Chapter 54: S#9. Midnight Vegetable Train (3)
by fnovelpia
Here’s the story:
The dawn train has red and green cars.
The owners of this place are the Meat Human and Vegetable Human.
The Meat Human fills the space with red, and the Vegetable Human fills it with green.
Their staple food is human flesh.
However, since they cannot kill, twins are passing each other’s flesh to them.
Flesh from the Vegetable Human to the Meat Human.
And flesh from the Meat Human to the Vegetable Human.
It’s a bidirectional, innovative supply chain.
The creator of these two monsters, Dr. Frankenstein, is none other than the twins themselves.
The twins are desperately searching for a way to turn the two monsters back into humans.
In the chilly dawn—inside the speeding train, the madness of the two starving monsters races towards each other.
As dawn broke, I left the house.
I saw the back of Hilda Hyper, standing dejectedly in front of the fence.
“Hilda.”
She didn’t turn around when I called. I had forgotten that she couldn’t hear.
I approached and grabbed her shoulder. Hilda flinched in surprise.
Seeing me, she hesitated and then wrote ‘hello’ while holding my hand.
Her writing was incredibly fast, but the characters were so neat that I could understand them all.
I was holding a box containing flesh (from Vegetable Man) and headed to the subway station.
Today, only Hilda had come out of the house. Now that I was here, it was okay for just one of us to go.
Zelda said she was conducting research to turn Meat Girl and Vegetable Man back into humans…
Standing on the empty platform, I waited for the train.
Hilda conveyed various information through her palm.
‘Meat Girl and Vegetable Man hate each other a lot’
They really hate each other.
The narrative’s goal became clear to me.
Reconciliation.
I didn’t know why, but it was up to me to heal their deep-seated feelings.
This time, I wrote a few words on Hilda’s smooth palm.
‘Have Meat Girl and Vegetable Man ever met directly?’
‘Of course. They used to live together in the past’
‘Live together? What was their relationship?’
‘That’s a secret’
After writing this, Hilda scrutinized my palm closely.
‘Summer. May I take a look at your hand?’
I nodded, and then Hilda gently stroked the calluses on my knuckles.
It tickled, but I didn’t show it.
Hilda found it strange that my hand was different from her sister’s.
Of course, it would be as different as silk is from sandpaper.
‘It’s the first time I’ve written on a man’s hand other than Dad’s’
She wrote and then seemed a bit embarrassed.
I wondered if Hilda’s hearing loss was congenital, but I didn’t pry further.
The train arrived. I boarded with the box.
We headed straight for the last car. The starving Meat Girl was waiting for us there.
“Uh-oh.”
Before the last car, we stopped.
Today, there were people inside the train. As many as five.
They looked like scruffy young men.
Whether drunk or high, their eyes were all messed up.
Hilda, turning pale, hastily wrote on my palm.
‘Those are the delinquents we met before. They tried to harm my sister and me.’
She said they barely escaped.
Looking at the delinquents, I thought:
…Messing with innocent girls…a suicidal move with a 1000% mortality rate in horror movies…
They’re going to die soon.
Sure enough, in front of the last car where Meat Girl was sleeping, they were doing something.
Bang, bang.
The sound of metal clashing.
A man with a red band around his forehead was hitting a lock with nunchucks.
Seeing this, I was dumbfounded.
“Hey.”
I called out, and the five delinquents all turned around at once.
They looked back and forth between me and Hilda, as if seeing an interesting toy.
“Uh? Isn’t that the pretty one we saw a few days ago?”
“Did you bring your boyfriend?”
The man with tattoos on his face flicked his tongue in and out. He was missing a few teeth.
It was a sight I couldn’t stand.
I moved closer, and as they realized the size of my body, they shrank back.
A heavy silence fell over the train.
But it was brief. One of the guys, apparently high on drugs, screamed and threw a punch.
The punch connected with my side.
“Argh…!!”
The scream wasn’t mine; it came from him.
He cradled his broken wrist and collapsed, crying like a baby.
My body was too solid to be affected by a normal person’s punch.
The delinquents were shocked to see their comrade down.
“That bastard did that to Jackson…”
“Calm down. I didn’t do anything.”
Then someone stepped in front of me.
