Seat Number Seventeen
The lights went out.
Kino could see nothing, but he could hear everyone breathing around him. Arlan’s breaths were short and fast. Gama held back a sob. Mario was still kneeling beside Abim. From beneath the floor, the fingernails scratched again.
Creak. Creak. Creak.
“Don’t move,” Sean whispered.
“What is that thing underneath us?” Arlan asked.
“Not a thing,” Sean replied. “Someone.”
The scratching stopped.
Then something knocked directly beneath Kino’s shoe.
Knock.
Kino looked down, though the darkness made the movement useless.
“It knows where you are,” Sean said.
“I haven’t done anything!”
“That is exactly the problem.”
Suddenly, the lights came on.
The floor beneath Kino’s feet looked intact. There was no crack or opening. Only long scratches that formed the number seventeen.
Naren backed into the window.
“Seat number,” Jidan murmured.
Sean walked toward the end of the carriage. “Seat number seventeen.”
“Where?” Kino asked.
“Carriage four.”
No one wanted to move. They had just heard something beneath the floor, but Sean gave them no time to understand. He had already opened the connecting door.
Cold air burst through the corridor. Outside the window, fog clung to the glass like wet palms.
“I’m not going there,” Gama said.
Sean looked at him. “You never wanted to go back.”
“I said I’m not going!”
Gama raised the metal chair. Before he could swing it, every seat in the carriage rotated to face the same direction.
The door to Carriage Four.
Metal scraped against metal throughout the compartment.
Abim, still injured, forced himself upright with Mario’s help. “If we stay here, whatever is beneath the floor will come to us.”
“Bim, can you walk?”
“I can. If I can’t, drag me.”
They moved.
Kino walked at the back with Naren. Kino did not trust him, but he did not want to leave him alone either. Since the recording had played, Naren had not stopped staring at Kino’s phone.
“You know that voice,” Kino whispered.
“I’m just panicking.”
“You know that voice.”
“Everyone heard it.”
“Not the voice in the recording. The voice under the floor.”
Naren quickened his pace.
Kino was about to follow when the door ahead of them slammed shut.
BANG!
Arlan and Mario turned. Jidan tried the lever, but the door did not move.
Their reflections appeared clearly in the glass.
Kino. Arlan. Mario. Jidan. Abim. Gama. Naren. Sean.
Then an additional figure stood among them.
A young man with a face covered in wounds and a neck bent as though it had been broken.
Kino turned.
There was no one there.
When he looked back at the glass, the figure stood directly behind Naren.
“Naren,” it whispered.
Naren spun around with a scream. Nothing stood behind him.
Sean pressed his palm against the glass. Cracks spread from beneath his fingers, but the door remained closed.
“He doesn’t like us getting close to his seat,” Sean said.
“Who is he?” Jidan asked.
Sean stared at the reflection of the wounded figure.
“A piece of the night you threw away.”
Gama slammed the chair into the door. Once. Twice. On the third strike, the door flew open, and Gama was thrown onto the next carriage floor.
That carriage looked different.
Its seats faced one another. The lights were dim. Its windows were broken. The air smelled of wet earth and rusted iron.
In the center stood one intact seat.
Number seventeen.
Kino recognized it from an old news photograph. It sat near the rear door, exactly where Sean had been sitting before the argument.
“Don’t sit there,” Mario said.
“I’m not that stupid,” Kino replied.
A phone began ringing beneath the seat.
Everyone froze.
The ringtone was simple, but Kino recognized it. It had once belonged to Sean.
Gama covered his ears. “Turn it off!”
“It could be a clue,” Jidan said.
“It’s bait!”
Sean nodded toward the seat. “Take it.”
Kino looked at him. “Why me?”
“Because it is waiting for you.”
The phone rang again.
Kino knelt. His hand slid beneath the seat. His fingers touched something cold and slick. He pulled it free.
An old phone.
Its screen was cracked but still glowing. One unplayed video waited on it.
The file name was one word:
DON’T.
“Open it,” Jidan said.
Mario stood at once. “Don’t.”
Jidan turned. “Why do you always stop us whenever there’s evidence?”
Mario did not answer.
Kino opened the video.
