Voice

The people walked along the street of tarnished metal and little used walkways. The walkways broke too much, didn’t get fixed. They messed with the cycle. The people were absolutely silent, the cycle had begun. A bird cawed above their heads, none looked up. Birds were common now. Ever since that had begun there have been more and more. All they ever did was caw. The ones that you needed to be careful about were the silent ones, the ones that open their mouths and no sound comes out.

The bird swooped down and landed on a woman’s shoulder. It was a crow, fat from the crumbs left in grocery parking lots and roadways. The crow opened its mouth. Complete silence.

The woman screamed, breaking the silence. Everyone moved away from her. They were all horrified. No one, no one, broke the cycle. No one ever made any noise. Not once the cycle began.

Everyone stopped. The cycle was disrupted. People turned toward each other.

“Its silent.”

“They’re going to get her.”

“Poor lady, what do you think she did to deserve this?”

“Not another one!”

The woman’s eyes grew huge, her mouth opened in disbelief. “Not me, not me! I never did anything! Someone help me!”

Everyone turned away shaking their heads, muttering to themselves. Some ran away, afraid that would happen to them. The unused walkways were clustered with people, trying to finish the cycle as quickly as possible.

No more people, only the women and the crow. A person slinked out of the darkness of an alley way. He was wearing a cloak with its hood drawn up. His feet peaked out of the bottom of the cloak. They were bare. A hand moved out of the cloak. It held a hollow tube with a clear chamber on the bottom. Little ridges decorated the outside.

The women fell to the ground. The crow remained perched calmly. She, however, was terrified. As the man approached her mouth opened against her will and out of it, in her voice, the man said, “Your voice belongs to us now.”

And with that the man lifted the tube and inserted it into her open mouth. A multi-tone blue liquid that shone and sparkled rolled down the tube and into the clear chamber. The man removed the tube.
The woman attempted to shout at him, call for help, but no sound came out. The woman fainted. The crow flew away. People walked out of buildings, walking around the woman like she was a rock in a river.

The cycle had begun again.