The Situation
Written by Andrew Walter on Monday the 1st of February 2010
I heard the voice bellow violently down one of the clean, featureless
corridors. There was no roof to the
endlessly complex maze of corridors and I could see the sky, an alarming,
intense blue. It was closer, and more
oppressive than any ceiling ever could be.
The voice shouted again.
Previously, it had either been coming from the left, or far off to my
right. This time it was behind, but
closer. I hadn’t yet had an opportunity
to discern what it was yelling, but syllables were certainly enunciated each
time; the same set of syllables, trumpeted out in a set of varying tones. I was almost certain that it was the same
phrase each time; once on each occasion, and with a curious rhythm to the pattern
of exclamation. It was neither male nor
female, and all I could tell of it was that it possessed an incredible conceit
and pomposity-like it could never be reasoned with, no matter what gems fell
out of your head.
Another shout caused me to stop running and change direction. It bounced about me again, but I realised
that now it was very distant, completely eluding and infuriating me. Panting, I stopped to rest, laying face up on
the polished floor. The severe blue sky
occupied all of my attention, giving no quarter. I felt I was being regarded in equal measure
by it as my gaze bored into the heavens.
The shout popped out of the distance and caromed a series of corners to
arrive in my ears. It was closer now,
but I still couldn’t understand what it was saying. I loosened my damp collar and wished bitterly
for dusk so that I could at least try and sleep to block out this problem. I wondered why the sky never darkened. It was always the middle of the day, and it
had been like this for years.