Varnished seating

Wheezing, she finally got on the train. Body contorting so as to land unto a seat as quickly as possible, her body slumps on a seat as soon as it lands on it. Soon every other seat and every aisle became filled up to the maximum carrying capacity, many people squeezing the air away from the train. As it becomes more filled, she releases her last wheeze before the train's whistle roars to life. The train's whistle roars once more as the train chugs away from the station. Turning her head to look outside the window, she sees the bright flashes of the police vehicles lighting up the entrance to the train station. Yet it's too late, she and her train whisk away to the darkness of the city outskirts and beyond.

Cocking her head back towards the overfilled aisle, she truly breathes for the first time tonight. With nothing but her clothes on her back, a knife for self-defense, her pockets fistfuls full of cash and her pretty face, she could only laugh remorsefully that her luck bought her enough time to book it to this train. Crooked fiends those in the uniform her follies told her; nothing but armed and legalized arms of those that drove her to such petty crimes. But a folly is a folly she told herself while her sleepy thoughts began blurring the world and dulling her shocked senses. Yet with every bump the train suffered, it would re-awaken her from her slumber. But to her eyes, it seems like the crowd could care less about her as long as she stayed put. For that, her mouth slowly crept to a smile as she quietly giggled back to sleep when the train stopped bumping about.

Blurring out the world again like she had before reaching this mobile heaven, she silently spoke to herself:

"Oh! What horrible person undertook the trouble to lead an armed patrol of thugs to arrest me? I already was on the edge with this city's policing arm, but why would they suspect me of stealing a bike now? Or was it a false pretense to finally force me to confess about the real crimes I committed? Whatever . . . it was already dangerous to live that long in a city full of thugs afraid of petty thugs like me. What I just don't understand is how could they be so slippery in apprehending me, so much so that I escaped their grasp so easily? No, I don't want to believe they were premeditating murder now; they're scum, but they must have standards . . . right? I have to be right, this is just batshit insane if they wanted to end me then and there . . . I don't know with that city anymore, I'm glad I'm getting away from it all. Still, it shivers me they desperately tried taking pot-shots at me."

Mulling on the details, the train bumped again and this time she really woke up from her ruminations. The crowd still remained the same as before, still the same drab colours and shifting bodies. Some had fallen asleep, but she sensed some others were dead tired as she was and yet couldn't sleep one bit. Slumping into a more comfortable position, she willed herself to attempt sleeping once more; thinking the train will continue riding for a few more hours until it arrived in the next city over. Drifting back to her rumination, she brought some more follies to mind:

"Why does my bosom even hurt? I couldn't have been shot, I was sprinting like a cougar down those dark alleyways and mean streets. I would've at least felt something hit me, or whatever. Maybe I ran like I never ran before, my lungs do burn a bit and my throat thirsts for water. Yet, who the hell was going to give me that? I will just have to wait it out, gonna hurt like Hell when this train finally arrives. Well, I can mull over how I'm gonna nurture my poor corpse when I arrive. Now, I just need some damn rest."

Closing her eyes, the train quietly chugged along so as to not perturb her. And yet her eyelids bolted open when her ears heard the light fixture above blew out, her eyes detested this sudden change of events. But pushing through the drowsiness, her vision soon revealed the crowd had diminished significantly and she slept serenely on a train still chugging along. Despite worrying why no one inspected her nor called her to leave, she shook her head a bit and tried sleeping again. However, all she could muster was ruminating once more but not sleep; accepting her body's mixed messages, she allowed herself to ruminate all to herself:

"While my throat hurts like Hell, that's more tolerable than my body desiring sleep while being unable to do so. My mind can't even sense any danger lurking around me, perhaps I'm too disturbed by the lack of an audience that could shield and warn me in the event those city-hired thugs raided this train. Perhaps, perhaps, yet no tangible lead, less a clue as to how I slept so long without realizing how I didn't hear a million feet marching off this train. What makes less sense is why on Earth doesn't this train have its overhead lights on, even with the gracious dawn illuminating the world behind me? Yet what do I know, I don't operate trains for a living? I feel . . . cold? This train was rather warm a sleep ago, does this train not store heat correctly? What kind of train-model is this, sheesh! Well, whatever. I will stomach this ride and make sure to get a cup of water somewhere, shouldn't be to hard to find a store when this train stops."

