Disclaimer: this is a work of fiction. It is a draft; there are mistakes, many misspellings and sometimes long periods of no updates. copyright: ion fyr 2025
Unlike the doors in Londbridge, which in Nila’s flat had been a kind of pocket door, sliding into the wall so as to not take up space, the door to which Philoctetes led Pool opened like a proper door: into the room.
The building itself was respectably old, thought Pool, at least as old as him. He was informed by his robot companion that the building had stood since at least the early 20th century, by Pool’s reckoning. It looked it.
It had been constructed of a sort of compacted aggregate blocks, cemented together and thickly painted so many times that the peels produced a muted iridescent affect, like melting wax-[crayons], or varied-color candles in the sun.
It was apparent to Pool that the door itself was positively ancient; there were slats, the downward tilted kind, embedded in the panels–it was hardly secure–a thief of murderer could kick his way in–but the intent was to let in a less murderous airflow, an airflow that would have been of utmost importance in the climate of the place.
Airflow was not as necessary in this day and age (though Pool always appreciated a pleasant breeze, especially one off the sea, to the soulless and scentless imposter wind that blew without variation or origin from grilled orifaces in all of the walls of this dying age.
Perhaps to ameliorate the false winds, the slats of the door had stapled over them a clear plastic membrane, cut in places, as if it had been in a mild fight, but mostly intact.
Even the entrance to the “hostel”, a kind of flop house, Pool guessed, had (more fresh) wrapping. The effect was to keep in the cool and clean air of the interior, and exclude the noxious and nauseatingly crocodilian breath of the city beyond.
The room was a simple affair, not different much from Nila’s flat in Londbridge, though certainly ancient in comparison. It was much more to Pool’s taste and preferences. It seemed real to him. The bedding, the frame of the window, the frayed and worn carpet, they were all familiar sights. The musty odors, and pealing paint made him feel even at home.
A watercloset had been retrofitted; a pair of bare pipes, dabbed with paint from a half dozen layers ago, rose from the lid of the closet, a full meter below the actual final ceiling of the room.
The hub of a missing ceiling fan, probably as old as the room itself, was still mounted, wings clipped, in the center, looming over a bed.
A single window opposite the door looked out at the haze and the bare concrete of some indeterminate structure.
Ion Fyr 