It was the man with the red headband who had been smashing the lock with nunchucks.
He spun the nunchucks around; his eyes were fierce.
He looked like he’d watched too many Bruce Lee movies.
“Kiyaaaahhh───────!!”
The man let out a scream like a monkey hit in the balls as he swung the nunchucks.
I caught the flying nunchucks in mid-air.
I jabbed the end of the nunchucks into the man’s face. With a crunch of his nose breaking, he collapsed.
Then another guy charged at me from behind. Before his fist could reach me, I struck his jaw first.
Perhaps because I had faced all sorts of supernatural beings, it felt like I was fighting a kindergartner rather than an adult man.
But then it happened.
Crack-
The lock, already half-destroyed by the nunchucks, shattered.
Meat Girl burst out.
“Yum yum!”
Her appearance was completely unexpected.
Meat Girl grabbed one of the fallen men and chewed off his head.
Crunch.
It sounded like candy popping in her mouth as she crushed the man’s skull.
Meat Girl sucked on the crushed head, dragging the body into the last car.
It all happened in an instant.
“”””Ahhh… Ahhhhhhh!!!””””
The remaining delinquents panicked and fled.
Hilda, also startled, staggered.
I caught her to prevent her from falling.
The scene inside the last car was gruesome.
Surrounded by walls of flesh, Meat Girl was greedily tearing apart the corpse.
“Smack smack, it feels like living again to eat meat instead of just greens.”
Hilda sobbed at the horrific sight.
“Eh… Ah… Ehhhh…”
Making strange noises, she pointed at a box with her fingertips.
The box containing vegetables from Vegetable Man.
“No need for those damn greens today! Go back!”
She was full from the human flesh.
I pulled out an axe.
To collect meat for Vegetable Man, I aimed the axe at the flesh wall.
Then Meat Girl freaked out.
“You! What are you doing?!”
“Just collecting some meat.”
“No way! I haven’t received any vegetables from that side, there’s no reason for me to give up any meat!!”
She argued that since she hadn’t eaten Vegetable Man’s vegetables, she had no obligation to give up her meat…
It was a logical argument.
“But you have to give it. Otherwise, Vegetable Man will starve, right?”
“I don’t care!”
She was adamant.
It was true they didn’t get along.
How could they be at odds while sharing each other’s flesh?
I couldn’t understand.
Meat Girl chased Hilda and me out.
As soon as we stepped out of the last car, a red barrier appeared near the door.
It was a hard meat barrier that couldn’t even be scratched with an axe.
The box that should have contained raw meat from the flesh wall still had the vegetables.
This was bad.
If it continued like this, Vegetable Man would starve.
Should I dig up a grave and bring a corpse?
A downcast Hilda approached me.
‘What should we do? There’s nothing to feed him’
‘We should have caught some of those delinquents, one would’ve been enough’
To feed human flesh to Vegetable Man…
After I cracked that joke, Hilda backed away with a terrified expression.
It was an adorable reaction.
Having no choice, we disembarked at the next station.
We visited a night market and bought some beef. We also purchased a new lock for the last car door.
Despite claiming that he only eats human flesh, there was a chance that beef might surprisingly suit his taste.
I was hopeful.
However, that hope was completely dashed.
Vegetable Man vomited after eating the beef.
“Ugh… How dare you feed me such trash…!! I asked for edible flesh!!”
“Meat Girl doesn’t want to give up her meat.”
Vegetable Man was enraged.
I barely managed to prevent him from charging off to tear Meat Girl apart.
Fuming, he roughly pulled the vegetables out of the box.
“I’m taking these back! I won’t give that b*tch even a piece of my flesh anymore!!”
Just like in the last car, Hilda and I were once again driven out.
A green barrier appeared near the door.
It was a hard vegetable barrier that couldn’t even be scratched with an axe.
This was serious.
If things continued this way, Meat Girl would starve tomorrow.
A vicious cycle had begun.
“…So that happened yesterday.”
Yesterday it had been Hilda who came out, but today it was Zelda’s turn.
“It’s shocking to hear about the casualties.”
“Don’t worry about it. They were trash who deserved to die.”
“But… it could get complicated if the police get involved.”
“Even if the delinquents go to the police station to complain, the police won’t believe them. They’ll just dismiss it as the ramblings of drug addicts.”
