Last Train To Hope

Screams echoed through the carriage. Most passengers suffered stoically. A few exchanged silent judgments. A desperate mother was trying to soothe the crying baby. She stood up from her seat with the infant in her arms. Walking along the aisle, she shook and hushed the child. George looked discreetly at the woman. She avoided eye contact with other passengers. Small drops of sweat shone on her forehead.

“She misses the chugging”, George’s companion said. “Chugging soothes them. She started crying when we got held up here.” George followed Boris’s gaze out the train window. Under the light of the stars and the clear moon, the outline of a mountainous landscape was discernible. The train was held at a small village station. “Gara Babul”, read a sign hung on the shed representing a station building. The structure was just about visible ahead. Their window looked over the platform. Past the station facilities, the terrain sloped down. Iskar river meandered below, glistening in the silver moonlight.

“This doesn’t look right”, George said. “Why are we being held here?” He looked over his shoulder repeatedly, suspiciously studying the other passengers. They were in second class. The carriage was furnished with simple wooden benches. Dirty overhead lamps cast dull light over the unadorned space.

“Trains get held up for all sorts of reasons, George”, said Boris, offering a smile. “I’m sure we will be on the move shortly.”

“Your majesty…”, started George but his companion’s sudden stern look stopped him. “Ah… Boris”, he continued, whispering. “I’m not sure it’s a good idea to travel incognito right now. The world is at war. You are the king of Bulgaria.”

“I know who I am, George”, said Boris, leaning forward to face his assistant. His head was bald. He wore a moustache on his clean- shaven face. “And I need this now more than ever. The country is pinched between the East and that Austrian lunatic. German soldiers are stationed across the country, but I refused to send ours to die in Russia. And the Jews… We didn’t let them get taken. How do you think the Nazis feel about that?”

George’s expression got increasingly weary as his king spoke. He looked around the carriage again. The mother paced along the aisle, clearly in despair with her inconsolable baby. Two men in suits across the carriage leaned over an open window, cigarettes smoke surrounding them. George could not hear their conversation, but assumed it revolved around the holdup.

“Boris, exactly stopping that train with our Jews from leaving west… That put a target on your back”, George said. “I don’t understand how travelling without guards is what you need!”

“Look, if they’ve decided to kill me, they will. No matter how many guards I have. Like this, I can hide in plain sight. I need to be seeing the faces of people and observe them. This helps me make better decisions.” Boris spoke calmly. Dressed in his plain clothes, he looked like a provincial clerk, returning home from the capital Sofia.

George scanned the carriage, mentally assessing the thread level from all passengers. Across the aisle, a large man slept with his head leaned on the window, seemingly undisturbed .

“George, why don’t you walk up to the engine room and check? Will that put your mind at ease?” Boris asked.

“And leave you alone?”

“Is this a problem?” The king gave his assistant an exaggerated authoritative look.

George was embarrassed for having overstepped boundaries before his sovereign. He apologised profusely and got up from the crude bench.

To reach the engine room, one had to go through the first class carriage. In the open air vestibule, he realised how stale and sour the air in the carriage had been. He leaned over the railing, looking for any movement on the platform or further ahead at the station shed. There was none.

George walked into the corridor of the first class carriage. To his left were compartments, furnished with soft seats. Reading lamps at the window sills provided dim lighting in the luxurious rooms. There were few passengers around. As he approached the end of the first class carriage, George’s heart rate sped up.

The engine room was hot and dark. Soot covered the floor. The boiler hissed. Next to the door, a pile of coal awaited its turn for the firebox. The train driver, a small man in dark blue overalls, had his back turned to the door. He was leaning through the side window. “Ivan!” The man yelled into the outside space. “Ivan!”

“Excuse me”, George interrupted. The man jumped, startled.

“Who are you?” The train driver demanded. His face was pale. A white moustache decorated his wrinkled it.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t want to scare you”, George said as he stepped onto the dirty floor of the engine room. “I just wanted to check why we are being held here?”

“We are being held because there is an obstacle”, the driver said. “I sent the fireman to check, but he hasn’t returned. And there’s no one at the station. No idea what’s going on.” George followed the man’s gaze.

Some thirty meters in front of the train, a pile of materials was dumped on the tracks. It looked like a jumble of railroad ties and barbed wire, rising some two meters in height. A knot of unease tightened in George’s stomach.

“You have to push through”, he said.

“What? No! Forget it”, the driver protested. “Railroad staff must be on their way.”

“Listen, mister! Does this look normal to you? A pile of rubbish on the tracks. In the middle of the night. No one at the station!”

