prologue
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This incandescent monitor pulled the eyes of the ardent ignorant. This screen, to them, was never off. In their position, they could not be swayed, or made to stop receiving their programming. It was their current, unwavering focus, and often it seemed only a third party could end it. Not just in our household, but all. Every family comprised of any man, woman and child across this state were given the programming. The minute fragment that rejected it was comprised of those looked down upon, those with intellect dwarfing that of those who dismiss them. And somehow we are not particularly intelligent. We bleed flaw. We tend to see ourselves as normal, surrounded by the muted, their every potential attribute of particularity eroded – their utter lack of any sort of good sense – by the screen. It seems fair enough to me.

I was born during the worst of it, as were most of those I commune with. We don't know when exactly the screen realized its intentions in full but we are mindful of it. One irony among a long list is that those who create and perpetuate the programming have been subjected to it themselves. I would call that a red flag when it comes to trust.

I have a difficult time convincing myself that those around me are, apparently, not conscious. My grief extends past those who birthed me, those who raised me and those that attempted to lower me. I feel for us all, that very such emotion that cannot be sustained, not with the retention of reason. A man could go crazy dreaming for universal revelation. I have learned to accept the exceptions and dismiss my desires, both for others and myself.

I still remain upset over what little I and the others can do. This incident is one that could have put me in a dire situation. Thankfully, the floorboards don't require a lot of strength to remove and move back into place. Focusing less on my ether of thoughts and more on the situation at hand is of the essence here. I shook my head and then crawled to the right to glance out again. The crack in the wood was small but sufficient. They strapped them to the seats. Mother, father and one of my two sisters, Jen. Phoenix remained right next to me, grasping and holding me tightly, shivering in fear. In her short 13 years of life she had been exposed to the atrocities of life far more than I had from birth to her age. I tried to comfort her as best I could while keeping her quiet. She refused to look out at the others, and instead buried her head into my shoulder, tears periodically falling. Throughout my life I've done all I can to ensure she wasn't subjected to the same sort of indoctrination that the rest of my family was, and although I've so far been successful, she remains vulnerable, being nine years younger than I and still naïve about a great many things. She was like me, however incomplete, in a sense. Looking back out, I had noticed that the stream had begun. They had opted not to attach the lenses, as the rest of my family had no resistance of any sort. Time went by and as the 45 minute broadcast elapsed, we remained silent, as did they – mother, father and Jen reciting though what they were told to, when they were told to. When it was over, a pulse sequence was used to induce further retention, and then the screen defaulted back to the general programming. They left the house, and the metallic sounds of their armor made the floor ripple with each step. When one of the three passed over the floorboard we were under, I pulled Phoenix down into a prone position and covered her mouth. We were not detected. We waited after they exited and drove away to climb out. Immediately another pulsing sequence began. I shielded her eyes and checked the door frame. I was astonished to find that, for the first time, my device proved competent. The magnetic box concealed in the drywall had removed a palisade key – they hadn't noticed. I dislodged the box and the key fell. Quickly, I crammed it into my pocket. Phoenix clutched my side, and I grabbed her and rested her on my shoulder as I ascended up the archaic, creaky stairs I now knew I'd never have to use again. Throwing every latch on the window of the washroom down, I slid it open. As I climbed out on to the ledge that entwined around the house, the winds felt peculiar. Tonight, they were the winds of revolution for us. Tonight, they were the winds of escape.

----

You know, they tend to say flames dance. Its stage a wick, or a torch.

I'd argue that the same could be said about the troposphere. Ten miles high of electronic blue, rippling back and forth. Human-generated aberrancy. Contrived. Gusts of elite proportions with no constitution. Contrived. You could give your trust to any group of persons proclaiming they'll fix the world again after it has endured the slow, sickening death they've brought upon it - they'll all outsource it to their fake engineer friends, unwounded, dancing on the deceased headstone its soil still serves with no concern, no acknowledgement of the violent rape that has once more occurred, almost as some form of consummation.

They don't care. It means, unconditionally, nothing to them.

So my former cell and makeshift bunker and the town streets tend to fare pretty congruently. If it weren't for my excitement, I'd probably complain about it some more.

The smell of the vines...mundane and slightly moldy. One hand clutching plant and the other pressed and sliding against the wall. Looking down, our skin being the only pale pigment not meeting the shadows, we descended.

And I stumbled and cut a line through my left hand as it brushed against thorn and into rusted pipe, yet again being too lost in thought.

"Shit! Ah-"...."Goddamn it,"
I collected myself and pressed my back to the wall in the crawlspace.
"Brother?"
"I'm..gh..I'm fine. Hand me..." I pointed anxiously at my bag. Apparently she'd caught it.
She unzipped it and pulled out an old cotton shirt.
"Yeah, yeah. That'll work," I said as I pulled it tight around my palm to stop the bleeding.
My right arm and hand still somehow managed to support her while holding on to metal and ivy. From this point the dark blue sky could barely be seen, as there were lights following the pipe all the way down. Only once prior had I nearly fallen in my many trips down, but it was far closer to the damp soil below, not at the halfway mark of the lights. In that moment, I laughed and resumed climbing with a short burst of adrenaline. In this moment, I worried for the safety of my sister and - stupidly - the potential for mockery in the irony that this climb I'd mastered tenfold in preperation for this one moment of bringing her down with me happened to be the moment I choked. Then I remembered that she had no knowledge of that and was not the paranoid one I was. After about ten seconds, I managed to lock that waste of thought away with all the others to deal with never. I pushed my legs against the opposing wall and placed my sister on a small ledge.

"Are you okay?"
She was not mocking me, thankfully.
"Yes, just need to-" I looked down at my dressed hand.
"Just need to rest a moment."
"...Did I cause it?"
I straightened up quickly.
"Absolutely not Phoenix. I screwed up, and you're okay, and I'm okay. I'll tell you if something's your fault, remember?"
She grinned naively but she was up to speed.
"I love you brother," she said as she moved her arms towards me, "I -am- happy."
I breathed a sigh of relief and felt happy too, if not just for a moment. Glancing down, we had 16 meters more to go. I clung with my left arm - the pain now dull - and wrapped my right around her, pulling her back to me.
"And I am so proud of you," I spoke, tearing up slightly, as she hoisted herself up and around my torso, leaving her face to the wall behind me.

We resumed our descent, and I felt the air below rush past me as the distant outside wind commanded it, with the sense of smoke and grief slowly replaced by the humid warmth below, but for whatever reason, I could only look up right now at the faint, fog lined opening giving way to only the stars now.
"Brother?"
"When does the storm end?"


"Never."