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Here's a fun collaboration I did with fellow writer Tim Pratt. We swapped sections back and forth, each of us trying to up the ante with the plot and conflicts, and the end result was quite amazing. You may never take another train ride again...
Helljack was first published in the first issue of HP Lovecraft's Magazine of Horror in November 2003. This story was named an Honorable Mention story in the Year's Best Fantasy and Horror anthology, volume 17, and (to my surprise) the Year's Best Science Fiction, vol. 22!
| Helljack And then, when she stood up next to her slim bed, everything outside the windows went black. At first Janis assumed it was a tunnel. But after a moment of standing in the dark, Janis realized that the sound was all wrong, that the train wasn't echoing the way it usually did in a tunnel; no hammering of metal wheels on tracks, the racket amplified by the tunnel walls. If anything, the train had gotten quieter since entering the tunnel, but that had to be some peculiarity of acoustics. When the darkness persisted, Janis lowered herself into her seat. Somewhere, far off down the length of the train, someone screamed -- not briefly, but a long, sustained wail. Years in the ER told Janis that the scream was caused by some sort of deep pain, not fear or any other source. That person was in agony. Janis scrunched instinctively down, hunching her shoulders, looking into the perfect blackness outside the window. Her hand was already on the icy door handle, heading toward the sound of the screaming.
Then the train burst into the light again, and they were no longer in the Rocky Mountains. Continued... |
First published in: What the critics said about "Helljack": |
