Silence Falls

At first, Dr. McCarter was predicting the insane avenging patients that were once ordinary folks to come erupting through his office door built above the underground facility he managed, but never in his wildest dreams did he ever visualized seeing Bert here again...especially not with a gun in his hands directed at his chest. Nevertheless, that wasn't going to stall him from concluding his current phone call to the church counsels in Silence Falls. He just had to warn them of the uprising taking place between patients and staff members below his very feet! Clutching the handset from his phone desk to his ear, he barked out. “SIN IS RAMPAGING, COUNSELOR! I REPEAT, THE SINS ARE RAMPAGING AMONG US AS W-”

BAM!

The phone was blasted on his desk, small pieces shattering forward against his best suit, electricity crackling before expiring. The doctor peered up at the gun man who was responsible for wrecking his only transmission to the outside world. Descending the handset to his desk, he tidied his suit and faced his trespasser.

“Afternoon, Dr. McCarter. Nice weather we're having up here, isn't it?” Bert asked reservedly, his finger ready on the trigger on his handgun, reliable and accurate. He stared as the doctor raised both of his hands up , his face that had formerly been filled with horror was now glowering down at who was once very dear to him.

“Are you gonna shoot me? Is that it? You think shooting me is the answer to all of this, boy?” Dr.
McCarter grilled, but only earned a barren stare in return from Bert. Progressing on with his new duty to persuade him to rethink murdering him, Dr. McCarter swapped his tone to a low tamed one. “Executing me isn't going to solve anything, you do know that right? Executing me would only add to the weight you continue to burden upon your shoulders with your unrelenting reprehensible choices. You didn't have to end up down there in the first place for all those years, Bert You CHOSE to go down there. You CHOSE sin. 'Sin-”

“I know. 'Sin Brings Forth the Devil.' I remember the adage.” Bert chanted tightly, finishing the devout town's beloved statement. He declined to lower his gun's aim from the older man's chest despite the fact that this was their first showdown in years and it had yet to expand into an feud. No, no one was hollering or cautioning yet, but that didn’t mean Bert didn't want to shoot him. He just wanted to hear what he had to say for himself first.

“Then you know what you're doing is a foolish mistake!” The doctor exclaimed in criticism, shaking his fists at Bert who again merely stared right back at him. It was evident in the young man's eyes that this wasn't a foolish mistake for him on his part. Sighing heavily in defeat, and feeling like the worst failure in the church, McCarter didn't know how else he could atone for the sin of his child. He'd done everything he could! His family did everything they could, but nothing changed. Everyone still looked down at them and all because of one damned mistake. If he was about to be assassinated now by this young man, McCarter wasn't too sure it wouldn't be that dreadful of a way to go. Sneering at Bert, McCarted snapped at him. “Well, are you going to kill me, you Satan vermin?!”

“No, I don't think I will.” Bert shook his head, bewildering himself that those words that spouted from his mouth rang true. In the blink of an eye he changed his mind. He didn't care to waste a bullet on this man. He didn't deserve one. “I just can't believe you're the same man who raised me.”

“And I can't believe you became the disaster you are today. Where did I go wrong with you Robert?!” McCarter roared, glimpsing at the updated picture on his desk of his happy family with one missing member. Planted right behind that very picture was an aged one that held the only remaining photograph of Bert this town hadn't torched. Abruptly, the hairs on the back of his neck stood up, hindering him from old memories linked to his broken family. Lifting his head, he glanced at his son only to discover something behind him that terrified him so badly he knocked himself back into the shelf behind himself in a frightened stumble and screeched out in terror. Behind Bert stood the devil himself in the flesh! A blackened demonic form, sharp dangerous talons at the end of each finger, piercing yellow red eyes, sharp white fangs, outstretched wings made of human skin...

Bert sprang back at his father's unforeseen and daunting exhibit of horror, and crashed into someone behind him. Rotating around to see who or what it could be, Bert came face to face with the alluring familiar face belonging to Hermanni.

“Bert. Leave. Now?” Hermanni attempted to say, neglecting the frenzied gestures of a petrified Dr.McCarter signifying at him.

“Shit, you're right, man. What the fuck am I doing?” Bert shook his head, no longer recalling what enforced him to scout his father out instead of escaping with the rest of his friends who were probably long gone by now. “I-I'm sorry, I guess I got caught up with some personal stuff. Let's get out of this place, yeah? There's nothing for us here.” Hermanni nodded as Bert turned to his cowering father to give him his final parting. He didn't have time to question what had frightened him so all of a sudden. Nor should he care. His father flung him down here and sat above his cell living a free life he swiped from his own son. He could rot in hell for all he cared. “Goodbye, Doctor. I really hope I don't see you, or your god anytime soon.”