The image flickered. It had been filmed from a low angle, as though the phone had been placed beneath the seat. Feet moved through the corridor.
Sean’s voice sounded.
“I only want one thing. For you to stop pretending you don’t know.”
Gama’s younger voice answered, louder and harsher.
“You think we’ll believe a liar like you?”
“I have proof.”
“Proof of what?”
“A message from Naren.”
Naren immediately went pale.
The video showed Gama grabbing Sean by the collar. Before the argument reached its peak, another voice came from behind them.
Kino’s voice.
“Sean, don’t cause trouble.”
Kino stared at the screen, expressionless.
“I wasn’t there.”
“You were,” Sean replied.
“No way.”
The video continued.
Young Kino entered the corridor. He stood several steps from Sean, Gama, and Naren. His face was unclear, but his voice was unmistakable.
“If you want to fight, don’t do it here. A railway officer is coming.”
Sean turned. “Kin, please listen to me.”
Young Kino stepped back.
“I don’t want to get involved.”
“You got involved the moment you received my message.”
The image shook violently. Someone grabbed the phone from beneath the seat. The screen suddenly showed Naren’s face close up.
Naren whispered to someone outside the frame.
“If he opens that file, everyone will know.”
“So?” Gama asked.
“Make him shut up.”
The video ended.
No one spoke.
Kino slowly turned toward Naren.
“What file?”
Naren opened his mouth, but no sound came out.
Gama stared at him. “You said the file was gone.”
“I don’t know anything.”
“You said it was gone!”
Gama lunged at Naren. Arlan caught him before the first punch landed.
“Not now!”
“Let me go!”
“If you hit him, we’ll never get an answer!”
Naren backed away, clutching his chest. “I didn’t kill Sean!”
“No one said you killed him,” Jidan said. “But you started all of this.”
The old phone in Kino’s hand lit up again.
A message appeared:
KINO KNOWS WHY I WAS ACCUSED.
Kino’s throat went dry.
Another message appeared.
BECAUSE HE SAW WHO PUT SOMETHING IN MY BAG.
Kino shut his eyes.
A small memory surfaced. Not from the night of the accident, but from the afternoon before it. He had been in an empty classroom. Naren came in carrying a black bag. Naren asked Kino to take his jacket. Kino saw someone place a small object inside Sean’s bag.
The person’s face was hidden.
But the hand wore a silver ring shaped like a bird’s head.
Kino opened his eyes and looked straight at Mario.
Mario wore the same ring.
Mario stared at his own hand.
“That ring…” Kino said.
Mario stepped back. “I can explain.”
“You put that thing in Sean’s bag?”
“Not the way you think.”
“Answer me, Mar!”
Before Mario could answer, Seat Seventeen moved on its own.
Its metal legs scraped the floor. Black blood seeped from beneath the cushion.
Sean approached and pressed his palm against the seat.
“He is not allowed to speak yet,” he said.
“Who?”
Sean turned toward the window.
Outside, the fog split apart.
Another carriage ran alongside theirs, even though the train had only one set of cars. Behind its windows stood Vier and Handra.
Vier pounded against the glass.
“DON’T TRUST MARIO!”
Handra stood behind him with his head bowed.
Kino ran toward the window. “Vier!”
Vier raised both hands. Red writing covered his palms:
HE OPENED THE DOOR.
Handra slowly lifted his face.
His eyes were entirely black.
He smiled at Kino, then pointed down.
Something was following the train beneath their carriage.
It was not crawling.
It stood upright.
Its fingers gripped the iron wheels.
Its face was hidden, but its voice came through the glass.
“Kin…”
It was Kino’s own voice.
“Do you remember the first message?”
The old phone in Kino’s hand played another recording without being touched.
Sean’s voice sounded very close.
“Kin, if you hear this, don’t trust anyone who says I’m dead.”
Kino looked at Mario.
The recording continued.
“Because the person most afraid of the truth is not the person who killed me.”
Sean’s voice paused.
“It’s the person who knows I’m still alive.”
Outside the window, the figure hanging from the wheels lifted its face.
It had Kino’s face.
Then every light in the train went out for the second time.
In the darkness, Naren whispered from near Seat Seventeen:
“I was only following orders.”
And something beneath the floor began to laugh.