“No”, the man said. “I’m not moving. And not without Ivan.”

George hesitated. He couldn’t make the stubborn old man move willingly. He padded his jacket, feeling his Walther semiautomatic pistol tucked in its shoulder holster. A fleeting thought passed through his mind, but he decided against it.

“I’ll go and find him”, George said. “And then we’re moving. Understood?” The old man shrugged his shoulders, then nodded in a gesture of reluctant acceptance.

“Prepare the engine. I’ll be back.”

George climbed down the side door ladder and stepped on the damp ground at the side of the track. He felt pinched between the towering mountains on his left and the steel locomotive on his right. He breathed in the cool, misty air and stepped forward.

“Ivan”, George called. “Ivan! My name is George. Are you there?” He kept making small steps forward. As he surpassed the front of the engine, he could see the dump in front of him and the train station to his right. Feeling exposed, George unholstered his pistol. He kept moving forward, weapon pointed away in his right hand.

“Ivan”, George kept calling. He approached the pile, taking a moment to study its content. It looked haphazardly dumped on the tracks. George couldn’t think of any innocuous explanation as to why it could be there. He felt an icy streak of sweat running down his forehead. Resisting his urge to run back to the safety of the train, he moved around the pile.

On the opposite side of the dump, he found Ivan. He looked no older than twenty. Tall and lanky, with black curly hair and a thin moustache. Ivan was sat on the gravel with his back leaning against the pile. His throat was slashed and blood had poured all over his front, soaking his dirty fireman overalls. Ivan’s dead blue eyes stared into the darkness, his head slightly turned towards the Iskar river and its gorge visible beyond the tracks in the distance.

George’s heart sank at the sight of the dead body. He staggered backwards, his feet crunching loudly in the gravel. He looked around and darted towards the train station. Almost colliding with the raised platform, he rose his foot over the ledge and pulled himself up.

“Start the engine”, he yelled. His cry came out too quiet between his gasps. George ran towards the engine. The train station shed was on his left. He made a split decision and ran towards the small enclosed part of the structure, dedicated as a staff room for the station’s signal operator. 

“Help! Anyone there?” George barged into the small space. The operator was sprawled over a his desk, face down. There was a hole on the back of his head. The desk was covered in blood and bits from his skull and brain.

“Oh, God”, George gasped. He turned around and sprinted towards the locomotive. The train driver had popped his head out the window.

“Get the train moving”, George cried. “Get moving now!” He sprinted across the platform, towards the train. The driver disappeared inside the engine room. George was a step away from the locomotive, when loud automatic gunfire pierced through the night. He instinctively dropped to the ground. His heart pounded. He raised his head and looked towards the far end of the platform. Two pairs of headlights were headed towards him from the village road. The vehicles broke through the fence separating the platform from the street.

George strained his eyes. He was looking at two military issue Volkswagen Kübelwagen. The vehicles were equipped with MG 42 machine guns. George could see the silhouettes of the men in the vehicles. More fire followed, projectiles hitting the solid steel of the locomotive over George’s head. He heard a loud metallic clank, accompanied by a powerful hum and hissing. The black steel juggernaut started to move. George stood up. Pain shot through his right leg. He staggered sideways, grabbing the ladder of the locomotive for support. He ran his hand over his leg. A bullet had crazed it, leaving a deep cut in the flesh. George quenched his teeth and stepped on the ladder as the train accelerated.

The Kübelwagen jeeps approached, leveling with the first class carriage. The vehicles stopped. Armed soldiers got off. A staccato of machine gun fire was released on the carriage, shattering windows and making holes in the panels. Two soldiers ran towards George with raised weapons. Hanging off the ladder, he turned and opened fire at them with his Walther. The two men dropped on the ground, giving him enough time to open the door and drop into the engine room.

The train driver was working relentlessly. Without a fireman in the engine room, he had to operate the train controls and shove coal into the burner at the same time.

“Ivan?” The man looked at George, desperation clear in his eyes. George shook his head with a somber grimace. With no time to grieve, the driver returned to his work, determined to get the train out of there.

Within the thirty metres between the locomotive and the pile, the steam powered machine gained some speed and smashed into the dump. The massive timber of the railway ties groaned. The train’s wheels screeched. The impact jolted the entire train. George leaned over through the window and looked back. Soldiers had tried to climb on to the train. Two of them had fallen on the platform following the impact. Three others held on.

