Station, стр. 6
Mid-step Hadder froze, then sat down, unsure thatwhat he had just felt was real or only a malicious phantom of hisown conjuring. He held perfectly still.
There! This time he was sure of it. A gentle breezecaressed Hadder's cheek like a Thai kiss. On he went, emboldenedand stooped in a half-walk, half-crawl like some crazedcalisthenics exercise. Excited by the promise of the same light hehad cursed earlier, Hadder almost ran headfirst into the cave wall,putting out his left hand just in time to save himself theindignity of leaving a bloody faceprint on the rock.
The cave doglegged hard to the right, so Hadder kepthis hand attached to the wall, sliding it along as he was herdedinto an almost 90-degree curve.
Coming out of the turn, Hadder was immediatelyflooded with relief that only accompanies a life that narrowlydodged a turn for the absolute worse. There, maybe one hundredyards away, was the faint opening of the cave. It must have beennight out, with minimal light filtering in, but Hadder's pinholepupils picked it up immediately, giving him renewed purpose andspeeding his crawl-walk into a crawl-run.
Hadder slowed as he approached the cave mouth. Dryvegetation cascaded down from above the cavern, obstructing theview of the outside.
Some thoughts bubbled up before Hadder snaked hisway through the dry creepers. It was midday when he submitted hisfate to the long-dead Lincoln. How long had he been stumbling alongin that cave? Did he pass out at some point, unable to determineunconsciousness in the lightless tunnel? And most troublesome –although he was by no means an expert in the topography of theregion, Hadder didn't recall it being a hotbed of dry cave systems.In which case, where the hell was he?
While these questions were both perplexing andworrisome, next to the fears of suffocation, falling from an unseenheight, and becoming permanently lost in the perpetual darkness ofan unknown cave, he shook these concerns off reasonablyquickly.
Mustering his courage, Hadder clapped his handstogether and plowed forward through the parched plants. A stiffbreeze, barely perceptible inside the cavern, blew back his hair ashe stepped out from the protection of the earth, his feet slippingfrom the hard rock onto soft sand.
Hadder looked out at the landscape and had to remindhimself to breathe as he stared into the barren face of anuninviting desert that spread out in all directions, disappearinginto the horizon.
Dumbfounded, Hadder shuffled ahead and slid down asmall hillock that rose up to greet the cave opening. Reaching thebottom, he noted that the ground was not soft and giving, butrather hard-baked dirt, void of foliage, with a thin layer of sandatop it, like the boardwalk leading down to a busy beach. The windwhipped around him, creating small sand devils that swept up deadweeds and sent them on cyclone carnival rides, depositing themdozens of feet away. The twisters seemed appropriate sentinels,warning Hadder not to continue on this path, but unaware that thiswas the only option available to him.
Hadder's eyes rose, and he was awestruck by theclarity and size of the moon in this wasteland. Never before had heseen it play such a role in the night sky, as if he were viewing itfrom another, much closer world. He felt unsubstantial standingunder its gaze, fighting the urge to prostrate himself before thegreat satellite.
Dark, wispy clouds cruised across the sky.Occasionally, lightning streaked between clouds, connecting themmomentarily by a leash of electricity, brightening the desolateworld in a flash before fading away in surrender to the night.
The air was crisp and dry, with a clean, pleasantsmell indicative of areas not yet tarred by man. With open sand allaround, Hadder had no idea which way to travel. Only dark shadowcould be perceived in three directions, with the hill-cavedominating the fourth view. Lighting continued to shriek across thesky, shining a spotlight on various areas at a time. One boltilluminated the skeletal remains of a dead tree far ahead. A secondraged behind the hillock, and Hadder looked back to discover thatthe hill continued to rise far above the cave entrance. A thirdstruck in the distance to Hadder's left, lifting the veil along thehorizon.
And it was there that Hadder found it, backlit bystartling light and submerged in shadow. But he saw it clearly,like catching eyes with a good friend in a crowded room. It lookedback with the beckoning call of an old habit that promised one moregood time while bringing nothing but pain. But Hadder had nowhereelse to go. And was fucking curious. And needed answers.
He marched towards the city in the distance, hopefulthat it was more dream than nightmare, more heaven than hell.
When judging distances, most people quickly learnthat they don't know shit about it. Hadder was no different. Hewalked and walked; footprints instantly erased by the secretivewinds. His form created an array of shadows, long and short inevery direction, the show above painting the canvas below with darkand light.
As he walked, Hadder's mind was blank, strippedclean of both thought and emotion from the trials of the pastyears. Electronic soundtracks echoed in his head, playing offwind-sound and emptiness. He strode with purpose, eyes focusedsolely on the city before him, getting slightly more substantial bythe step, slightly less invisible, slightly more real.
After what could have been an hour, the details ofHadder's destination began to fall into focus. At least, onesignificant feature became clear – the wall.
The place was fucking walled in.
Still too removed to approximate the actual heightof the enclosure, Hadder was close enough to decide that two wordscould be used to adequately describe it - vast and imposing. Butwas it to keep the desert out, or something else in?
As he continued, Hadder noticed a significantbrightening of his desert surroundings. He looked up, expecting tosee the moon receding in fear of the incoming sun. But there themoon still sat, arrogant in its