The Silent Witness
The world, for the mouse, was a tapestry of scent and shadow. He was a tiny, grey specter in the vast, silent house, a creature of instinct and routine. His name, had he needed one, would have been something like Dust or Scamper. Tonight, as with every night, his mission was simple: find the nightly meal. The cool air carried the faint, tantalizing aroma of crumbs from a forgotten biscuit tin in the pantry. He crept forward, his whiskers twitching, a silent navigator in the sea of polished floorboards.
Suddenly, the silence shattered.
It wasn't a sound he recognized. It was a scream—high, piercing, and human—ripping through the calm like a physical force. It's ears pricked, swiveling like tiny radar dishes, trying to pinpoint the source of this terrifying disturbance. Instinct took over, causing it to stand on its hind legs, a small, quivering statue in the dark. From his low vantage point, he could only see the legs of furniture and the distant, towering shapes of doorways.
Then came the crash.
It was a sound of immense weight and finality, a heavy, wet thud that vibrated through the floorboards. A large, shapeless mass—the body—came crashing down from the heights of the human world, landing with a sickening impact mere feet from where he stood. The air, which a moment before had smelled of dust and crumbs, was now thick with the coppery tang of something alien and frightening.
Terror, pure and absolute, flooded his tiny system. His mission was forgotten. The biscuit tin no longer existed. There was only the need to flee. He spun around, his claws scrabbling for purchase on the smooth wood, and scampered away. He did not look back. He shot into the familiar darkness of a hole in the baseboard, a tunnel that led to the safety of the walls.
Inside the cramped, dusty passage, he pressed himself against the cool wood, his entire body trembling. His tiny heart was a frantic drum against his ribs, beating so fiercely he feared it would burst. He could hear new sounds now—the heavy, hurried tread of another human, a different voice, this one lower, shouting. Then, the most chilling sound of all: a deep, guttural growl that belonged to no animal he knew, followed by a low, satisfied chuckle that promised more silence, more death.
The mouse did not understand the concepts of murder, jealousy, or greed. He did not know that the body had been a man named Arthur, or that the chuckle belonged to his brother, Edmund, who had just secured a fortune. The mouse understood only the primal language of life and death. He had been a silent witness to a moment of profound violence, a secret buried in the walls of the silent house.
He would not venture out again that night. The hunger would have to wait. For now, in the deep, dark safety of his nest, he would listen to the new, heavy silence, a silence now broken by the soft, ominous sound of a single man sweeping up a terrible secret.
#TheSilentWitness#MurderInTheManor#TinyObserver
#WhisperInTheDark#UnseenTruth#FlashFiction
#DarkTale#MicroStory#usmanshaikh#usmanwrites#usm
