Adventures on the Omega Train at Night

A.T. Greenblatt takes us on a gorgeously revealing underground adventure this week. ~ Julian and Fran, April 27, 2025

This month’s Sunday Morning Transport stories include an explicit cyberpunk/space pirate story from Arkady Martine, Thomas Ha’s surreal and spooky family arrangements, a sparkling surprise from F. Brett Cox, and an epic underground adventure from A.T. Greenblatt. As always, the first story of the month is free to read.

We are grateful to our paying subscribers, who allow us to keep rolling throughout the year. If you haven’t already, please consider signing up or giving a gift subscription.

---

Adventures on the Omega Train at Night

by A. T. Greenblatt

The thing about taking the night train was you never knew where you would end up. Estelle made that mistake once when she’d first moved to the city from her hometown, which she loved but wasn’t big enough for public transportation. Or medical specialists. Overstimulated and overwhelmed, maybe a little drunk from that fancy cocktail she got with her Latin-inspired pasta, she hadn’t checked the time when she stepped on the Epsilon line train.

It was only slightly past ten p.m., but that was late enough to find herself at a subway stop where the people were eight feet tall and ridiculously friendly. And though she was new to the city, she knew this wasn’t normal.

She never made that mistake again.

Until Hugo did.

It was a rare night out for them as a couple—some friend of a friend’s birthday, but the promise of good sushi was enough to lure Estelle out of her midwinter hibernation and justify the cost of a cab home. It was her fault, really. Throughout dinner, she wasn’t paying attention: to the conversation, to the time, to how many Sapporos Hugo drank. She blamed her hip, which hurt fiercely that evening, and the general loudness and closeness of the restaurant.

Which was why the argument they had out on the sidewalk between dinner and dessert blindsided her. As did Hugo yelling “I’m sorry! I can’t even with you anymore!” before staggering off in the direction of the subway.

Shock, which stung like ice water, was her only excuse for not following him right away. Instead she went back inside, finished Hugo’s beer, and only then thought to look at her watch.

It was 10:50 p.m.

Plenty of people navigate the night trains regularly—but you need to have the right constitution for it, a good head on your shoulders, and a firm internal compass to not get lost for days or weeks. Or sometimes, longer.

Hugo had the worst sense of direction.

“Shit!” Estelle yelled as she grabbed her coat, apologizing to friends and even more friends of friends, promising to Venmo them as she stumbled over chair legs in her hurry to escape the crowded, narrow restaurant. She limp-trotted to the subway, praying that, for once, the Omega train wasn’t on time.

Of course, it was. Hugo was nowhere to be seen.

In fact, the platform had that freshly empty look it gets when a train has departed thirty seconds earlier.

“Shit!” Estelle said again.

It took ten minutes for the next train to arrive, in which time Estelle called Hugo’s phone (straight to voicemail), texted him an apology (unread), chewed on her cuticles (a mess anyway), called again (no change), and read the Reddit page for the Omega night train (which apparently had thirty regular stops and a hundred potential unmapped ones). So by the time the train came thundering into the station, Estelle was well and truly worried she’d lost her boyfriend. This time for good.

The car was half full and, mercifully, there were seats open, and she sat down clumsily between two people in puffy coats. An announcement hissed over the loudspeaker, but the message was lost in static. For all Estelle knew, the conductor could’ve just shared the secret for happiness. The electronic displays, however, showed the normal stops on the route, and that was promising. The weekly night train editorials she and Hugo devoured in The Citygoer always stressed that sometimes the night train was just the day train at night.

So Estelle hoped as they pulled away from the station, even though things between her and Hugo weren’t amazing these days.

She decided she’d get off at every third stop between here and home to see if she could get a signal on him. If she was lucky, she wouldn’t even have to leave the station. Comforted by the plan, she leaned back and began absently rubbing her hip. Winter always made her syndrome’s symptoms worse, and before they moved, she and Hugo would spend the colder months cuddled in their massive TV room watching old movies and plotting adventures for warmer seasons. Now they barely had a living room in their apartment.

“Do you want to be healed?” said the man next to her, suddenly.

It shook Estelle out of her brooding. “Huh?”

“Do you want to be healed?”

“What?”

The man stared at her like she should’ve been expecting this conversation. “Healed.”

She realized he’d seen her limp two stops ago.

“No,” she said, and she stood, though the train was moving, wanting distance between them, but she couldn’t get far. Too many people were in the car now, and she felt his glower all the way to Biggens Street Station, where she rushed off. To her relief, he didn’t follow.

With shaking hands, she tried texting Hugo, calling, and the Find My Friends app. Nothing.

The next Omega train wouldn’t arrive for another twenty-five minutes. Swearing, Estelle went hunting for a bench.

Why don’t you ever say anything back? Hugo would ask her when these things happened.

Can’t think of anything fast enough, she’d reply.

“Fuck you” works in a pinch.

Says the six-foot-tall rock-climber dude.

Still, he’d say, and the conversation would remain unresolved. It was one of their many circular arguments.

Estelle paced the length of the platform, but there were no clean benches to be found. So she resigned herself to waiting on her cranky feet. She resolved that she’d only check her phone once every two minutes and set a timer. She imagined the story she’d regale her coworkers with tomorrow, who teased her for being the only data scientist in their department who was a fully committed hermit.

Waiting was agony, though. Estelle made herself study the mosaic mural on the station walls—birds in a jungle, bright feathers among deep green tile foliage. It was actually quite beautiful, and despite coming to this station semi-regularly, Estelle had never appreciated it before.

A motion and a flash of color caught her eye. One of the mosaic birds was moving.