When aggressive expenditure subsides, denial follows. The subject disengages, declaring the material irrelevant or nonexistent. The sonic event is relegated to the margins of consciousness, coded as ignorable background.
However, as psychoanalytic theory indicates, denial is never absolute. Auditory fragments remain: the persistence of a loop, the afterimage of a dissonance, the mnemonic trace of a texture. The red flag is not extinguished but repressed, continuing to function within the unconscious domain.
Denial therefore constitutes a paradox: the object is consciously excluded while unconsciously maintained. This silent negotiation signals the beginning of hidden integration.