As Bert turned around to withdraw, Hermanni smiled at the Doctor, his face briefly morphing into a demonic face again, causing the Doctor to shriek for his life before transforming his face back into his seductive human features again. Hermanni grinned and left the Doctor screeching as appalling unholy visions disturbed his mind for the next couple of hours.

“CAN WE GO NOW!?” Bam lamented, not understanding why they were sitting in an idled vehicle and NOT making their final liberation to freedom. What’s the damn hold up, he seethed in seclusion of his own mind.

“We're not leaving without Bert.” Otep strictly stated, keeping her feet off the gas pedal in interval. She had no idea where their leader had trekked off to, but she was certain he had done so under his own free will and not because someone else had hindered him.

A few seconds passed before Bam unbuckled himself from his seat and reached out to snatch Otep's arm with an impatient shout. “FUCK THIS SHIT! MOVE THE OUTTA THE WAY! I’M DRIVING!”

“FUCK YOU ASSHOLE!” Otep hollered at him as she hurled a punch at him and connected with his collarbone.

Bam tumbled back against Demetria and Alexis, who squealed, with a curse, his face boiling with violent temper as he rose forward to attack her. “YOU FUCKING BITCH!”

“STOP IT, BAM!” Connor apprehended Bam from the back seat by the throat and yanked him down into the spot in between him and Cris to keep him down. “You better calm the fuck down, or I'll rip your goddamn artery out with my bare hands, you hear me?! We’re not leaving here without Bert!”

“Look, it's Bert and...the new dude…” Demitria indicated out with a finger to the two young men rushing towards them, her voice reducing as she assessed the newcomer and murmured to herself. “Who we have yet to be introduced to.”

Reaching to the car, Bert ripped the side door open for Hermanni to clamber in only to see all the seats were taken except for the passenger side beside Otep. “Shit!” Thinking of another spot to wedge him in that wasn’t the trunk, he leaned over to affirm the one he had in mind. Stepping aside to let Hermanni in first, he notified him on where to go. “Okay, try to sit in between our seats on the floor." Shutting the food behind him, Bert shot around to get into the passenger seat and buckle himself in. “Lets go, Otep!”

“Where to, Captain?” Otep requested specifically, her eyes on him.

“Out of this town, for starters.” Bert directed, earning a nod from Otep as she stomped on the gas and lurched the white van down the only dirt road deep within the swamps.

Hermanni sat on the floor with his back to the radio. He had an exceptional prospect of everyone from there, notably the girls sitting up front. Hermanni tilted his head as he considered each of them.

Alexis was the tallest one, but had really dark magnificent brown eyes and full lips. She looked to be a mix between Asian and African American. Demetria was the shortest, and was the image of youthful innocence and everything pure about the world. Natasha was what Hermani would imagine what sexy would be in the eyes of man, but she also had an air of danger and enigma about her. Onika was a whole lot of sass from what Hermmani had spied briefly. She exuded beauty and stability even in the midst of being deathly afraid. Each one of them was gaping at Hermanni through wide eyes as he was examining at them.

Alexis was pondering on how everything around them could be so insane and tumultuous ,and she could still somehow find the time to swoon over this super gorgeous guy at a time like this. Demitria was practically salivating, having only seen one hot guy in her life that affected her this way, and was now seeing the hottest guy she'd ever seen in her life accomplish even more devastation in her! Natasha was fantasying all the many sexual positions she would have put him in if they had met under different circumstances. Onika was dumbfounded to find herself to be attracted to a thin white boy, for she was confident they weren’t her type at all!

While they all lingered on ogling at Hermanni and he extended to assess them, Bert spotted something enormous coming up ahead on the road so rapidly that if they didn’t slow down they’d hit it. “WATCH OUT!” Bert roared, making everyone scream as Otep swerved the van to the left, and decelerated it to a skidding standstill right in front of a line of four looming Hummers.

The passenger’s eyes magnified as they saw a man in bulky bullet-proof armor looking like the military coming out of the first hummer in thick black sunglasses. In his arm he cradled an AK-47, nothing like the small handguns the kids had acquired from one of the patient’s rooms in the facility manufactured on the surface.

“T-Those are big guns, you guys.” Cris sputtered, indicating the hulking weaponry he toted.

The man came forward and pointed his AK-47 at their windshield with a big pompous smile. “EVERYBODY HUMAN CAN SLOWLY GET OUT OF THE VEHICLE WITH YOUR HANDS UP AND YOUR WEAPONS DOWN IN FRONT OF YOU...EXCEPT FOR THE DEVIL YOU BROUGHT WITH YOU!”