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#168 Choo Choo!

The concept of train travel has always been a powerful motif in story telling. Train wagons can be a great setting for serendipitous love encounters, like for Jesse and Céline in Before Sunrise, or mysterious murders, like in Agatha Christie's classic Orient Express. 


On a train, the mind wanders, time shifts, and life… unfolds. We hope that these train-inspired prompts will put you on the right track to writing some great stories.

🥇 Winner

SOUTHBOUND

Winner of Weekly Contest #168 🏆

SOUTHBOUNDby David M. SweetDoralea looked out the window of the southbound train. Mid-October leaves dappled the Kentucky hillsides in fiery oranges and burning reds, dull yellows and rusty browns with a few evergreens peaking through the canopies. Colors were made even more vivid by the morning sun and clear, blue sky. Flaxen sedge grass along with green tangles of weeds, brambles, and even a few autumn flowers blurred together as she shifted her gaze downward toward the edges of fields and fence rows speeding by next to the railroad bed. T...

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⭐️ Shortlisted

This week's prompts

Start your story with someone looking out a train window.

– 98 stories

Write a story about a character who is moving on, literally or figuratively.

– 56 stories

Make a train station an important part of your story.

– 72 stories

Write a story about a character who misses a train, for better or worse.

– 33 stories

Write a story that includes someone saying, “Bon voyage.”

– 16 stories

Stories

The Vacation

Weekly Contest #168

I really shouldn’t have been looking out the window, but this was the first time I ever traveled by train. Two days ago, when we boarded the train, Mom and Dad told me it was a surprise vacation, that we were going somewhere special. They made me put on a blindfold so I couldn’t guess where we were going. The blindfold itched. My sister, Esther, complained about how itchy it was, but Mom said it was important and to keep it on.Every so often I could hear my parents snoring, and that’s when I knew it was safe to pull down the cloth and take a...

8 likes 0 comments 0
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Murder on the Train

Weekly Contest #168

Murder on the Train TW Alludes to emotional and physical domestic violence She sat opposite me without a word, her head turned towards the window, her eyes unblinking. Her stony expression almost veiled her fear. I joined her in gazing at the passing landscape, each of us gaining and offering comfort from this shared activity. The rhythmic whoosh of the train continued, oblivious to everything but its mission of heading forward. Trees, fields of irregular geometry, and houses haphazardly scattered about the countryside, all rushed by, bl...

8 likes 1 comment 1
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Becca On The Train

Weekly Contest #168

As the train starts moving, May looks out the window, her face growing pale. “Are you okay?” Steve asks, concerned, leaning towards her. “I-I think I ate too many strawberries…” she replies weakly, a hand over her mouth. Bucky closes his eyes, head shaking, unimpressed. Why did she eat so close to boarding? That appetite of hers… “Switch seats with me,” Steve offers, getting up. “You’ll feel better if you’re looking forward.” “Thanks, Stevie,” she manages in a weak voice. Bucky, worried, stares at May beside him, before f...

7 likes 0 comments 0
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A Different Place and Time

Weekly Contest #168

A Different Place and Time The cars of the electric train shifted as it roughly switched tracks. Allen Foster jostled in the cushioned seat. His limited view through the dirty window became tiring, so he tried to focus on the blurry countryside speeding by. But the creeping migraine continued. Lights inside the locomotive dimmed. He sat alone.  The constant humming from the racing train lured him to sleep, and before long Allen closed his weary eyes. Strange images of a small midwestern town formed within the...

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Blackout

Weekly Contest #168

As the train was enveloped by the tunnel, the view from Linda’s window turned from a vast mountain landscape into a rough stone wall. Occasionally, a bright fluorescent lamp flashed by, leaving stripes of white light in their wake. For hours, she had watched the green countryside and the quaint little sugar cube farmhouses snugly slumbering beneath towering peaks. Rivers coursed like veins through the verdant scenery, their frothing streams speaking volumes of wilder nature higher up the mountain.Cows and sheep and horses were grazing happil...

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LAST STOP

Weekly Contest #168

There isn’t anything more romantic or purely luxurious than train travel. I thought that. I used to think that. As I was growing up, I experienced that. As I stared out the train window, I searched my memory for why I’d thought that. I couldn’t remember.  My mind was protecting me, I knew, because if I allowed my thoughts to focus, I’d come around to thinking about what I’d done, the mess I’d left behind.I didn’t dare look away from the scenery as it flashed by, lest anyone near me get the mistaken impressi...

