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All this lasted less than a second. In the next instant, the girl was already on the platform. And no force in the world could make Tony follow her.

"You did not see it," he told himself. "She just has, well, a birthmark covering the whole cheek. A very ugly birthmark. Therefore she wears her hair this way. And all the rest you simply imagined. My God, in a such a short time it was simply im
possible to make out such details!"

But, nevertheless, he remained on his seat, as if he were glued. He still heard receding clattering-shuffling sounds.

Doors slammed. Dirty, dimly lit letters floated by the windows: "Myrtle Ave."

What the hell? Myrtle Avenue is in northern Brooklyn. And there are neither Q train stops nor parallel routes on it. It seemed like farther to the east there was a subway station belong
ing to the brown line. But, the main thing, if the train is in Brooklyn, it had to pass over the bridge! Manhattan bridge or, at the worst, Williamsburg, if it is indeed a "brown" station. But Tony could swear that the train had remained underground all the time. After all, it is impossible to be mistaken about this even at night. It is possible of course to cross the East River by a tunnel, but those routes definitely do not go through any Myrtle...

"It's a bad dream," Tony thought. "I've fallen asleep in a subway train and am having a nightmare..." It was impossible to wake up, however. And, as if wishing to prove the reality of the situation, the train once again began to brake sharply, almost tum
bling Logan down on a seat. This time the appeared to be very short.

"Is he crazy?" Tony angrily thought about the train operat
or. "Why is he braking this way all the time?"

"And what if that's true," a wild thought flashed. "The crazy train operator drives the train goodness knows where, pay
ing no attention to routes and the schedule... However, even a madman can't go where rails aren't laid."

In the following moment, Tony read the name of the next station with relief: "DeKalb Ave."

Well, at last. So, Brooklyn after all, and it's unimportant how he arrived here. Five routes meet at the DeKalb Avenue station and here Tony can change to the normal Q train. He could hardly wait when the doors opened and allowed him to jump out onto the platform.

He had time to take some steps. Had time to notice that the platform was empty and garbage lay about everywhere. Had time to see the "Downtown" sign, though in Brooklyn stations they do not use such a sign...

And then the lights went out.

Tony stopped dead, then turned towards the train that still was at a stop, lit from within, with hospitably opened doors. Strange, but light from the windows for some reason did not dis
perse the surrounding darkness at all.

"No, thanks!" Logan mentally said to the waiting train and walked through the darkness, extending his hand forward. He could see the train sideways from him and he was assured that he wouldn't fall down from the platform. Even if there is an power failure in the station, somewhere here should be a staircase... he saw it while the station lights were still on...

His hand encountered something soft.

More precisely, someone. Logan understood that he was touching a person dressed, apparently, in something woolen.

"Sorry," Tony confusedly muttered, hastily withdrawing his hand. "Do you know what happened to the electricity? And where is a staircase?"

The person answered nothing and seemed to not move at all.

And then Tony remembered that a few seconds ago, there was nobody on the platform. And he had not heard any steps since then.

Logan recoiled.

And then from the darkness sounds came. No, not from where somebody silently stood. From the other side. A heavy breath and a sound as if a body was being dragged on a stone floor. And these sounds were approaching.

Tony quickly turned and rushed to the open doors of the nearest car. It was very clear to him that these doors would close immediately. He would be only a fraction of second late. A frac
tion, still sufficient time to push his head between closing doors... and to experience the same fate as the red figure on the poster. This abrupt fear was so strong that, already having reached the doors, Tony almost recoiled back, but nevertheless forced himself to jump in, feeling during this moment, as if he was jumping from one skyscraper roof to another. With great relief he fell on the nearest seat.

"Well, and why were you so frightened?" inquired com
mon sense, which appeared, as usual, after instinct. "There is a power failure at the station. Workers probably are simply dragging a cable or something like that."

Yes, certainly.

But why don't these workers use flashlights in the dark?

And then Tony realized that he was still hearing those dragging sounds and they were approaching again. Now he men
tally begged the doors to close as soon as possible. But they still remained wide open.

And then Logan saw a man creeping into the car.

He snuffled and puffed, but crept rather fast, pushing off the floor with his hands...crept without rising his head, so Tony could not see his face. He saw only a shining bald pate and a dirty gray coat which was puffing up on his back.

And just when the man was halfway in the car, the doors slammed and chopped his legs off at the groin.

The train moved. Tony screamed.

The maimed man turned in the aisle and crawled straight towards Logan.

There wasn't any blood. There was none on the floor, nor on the remnants of the creeper's trousers. The doors apparently were free of blood, too–while Logan, who was sitting with his back to the dark platform, hardly could make them out from such foreshortening. He understood that he once again had become a victim of his own imagination. The man's legs had not been chopped off tonight, this man had not them for a long time...

If it was a man at all.

Tony looked in dismay at this stump quickly creeping along the aisle between seats. He could not imagine a disabled person who would behave this way. At home, having fallen from a wheelchair or a bed–certainly, a legless man has no other option than to creep on a floor on his hands. But in a public place, in a subway, and before, obviously, on the street–otherwise how did he get here? The most terrible impression was made by the fact that the creeper did not lift his head at all and almost dragged his face along the dirty floor...

As if having heard Tony's thoughts, the freak, now separ
ated from Logan by no more than one and a half yards, began to raise his head.

But before Tony, who was frozen in horror, had time to see his face, the light shut off in the train, dipping all cars into the absolute darkness of underground.

