The empty train station rang with their footsteps. Behind her, a baby thrashes, its jarring wail echoing around the high ceiling above her. She was transfixed as they approached.

Faces hooded and blurred like an ink drawing in a rain of tears. A scream swells but spills silently, mutely, over her lips. She tries to turn, to move away but her feet are molded into the frozen ground. They have no eyes yet their lewd stares petrify, their laughs ricocheting off the walls like a ball in a museum of fragile memories.

They brushed against her, hands roaming intrusively; probing, pushing her back into that wretched night. They prowled past, leaving a wretched form to weep.

The baby.

Its screams escalated, piercing and shrill, slightly hoarse now. But she could not turn, to protect it from the cruel abuse being inflicted upon its defenseless self; she could not flee, to escape the torturous wails. Falling to her knees, she was dreading – wishing for the painful screams to stop.