A low ring indicates an imminent communication from the personnel.
"Ladies and gentlemen", the sweet voice of the stewardess almost whispers in the speakers, so as to avoid waking up the travelers who have already gone to sleep. "We are currently approaching the Mining Outpost 9, may I remind you that there will be no other stop before we reach Imperada central station at approximately 11 am tomorrow. So, if this is your stop, please make sure to get your luggage ready. The train will stop for exactly ten minutes. To everyone else, have a great evening, I hope you are enjoying traveling with Palera Line. Appetizers and snacks will be available in a few moments. Thank you for your attention."

A young canine opens just one eye as the message ends, his head rested against the window; his glance meets the evening sun in the distance, basking the horizon in a cold, reddish light. He lets out a little sigh, and lets his heavy eyelid close again as the message is repeated in three other languages. Then communication ceases. A few more travelers might have fallen asleep as she was talking. Everyone else is slowly peacing out. Is it really this late already? employees have just begun to walk through the rows of seats, proposing appetizers to the dazing off passengers; the wheels of their carts, muffled by the padding on the floor, are one of the few noises that can be heard, other than the distant white noise of the engines and wheels, and some typing from the laptops of businessmen scattered across the aisles.

But the voice is so soothing. And the jungle's canopy cascading endlessly outside in silence, in all directions, darker and darker as the sun softly goes down, is so calm. And barely anyone ever goes down at Mining outpost 9, anyway. It's a stop that exists purely so there would be one somewhere midway between two shreds of civilization. If it wasn't for the voice of the stewardess, it would be an unwelcome interruption, really. It does break the rhythm.

The young canine pulls his blanket up to his chin, lazily opens one eye again to look at the sunset some more. Outside, in what little visibility is left, he sees figures dancing in the distance... tribesmen? mushrooms? some supernatural beings in midst a nightly festival? or just the weariness maybe... the weariness, and the excitement of tomorrow's adventure. Tomorrow morning the train will reach Imperada, the capital that wasn't meant to be. And the next day, Palera II. And next, Palera... Although they seem to jump around in the foliage, lightly as autumn leaves, this can't be. You couldn't tell from looking at this landscape, that the train's rails are not resting on solid ground, but anchored to a frail-looking viaduct. But why wouldn't you want to go out, join the frantic dance of shadows?

All around, towering high above an unstable ground made up of millenia of fungal humus, is the canopy. They think it has reached its maximal height. Some more fertile spots in the jungle may grow of a few inches every other year, but most of it, and certainly the valleys furrowed by the Canopy express, has been left stagnant for well over a century, its melancholic fungal growths lunging to the sky in vain, like eager, tired hands praying to a deity long gone.

https://youtu.be/iyqKy5P1Y0Q