Time Travel

1

Eagerly, I sat peering out of the train window, I was on my way to meet a friend. The station was magnificent. I was completely mesmerising by the picturesque beauty of the place; stone walls secured the trains and invited passengers to a safe and pleasure able journey. I doubt I will ever be able to recall the beauty of the place , but I am sure I would recognise it even 200 years from now! The light shifted and the glamorous stone glittered, gratifying my observing eye and kept me watching constantly like flowing waters. Slowly, the train pulled out of the station, I kept my eyes steady on the grand building for as long as possible in hopes the stunning architecture would preserve itself in my memory. After a while we stopped. Something was happening.

But what?

Lightening permeated the dense grey clouds. It flashed hot and bright- so blinding that the sky, for an instant, became a single sheet of white. A low rumble of thunder echoed and then nothing. Silence. The thick blanket of nimbostratus cloud that threatened to release floods of water down on us had vanished as though it was never there. Everyone cautiously emerged from the train. At first, I thought we had landed in some abandoned wasteland; the area was ancient and in despair. Large stone walls engaged a few acres of land, they were permanently decayed from years of exposures the cruel elements, and though the air had long been dry, it was clear the walls had stood long enough to have been encountered with the weathering effects of rain. The wall seemed to have been carefully crafted to form its solid structure and though it was worn, it was clear there was no way of breaking it down.

Despite this place being seemingly deserted, many people were sitting around in rags. Trapped in the walls careful grip. Although they were in plain sight, they were almost too unimportant to notice. Although they were talking, not at all quietly, my brain didn't seem to want to allow me to notice the unpleasant pain in their voices. A man, tall and extremely thin, walked over to us.

'Welcome,' he said, 'to the Station!'

'Station?' I repeated. He then went on to describe how this used to be a train station, built around 250 years ago. The same station, it appeared, we had just left. I then asked him what year we might happen to be in.

'The year is 2221!' The man exclaimed. The other train passengers and I looked at each other with obvious concern. What had happened to this place? These people were confined to the walls of the Station for their safety as the outside world was too dangerous to risk inhabiting. While everyone else began discussing a possible way of getting back, I allowed a wave of despair to sweep over me before dropping the my feet, branding the ground beneath me.

Meanwhile, the other hundreds of people were hunched over their small space of land, communicating amongst themselves. Is this the world I would have to force myself to become a part of?