Day 7 – The Siren

It came just after midnight.
A faint whine at first, like the wind through the chimney, then it rose and fell in slow waves. A siren.

Not the high, sharp kind from ambulances, but the deep one. Official. Something from before.
For a few seconds I thought I’d imagined it. Then it came again, longer this time, echoing off the wet buildings.

I sat up on the floor in the locked office, listening.
Rain was still coming through the ceiling, dripping steady into the buckets in the bar area. The sound of the water made it harder to tell where the siren came from. It felt close one moment, miles away the next.

I didn’t move. Didn’t even breathe properly.
If it was soldiers, they’d cleared out weeks ago. If it wasn’t them, then who still has a siren?

After a minute it faded into the rain. The kind of fading that feels final.
I waited another hour before I dared lie back down. Every time I closed my eyes I could still hear it, soft, behind my thoughts.

Keith