Scanning the entire train cart she was in, many faces were either too dark to see or facing away. Feeling a bit queasy, she checked her entire row and felt a smidgen of relief to see people were as exhausted as her. Perhaps, she thought, the train conductor turns off the light to avoid tingling people's sleepy eyes – that was her thought until she cocked her head to check the other carts and found their lights also off. Wagging her head to awaken herself more, she breathed just a bit more heavily as she began troubling herself with what could be going on. However, she turned herself around to look outside. Her eyes peering through the window, her mouth dropping when she saw the sun looming through the horizon. Seeing all the sun touched, she spotted many gorges and rivers teemed with diverse amounts of wildlife and various plants strewn across the land. Tears sliding down her face, her eyes welled up seeing the world outside the city. Wondering to herself how she has been deprived of this sight for so long, how she deprived even herself of just taking in the view of the non-industrialized, non-mechanical world around her – to see what gifted so much to her city but paid not even lip service to nature.

Then shaking herself as the cold gusts breezed her back, her shoulders hunched when a finger poked at her spine. Twirling around, she spotted a figure in a suit beholding an apple cautiously close to her face. Tilting her head left and right to see the face behind the apple, somehow the figure moved the apple to cover their own face despite feeling like they didn't move themself one bit. Bugged out by the persisting insistence of the figure handing her an apple, her arm first tried snatching it; to no avail, as if she swatted air. Calming herself down, she cautiously reached out; however, her hand never seemed to reach their own hand perfectly beholding the apple. Sitting herself back down, the figure's fingers scraped the apple and flung the scraps towards her open mouth. Choking a bit, she gulped the scraps down and looked back at the slightly scraped apple.

Her mouth decided to take command, pulling itself forth and yanking the body with it. Soon crunching on the apple, her body sat her back down so as to enjoy the luscious apple-bits coursing through her mouth. Fully closing her eyes to enjoy the apple some more, some tears dripped downwards as she munched on. The first bit of any food in days, and one that she could enjoy her time with. Gulping it down when finished, she looked at the figure holding the apple to find the apple no more present. However, her body tensed up as her eyes saw nothing but darkness plaguing the figure's head. Bringing the same hand that held the apple towards their face, their fingers snapped and light bathed the entire cart.

After seconds of blinding light, her eyes were no longer burned with the image of pure light. Rubbing her eyes frantically, her eyes quickly searched for the figure and found them still sitting on the seat like they themself did some seconds ago. Then her eyebrows dropping and her eyelids forcefully closed, her eyes began once more to well up as she murmured to herself that it was all one hasty dream or a sleep-deprived delusion. Then the figure wheezed a bit, croaking out:

"My good sister who has suffered herself a great monetary-debt to acquire the looks that your body refused to transform itself into originally, pray look upon me. Yes, yes. Bandaged I am from head-to-toe, yet I wear a funny outfit like this suit. But giggle not, nor weep at all. Pray stare at me further, for I need to see your face to know your real feelings of what I am to say . . . I will say this once, though imperfect I am as a messenger, and you must hear me say this one line: you are to temporally expire soon."

Eyes welling up in fear, her hands grasped her hair as she began yanking on it:

"Was my life all for nought! What curse have I accrued or been ill-fated to inherit from my past? Oh, you bandaged figure, please I beg for you to spell out the evils I have caused that warrants this untimely death! Was it my revolt against a corpse that reflected not my soul perfectly, was it that I am a mere pawn in a cruel act, was it that I have committed so many petty crimes I have yet to repent for, or was it that I have miscalculated my escape that leads your being haunting my being?"

Within a blink's notice, the figure impossibly was next to her and she fell her head upon their treated shoulders as she weeped. Soon feeling all her corporeal stresses vanishing from her, she weeped even more that her body is but no more. Sighing, they the figure replied after giving themself some time to release much of her sealed-up sorrows:

