bridge heaved and swayed horribly. There was a good chance that he would miss the other side, or worse, make the landing, but due to the sway slide right off and into the fiery abyss.
His feet flailed about mid-jump, but he could make the landing on the other side with luck. His forward momentum flew him face down onto a burning tread. The heat snapped him back to reality, and Leon was able to complete his mad dash to the other side.
Hitting the ground on the other side of the bridge felt like a million pounds had been lifted from his shoulders. As he took a moment to catch his breath, bent over, hands on knees, Leon spotted what looked like a handle in a camouflaged wall. Ripping the door open, he stepped out on the platform between coaches again.
This time, as he looked back to the door he had just exited, he saw the inscription read:
The longest days of the solstice bring many hardships. It is the fortitude of man’s spirit that overcomes them all.
IV.
Leon could tell the train had sped up again. The intensity of the wind made it hard to cross between coaches. Preparing his mind, he wondered what torture would lay on the other side of the door.
How much more time did he have in the hour?
Wasting not a second more, he thrust open the door and stepped into the world of a junkie. The rundown trailer smelled of autumn. Used needles and empty packages of heroin were strewn all about. Leon recognized the room all too well; it was the apartment he shared with the girl from the bridge when they first were married.
It had seemed like a good idea at the time. They were both high on drugs and life and thought getting married seemed like a logical next step. Oh, the thoughts of the wasted. They spent their honeymoon in a drug-infused bliss. They would continue in that manner for about a year, that was until she overdosed and barely came back. She was able to get her life back on track, but Leon kept at it. His public habit became his private hell, and as much as he tried to hide it from his wife, she knew. She always knew.
She pressed him repeatedly to quit and enrolled him in rehab programs, but it wasn’t until he got violent with her that she threatened to leave. These memories flooded Leon’s mind and made him cringe at the afterthoughts of his actions. The woman he married was a saint; he was the problem.
Stepping into the room, he was waiting for something to pop out and grab him, to force him to use. Leon could feel the blood in his veins jonesing for a fix. That’s when he saw it.
A pre-prepared needle was waiting on a broken and beaten table next to the torn armchair. Leon knew this was the test for the room. He could hear the voices in his head scream to take it. One more hit in his life wasn’t going to kill him. Just do it; it would make him feel better. Then maybe he could think.
An internal war raged in Leon’s mind. He thought back to his meeting with Papa Legba. What had he told him? He needed four things to survive. What were those things?
Leon searched his memory. The first two were faith and fortitude. At that moment, it dawned on Leon that those attributes were the keys to success in the previous coaches. Perhaps he had figured out the game after all?
But what was the third?
“Fortitude and what,” he repeated over and over.
Resilience is what came to mind. He hoped it was correct. Resilience is the ability to overcome adversity. But what did that mean in this room? Was he supposed to walk away from the drug or take it? So many questions.
He willed himself to walk past the table and to the door beyond. As his hand gripped the knob, he paused. He remembered something. Resilience was the ability to recover quickly from difficulty. Papa Legba was not toying with him; he didn’t want him just to walk away.
Leon returned to the table, tied off a vein, and took the shot.
He sank into oblivion.
V.
The fall of man is a downward spiral with little upside
Leon Morel stared at the words carved into the coach door. He was prone on the platform, unable to move. His body was still reeling from the injection, but he took a moment to convince himself he had done the right thing.
On the platform behind Leon stood the three chalky white children with blacked-out eyes. They moved in unison to drag Leon’s body into the fourth and final coach; he barely put up a fight.
The final coach looked like no memory Leon had ever had prior. The decorations looked Victorian but sparse, and a stone fireplace stood sentinel on the far wall; snow flurried from the coach's sky. The fire roaring in the hearth was the only heat source in the otherwise frigid room. Leon was beginning to regain mobility and noticed an older woman sitting in a chair next to three doors. She wore all black and had a veil covering her face, but Leon could tell she was at least thirty years his senior.
“What do I do here,” he questioned her. Leon knew he had to move things along, for the time was surely running out, and he had come so far.
The woman motioned the black-eyed children to the doors; they split up girl, boy, girl so that each entry was covered. Once the children were in their places, the woman simply said one word – “Choose.”
