The platform beneath her boots was cracked and uneven, a graveyard of weeds breaking through the once-proud stone. Above, the tattered remnants of banners fluttered like dying birds in the restless evening wind.
The man stood motionless, a still point in the shifting landscape, watching her with a gaze that measured more than it revealed. He said nothing more after his first question, offering no explanations, no comfort.
Elara didn't expect any.
The world had emptied itself of easy kindnesses long ago.
Still, something unspoken passed between them — a current, faint but undeniable, like the first tremor before a storm.
"You were waiting for it too," she said at last, breaking the silence. Her voice sounded foreign to her own ears, roughened by too many months of speaking to no one but herself.
He gave a slight nod. Beneath the brim of his worn hat, his hair was dark, threaded with the first hints of silver. He had the look of someone who had been young once, long ago, and had forgotten how to wear the face of youth.
"The train," he said. "I heard it three nights ago. Thought I imagined it. But tonight..." His voice trailed off. He shook his head. "Maybe it's a trick of the wind. Or maybe..."
Maybe hope.
Neither of them dared say it aloud. In this world, hope was dangerous.
He shifted slightly, the long coat he wore whispering against his boots. She noticed, for the first time, the heavy satchel slung across his chest — military issue, judging by the design — and the faint line of a scar that cut across his jaw like a blade's memory.
A soldier once. Or something worse.
Elara straightened her shoulders, wary but unwilling to show fear. Fear only fed the wolves.
"I'm Elara," she said, her voice steadier now. "Elara Morn."
The man hesitated, as if measuring the wisdom of sharing his name. In the end, he offered it like a reluctant gift.
"Kael," he said. "Kael Corren."
The name felt solid, worn at the edges but still intact, much like the man himself.
A silence fell between them again — not unfriendly, merely cautious. Elara looked past him toward the tracks that stretched into darkness. The rails were twisted in places, swallowed by vines and rubble, but further down, in the untouched zones, they gleamed faintly under the rising stars.
"If a train did come," she said slowly, "where would it go?"
Kael's mouth quirked in something that wasn't quite a smile.
"Nowhere good," he said. "Or everywhere we haven't dared to dream about."
The wind stirred again, bringing with it the faint scent of oil and rust. Elara shivered, not from the cold but from the sensation of standing at the edge of something vast and unknown.
Kael seemed to notice.
"You don't have to stay," he said. His tone was neutral, almost detached, but his eyes told a different story. Eyes that had seen too much loss to bear witnessing one more person walk away.
Elara tightened her grip on the strap of her pack.
"I'm not looking for promises," she said. "Just a direction."
Kael studied her a moment longer. Then, with a slight motion of his head, he turned and gestured toward a patch of shadow at the far end of the platform — a service door half-buried under a fallen beam.
"Come on," he said. "It's not safe to be exposed after dark. If you're serious about finding answers, you'll need to make it through the night first."
Trust was a currency Elara had almost forgotten how to spend. But survival demanded risks, and something deep in her gut — that old, stubborn instinct that had carried her through the worst — whispered that this man was not a mistake.
Or at least, if he was a mistake, he was the kind she was willing to make.
She followed him.
Together, they slipped through the broken door into the bowels of the station, swallowed by darkness, leaving the ruined platform behind.
Somewhere, deep in the hollow bones of the earth, a low hum stirred — not the mournful wail of a ghost train, but something real. Mechanical. Alive.
Elara didn't know if it was salvation or a death sentence.
All she knew was that she was no longer facing it alone.