Sensors

Propellant cylinders. The warning signs are in Mircean.

Thin plates of metal buckle and wurble with the wind.

Pack of cigarettes.

Upside down, message forgotten.

PORTOFIRO CENTRAL <--> SHRINE TO THE DEATHLESS HEROES

Upstairs is where they keep the good stuff.

Garments drying, from smallest to largest. A family hung in order.

Satisfyingly geometric, carved deep.

Amid the chaos and disrepair, the ghost of what this room used to look like emerges for a moment:

A lone housefly buzzes in the fridge, ecstatically trapped.

Scrap silk, salvaged from the ruins of Essilk #3.

Masonry shifts beneath your feet.

Animal footprints in the sandy soil.

Like the stem of a wilting tulip, the girder bends towards the pit.

'ACCESO SOLO PERSONAL AUTORIZADO.'

Heavy-duty chemical signatures. Not for partying.

Dishes. Recently washed.

'EMPLOYEES ONLY: DO NOT ENTER'

Scattered star stickers, edges curled, cling to the EXIT sign.

Wine sediment clings to the bottom. Reminds you of dry blood.

An old ladder. Caked in dried bird shit.

The lights flicker weakly from time to time.

The handset appears to have been ripped straight out of this payphone.

The smell of ink hangs in the air, with an undertone of sewage.

A tiny, iridescent crustacean skitters out from under a rock.

Water gurgles beneath.

Your flashlight beam pans across a series of steel shelves on floor rails. Some aisles sit half open.

Stopping abruptly by the Honour book stall, your double HOLOCENE opens the duffel bag he has been carrying with him and begins depositing…

Clumps of wet hair crowd around the drain.

Beneath the shelves, rails run parallel -- part of a mobile racking system.

Water through a pipe, four levels down. Human activity.

Doors crowd you, stacked upon each other. Behind one of them -- your former asset, ESTOC, draped in a see-through cloak.

Incense. The smell reminds you of your childhood in Mircea.

The planks are well worn.

Small white flowers have opened up at the touch of a sunbeam, tight buds unfurling. Pale, fragile things.

The sounds of plates clattering call to mind the first time you met Eszti. She's waiting for you in the corner of a restaurant occupying…

A sticky note reminds him to pay the cleaners.

Light glints off shards of broken glass.

Soft coos echo through the pipes; pigeons are nesting inside.

Fare evasion has worn these bars out.

Cobblestones shift under your heel.

Paper pasted over paper over paper over paper.

The strange noise is coming from here.

In the dimness beyond the pane, a small, simian face.

Orders to purge records 'by end of day.'

An array of electronics watches over you.

A residual smell: burned paper, melted plastic.

A line of reflective scarlet catches the light within the box.

All his worldly possessions, protected by rubble.

Nothing can be seen through the opaque glass of that narrow window, but you know exactly what's on the other side: a cramped, dirty…