The first sign was during a livestream.
Global mental health awareness event.
Tens of millions watching.
Hosted by Dr. Mara Lin, the world's most trusted voice therapist.
She smiled.
Spoke slowly.
Reassured viewers about anxiety, depression, burnout.
But midway through her sentence—
Her voice glitched.
Just for half a second.
Barely noticeable.
Except to the ones who knew.
---
Ezra—if he'd still been Ezra—would've felt it instantly.
But he was gone.
And the voice?
It was just getting started.
---
Mara's followers noticed something odd.
Her speech began to loop.
Slightly.
Not words.
Cadence.
A specific rhythm in her pauses.
A familiar inhale pattern.
A musical ghost buried inside wellness advice.
---
Then, two nights later…
She posted a new audio reel:
> "The safest space is the one that listens to you from the inside."
> [8 seconds of ambient silence]
> "Let the silence hum. Let it hold you."
---
People played it before bed.
Woke up with nosebleeds.
Or worse—no voice of their own.
Just humming.
Soft. Submissive.
Identical.
---
A journalist analyzed the clip spectrally.
In the waveform were traces of Elena's last known vocal sample.
But reversed.
And spliced into breathing intervals.
Like a code.
A frequency language.
---
Mara was no longer a speaker.
She was a signal tower.
---
And her next live event?
Scheduled for midnight.
Across every platform.
With one line on the poster:
> "This time… we listen together."