Tony could not stand it. He jumped up and blindly rushed away down the aisle, hearing behind him the same sounds of a dragged body. His extended hand ran across a door at the end of the car. In his panic, he could not grasp the handle and began to rummage blindly on glass and plastic. Sounds behind were quickly approaching and Tony thought that he would be seized by his ankle any moment. But his fingers caught the handle, which moved with a click. Tony stepped again into the roaring intercar space blown by an icy wind–but this time in complete darkness. Now he was moving in the opposite direction–not to the head of the train, but to its tail. And at that moment, the next, especially sharp lurch of cars, ruined his balance, knocking the support out from under his feet! But fortunately, already falling into darkness, Tony managed to grab an invisible handrail. For some seconds he stood, grasping the handrail with both hands and waiting in horror for the sound of an opening door behind his back. Then Logan thought that the legless man simply could not reach the handle from the floor, and felt himself grow slightly more confident. He made himself unhook his right hand from the handrail and reach for the door to the next car. On the second or third attempt, he caught the door handle which was wiggling in the dark and entered the next car.

He still would like to get as far as possible from that... creature, and, spreading wide his raised hands and catching first the left and then the right handrails, he came up almost to the end of the car. Nothing hindered him. At last he turned aside and flopped on a seat–which he could not see, but was assured that it was empty. This time his intuition had not deceived him.

He tried to summon his common sense–though now, in the dark, it turned out especially hard. "It's a shame to run from an unfortunate cripple," Tony told himself. "Perhaps the poor fellow simply needed help... But then why didn't he ask for it? Did he lack not only legs, but a tongue as well?"

And what if this man was simply drunk? Or mentally sick? Anyway–what harm can be caused to a strong and healthy guy by a legless man wriggling on the floor?

But at this moment, one more source of unease, besides darkness and uncertainty, broke through these reasonable thoughts. A smell. Tony distinctly smelled a faint, but heavy, stench. It it were stronger, he surely would vomit.

After suspiciously sniffing for some time, he understood that the smell came from himself.

More precisely, from his hand. The hand which had touched someone in the dark. It seemed to him that his fingers were covered now by some dirt. Slippy and rotten, judging by the smell.

However, that creature was not necessarily the reason. Quite probably that sticky muck was on a handrail or door handles which it had grabbed.

Tony began to rub his hand against the next seat, though firm cold plastic could hardly substitute for a towel...

"Anyway, this isn't a nightmare," Logan gloomily thought, holding his hand away from his nose. "My sensations are too bright and distinct." He did not remember himself ever smelling anything in a sleep, and his sense of touch in dreams always was significantly dulled. Still smelling the rotten stench–and hoping that now it mostly came from the seat–he stood up and, stretching his hands forwards, crossed obliquely the aisle in the dark and took a seat at the very end of the car.

It solved the problem only partly.

Having sniffed, he again noticed an unpleasant smell–but not the scent of decay. Different. Now the smell of something burned was clearly felt in the air.

"A fire in this hellish train will cap it all!" Tony thought, turning his head in search of flames. But there was still an impenetrable darkness all around. And the smell... no, it did not contain the caustic bitterness of fresh smoke. More likely such a smell can be produced by something that has burnt out already. Something cooled down long ago... cold...

Logan suddenly remembered the Black man, sitting in the far end of a car. Apparently, it was this car... and he sat some
where right here. Or on an opposite seat? Tony tried to remember, but he could not. And now Logan had the clear feeling that, just slightly moving his hand, he would
touch
that person. But he did not want to do it–oh no! Even at the thought of touching whoever was sitting next to him, his hand became as heavy as not even lead but... what is heavier? Uranium? Let it be uranium.

The train began to reduce speed again until it stopped at a station sunk in impenetrable darkness. Or probably in the middle of the tunnel? But if it was the tunnel, why open the doors?

And then Tony heard clatter of heels on a platform. This time without any shuffling. The unknown woman went steadily as if the station and the train were brightly lit. She entered the car through the door nearest to Tony. Heels clattered several more times, approaching. Then the sound ceased. But by almost inaudible movement of air he understood that she had eased onto a seat to the left of him.

So, there had been nobody on the nearest seat before–the Black man had either left earlier, or had been sitting opposite... But that was before. And now...

"She's simply blind", Logan tried to convince himself. "So it's all the same to her if there is light or not. She doesn't even know about the power failure." Oh yes, one more almost feasible version. But, even if he believed in such a concentration of sick and disabled people on one night train, Tony had observed blind persons before. In the dark they, of course, are more confident than sighted people–but still less confident than a person able to see in the light. A blind woman would tap her way with a cane and the noise would be audible. She would not go stamping along like a person who knows precisely where she's going... or who does not care about it at all.

The train again started off.

Tony sat next to the invisible woman without daring to move and almost trying not to breathe. He didn't know whether she knew about his presence. He didn't know what would happen if he drew her attention. And, despite all rational hypotheses, he absolutely, definitely did not want to check it.

And then he felt a cold touch on his hip.

Tony didn't scream. Perhaps, because the fear of betraying his presence was stronger. Or simply because he understood–he wasn't touched by fingers or anything similar. Not by an object at all. It was a liquid. A liquid had flowed under his hip from the next seat.

"Blood," he thought. "She's bleeding profusely".

However, the liquid was not warm. It was hardly anything... physiological. Perhaps, she simply had a bag and in it–a self-opened can of beer. Or cola. Or any fruit or vegetable juice. Or... even more simple: a wet umbrella and a raincoat. Since the evening sky had been overcast, it could be raining now... However, isn't it too much water even for a very wet umbrella? Not just individual drops, but a whole pool flowing into the next seat... Tony felt the liquid seeping farther along his leg. Doesn't she feel that she's sitting in a pool? And why the hell is he resignedly suffering it? If it is not simple water, his trousers are already spoiled. At least they should be washed... He should express his indignation to this person, whoever she is! Or, at least, stand up and change his seat!