Leon had heard this before from Papa Legba at the start of this adventure. The simple directives infuriated him. He wanted more answers, more direction than that.
“Oh no, I need to know what’s behind those doors. The Papa man said four coaches, four challenges, and I’d be free for heaven. So tell me, woman, which door is it! I don’t have all the time in the world.”
The woman chuckled slightly. “But I do. It is not for me to tell you; it is for you to know which way is the right way forward. Listen to your soul. It will tell you.”
Completely frustrated, Leon kicked at the floor and pounded his fist into his leg. He let out a guttural growl that put his dissatisfaction on full display. He ran up to the three children and implored them to tell him which path to follow. He tormented his mind with the possibilities, completely tuning out any gut instinct.
“There’s one boy; that has to be it. The boy’s door is the way to heaven.”
But then he would second guess himself. He wondered if it was the right hand of God thing and maybe the door to the right was the furthest. No, that couldn’t be right either – it was too easy.
The more he guessed, the more flummoxed he became. He turned back to the woman in the chair and beseeched her for her help; he just wasn’t strong enough to make it on his own.
The woman took Leon’s hand in hers. Despite her age, the skin was soft to the touch, and the caress felt warm. Leon was near tears, and the inviting hand of the woman felt motherly and comforting.
“I’m so sorry, my dear. But time’s up.”
Leon’s face turned to meet the woman’s gaze from behind the veil. A look of horror was etched in stone across his face. He had completely lost track of the time variable in all his ranting.
The Judgement Night Express accelerated for the final time, hitting a speed that was not reasonable for a locomotive. A voice called out from behind the doors.
“Next stop hell, all aboard for hell, one-way ticket.”
Leon knew the voice; it was the voice of Papa Legba.
The man with the skeletal mask sauntered into the room from the left-hand door. Leon scrambled to his feet and ran up to him. He begged for more time, just five more minutes, and he would have it all figured out.
“No, no, my son. You see, you were never meant to figure this out. I knew you never would pass the strength of character test. Never in your life did you listen to your gut when it told you what not to do. Why would this time be any different?”
The sinister sneer sprouted on Papa Legba’s face again.
“Next stop hell, all aboard for hell, one-way ticket,” he stated again in a sing-song voice as he walked away from Leon.
The Judgement Night Express ripped through the sky and across the River Styx. Papa Legba tossed the three coins out the window to the ferryman to pay the toll as they passed.
The inscription on the door that Leon never got to see read:
Winter is always the season of discontent.
VI.
In some cultures, there is the legend of the black locomotive. It is said that on certain nights and in certain conditions, one can see it racing across the sky right around midnight. It seems quiet and still to those on the ground, but the train moves fast and to destinations pre-determined by the conductor’s book.
The woman thrust the shovel into the mound of dirt that stood next to the grave she had dug for her husband. She had to take every precaution to do this right. She had made sure of the three copper coins, the needle and thread to bind the eyes, and most importantly, the prayer and candle to open the communication with Papa Legba. That night would be the last time her husband, Leon Morel, ever shot up and knocked her around.
“It is now time for us to conclude our business, Papa Legba. Please close this channel, and may you have mercy on Leon’s soul.”
About the Creator
Jeff Newman
I am reading and writing enthusiast with a wide variety of interests ranging from history to horror and anything in between. I am a guitarist, self published author, movie buff, travel enthusiast, and cat dad to 13 awesome fur babies.
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Excellent storytelling
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Comments (2)
I’m a little biased because of our friendship, but I managed to put this aside and immerse myself into Jeff’s story. I like liked the absence of preachiness, which, considering the nature of the tale, must have been nearly as difficult to resist as Leon’s syringe. Being a hopeful person I was surprised that the end was indeed just that. Trains have been used in stories and in movies and TV to evoke nostalgia, mystery, fear and horror. Using each coach as a gate he must pass through to get out of his dire predicament is a novel twist. Reminiscent of Snowpiercer, this train’s purpose was to render a judgment that was already determined; the first paragraph contained the judgment. I wasn’t astute enough to comprehend it. Great work, Mr. Newman!
This is a very interesting take on the challenge, I really enjoyed it! Thank you for sharing! 🥰