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The Last Platform
A railway employee assigned to a nearly abandoned station discovers that one train still arrives every night at 2:17 a.m. It has no number, no driver, and its passengers all seem to be waiting for someone who is still alive.
The station master gave me only one strange instruction.
“After two in the morning, never go to Platform Four.”
I smiled when he said it.
Platform Four had been closed for almost twenty years.
No passenger trains used it.
The tracks were covered with weeds, the lamps no longer worked, and an old sign hanging above the platform had become so rusted that the station's name was barely visible.
I had recently been transferred to this small railway station in the hills.
My job was simple.
Night duty.
Check signals, maintain the register and assist the occasional freight train passing through.
Most nights were painfully quiet.
Until my fourth night.
At exactly 2:17 a.m., I heard a train whistle.
I checked the control board.
Nothing.
No train was scheduled.
Then the rails began vibrating.
The sound came from Platform Four.
I remembered the station master's warning.
Naturally, I went to look.
The Train With No Number
Fog covered the tracks.
Then a light appeared in the distance.
A locomotive slowly emerged from the darkness.
It was unlike any train I had seen.
Old.
Black.
Its metal sides looked burnt.
There was no train number painted on the engine.
No destination board.
And strangely, despite its size, it made almost no sound.
The train stopped beside Platform Four.
Every carriage was illuminated from inside.
I could see passengers sitting near the windows.
Men.
Women.
Children.
All completely still.
Nobody spoke.
Nobody moved.
Then one passenger turned his head towards me.
An elderly man.
His face was grey.
There was blood running from his forehead.
He lifted one hand and pressed it against the glass.
Other passengers slowly began turning.
Within seconds, every face inside the carriage was looking at me.
I stepped backwards.
The train doors opened.
A conductor came out.
His uniform looked decades old.
“Ticket?” he asked.
“I work here.”
“Ticket.”
“I don't have one.”
He stared at me.
Then smiled.
“Not tonight.”
The doors closed.
The train disappeared into the fog.
The next morning, I told the station master everything.
His face changed.
“You saw it?”
“Yes.”
“Did anyone speak to you?”
“The conductor.”
He immediately stood.
“What did he say?”
I told him.
For several seconds, he said nothing.
Then he whispered:
“You're leaving this station today.”
The Accident
Before I could ask why, he unlocked a cabinet and removed an old newspaper.
The date was August 14, 1986.
The front page showed a photograph of a destroyed passenger train.
A landslide had pushed rocks onto the railway line during heavy rain.
A night train struck the debris and derailed near the station.
Several carriages overturned.
One caught fire.
More than eighty passengers died.
The station master pointed towards the photograph.
“Platform Four was where they brought the bodies.”
I looked again.
Then I saw him.
Standing beside one of the damaged carriages was the conductor I had spoken to.
Same uniform.
Same face.
The station master told me that railway workers had been reporting the mysterious train for years.
Always at 2:17 a.m.
Always on the anniversary week of the accident.
“Why did he ask for my ticket?”
The station master looked away.
“Because sometimes the train takes passengers.”
That evening, I packed my bag.
But heavy rain began before sunset.
A landslide blocked the only road out.
I would have to remain at the station until morning.
At 1:55 a.m., the electricity failed.
I locked myself inside the office.
2:10.
Nothing.
2:15.
Still nothing.
Then the clock stopped.
2:17.
A train whistle echoed through the station.
I didn't move.
Three knocks came from the office door.
“Ticket, please.”
The conductor.
I remained silent.
Three more knocks.
“Ticket, please.”
Then another voice spoke.
A woman's voice.
“Arjun?”
My blood went cold.
It was my sister.
My sister had died five years earlier.
“Arjun, open the door.”
I moved towards it without thinking.
Then stopped.
She was dead.
“Please,” she said.
“I'm cold.”
My hand touched the handle.
The station master's warning came back to me.
Never go to Platform Four.
I stepped away.
The voice changed.
It became angry.
“OPEN THE DOOR.”
The entire office shook.
Windows rattled.
The lights suddenly returned.
The door flew open.
Nobody was there.
But Platform Four was brightly illuminated.
The train was waiting.
And my sister stood beside it.
She looked exactly as I remembered her.
She smiled.
“I've been waiting.”
I started crying.
Every part of me wanted to run towards her.
Then I noticed something.
Her feet were facing backwards.
The Passengers Get Off
The train doors opened.
Passengers stepped onto the platform.
Dozens of them.
Some were burned.
Some were covered in blood.
One child carried a broken toy train.
They began walking towards me.
Slowly.
The conductor stood behind them.
“Your ticket is ready.”
I ran.
I crossed Platform Three and entered the signal room.
Behind me, footsteps filled the station.
Hundreds of them.
I locked the door.
Then noticed an old emergency lever beside the signal panel.
The station master had explained it earlier.
It manually changed the points controlling which track a train entered.
An idea came to me.
A terrible idea.
The ghost train always used Platform Four.
Perhaps it followed the rails.
I pulled the lever.
Outside, metal screamed.
The track switched.
The passengers suddenly stopped.
The conductor looked towards the signal.
His smile disappeared.
The train whistle screamed.
Not like a locomotive.
Like an animal.
The passengers began running towards me.
I pulled the second lever.
The abandoned track now led towards an old maintenance tunnel that had collapsed decades earlier.
The ghost train began moving.
Passengers desperately climbed back aboard.
My sister remained on the platform.
“Arjun!”
The train accelerated.
She screamed.
Then her voice changed again.
Deep.
Inhuman.
“You belong with us!”
The train entered the abandoned tunnel.
There was a flash of white light.
Then silence.
Every lamp on Platform Four exploded.
Morning
I woke on the floor.
Sunlight filled the station.
The clock showed 6:42.
The station master arrived soon afterward.
I told him everything.
He listened silently.
Then walked towards Platform Four.
Something was lying beside the tracks.
An old railway ticket.
Burned around the edges.
He picked it up.
My name was printed on it.
ARJUN SEN.
Destination:
UNKNOWN.
Departure:
2:17 A.M.
The station master tore the ticket in half.
“You should leave.”
I did.
I transferred to another city and never worked a night shift again.
For three years, nothing happened.
Then last winter I travelled home by train.
Sometime after midnight, I woke suddenly.
The carriage was completely silent.
Everyone around me was sleeping.
I checked my phone.
2:17 a.m.
The train began slowing.
Outside the window was a small abandoned station.
Only one platform was illuminated.
Platform Four.
A man in an old conductor's uniform stood beneath the lamp.
He looked directly at me.
Then he raised something in his hand.
A railway ticket.
Even through the glass, I could read the name printed across it.
Mine.
The conductor smiled.
The train doors opened.
And from somewhere behind my seat, my sister whispered:
“This time, you already boarded.”
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