Tales of the city,part floor

'That reminds me of a story.' 'What does?' 'What she just said about being late to catch the train.' 'Me? I didn't say anything?' 'Well, I'm sure I heard someone mention it, and that reminds me of a story that scared the hell out of me. Do you remember that subway drver last month who went nuts?' 'Remember it? I was on that train.' 'Do you want to tell the story about it then?' 'What else is there to tell?' 'A lot. Plenty of rumors around dispatch about that one. Not that I believe any of them, mind you, but the way I heard it, it happened like this...' *** That voice was really starting to get to the driver. 'We will depart shortly. Please wait.' They'd been hearing that for twenty minutes now. The train was stalled two miles into the Transbay Tube. It wouldn't budge an inch, but the driver's console showed that everything ought to be working, so it must be a problem with the tracks. She'd called it in, then assured her passengers everything was all right, and then waited. It wouldn't be so bad if the PA didn't seem to be on the fritz as well. Every few minutes a woman's disembodied, mechanical voice chimed: 'We will depart shortly. Please wait.' She couldn't turn it off. She didn't remember ever hearing that announcement before; but then, she'd never had a breakdown like this before either. The train hummed on its electric rails, sealed up inside a steel tube submerged 130 feet below the surface of the bay. Her ears were stopped up from the pressure the water above them. Up ahead, all the driver could see was darkness, the occasional lighting fixtures doing nothing except demonstrating precisely how pitch black it really was down here. She'd made this trip six times a night every night for seven years, back and forth across 30 miles of track between SFO and Bay Point, which meant back and forth through the underwater tunnel six times, and never before had she stopped to consider the crushing weight of all that water. She thought she could hear bolts straining and water dripping somewhere. Just her imagination, of course, but still... 'We will depart shortly. Please wait.' She toggled the PA switch again; it hadn't done anything the last five times, but she could help trying nce more. She checked the security monitors; the passengers seemed calm enough, considering the circumstances. Her four-car train held only seven people as they came up on one o'clock in the morning. Two were dozing and one was pacing the aisle. All but one had white earbuds snaking into the sides of their heads, and they would nod now and then to whatever they were hearing. She envied her rider's calm. If it just weren't so dark out there she might not be so frazzled. The tunnel looked like it went on forever. And if they had stopped anywhere but under the water. And if that damn voice would just knock it off... 'We will depart shortly. 'No one can hear me but you. 'Please wait.' The driver blinked. What was that? She toggled the switch again, but of course, nothing happened. Up ahead one of the lights winked out. Or was that her imagination again? She fanned herself with her clipboard; the stalled train seemed hot and stuffy all of a sudden. The air conditioning was still on, according to her diagnostic panel. Perhaps it was just the confinement wearing on her. Would dispatch ever tell her what was going on? She thumbed the call button again. 'Any word on that track problem?' she blurted it out, not even bothering to identify herself first. The only answer was static. She frowned and hung up. She began to sweat, and she pinched the ridge of her nose, eyes squeezed shut. A headache was coming on. 'We will depart shortly, please wait' the automated voice whirred. Then: 'They're already inside. Look at the riders.' The driver's eyes snapped open. What did it say? She looked up and did a double take. She grabbed a Windex-soaked rag and rubbed the monitor screens, but nothing changed. Something must be wrong with the cameras? Cars three and four looked fine, but in car two both of the sleeping passengers looked like indistinct, grey blurs. In car one (