She is in Silence

Iolite loves to draw.Whatever she sketches instantly manifests into reality.

Everything, that is, except for human beings.

I struggle to truly grasp the concept of the apocalypse.

Outside the hospital building—its iron gate left ajar—the world looks as it might ten thousand years after the disappearance of humanity. Hyacinths bloom across the ruins; only very rarely can one spot a remnant of steel or concrete, now turned to fossil. The hospital building where I once stayed is an exception—its exterior walls are blanketed in moss and vines, the marks of long, relentless erosion by time. My intuition tells me that you have likely been in isolation for fourteen years.

Is Iolite herself human? I find it hard to say. She wears her hair—a deep, bluish-purple—in a loose, casual ponytail. She is dressed in a purple frock, a shade somewhat murky and mottled with patches of cyan, like clouds; the edges are frayed and torn. She refuses to share anything about herself, reveling instead in the curiosity she stirs in me.