"Your death was an accident, a pure contingency of a stray bullet that struck thy bosom. For all the crimes – petty they all were – that you have committed and inflicted upon those broken like you to those who could throw money away their problems, they can and have been forgiven by the One who determines me because you have done them all under duress. And no, my dear sister born originally in a mimic-body of the First Man, you are neither a pawn nor in a cruel act, but are rather stuck in an awkward situation caused by those who have perverted justice. And on the note of your body and soul, may you keep in mind – especially when you step off this train – the words of your patron St. Thomas of Aquin that gender is an inseparable accident and what matters more is the devotion we lay upon for the One. Life . . . oh what a mercifully miserable and justly jeering entity it is, much like most of our everyday struggles when we look back at them when we have achieved greatness at the extreme cost of suffering! . . . Yet you might ask, and ask auspiciously, why am I here if I claim that all of our ends is simply greatness as long as we suffer for it? It's because of my bandages wrapped all around me that serves as a constant reminder that there are those here in life before death still suffering all these temporal inflictions in the many ways that happen to all of us. Thus, I serve as a purgatorial servant to help those with unresolved sins to cast off their bondage to these deadly and unmercifully heavy chains; equally, to serve as a reminder post-mortem of currently existing suffering in life."

Though the figure's monologue had her lost a bit, she apprehended the general points they themself were gesturing at. She wanted to ask more, but her throat felt rather squeezed for air; instead, she cocked her head to look outside once more and gaze at the nature around her. The figure coughed and spoke further:

"Worry not, the train shall shortly cease. We'll exit soon enough, you'll finally feel what you see of the One's determinateness. However, when we do stop, do promise yourself one thing. May you for the first time live, especially because you have died back on that train and are no longer beholden to human laws?"

Slightly confused in how to respond exactly, yet she heard the train's whistle tooting. So inhaling and then exhaling, she made her attempted response:

"I understand what you mean by living, but are you saying that all my life before my death had been an error? So to say that while my body did shamble, that there were better ways for me myself to have done things?"

The train's wheel squealing while ceasing, the figure responded:

"You've done what you could've done under duress. What I am saying is that you no longer are under duress, you're free to act as how one wants to without being hindered by privation itself. To go from vulgar freedom to real freedom; to go from acting for the sake of acting because you haven't fully understood the necessities of life, and to go into acting in the recognition of and acceptance of higher things. For upon the recognition of necessity can that necessity be grappled with, there we can have freedom by understanding all things as they are and still struggle with them to raise ourselves to a higher status. In the words of the foolish who are blessed with insight against the wisdom of mere humanity: it is to will yourself to will for what's right because you know what sustains you and your activities. In more human words: it is to know what sustains you and your limitations so as to overcome your very self unto towards greater heights. So I ask again: will you will yourself to live because you have died so as to achieve what you really demand?"

With the last words of the figure, the train finally halted and soon the train was bathed in sunlight that temporarily blinded and dulled her senses. While her mind screamed yes, she wondered if the figure could hear her thoughts. As soon as the train was no longer inundated in light, her eyes were able to see with more clarity and her body was moving without any sort of pain. Taking it as a sign, she boarded off the train and her foot landed on gravel. The station, albeit luminous, around the train was filled with many a foliage and natural decor – not a sight of machinery in sight except for the train behind her. All resembling the earthly objects like benches, pillars and light-posts; she trodden carefully along the beautified earth until she left the station. Seeing outside the figure kneeling before a tree which contorted itself naturally into a cross-shape, she felt at first weirded out. She – however – looked all around her, seeing all the naturally forming shapes that would look weird on Earth; with her sensuous insight, she kneeled next to the figure yet knew not what to say.

Then an inkling of an idea bubbled up to her mind, and she mentally prayed. And prayed she had to find herself on the peak of a mountain overlooking the entire landscape; without feeling much but a gentle breeze had she found herself where she had prayed to be at. Willingly falling unto her knees once again, she casted out one more prayer for all to hear as her tears blurred her sight again:

"Amen, amen! Redeemed I am though I haven't worked towards such redemption in my busied and dirtied life! Redeemed I am to work towards achieving true liberation thanks to the second chance you gave me to achieve such, to fight for a life that's worth living! Redeemed I am now to also understand the gracious forms as they flux to and fro Earth, guiding us as they sustain our wills! Redeemed I am to understand what I could never had understood down there on Earth, to finally be free from all privations that deprived me of me. Amen, amen, I say to it all!"

Remaining in her kneeling position and practicing to better observe all things, she for the first time could stand put without being in peril. To be freely at rest, she serenely contemplated as she reveled at the sight of everything beautiful that struck her eye. And without worry for Time's threats nor a worry to self-feed, she carried out her demand. Peace had she received, and everlasting pleasure she earned from her continual contemplation that flowingly freed her from her spiritual burden.