7 likes 4 comments 4
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Sent to Nowhere

Weekly Contest #168

CW: References to violence, suicide, cannibalism, and threats of violence Darkness loomed with a foggy heaviness as Ander took his seat. The Night Train was meant for one thing and one thing only—a trip to Nowhere. He gave a sigh as he sat against the royal purple cushions in the bench that awaited his company. He glanced out the train window for a moment before adjusting the collar of his coat. Nowhere was a dreadful place that most criminals were sent to fend for themselves. It wasn’t a prison, but a ravenous, secluded town barred off ...

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The Hell Coach

Weekly Contest #168

I knew the woman was bad news the second she entered the stagecoach. Though, more accurately, I should say I sensed she was bad, the knowing would come later. The horses certainly sensed it and did their best to flee her and the perceived evil that enshrouded her. The driver and his shotgun were able to hold them long enough for her to give them a look which calmed their demeanor faster than a shot of angel dust from old doc Metzger.            After shrugging their shoulders at the hors...

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Mystery of Tobias Smith

Weekly Contest #168

Night. 1887, 12th October. Tonight is the night I will run away. Toby is waiting for me at the train station, I will meet him there once I have packed all of my things. I do hope Daddy doesn't wake up, he doesn't approve of Toby, he thinks Toby is a scoundrel and a thief. I do not think of Toby this way, he is charming, handsome, and smart. I love Toby, and I won't let Daddy get in between us. I have finished packing all of my things, and now I am ready to go. I do hope Daddy is asleep, I can hear him rolling over in his bed through the wa...

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The last train out

Weekly Contest #168

Mention of hardship, poverty & deathWhen people think of train stations, they tend to think about adventure, about magical far-off places, about a journey. Others (like those of us who are much too neurotic for our own good) think of wrecks, crashes, and all manner of disasters… death. Trains can instantly conjure up images of magic and nostalgia, of wizards and war, of transport and tech. What people seldom think of when imagining a train ride, may be the medley of passengers who wished they were anywhere but there…On the usual morning ...

7 likes 2 comments 2
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Bringing Home the Boyfriend

Weekly Contest #168

Annie stared out the train window. There was a couple outside, enthusiastically reuniting after a long time apart. The man with curly hair and glasses had swept the dark-haired women off her feet, clutching her to his chest like he never wanted to let go. She smiled at their reunion—the desperate clutching, the whispering in ears, the blinding smiles… It was cute. “What are you looking at?” Kiyo asked, sitting beside her. He took a peek out the window too. “Oh. Ew.” She rolled her eyes. “Ew?” He nodded like she agreed with him. “Exactly. It...

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The Princess of Armeada, Atlantis

Weekly Contest #168

I watched out the train windows as the city flew by and then became countryside. Miles and miles of nothing but trees. Leaning back in my seat, I closed my eyes. My head was throbbing. Thatcher had nearly caught up with me in the last city. I had gotten comfortable and stayed too long in one spot. Not that it was possible to ever be completely comfortable here in the Earth realm. As an Atlantean, coming to the Earth realm was strictly forbidden. Centuries ago, our kind used to travel to this realm regularly until it became clear that hu...

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The Absolutely True and Ghastly Story of the Brief Disappearance of the Gold Spike

Weekly Contest #168

This story needs only a brief foreword. It is a verbatim reproduction of a manuscript I recently found among the belongings of my third great-grandfather, James Finch. Finch was a journalist, and worked for several papers across the American West during his long career, including the Rocky Mountain News and Sacramento Bee. As far as I can tell, he was well respected in his time, and his good reputation in the profession continues to this day.**The view out the window was monotonous—a flat brown landscape dotted with sagebrush. In the crisp d...

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First Heartbreak

Weekly Contest #168

Boston explodes into Autumn around us, leaves showing off in shades of flames, and that familiar smell that is uniquely autumn filled the air.Not that I was able to enjoy it.I saw in shades of gray, smells didn’t register to me, and if my surroundings were beautiful in any way, well…let’s just say I was less than receptive. I skipped classes, emailing that I was sick to my professors and ignoring assignments. Called my coaches and faked the flu, getting bed rest orders for the next week.I just wanted to hide.Disappear.The thought of facing p...

7 likes 3 comments 3
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Tracks To Nowhere

Weekly Contest #168

Gathering around a newspaper stand like moths to a flame, is a group of people who believe a rumor about a train that can travel in time. Some people think it's inhabited by spirits that are lost and wandering in between planes of existence. Others believe it is cursed by someone who died a tragic death, by falling onto the train tracks and wanting to move time forward or backward to prevent their death. But there is another rumor. A rumor of how a woman in white leads lost and desperate souls down a path they can never return from. Such new...

7 likes 2 comments 2
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