That had to be a dream, right? Surely there was no way that such a thing was possible, right? So why was the impossible actually happening?
Jasmine shook her head a couple of times to make sure that what she was seeing was real. After pulling an all nighter to study, she was sure that sleep depravation had gotten to her and had made her begin to hallucinate. Yet, she wasn't the only one who doubted what they saw.
At least one hundred and fifty other people were observing the same scene. A vast ocean of crystal clear water that seemed to have no end. Uniform in nature unless an object land on it and send ripples across for only a short distance. No waves. Nothing.
The sun was slowly sinking, it's red and orange rays reaching as far as the human eye can see. As of the moment, half of it had set and the ocean cast a perfect reflection of the upper half.
Jasmine looked over at her friend, Ema, who was as confused as she was. She had that kind of look that one had while trying to process what the hell was going on. One minute they were going to school and the next the train they were in just teleports in the middle of a vast ocean and the train doesn't even sink.
Ema was trying her best to put two and two together. It wasn't working. And she wasn't the only one. Lots of passengers were in a state of panic and confusion. A few were discussing what could possibly be happening while a few couldn't help but panic and shudder as the thought of being in a foreign environment didn't sit well with them.
"What the hell is happening?"
"Bests me. Think it might have something to do with aliens."
"You and your stupid conspiracy theories."
"Can you get service from here?"
"Can't get any. Not even a single bar."
"Mommy, what's happening?"
"I'm not sure dear but everything is going to be okay."
'Calm down Jasmine, try to take make sense of the situation.' She told herself.
The first step was gathering information. The first thing that was clear was that they were most probably no longer on earth, or if they were they were in some kind of foreign dimension. It didn't take a genius to realize that.
The second thing was that there was no way of communicating back to the real world as there was no service as tested by her and other passengers. They had no power in the train as the lights were off. All of it seemed to be discouraging but they could at least move from carriage to carriage since the doors could be opened mechanically.
"You seem to be taking this well." Said Ema.
"Not really. I just forced myself to calm down as panicking won't get me anywhere."
Ema sat besides Jasmine and leaned on her shoulder.
"You think this is one of those transmigration novels where one is taken to a whole other world?"
Jasmine had no response for her question. It would be wrong to assume that it was the case and even if it was, she wasn't sure the same cliche that most stories followed would apply.
"Hey Jasmine, there's something I'd like to ask." Ema said after a moment to silence between them.
She looked at Ema, who had a worried expression. Her silence meant that she did not decline the incoming question.
"I'm not sure if it was a dream or my brain playing tricks on me but...." Ema went silent.
"But what?"
"I don't know. For some reason I can't seem to remember what I wanted to ask you."
"Yeah sure." Jasmine said dismissively.
"I'm serious. I have something important to ask but I can't access it in my brain." Ema said with a desperate tone, not wanting Jasmine to doubt her.
Jasmine didn't say anything. She just stayed there next to Ema as she tried to remember what it is she was to ask.
They sat in prolonged silence till the veil of darkness covered the sky.
The passengers lit up their torches and continued conversing with one another.
That's when Jasmine sensed something moving out of the water at high speeds. She instinctively looked back but was met by nothing but still waters.
"What's gotten you so edged up?" Asked Ema.
"Nothing just....."
Jasmine was cut off by a blood cuddling cry followed by screaming coming from the carriages ahead of them. Before any of them could even find out what was going on, a stampede soon insured as people struggled to go away from the front carriages to the rear ones. Jasmine and Ema were soon engulfed by a huge wave of people that only seemed to intensify by the second.
Ema had crouched up and protected her head and after she felt the number of people trampling her decrease. She rose only to find Jasmine standing there with slight bruises on her face and hands, motionless. She didn't move an inch, almost as if she was frozen in time.
"Jasmine, are you ok. You seem...". Ema grew silent as she heard a slight growl coming from the carriage Infront.
She slowly shifted her head to look at the being that had welcome itself to the train. It was hard comprehending what it was. It was humanoid yet it had a weird crouching figure. It's arms were longer than it's legs. It had reddish brown skin that was full of sores. It's eyes were moving in all directions independently and it's large nose let out some black fluid. From it's appearance one would conclude that it had achieved the epitomy of ugliness.
It's deformed head was attached to a long neck and each time the head turned it produced a kind of crackling sound, like bones were being broken or something. Upon seeing it, Ema lost all strength in her legs and fell to the ground. She was so terrified she couldn't even breathe properly.
Meanwhile, Jasmine's brain was working overtime trying to come up with the the best solution. The creature was obviously unknown to her hence whether to run, fight or stay put was a debate she was currently having.
Actually, she shut down the idea of fighting. There was no way she was going to put herself at risk throwing hands with a deformed being that she'd only met like a few seconds ago.
The creature seemed to notice them and it let a large growl. Then it tapped it's elongated fingernails that functioned as claws that were around forty centimeters long on the floor. It's mouth opened unnecessarily wide and it's tongue hung out from it's mouth.
The creature then lifted it's hand to strike Jasmine.