The Hollow Below

The wind howled faintly through the cracks in the ceiling—thin veins of sound from the world above, where the storm raged across the broken city. Down below, the tunnels pulsed with the dim, flickering glow of lanterns left behind.

The rebels had abandoned the chamber in haste, their shadows dancing against the curved concrete walls as they slipped deeper into the labyrinth. The air smelled of wet earth and iron. A few papers—maps, coded manifests, and fragments of old data printouts—fluttered on the stone table where they’d once gathered. Wax dripped from a candle still burning, its flame shrinking in the cold draft.

Outside the chamber, Kerrin moved last, glancing back before vanishing into the deeper corridor. The storm above had come suddenly—a furious mix of rain and ash stirred by unseen hands. No one wanted to be near the surface when that kind of weather struck. It wasn’t natural anymore. It was toxic, tainted. The sky had been poisoned long ago by what was left of the old world’s greed.

As they descended, the echoes of thunder grew distant, muffled by layers of earth and steel. In the half-light of their portable lamps, their faces looked pale and spectral.

“We’ll wait it out in the reservoir caverns,” Kerrin said softly, her voice low but steady. “Then we move west.”

West—toward the message Silen had left. The one that promised safety, or at least direction. None of them knew if he was still alive. But his words—“Below lies truth, above lies ruin”—had kept them from giving up.

A few of the younger rebels murmured quietly to each other, clutching the straps of their makeshift packs. They had once been students, coders, medics, all thrown into the same current when the world fractured. Now they were the last embers of what once passed for civilization.

Behind them, the abandoned chamber slowly darkened as the last candle flickered out. The maps on the table rustled one final time before settling into silence. The light was gone, but the resolve remained.

The tunnels swallowed their footsteps, and soon the only sound was the heartbeat of the earth itself—a steady thrum, deep and patient.

Above, lightning split the clouds, illuminating the cracked streets and the outlines of ruined towers. For a brief second, the city looked alive again—like a ghost remembering what it once was.

Then darkness reclaimed it.