They whistle through the lonely wind
WHO: Wendla Bergmann, Scotty Wandell
WHERE: Outside the school (building 9)
TIME OF DAY: Afternoon
POST SUMMARY: Wendla and Scotty land in the city.
She hadn't needed to hear the doctor's whispers to know the end was coming for her. If Wendla was honest, she'd had a feeling for a long while now.
Or maybe it wasn't just a feeling, maybe it was just being reasonable. She'd written Melchior so many letters that she just knew he wouldn't get -- letters to that reformatory school where they were probably confiscated before he ever saw them. They were letters of hope for their future -- a young, blissful insistence that they could beat the odds, the two of them, and they could take this string of events which had destroyed their lives as they knew them and make their own luck instead.
But she'd known, though she had to speak with certainty, had to really believe that it could work if there was any chance it would... she'd known that their future was bleak. That her future was bleak.
So Wendla had no choice but to accept the darkness pulling her away. In those last moment she'd had tried to imagine what came next. She knew it could be nothing at all. But she believed that there was something -- heaven, hell, purgatory? Just something.
When she groggily woke, she did not expect to find herself in a strange city. And when she reached the afterlife she didn't expect this shiver through her body that felt still so alive -- a shiver of panic.
She didn't feel dead. Maybe the most sickening part about it was that thought -- maybe she wasn't dead, somehow, after all. Maybe she was just awake. And that meant she'd been dumped here in this place she didn't recognize.
"Mama?" she called, but her voice was weak, not expecting to be heard. Mama had already betrayed her -- she knew that.
She closed her eyes, fighting the feeling of insecurity that came with that, and forced herself to breathe. Alright. Find something, someone -- figure out where you are.
Wendla stood, shaking, and brushed some dirt off her skirt. If she was alive, she felt... fine. The blood, the pain, the dizziness... all gone. That was strange. It was almost like something must've happened, between that memory and now -- but she felt like she'd just slept through it all.
She started down the street, hugging her arms to her chest. She peered in dark windows. It was the middle of the day but everything was so quiet. She couldn't even read the signs on the buildings -- they were all in some language that didn't even look like German or English, which were the only languages she knew. Where was she?
"Hallo?" she called into the empty street. As if the whole thing weren't so frightening already -- and she had dealt with a lot of frightening situations lately -- the silence was the worse.
The wind pulled leaves across the pavement and whipped her dress around her legs. As she ran through what seemed like an overgrown park, the path difficult to make out through the brush, her breath grew quicker, her grip tighter.
Finally, on the edge of the park she ended up outside what looked like a school and dejectedly perched on the steps outside the front doors. "Hallo?"
WHERE: Outside the school (building 9)
TIME OF DAY: Afternoon
POST SUMMARY: Wendla and Scotty land in the city.
She hadn't needed to hear the doctor's whispers to know the end was coming for her. If Wendla was honest, she'd had a feeling for a long while now.
Or maybe it wasn't just a feeling, maybe it was just being reasonable. She'd written Melchior so many letters that she just knew he wouldn't get -- letters to that reformatory school where they were probably confiscated before he ever saw them. They were letters of hope for their future -- a young, blissful insistence that they could beat the odds, the two of them, and they could take this string of events which had destroyed their lives as they knew them and make their own luck instead.
But she'd known, though she had to speak with certainty, had to really believe that it could work if there was any chance it would... she'd known that their future was bleak. That her future was bleak.
So Wendla had no choice but to accept the darkness pulling her away. In those last moment she'd had tried to imagine what came next. She knew it could be nothing at all. But she believed that there was something -- heaven, hell, purgatory? Just something.
When she groggily woke, she did not expect to find herself in a strange city. And when she reached the afterlife she didn't expect this shiver through her body that felt still so alive -- a shiver of panic.
She didn't feel dead. Maybe the most sickening part about it was that thought -- maybe she wasn't dead, somehow, after all. Maybe she was just awake. And that meant she'd been dumped here in this place she didn't recognize.
"Mama?" she called, but her voice was weak, not expecting to be heard. Mama had already betrayed her -- she knew that.
She closed her eyes, fighting the feeling of insecurity that came with that, and forced herself to breathe. Alright. Find something, someone -- figure out where you are.
Wendla stood, shaking, and brushed some dirt off her skirt. If she was alive, she felt... fine. The blood, the pain, the dizziness... all gone. That was strange. It was almost like something must've happened, between that memory and now -- but she felt like she'd just slept through it all.
She started down the street, hugging her arms to her chest. She peered in dark windows. It was the middle of the day but everything was so quiet. She couldn't even read the signs on the buildings -- they were all in some language that didn't even look like German or English, which were the only languages she knew. Where was she?
"Hallo?" she called into the empty street. As if the whole thing weren't so frightening already -- and she had dealt with a lot of frightening situations lately -- the silence was the worse.
The wind pulled leaves across the pavement and whipped her dress around her legs. As she ran through what seemed like an overgrown park, the path difficult to make out through the brush, her breath grew quicker, her grip tighter.
Finally, on the edge of the park she ended up outside what looked like a school and dejectedly perched on the steps outside the front doors. "Hallo?"