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I pull my backpack up onto my back as I walk onto the old land. It's certainly been a while since anyone's been round here to say the least. These settlements look old even by human standards.
There are some modernish things here. A few warning signs installed about 30 years ago advising people not to go this way but that won't stop me. I'm an experienced explorer and I know what I'm doing.
I follow the old tracks, still somehow viable through all the overgrowth and rust coating them. It's amazing to think that society hasn't touched this place considering how close it is to the nearest settlement.
My search doesn't turn much up for the first half of the journey. The only interesting part is the part of the former line has turned into a shallow river meaning I had to walk alongside it, there wasn't enough water to hurt me though I just didn't want to get wet.
I take a brief detour down to where one of the Old mines was located. Only to discover that it's been completely flooded over. So I head back to the main route.
After a quick snack break I find myself at the most notable location, one that has only been partially explored by cephalopod kind. The buildings are surprisingly still there which is an amazement considering that even in the late human era they had been out of use for quite a while and weren't even resorted when the new railway that replaced it extended it's line.
The buildings have a quaint feel to them. The main shed at one point would have held at least four engines, not sure about the one to the side though. I'd check it out but it looks unstable and I don't fancy being crushed by rock.
I'm about to continue my journey when I hear a faint sound in the distance. It sounds like puffing, but that can't be because there are no other active railways nearby.
The sounds grow louder and louder until to my shock the shape of a locomotive appears from around the corner headed straight towards me, shrieking out of its pistons.
I jump onto the nearby station platform and bolt into the remains of the building. I watch from behind the windows the engine rolls past into the distance.
Dusting myself off and trying to process what the shell I just saw I rightfully decide that that's enough exploring for today and start to walk back. I take a slightly different route this time as I really don’t want to run into another one of those things again.
When I get home I immediately head upstairs and grab my laptop to do research. Nothing comes up on any of the major websites so I decide to look on the old internet to see if I can find anything there.
This is a more tough task. I’m not proud to say it but my knowledge of human languages is fairly limited so I have to use the inklish translater thing which isn't always that reliable but it’ll have to do.
I scour the ancient articles until finally I come across something that I can vaguely understand. From what I can tell the old railway used to have a green engine called something along the line of Smuger. He worked on the railway for a number of years but due to a varying amount of incidents the humans had him turned into a generator.
Now the rest of the information is unclear. According to the article nobody knows what happened to him after the railway closed, most just assumed that he was left to rot, others claimed he was moved down to the mines to be used as a pumping engine and died in a mine collapse that sealed the fate of the railway.
Whatever the case it seems to me that even thousands of years after his railway closed and all the other engines that worked there were forgotten to time he still lingers on. Perhaps out of spite, a warning to others or simply because he feels trapped and unable to move on.
Whatever the case is I hope that one day he’s able to find peace and let his spirit be free once again.
However if there’s one thing for sure it’s going to be a good while before I traverse that line again, at least without company anyways.
I guess those signs were there for good reason….