by Emily Gee

Created on: June 04, 2008   Last Updated: July 11, 2008

The first time Charlie heard the noise coming from the loudspeaker he automatically assumed it was a technical fault. Never mind that, even then, the sound was far too organic. He knew just knew that it was something technical. That's what Charlie was about, after all.

He stood in the centre of the deserted warehouse and stared up at the speaker system. It was a relic of the 1970's, not exactly ancient but a far cry from the much smaller, more discreet tannoy systems companies employed these days. It was suspended from the ceiling in the centre of the room like some kind of strange growth; four trumpet shaped speakers jutting out into the vacant air as though at one time they would have had to scream to be heard over the melee of workers.

Now, however, they were just so much scrap metal, waiting to be dismantled along with anything else that could be salvaged from the building before it was demolished.

And Charlie had been about to do just that before the noise had started.

At first he had thought it was some kind of siren; it pulsated with the same rhythmic rise and fall, though the noise was soft, muffled somehow. Then, as he had stood closer, listened harder, he had noticed subtle changes in the pitch that suggested something else. If he had had to describe it, right then in that moment, he would have said it sounded like something between a moan and a wail.

But luckily he wasn't asked and, as soon as the logical part of his mind reasserted itself, he realised it must be some kind of technical fault. Aside from that, he didn't care. He wasn't there to fix the thing, thank God, he was there to dismantle the place and salvage anything that could be recycled.

So he tried to tune out the noise and got to work unscrewing the distorted, skeletal framework of shelves that still twisted out of the floor in all directions. There had been a fire, several yeas before, which had raged so hot that even the steel had begun to warp. Everything else had been destroyed, including almost all of the people who had been unfortunate enough to be working that day. Since then the building had lain empty until some development company bought up the land with big plans to construct a new, shining office bock in place of the ugly old factory.

After a while the noise stopped and all he heard was the clatter of his own tools as he unbolted the steel pieces and stacked them ready for another member of the salvage crew to pick up later. It was only when he came to remove the door handles

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