I trusted the investigative abilities of our local police.
As long as we have a skilled detective like Bob Bojangles, this town is safe from the force of law.
My worry was about personal retaliation.
The delinquents might have been part of a gang.
It would become a real problem if they came armed in droves to the train to avenge their colleague’s death.
Putting that worry aside.
The real issue was the empty box.
“What should we do, Zelda? If this continues, the relationship between the two monsters will only get worse.”
“We need to somehow reconcile them. Meat Girl can’t live without Vegetable Man, and Vegetable Man can’t live without Meat Girl…”
There has been no progress in the research to turn the two monsters back into humans.
I carried the empty box and headed to the subway station.
I went to the last car, picked the lock, and opened the door.
A steel-like red barrier tightly sealed the entrance.
I knocked.
From inside, Meat Girl’s metallic voice flowed out.
“Did you bring any food?”
“No. Because you didn’t give any meat yesterday, Vegetable Man is angry.”
“Hmph. Then there’s no meat today either.”
It felt like boiling hot oil was churning inside me.
“How can you be so selfish, Meat Girl? Stop being spiteful. You started this. You need to end it.”
But the red barrier did not open.
Her stubbornness was incredible.
I tried to tear down the red barrier, but it was as tough as diamond, so there was nothing I could do.
Eventually, I took the empty box to the front car.
I picked the lock and opened the door, only to find a green barrier.
It was a barrier made of solid vegetables. Like Meat Girl, he had sealed off his space.
When I informed him that there was no meat today, Vegetable Man shouted.
“That crazy f*cker didn’t give it again today…?!”
“I understand your frustration. But at times like this, it’s important to make concessions. How about you start by giving some vegetables to Meat Girl?”
The answer I got was ‘f*ck off.’
Zelda and I had no choice but to continue trying to persuade him.
Of course, Vegetable Man was not persuaded.
He was as stubborn as a Santa Claus who declares no gifts for crying children.
“I’d rather starve than give up my flesh first!”
“Meat Girl says the same thing.”
“Then we’ll just have to die!”
There was no solution.
“They’re both going to starve to death at this rate…”
Zelda said dejectedly.
She was right. The two monsters had opted to starve rather than cooperate.
The situation was quickly spiraling towards disaster.
A terrible deadlock. The chain of hatred had to be broken.
The narrative’s goal was the ‘reconciliation’ of the two monsters.
But how could I reconcile such two?
I pondered deeply in front of the unyielding green barrier.
No clear solutions came to mind.
Eventually, Zelda and I left the subway without having been able to feed Meat Girl and Vegetable Man.
The train was plunging into darkness.
The next day.
I set out to seek advice.
I went to Reiko, who might know a solution due to her mystical abilities.
I explained the situation to her, concealing the fact that Meat Girl and Vegetable Man were monsters.
I loosely adapted it as a discord between a man and a woman.
Reiko shuffled her tarot cards and spoke.
“When you intervene in such relationship issues, it often backfires.”
“Are you saying no one should intervene?”
“Well, it might be effective if it’s not an outsider but a family member who intervenes.”
Meat Girl and Vegetable Man’s family…?
I couldn’t show their monstrous forms to their families.
Unfortunately, Reiko’s advice wasn’t very helpful.
Next, I visited Ellen Strode.
Having experienced married life, she might know a solution.
Ellen spoke with a very serious look.
“When there is discord, you need to meet and talk it out.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes, because only a sincere conversation, face to face, not through letters or calls, can draw out true sentiments.”
It was good advice.
However, it wasn’t suitable for the situation.
If Meat Girl and Vegetable Man met directly, a fight would surely break out 100%.
Driven by hatred and hunger, they would likely tear each other apart.
Lastly, I went to Nancy Strode.
Being a social butterfly, she might know a solution.
“Try using a trick.”
“A trick?”
“Yes. Tell lies to both sides. Tell the man that the woman is repentant, and tell the woman that the man is regretful.”
It was a cunning scheme, quite unlike Nancy.
“But their mutual distrust is so deep, I doubt they’ll believe it.”
Nancy pondered for a moment, then her eyes lit up as if she had an idea.
“Why not prepare a surprise?”
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