Above His Station Read Online Free PDF

available orifice. Its head was almost intact, and it would probably have fetched a pretty penny from a taxidermist had it not been for the fact that various internal organs had forcibly pushed themselves up its throat and out of its mouth.
    I steadied my breath as I pulled myself up to my feet.
    ‘You are one lucky fucker,’ said the rat, and I was forced to agree.
    Limping over to the train, I noticed that it was the same one that I had arrived upon a couple of hours before. It only had two compartments; the passenger car and the driver’s car. Stepping over the tiger’s body I cupped my hands to the windows. The car was empty. Something was up with the electrics as the doors wouldn’t budge, so I walked along to the driver’s side and tapped on the glass. Strangely, that car was vacant also. Desperately needing to have some sort of discussion with someone to gain another perspective on the situation, I turned to my singular source of conversation.
    ‘It’s completely empty,’ I said to the rat. ‘But then…who was driving the train?’
    ‘You tell me. Like I said, you’re the one that works here.’
    ‘And like I said, it’s my first day!’ I snapped.
    ‘Well…you sure know how to pick ‘em,’ said the rat.
    ‘Don’t I just,’ I muttered. The excitement had made me forget my wounds and I hissed as I felt my torn flesh seeping blood. It was as if the rat could read minds as well as talk, for it said:
    ‘You need to get stitched up, mate. You think there’s a first aid kit onboard?’
    I took a painful step back and considered the rat’s suggestion. All the trains were equipped with first aid kits these days, front and rear compartments, but the only problem was, ‘I can’t get inside. The doors are jammed.’
    ‘So smash the bloody window!’ said the rat.
    And then I said something that would make me grin like the Cheshire Cat whenever I recalled it after the event: ‘But…that’s vandalising company property.’
    ‘Fuck company property!’ said the rat. ‘Get that spanner and smash the bloody window. After what’s gone on topside, do you really think anyone’s going to give a shit?’
    As much as it went against my grain, I smashed the wrench against one of the windows. It took several attempts before I even put a scratch in it. Giving up, I managed to jam the wrench into the small gap between the doors’ seals, and with a bit of strenuous effort that made my shoulders ache, I successfully wedged open the doors just wide enough for me to squeeze inside.
    The compartment was just as I’d left it, for it had only been two-and-a-bit hours since my occupation, but as I moved up and opened the door into the driver’s car, I noticed something new. A navy-blue uniform was lying in crumpled heap on the floor. But not only that, next to it was a white shirt with the tie still fastened at its collar, a thermal vest that had seen better days, some underpants that were in an even worse state, even a pair of socks were discarded on the floor next to some shoes. What on earth had gone on? Had the driver lost his marbles? Don’t get me wrong, my old next-door neighbours were into a bit of naturism from time to time (how I kept a straight face as I spoke to the wife over the garden fence, I’ll never know), but most nudists don’t usually have a spontaneous compulsion to do it whilst they’re driving a flipping train!
    ‘You’re lucky this train came by when it did, mate!’ said the rat. ‘Thank god for timetables, eh?’
    ‘This station isn’t on any timetables,’ I corrected the rodent. ‘I wonder what made the driver return. Had he come to pick me up? And why on earth did he get his kit off?’
    It is a little known fact that rats can frown. I know this because I have seen it.
    ‘You really don’t know?’ it asked. ‘Where the fuck have you been? On the Moon?’
    ‘I’ve been stuck down here for almost 3 hours!’ I said. ‘Why? What’s happened?’
    ‘Best you get that leg