“This can’t be good.”

The next train car looks different, like a giant shipping container someone pulled from the bottom of the ocean. There are no windows breaking up the metal walls. Grime is plastered to every surface of it. The door is covered in rust like a coat of paint. Bits of dirt and dust and rust break off in the wind. The metal groans from deep within.

I try the handle, but it doesn’t budge. I take some time to look around. This dirty compartment is out of place with all the others I’ve seen. There are only a handful of train cars left before the engine. Most seem to be containers like this one. I see them stretching ahead, curving to the right as the train rolls along the tracks.

We’re going around a coast. It’s a peninsula, I think. Rocky shore and breaking waves lies to the left of the tracks. Scrubby undergrowth and scattered trees lie on the right. Still no sign or real civilization.

Through compartment windows, I’ve seen big buildings, like warehouses or shipping yards. I’ve seen silos and water towers in the distance. I’ve seen distant roads and billboards. No towns. No light at all. Even the moon and stars are covered by clouds. And it is oppressively cold, depressingly so.

I wrap numb fingers around the door handle again, and push a little harder. Seems jammed. I lean up on it and push and push. It barely budges.

I take the bird-beaked cane in hand and whack the end of the handle as hard as I can. After a second and third swing, rust rains from the door handle. The cane snaps from the impacts. I toss it aside and pull on the door.

Stuck. Wedged into the frame good. I put a foot up on the wall and pull with everything I’ve got.

Grrrnk!

The door explodes open with the sound of tearing metal. I land flat on my back and look down at the cloud of flies leaving the doorway. It’s as thick as smoke. The air is buzzing with them. They cover everything.

The constant motion of the swarming flies makes the inside hard to make out from where I am. It’s just a shifting mess. The smell reaches me, and I choke on my breath. I cover my face with my hands. My eyes are burning. My stomach heaves.

I tear some of the rags out of my pack and wrap them around my face. My breath hitches and I gag. What can smell as terrible as this?

Once again, the only way forward is something I’d rather avoid. I’ll just have to rush through and deal with the disgust.

I ease up to the door and open it the rest of the way. The smell is powerful, almost overwhelming. I ignore it to look inside.

Even to my lowlight vision, this place is gloomy. It’s the flies that make everything seem so dim and hazy. On each side of the container, there’s a wall of cages up to the ceiling. They’re full of still forms.

Something drips from each one and pools on the floor. The metal bars are caked in something not quite solid. The smell of rotting corpses and shit is enough to make me dizzy.

These are people…

The cages are so small, many had to curl up to fit inside. They were left here, feces and blood clinging to the bars and floors of their cages. They were left in the dark.

All the people are dead. Only the flies make any sound. Only the insects are moving. The cages are filled; all those lives reduced to piles of rot covered in maggots. Their slumped forms are covered with the pale things, to the point that they look like snowy mountains.

The bodies sit in piles of sludge. It drips down and collects in a thick stream at the base of the cages. A mat of wriggling larvae lies on top. They’re constantly crawling around and falling off of things. They break away from the mass and wriggle across the aisle. I glance at the ceiling, half expecting maggots to be crawling up there.

This is madness. What do you say to something like this?

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I take my first step, and the boot sinks down, popping the little bodies it steps on. I swat at the flies buzzing in my ears and landing on my face. I blink them away and take another careful step. And another.

The soles of my boots begin to stick. Little tendrils of filth cling on. I keep my eyes on the door at the end of this walk. These walls of cages seem to close in. They loom over me, their dank smell cloying and thick.

I feel my head lowering as I go. I feel myself holding my breath until it hurts. I notice fingers reaching for me, so my gaze drifts.

Those fingers reach between the bars. On all sides, I see hands pressed against the cages. Fingers peeking through the bars…

They were reaching for help.

I take a shallow breath and gag on it. This time I can’t hold back the bile rushing up. I pull the rags from my mouth and vomit in front of my boots. All that comes is stomach acid, but the heaving still wracks my body and hunches me over. After a while, I fight it down and cough out the last of the caustic fluid.

