Ash Street old fragment

3AM.

Far from the main road was a narrow, seldom-travelled street. It was one of the oldest intact streets in the city, despite having no noteworthy landmarks. It was lined on both sides with tall, narrow buildings — gothic spires of red brick.

There was an old laundromat. A shady medical clinic. A Chinese take-out restaurant. A church. Some were closed for the night. Others were abandoned.

It was once called Vermilion Street. But now it was named for its new color: Ash. For many years ago, a great fire caked their façades with soot, and a century of dust storms had worn the once red bricks into craggy, ashen stones.

Though all was still, it was not silent, as there was a steady wind from the north making a cavernous hum through hollow alleys, and beneath that, distorted echoes of distant machines.

The last street light burned out some time ago. The yellow halogen bulb had steadily dimmed over the years, until one snowy night, unannounced and observed by no one, it sputtered and faded into nothing. And in the dark the buildings became nameless forms, whose jagged silhouettes jutted from the earth like the broken teeth of some colossal beast.

On Ash Street, only one light remained: Cybil’s Diner. It occupied the corner of a massive, otherwise vacant building near the barricade where the road came to an end. It was an unusual room whose original purpose was uncertain: an oblong corridor in the shape a crooked “L”, with high ceilings. Mismatched lamps at every booth filled the room with soft light. 
 The place was empty, except for one.