34. Memories of Gold
Isaac collapsed onto the train seat as a wave of exhaustion crashed over him. Thankfully there was no one else on the train, so he allowed himself to fully relax into the plastic seat. He suspected he probably looked ridiculous, but no one was watching, so it didn’t really matter.
The rocking of the train, such a familiar sensation by now, was easy to get lost in. He allowed his eyelids to fall shut, and he sank into that half state of consciousness where the surroundings blurred into white noise and old memories rose in smoky clouds.
—
When he woke up, the first thing he registered was a persistent throbbing in his head. Even though his eyelids were closed shut, he could tell something bright was directly above him, which didn’t help at all with the headache. He squeezed his eyes shut tighter in a feeble attempt to block the light out, which was about as ineffective as he’d expected.
His entire body felt sluggish, heavy, and distant, and his brain was still in the process of waking. He vaguely remembered exiting the subway station into some weird field. He hadn’t known Chrowall City had patches of unoccupied land that big.
Isaac furrowed his brow. No, that hadn’t been it. He could distinctly recall golden lights rising from the earth, too large and too plentiful to be mistaken for fireflies. He’d collapsed onto the ground, he remembered, after stumbling out of the gold line train.
Oh God, the train. How many transfers had he made? The memories were hazy, a blur of opening and closing doors and the rolling screech of the rails. There hadn’t been any rhyme or reason to his travel decisions; they’d been entirely random and thus impossible to retrace.
No, he needed to rewind. Why the hell had he been wandering around the subway stations in the first place? He’d started on the streets, he knew that much, dragging himself aimlessly over cracked concrete at the edge of the road. He’d gone out of his way to avoid people, but before that, he hadn’t been alone. He remembered yelling, the deep red hue of the sky, the hoarseness in his own throat, and the screeching of tires before—
Isaac’s eyes shot open and he jerked upright. He whipped his head around frantically as everything came back to him in a rush.
Heaven, he’d thought before he’d fallen unconscious. No, this was no afterlife. Someone had brought him here. Isaac narrowed his eyes, taking in his surroundings with a quick, sharp gaze.
His eyes traced over the ornate wallpaper, the shelves stuffed full with odd contraptions that he’d never seen before. Overhead, thick curtains draped across the ceiling, resulting in the whole space feeling cramped and confined. A swinging chandelier hung right above him, the source of that bright light from when he’d woken up, and when Isaac looked down, he saw that he was lying on some sort of vintage couch. His fingers easily sunk into the soft cushions, which were decorated with an elaborate floral pattern. Isaac squeezed his hands into a fist, then released them, then did it again. He certainly felt solid.
This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.
Isaac narrowed his eyes and looked around again. He couldn’t see anyone else in the room, but there had to be someone around. He furrowed his brow, recalling the foggy image of a woman standing over him. She’d been wearing a strange dress, one that looked all too fitting with the room’s furnishings. She must be the owner of this place.
“Oh, you’re up!”
Isaac jerked, nearly falling off the couch in the process of flinging himself as far away from the voice as he could. There behind him stood a woman who he knew for a fact hadn’t been there a second ago.
It was immediately clear that she was the woman in his memory. Up close, her monochrome dress looked even more absurd, with its layers and layers of ruffles and the cursed combination of every kind of drape imaginable. He hadn’t noticed her eyes before in his state of half consciousness, but now, he saw that they, like her hair, were a clear, bright gold hue that couldn’t possibly be natural.
She was smiling at Isaac, but he couldn’t discern anything from her body language. His muscles tensed, wary. There was too much ease in the way she carried herself, an amount that he’d only ever seen in people who were either scarily good actors or dangerous enough to not have to fear anything.
He clenched his fist and kept his gaze steady. “Who the fuck are you?” His voice came out hoarse and raspy, but he continued without pausing. “Where the hell am I?”
The woman just kept on smiling like some kind of creepy doll. “My, you’re rather rude, aren’t you? Don’t you know you’re supposed to introduce yourself first? Tsk Tsk.” She shook her head in exaggerated disapproval.
Isaac’s eyes narrowed. “Just answer the fucking question.”
The woman laughed, the sound light and clear. It sent chills down his spine. The stranger looked amused. “Well, if you’re so insistent,” she said. She pointed at herself. “I’m Lilith. And this—“
She turned away and stepped over to a section of the wall obscured by a particularly low curtain, her shoes making light clicking noises with each step. She pushed the fabric aside, revealing a large glass window that was so transparent it was nearly invisible. Isaac’s eyes widened. Beyond the glass, he could see the flowery hills and the golden lights, now perfectly crisp, clear, and undeniably real.
“This,” Lilith said, smiling, “is the Underside.”
—
The lurch of the train jolted Isaac awake as it pulled up to the station. He sighed and rubbed his eyes.
It was with great effort that he stood up, moving as slow as possible and taking the extra time to stretch his limbs. He yawned. The doors always stayed open absurdly long anyway.
Isaac turned and grabbed the tablet that he’d left sitting on the seat beside him. The words, [CURRENT LOCATION: THE GOLDEN LANDS] were scrawled across the screen in flowery golden text. It figured that Lilith would take the time to make sure this realm specifically had its own custom font.
For a moment Isaac just stared down at the device, but nothing strange happened. His vision remained clear, and the words on the screen were perfectly normal. Shaking his head, he turned the screen off and glanced outside through the open train doors.
Of all the realms in the Underside, the Golden Lands were the most constant. The rolling hills of flowers looked exactly the same as they had all those years ago when he’d first arrived—perfectly frozen in time.
From where he was sitting, he could make out the distant silhouette of Lilith’s house, a dark splotch that stuck out starkly against its golden surroundings. It was the only building in the entire realm, occupied by the only resident of the realm.
Isaac heard a single beep signaling that the doors were about to close. With a final sweep of his surroundings, Isaac slid the tablet under his arm and stepped off the train.