The metro tunnels gave us safety for one night. But safety, like air, never lasted long.
We emerged from the underground at dawn, thinking the worst had passed. The city above was unrecognizable — ash piled into dunes along streets, cars half-buried, buildings hollowed. The sky itself was pale grey, the sun only a smudge of weak light bleeding through.
We had five of us left now. Myself, the boy, Karis the nurse, two teenagers who rarely spoke, and Harlan, the old mechanic whose hands shook when he held his pistol. We needed food, water, shelter. And perhaps more importantly, we needed to know if anyone else was alive.
That's when we heard it.
At first it was faint — like a choir rehearsing in the distance. A hum, long and low, resonating against the ruined buildings. The boy tugged at my sleeve and whispered: "They're singing."
I didn't want to believe him. But the sound grew louder.
Not a song of words, not even melody. A vibration. Like a thousand voices humming together, tuning the air itself.
And then we saw them.
---
The Hollowed
They stood in the shell of what had once been a church. Faceless, featureless — their heads smooth, their mouths sealed over with pale flesh. Their skin glistened like wax, stretched too tight over frames that bent and twitched.
When they turned toward us, they opened their mouths.
Not mouths, really. Just fissures tearing open their faces, raw and red. And from those fissures poured the sound.
It wasn't just noise. It was disorientation made flesh.
The vibration rattled through bone, scrambled thought. Karis dropped to her knees, clutching her ears. The teenagers began retching, one clawing at his own throat as if he had forgotten how to breathe. My vision spun. The buildings around me swayed. My stomach heaved until bile burned the back of my throat.
The Hollowed advanced slowly, step by broken step, their song thickening into unbearable resonance. Windows shattered around us without touch.
I fired my pistol. The sound of the shot drowned for a heartbeat in their vibration, like a stone vanishing beneath waves. The bullet ripped through one, but it barely staggered. Its head tilted, as if listening more intently.
The boy screamed, "Stop singing!"
And for a moment, impossibly, they did.
---
The Break
Silence fell, sudden and absolute. Even the ash seemed still.
The Hollowed stared at the boy. Their fissured faces quivered. One stepped forward, its feet dragging through soot. The boy shrank back into me, shaking.
Then the sound returned. Louder. Sharper.
Karis collapsed fully, blood trickling from her nose. Harlan fired wildly, bullets sparking against walls, hitting nothing. The teenagers fled down the street. I don't know if I'll ever know what happened to them.
I grabbed the boy and dragged Karis to her feet, half-carrying her, half-dragging her into an alley. My head spun with the song's aftershocks.
Every brick seemed to hum. Every shadow seemed alive.
---
Inside the Church
Later, when the vibration had faded, we dared to look back at the church.
The Hollowed had gathered in rows before the altar. They swayed, bodies quivering like reeds in wind. Their song rose and fell in unison, building into a wave that shook dust from the rafters.
And I understood, with cold horror, what we had stumbled upon.
It wasn't random.
It was worship.
The Hollowed were singing to something. Something unseen, something vast, something that listened through their resonance.
---
Karis's Fear
That night, Karis whispered to me while the boy slept beside us.
"They're not deaf," she said. "They're not blind. They don't need to see. They feel us. Every word, every step, every heartbeat — they feel it in the air."
Her voice shook. "If we speak too loud, if we breathe too hard… they'll come."
I wanted to tell her she was wrong. I wanted to tell her we could still fight. But deep down, I knew she was right.
The Hollowed had made the world itself an enemy. Even silence wasn't safe, because silence was only the pause before the song.
---