JOURNAL ENTRY #6: HOTEL-LIKE LOBBY

I followed the pantry stairs down and down. Now I’m standing in a wide vaulted area so far underground that I just heard the whoosh of a subway train above me. So much concrete weighs on my head that I can hardly breathe. The electricity down here must be on a NCP back-up system, since the low-wattage lights on the walls are still working.

The only way I can describe this place is to say that it looks like a decrepit hotel lobby, minus the hotel. The sense of sudden desertion is eerie. There’s a plastic cup of Nozz-A-La cola by a DOORCOM screen and abandoned newspapers litter the floor. Suitcases and packages have tumbled from luggage trolleys and now sprawl everywhere.

This must have originally been one of the time-traveling way stations used by the Old People. Those newspaper dispensers selling The Discordian and The Fedic Daily prove it. On the far side of the lobby there is even a kiosk with a sign in its dusty window advertising trips to SEPTEMBER 11, 2001. How sick is that?

I’ve just tried using the DOORCOM terminals, but they’re not online. One is completely dead and the other has an issue with its data connection. I’ll take a quick look around and then I’ll move on to the tunnel.