Prologue
-Song Of The Century-

The fall sunlight, still orange in glow, floods the next street as you round the corner. The street is completely empty and every house is boarded up. There is a definite snap in the breeze that blows up the street towards you, it makes you want to wrap up against the coming winter and you draw your jacket around you.

You walk through the old neighbourhood slowly, your arms folded, a barrier against whatever brutal memories lie here. You've been told not to walk through the old neighbourhood, but it feels like you know it some how and you always found it was a comforting place to be, like home.

You pass the abandoned houses, burnt out and bullet pitted, windows and doors boarded up and sprayed with incoherent graffiti, bearing the slogans of the many different generations to live in the small town. This was once a neighbourhood of discontent, but you are far too young to remember the Class Wars, unlike the people you live with who remember it well. But they never talk about it, they just tell you it's in the past and you shouldn't think on it. The breeze picks up and you shiver as it reaches you.

You're used to the sight of the neighbourhood, you walk through it every day to get to the 7/11 to meet friends, but this evening it seems just… creepy. As you reach the middle of the nameless street you hear something new, a voice on a radio, fading in and out of reception. You stop and listen carefully, you tell yourself you're hearing things… but you know that tune, you know those words, you don't know how though.

Curiosity gets the better of you and you first check you aren't being followed then slowly search for the sound of the radio. It leads you to an old house, set further back from the rest of the street, its green paint peeling to reveal the white undercoat and the wood beneath. This building managed to escape the fires, but paid for it in bullet holes of various sizes. This house is where the music is coming from, much louder now, but still not clear enough to hear the words.

Looking up at the house, you make up your mind. Dropping your arms to your sides and taking a deep breath, you walk up the drive to the front door. You press your ear against the peeling door and the voice becomes clearer, "Sing u… ong… the century, loude… bombs and et…", the static on the radio makes the voice fade in and out, making words meld together. You step back and look around for a way to enter. The front is a no go, it's boarded up tight. So after a glance at your watch and a look over your shoulder, you run around back.

One of the windows leading into the small kitchen has been broken into, the board pulled away far enough to squeeze through. Something tells you to turn back, but you push those thoughts away and battle through the overgrown weeds. You pull yourself clumsily through the small gap, thinking in the process, that you would make a poor thief as you crash around. You dust yourself off and curse that you made a hole in your jeans. This distracts you for a few seconds, until you remember why you just squeezed through the window.

You look up at the damp ceiling and listen hard, the radio is upstairs. You take your cell phone out of your pocket, there is no reception here, however there is a flash light on it that you can use, which you promptly switch on to light the way. You rush through into the hall and make your way up the slightly rotten stairs, taking care to hold onto the handrail, even though it offers little protection from falling.

You at last pinpoint the radio to a bedroom at the very top of the stairs. You push the door, expecting it to open easily, but years of damp and rust have seized the door up and it takes you several kicks to open it up.

When you get the door open, you're shocked by the sight of the room. There is enough weak sunlight coming through the top half of the grimy window to see by, but the lace hanging over it is rotten and mouldy, blocking most of the light from getting in. The wallpaper is falling off the walls and there is a nasty stain on the wooden floor that you can't mistake as anything other than blood. There are a few sparse pieces of furniture including an old coffee table, a few chairs and a babies crib.

The radio is on the coffee table in the corner of the room furthest away from you. It's plugged into the wall, so obviously there is power still leading to the house. You try the light switch and you are pleasantly surprised when the old bulb flickers on, throwing a dim yellow light over the room.

You make your way slowly over to the radio, dodging the blood stain and keeping your eyes ahead. You pray silently to yourself that the floor holds out and that you don't fall through it into the room below. Your foot kicks something metal and you look down. It's an old tin, you frown and pick it up, it's heavy in your hands. You walk quickly over to the table the radio is on and you hike the dial up until the static is gone.

A calm soothing male voice emits from the speaker grill, calming you down and making you feel a little less scared than before. You place the tin on the coffee table and turn the radio up even louder.

"Sing us a song of the century…"

You open up the old tin, it's a struggle as the lid is just as rusted as the door you had to break down, but you manage to do it.

"That's louder than bombs and eternity…"

Your eyes widen as they fall on the boxes contents, all of which seem to have escaped the damp.

"The era of static and contraband…"

You place a shaky hand into the box and pull out a gun, holding it up to look at it closely, it's fully loaded.

"That's leading us into the promised land…"

You recognise the make… it's a Peacemaker, you put it to one side, careful to check that you don't take the safety off accidentally.

"Tell us a story that's by candlelight…"

You pull a tattered looking notebook out of the box, the front is splotched with more bloodstains, but you're not bothered by that any more.

"Waging the war and loosing the fight…"

You look closely at the front, reading the faded title, '21st Century Breakdown', you look up and listen to the song on the radio and you're shocked when you begin to sing along with it.

"They're playing the song of the century, of panic and promise and prosperity, tell me a story into that goodnight, sing us a song for me…"

The voice fades and the station slips into static once more. You place a shaky hand on the dial and switch it off. You look down at the book in your hands and open it up. A picture slides out of it and hit's the ground. It's an out of focus Polaroid photo of a young couple woman caught in a loving embrace, kissing gently. The picture is so old that it's hard to tell who it is in the photograph. You slide it back into the book and you open it to the first page.

Quickly flicking through it you see that it is filled with writing. This was someone's diary, in fact by the looks of it this was shared by two people. The first page is dominated by a heavy scrawl and later a fine, elegant script. You pull an old beaten up chair towards you and sit down. As the light outside begins to dim, you begin to read.