I try to spit that little bit out. Opening my mouth fills it with a flavor I can’t begin to describe. I keep moving past the bars and hands and people trapped inside.

They were trying to reach past grimy bars because it was all they could do, until the end. My eyes are burning when I reach the door. Tears are spilling out, flowing heavy and hot down my cheeks.

I twist the door handle easy enough, but it doesn’t open at first. I ram it with my shoulder until I burst out into the snow and cold air. I lay there, taking deep breaths and digging my fingers into icy powder.

For a while, I can’t find the strength to push myself back up. I lay there shaking. I clench my stomach and smash a fist into the ground.

There’s no time for this. I have to be moving. Another shipping container looms over me. Another rusty, metal door. I climb to my feet and test the handle.

Stuck.

I twist it and use my whole body. Once it’s turned as far as it will go, I tear the door open. I jump away from the wave of flies that flows out of the doorway. I swat at the cloud as I walk into another compartment full of cages.

It’s the same putrid scene. Death and gloom and despair. I feel dizzy, blinking and breathing in the disgusting, buzzing air. Every time I blink, the door seems farther away. Metal bars and grimy floor stretch.

I burn the sights into memory. This place isn’t something I’ll ever forget. I wouldn’t want to. If something like this can happen to people… I would want to remember. If I were them, I’d want to be remembered.

I take a few steps, then reach a gap in the wall of bars. I see an alley between them. I turn and see a path on the other side too. The walls of cages are broken by alleys on both sides of the aisle, each one a few meters long.

“What the hell is going on?”

This container looks at least ten meters across. It can’t be. The train isn’t even close to that wide.

… Is this container bigger on the inside?

An illusion. Maybe…

I walk down the alley to the left, surrounded by the doors of cages. I stare through the bars, at the rotting corpses. In death, they all look the same. Naked. Faceless. Maggots make meals of them. Flies land to lay their eggs.

I stop at the grimy metal wall at the end of the alley and retrace my steps. It’s real. I look down the strange, long path and wonder if I should head straight for the exit. There’s no real reason to waste time here.

I can leave the filth behind. But… it’s not filth, is it? These were all people. Men and women… probably children.

I walk down the other alley, between the cages. There’s nothing new to see. No surprises. Still, I look in every cage, at every slumped form. I wish there was more to set them apart, more to tell who they were. I wish they seemed more human.

I reach the end of the alley and turn back.

It’s slow going through the container, ignoring the smell, walking down every pathway.

Some cages are empty. Were they never filled? Was someone removed and never returned? How many people were trapped here? A hundred? More?

Why?

Who did this? Who would? Who could?

All these people died where they were kept, packed in like dogs and abandoned. Was I in one these cages? Am I some kind of chattel?

I know someone cut me apart. They pulled my heart out. And whatever they were doing, it was organized. It was big. Where did they even get all these people? I suppose… they could have been zombies.

A part of me wants to poke something through the bars to see if it moves. I resist. These bodies have been through enough, and what will the answer help?

I reach the far door, but when I put my hand on the handle, I feel the urge to look back. Rows of cages line a long path. I should do something for them.

I pull off my pack and dig around the rags and dollar bills.

There’s a tiny candle in an aluminum tin and a lighter near the bottom.

I go back to the center of the container and light the candle. The tiny orange fire adds a circle of color. It shows a world of brown and grey and sickly yellow squirming things, with flakes of rust dusting it all.

I place the candle on a clear patch of floor, surrounded by muck. Hands together, I bow.

“Rest in peace.”

I get the door open without too much trouble. I ease it closed and lean back. I pull the rag off my face to breath the fresh air.

The lands outside have lost their snow, but the trees are still barren, and the wind still ice cold. On the distant horizon, the night is getting brighter, just barely.

Dawn is coming. At least I’m moving forward. And I can keep going. I have to. I’ve seen what happens to the helpless.

“Rest in peace…”

I let the wind cool my face until I’m ready. I move to the next compartment. Another shipping container, but these walls and this door are clean.

The door opens easily.