Deleted scenes from Beneath the Silence

 FROM THE FALL ARCHIVES

CHARACTER STORY: STEPHEN

Waiting for a Sign

Stephen stood in the middle of the road and watched the car disappear.

The engine noise faded as Derek and the others drove away towards the prison. For a moment, the sound echoed through the empty streets of Bellshill, bouncing off silent shop fronts and abandoned cars.

Then it was gone.

Only the wind remained.

Father Luke’s church stood behind him, its doors hanging slightly open. The others had chosen to go with Derek. It was the smart choice. Safety. Walls. People.

Hope.

Stephen looked down the road one last time.

Then he turned and walked the other way.

His kids were still out there somewhere.

He had to believe that.

They had talked about it before everything fell apart. If something bad ever happened, if they got separated, they were to go somewhere safe. Somewhere familiar.

Home.

The journey to Crossford took most of the day.

Stephen avoided the main roads where he could, cutting through fields and side streets. The towns were quieter than he expected. Occasionally, he saw movement in the distance — one of the dead wandering aimlessly — but most of the world seemed eerily still.

When he finally reached his street, his chest tightened.

Everything looked the same.

The same parked cars. The same gardens. The same row of houses.

But there was no laughter. No children playing. No music drifting from open windows.

Just silence.

Stephen approached his house and stopped outside the front door.

For a few seconds, he couldn't bring himself to open it.

Then he stepped inside.

“Kids?”

No answer.

He moved through the house, checking the living room and kitchen before taking the stairs two at a time.

Their bedrooms were empty.

“Kids!”

Still nothing.

Stephen searched everywhere, even places he knew they couldn't possibly be.

Nothing.

Their things were still there. School bags hung from the backs of chairs. Shoes sat where they'd been kicked off. A half-finished drawing lay on the kitchen table.

But his son and daughter were gone.

The first few days were spent searching.

Stephen checked every house on the street. Then the next street. Then the one after that.

He called their names until his throat hurt.

He knocked on doors that would never open.

Sometimes he found supplies. Tinned food. Bottled water. Batteries.

Sometimes he found worse.

But he never found his children.

Crossford felt abandoned, as though everyone had simply vanished overnight.

On the fifth day, he found the flare gun.

It was inside a small emergency kit in a neighbour’s garage. Dusty and forgotten, but still intact.

Stephen turned it over in his hands.

A signal.

A chance.

Maybe someone else was out there.

Maybe his kids were with them.

Weeks passed.

Stephen survived by moving between houses, gathering what little food remained. Nights were the worst. The silence pressed in around him, broken only by the distant groans of the dead somewhere beyond the village.

Sometimes he sat at the upstairs window of his home, staring down the empty road.

Waiting.

One afternoon, he took the flare gun outside.

He stood in the road and looked towards the distant hills.

Maybe nobody would see it.

Maybe nobody was left to see it.

But if his children were still out there, he couldn't stop looking for them.

Stephen loaded the flare.

He raised the gun towards the sky and pulled the trigger.

The flare screamed upwards, burning bright red against the grey clouds.

Stephen watched it climb.

For the first time in weeks, he allowed himself to believe someone might answer.

Then he went back inside.

And waited.