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⁰⁸ GONE UNDER
❝ Of their minds at fault. Of their hearts in ruin. ❞
―Jesse Marchant, 7 & The Fall
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SILENCE USED TO BE ALL BUT FORSAKEN. They had moved away from the radical monstrosity cities had become into the countryside so the age of bluster could be forgotten. So the grinding and trilling of machines and people would abide far — miles from their crashes and judgemental eyes and whispers. Humans had crossed silence to avoid the truthful noises of their minds, to be heard across the world that had become a gray vegetation of anxiety and secrets.
Secrets survived not long back then, never more than moments now. The betrayed silence had made its return in a tragicomical fashion. Without it, they could not prevail, counting every breath and quietening their steps for one more.
Now, they had to shut their mouths and make peace with the haunting voices. Growing up surrounded by wheat fields and no more people to count than the fingers of a hand, it came easy to Harlene, unlike Landon, who had shunned his childhood home.
She loved the sounds of laughter, however. The chatter of her family. Silence, she could live with; joy, she would think to be God-given.
The morning furor echoed across the hall that led to the mess hall. From meters away, the ruckus pounded on her head, awakened after falling from the sofas of the rec room. Her wrist had swollen by daylight and ached as she washed her face — she assumed it was dawn due to the unrest. Being underground clogged all the implications of time.
It felt suffocating when hungover.
To think of another tragicomical manner, she looked not much different than a prowler with how her feet trudged. Her hair had frizzed from a hasty drag with a plastic brush. Wrinkles tattered around her tightly shut eyes, complaining about the fluorescents. The laughter ached her ears, maybe, but it uplifted her heart and allowed a breath of relief.
It had not been a dream, for better or worse. CDC was their haven. Whatever wretched things to come, they would come from within these walls beneath the surface, away from the undead. And Harlene believed she could deal with those problems — with words and without bullets.
