agentblack

Robert led Julia around the little world he'd tracked out during his morning walks.

They started by heading down to the beach. As they trudged towards it through the tussocky grass that headed the dunes, Robert could sense her begin to prance a little as she stepped, an unconcious eagerness spilling from her. She was dressed like him, in salvaged clothes with the faint charity shop smell.

Whilst he wore dark cotton trousers and a old team t shirt under his gently unravelling jumper, she had washed out and illfitting jeans and a faded flannel shirt.

When they crested the last dune she gasped at the sight of the sea. Robert wondered if he had done anything like that when he had seen it for the first time. He was disapointed at the idea he might not have.

They made their way along the beach, following it around the edge of the spit of land that Robert had found himself on some weeks earlier.

As far as Robert could make out, the land he criss crossed each morning was a spit of sandy fixed in place to the coastline by grass and birch trees, a rough tongue of land lolling out into the sea, partitioned off at the mainland end by a ranks of chain link fences and cameras.

The two of them stopped there for a while, staring through the grey meshes.

On the other side, a large building loomed, that looked black in the distance. It had the look of a bunker, something military and fortified about it in it's flat concrete surfaces and hunkered down posture.

"I don't like the look of it. It looks sinister." Julia said, lacing her fingers through the fence as she spoke.

Robert nodded.
"I know what you mean."
"So how do you deal with it?"

Robert shrugged, turning away from the edifice beyond the fences.
"I don't think about it. I can't change it being there."

Julia seemed satisfied with the answer, but seemed anxious as they walked along the fence.
Robert felt as though he'd made a mistake, showing Julia the bunker/fort/hospital.
He'd only seen it a few days after he's spoken to Doctor Hesperius, and had a better idea of where he was. He felt as though he'd spoilt things for her.

Trying to lighten the mood, Robert smiled and gave Julia a nudge, changing direction away from the fence, to thread a path through a patch of gorse bushes.
"Come with me."

Ten minutes later, Robert lead Julia down to a opening amongst the gorse and sporadic birch trees. A hamlet, like the one they had left earlier that afternoon; but separate and clearly deserted.

Instead of the village round space in the middle of a semi circle of house, this hamlet appeared like a parenthesis, gaping open at one end to admit a neat gravel path that looped back open itself to feed back the way it came.
Otherwise it was just the same, open to the sky and light and neat and spacious.

Picking up on the emptiness of the place for the first time, Robert worried about having brought Julia here, worried that it would seem creepy after seeing the fence so soon. When he had stumbled across it, it had seemed magical, like some fairy tale castle. Like some magic word would bring the inhabitant s into view and life, and that they would carry on their lives as if they'ed never been away.

Looking round at Julia, he saw he didn't have to be worried.
"It's like our little village!"
"Yeah"
"Does anyone live here?"

Julia was trying to peer in through the windows, buit some instinct of politeness kept her back.

Robert shook his head.
"Nah, not yet anyway. I think these are here in case more people come."
"Yeah?"
Julia looked back at him from one of the windows. Finding out that there was no one inside to disturb had made her less nervous, and she had her nose back against the glass when she spoke again.
"How come you know so much?"

"What, about here?"
"Yeah."

Julia turned round to face him, her face serious, a little suspicious or betrayed. Robert felt nervous. He'd been on his on a long time, not counting Maria's occasional visits. He wanted her to like him.

"Well, I've been here a couple of weeks, I sort've picked stuff up. But, I don't remember stuff, from, y'know..." Robert felt unaccountably embarrassed.
"...Before." He finished lamely.

Julia nodded, her face clearing.
"Me too. So what is this place?"

"I'm not sure." Robert turned to walk back to the hamlet - Julia had called it a village - he thought. She followed alongside him, hand in her pockets.
"I only know what I've been able to pick up from Doctor Hesperius."
Julia's face brightened. She turned and smacked him lightly on the arm.
"Maria mentioned him!"

"Yeah, you'll talk to him yourself soon enough."
"Yeah, Maria said... What's he like?"