Chapter 5: If We Must Die, Let It Be Loud
If We Must Die, Let It Be Loud
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It rained the next morning.
Not a soft, washing rain.
A bitter, oily drizzle that stung the skin and reeked of chemicals. The kind of rain that carried ash from burnt zones, blood from overflows, and the filth of a world that had forgotten mercy.
Rael didn't flinch.
He stood at the edge of the tunnel mouth, watching the checkpoint just 400 meters away. Two guards. A surveillance post. A drone on auto-patrol.
Dust stood beside him, arms crossed, wrapped in patched black rags.
"You sure you want to do this?" he asked.
Rael's jaw tightened.
"They want us to die quiet," he said. "Let's ruin that plan."
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The plan was simple.
They would not attack the main gates. They would not go in screaming with knives and fire like savages.
They would tell a story.
They would make a scene so unforgettable, the world above would be forced to ask: What the hell is happening below us?
Rael wasn't interested in survival anymore.
He was interested in witnesses.
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They chose Zone 7A.
A border district filled with broken buildings, corporate warehouses, and the husks of apartment towers that still held corpses from years ago.
The guards didn't patrol deep inside — the stench was too heavy. The memories too loud.
Rael wanted it that way.
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They took three days to prepare.
The others watched him closely now — especially the ones who had seen what happened to the soldier in the last tunnel.
Rael wasn't just a survivor anymore.
He was becoming something else.
Something that carried weight in his voice.
Even the older boys who used to laugh at Dust now listened when Rael spoke.
Not because he smiled.
But because he didn't.
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They gathered scraps — wires, oil drums, broken speakers, food wrappers, and scraps of metal from torn fences.
But Rael gathered something else.
Memories.
He walked the tunnels again, listening. Not with ears — but with pain.
Each wall, each room, each abandoned corner held echoes.
Screams trapped in stone.
Fear buried in floors.
Eyes that once blinked their last breath.
He touched them.
Felt them.
And then, for the first time, he tried to shape them.
Not just replay them.
Control them.
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On the fourth night, they struck.
Rael walked alone into the checkpoint's blindspot, through the back entrance of a collapsed pharmacy.
He placed a cracked speaker on the broken windowsill.
He didn't plug it in.
He didn't have to.
His power had grown past illusion.
Now, it could broadcast pain.
The speaker crackled to life.
And then it screamed.
Not static.
A child's scream.
Then another.
And another.
A chorus of real screams, echoing from memories Rael had stolen from the walls.
The sound vibrated across the alley like a weapon.
The guards heard it.
They moved to investigate.
The first stepped into the alley.
And Rael was waiting.
He didn't lift a finger.
He only thought.
And the walls responded.
They twisted.
Melted.
Images appeared — children hanging by their wrists, fire swallowing small legs, soldiers laughing while pressing blades against skin.
The guard screamed.
He turned to run.
But behind him, the alley had changed. It was no longer bricks and graffiti.
It was a tunnel — a sewer — a room where dozens of eyes stared back at him.
Eyes that belonged to the dead.
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Rael's phantom field had expanded.
Now, he didn't need touch.
He only needed anger.
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By the time Dust and the others arrived, the guards were already down.
One had gone mad, muttering "they're in the walls" while punching his own face.
The other had turned his rifle on himself.
Blood splattered the checkpoint.
But Rael didn't flinch.
Dust looked at him. "This wasn't just fear."
Rael nodded. "This was a message."
---
They left one body hanging from the watchtower.
Not torn.
Not gutted.
Just suspended, arms wide, with the word LISTEN burned into his uniform with acid.
Above it, they hung the tattered shirt of one of the dead girls.
Not to be cruel.
To be clear.
---
The next day, the Capitol saw the footage.
The media ignored it, of course.
They called it a "malfunction" in the system.
But the public… noticed.
Rumors started spreading.
A ghost in the tunnels.
A rebellion of children.
Some said the walls cried at night.
Some said the screams could be heard in dreams.
---
Rael sat alone, near the drain pipe where the dead girl had been found.
Dust approached quietly.
"You know they'll come harder now," he said. "They'll send hunters. Kill squads. Not just soldiers."
Rael didn't look up.
"Let them come."
Dust sat beside him.
"You're not scared?"
Rael paused.
"I'm scared of forgetting her face more than I'm scared of dying."
Dust didn't speak for a while.
Then he said:
"There's a story… about a city that once tried this."
Rael looked at him.
"They called themselves The Unseen. Slum kids who tried to fight back. Thirteen years ago. Created illusions. Psychological warfare."
"They were wiped out in two weeks."
Rael didn't blink.
"They didn't have me."
---
Somewhere far above, an elite dinner was held.
The guests laughed over sparkling drinks.
A general raised a glass.
"To the purge."
Someone asked about the rumors of ghosts in the slums.
The general chuckled.
"Ghosts don't kill soldiers."
Another voice whispered: "No. But maybe the dead finally found someone who can speak for them."
---
And down below, Rael stood facing the dark wall again.
This time, he didn't call memories.
He projected one.
A memory that hadn't happened yet.
A vision.
Of fire.
Of collapsing towers.
Of soldiers screaming.
Of people above crying as the world looked back at them.
Rael whispered to the wall:
"If we must die… let it be loud enough to wake the gods they stopped believing in."
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