George tapped the driver on the shoulder. “Keep going”, he shouted. “They’re inside. I have to go!” He exited the engine room and stepped into the corridor of first class. The deafening cacophony of groaning metal and timber reverberated through the train. George pictured Ivan’s body in his head, mangled by the debris as the train relentlessly cleared its way forward. He moved along the corridor, pistol raised. The two German soldiers appeared in the distance, behind a glazed door. Their brief disorientation gave George a chance. He raised his pistol and fired. Glass shattered and a head jerked. A soldier dropped out of sight. The other one ducked down. The benefit of the swift action was over. George knew the surviving soldier would come after him with an automated rifle and he stood no chance. He jumped to the side and into one of the luxurious compartments of first class. He dropped on the floor, startled as he found himself face to face with a young woman. She sat on the floor with her arms around her knees, hyperventilating and shaking. 

“Aussteigen! Sofort aussteigen!” George heard a distant voice through the continuing noise. Someone gave a command to disembark. He rose up and carefully peaked out of the compartment. There was no one in the corridor. He moved forward, looking through the train window. The surviving German soldier he had shot at ran across the platform, joining his comrades.

“Wait! Don’t leave me here”, the woman from the compartment cried.

“Stay down! Help is on the way.”

George ran along the corridor towards second class. The train still moved at a low speed, held back by the debris.

From the open vestibule, George saw a German soldier raising what looked like a large hose with a source of flame attached to its nozzle. Another soldier followed him, holding two large tin cans. Their commander stood behind them, arms crossed over his chest. George froze as he realised what the men were doing. He ran inside the carriage as the soldier pressed the trigger.

Liquid fire spewed out of the hose with a roar. The intense flames ignited everything in their path. The train was engulfed in a red inferno. George felt the heat on his face instantly as he spilled into the carriage, manically looking for his kind.

“Your majesty”, he cried, instantly abandoning hiding his companion’s identity. “Boris!”

The king emerged from within carriage, a group of passengers surrounding him.

“Go to the front! Everyone hurry! George, make sure no one is left behind!” Boris commanded, rushing the mother with her baby in front of him. 

The soldier on the platform kept pressing the trigger of the flame thrower. The beam of fire showered the train in ignited fuel. Fire broke through the windows, instantly igniting wood panels, benches and luggage.

“Go, go! Run forward!” The group of passengers haphazardly spilled out of the carriage. Staggeringly, one by one they passed through the open air vestibule on their way to the front of the train.

“Zwischen den Wagen! Feuer! Feuer frei!” The German commander had spotted the group of people and shouted to his troops, hands flailing in the air. A staccato of machine gun fire echoed, adding to the clamour of the dragged debris and the flame thrower’s roar. One of the men who had stood at the window earlier was hit multiple times. His body shook violently before falling over the railing. George narrowly avoided the bullets, crashing into the first class carriage as the vestibule was showered with fire and bullets.

The train kept pressing forward. The debris finally gave way under the relentless power of the steam engine.

The German force ran along the platform as the train left the station. The man with the flame thrower took aim one last time. He raised the hose and unleashed the hellish force of his weapon on to the first class carriage.

George felt the blazes with his back as he moved forward. The flames engulfed everything in their path, instantly incinerating wooden paneling and the velvet covers of the first class seats. The group of passengers accumulated at the front of the car. Their desperate cries were barely audible under the noise of the inferno and the chugging of the train.

A few kilometres north of Gara Babul, the town of Svoge lay nestled in the Balkan mountains. The rustic houses of the sleepy settlement were dotted around in the foothills. Dense pine forests surrounded the town, situated on the banks of the Iskar river. At the towns train station, the signal controller strolled along the dimly lit platform. A thin wisp of smoke rouse from his cigarette.

The signal controller stopped his lazy stroll and stood still on the platform. He stared into the dense forest at the edge of town, straining his eyes and ears. A faint sound was audible from the distance. Then it grew louder. The night sky over the treetops was tinged in an orange glow.

The signal controller took a few tentative steps along the platform, towards the lure. The sound grew louder and more discernible. It was a train whistle.

The signal controller’s eyes widened in shock as a vision from hell appeared in the distance. A locomotive approached through the trees. The steel behemoth huffed and shook, spewing steam into the starry sky. Behind the black face of the locomotive, its carriages were engulfed in flames, blazes reaching high above the dark trees. The train whistle pierced the night over sleepy Svoge. On either side, the locomotive dragged pieces of massive timber beams, tangled by barbed wire. The signal controller stood frozen, cigarette still glued to his lips, as the steaming red-hot mess of steel and debris chugged towards him.