When Salin was thrown out of the van, the world was still spinning a bit. His legs barely held him up, but he didn't fall. The ground was raw concrete, uneven, and the air around him felt like it stuck to his lungs.
He tried to breathe slowly. Tried to stay upright, but rough hands grabbed him by the arms and dragged him down a damp hallway, with water dripping from the stained ceiling. The men's footsteps echoed. The lighting was weak, fluorescent, flickering in spots like everything could plunge into darkness at any second.
The strangest thing was the contrast.
Just ahead, the dark hallway opened into a bright, freshly painted room. A hospital? Yeah. Or at least a grotesque copy of one. The walls were too white, the floor too clean, everything reeking of fresh paint. But there was no soul there. No sound of life, no nurses, no patients, no signs of real use. It was a stage.
Salin squinted, forcing his vision to focus.
