8 months ago.....
Arien's POV
"Come together, hand in hand,
Walk the earth, and know the land.
Speak your name, and hear the sound,
All our voices go around.
Weave the thread, strong and true,
I give to you, you give me too.
Face to face, and heart to heart,
We are whole, though worlds apart."
The verses sailed through the air on a calm evening.
Carried gently by the wind, they drifted across rooftops and treetops, whispering through narrow alleys and open courtyards. No one knew where they came from, and no one could pinpoint their source.
Curiosity quickly sparked among the students. Arrays of mobile devices flickered to life, screens glowing as everyone tried to trace the origin of the sound. But nothing showed up — no app, no signal, no transmission. The verses weren't coming from the phones.
In the classroom where I sat, confusion gave way to chaos. Students stood up, eyes wide, voices hushed and frantic. Whispers turned into murmurs. Some recorded the air around them, others simply listened — stunned and uncertain. The teachers had already left, summoned earlier to meetings with higher authorities.
Soon after, an announcement echoed through the building, instructing all students and staff to remain indoors. The message was clear — do not leave your current location. It was meant to prevent panic... or perhaps something worse. We had been sitting there since morning, trying in vain to make sense of the situation. Time felt suspended, as if the world itself had come to a standstill — yet the slow, shifting hues of the sky outside told another story. The day was moving forward, even if we were not.
Yet fear had already seeped into the atmosphere, heavy and inescapable, clinging to every breath like invisible mist.
I watched as students wandered the room, pacing restlessly, some trying to comfort each other, others lost in their own thoughts. They whispered theories to one another — wild, hopeful, paranoid — as if trying to hold onto something real in a moment where nothing made sense.
"It's not coming from any speaker... do you hear it? It's just there. In the air."
"Like the sky itself is whispering to us. How is that even possible?"
"I tried recording it. Nothing. Just silence. But I can hear it—right now."
"It's speaking in patterns... repeating. Over and over. Like it's waiting for us to answer."
"This isn't normal. We need to get out. What if it's a warning?"
"Come together... meet again... it's beautiful. But why does it feel like a farewell?"
"Could it be some atmospheric thing? A resonance? A frequency trapped in the clouds?"
"My little sister said the wind was singing to her. She thought it was a lullaby..."
Lullaby... Lullaby..... Lullaby...
The word kept echoing in my mind — soft, haunting, strangely magnetic. No doubt, the verses seemed to be pulling us somewhere — though not toward sleep. It felt as if they were guiding us toward the open ground in front of our building — a vast stretch of land meant for football, cricket, or any sport you could think of. A place that once pulsed with life, where students from both our college and the adjacent school played side by side. But today, it stood empty.
Silent.
And steeped in a heavy, almost sacred stillness. That's when I noticed something. The sky — its colors had stopped shifting. The soft hues that once moved with time had frozen, mid-glow. Even the sweeping beams of the police searchlights, scanning the area in slow arcs, seemed to dim as they passed through that space — as if swallowed.
Could something like this really happen?
"Favi! Favi! Favian!"
I couldn't stop myself. The name escaped my lips — urgent, involuntary. Something was happening. And someone had to know.
"What happened, Arien? You look like you've seen a ghost... though, given this atmosphere, I wouldn't rule it out ", Favian said. His last words were more of a murmur, but in the eerie silence that had fallen over the room, even low tones carried far. Those seated nearby turned their heads slightly, listening.
Favian was from the adjacent class, but he and his twin sister, Tavira, had clicked with me almost instantly, not at first sight but at first conversation. I'm sure everyone has those kinds of friends, the ones you lock into with a few shared words and never quite let go of.
Classes had been a mess ever since the verses started, which explained why he was sitting with us instead of his usual class. He wasn't one for crowds or noise. He was quiet, observant, and always armed with a dry, sarcastic edge.
"Don't jinx it", Tavira rolled her eyes at him. The extroverted half of the pair, she never minced words. Blunt, bold, and impossible to ignore. She was the flame to his still water, and somehow, they balanced each other perfectly. Though when these two are against each other, it is a little too much too handle.
"Stop fighting, Tavi and Favi! Just listen to me!" I burst out, exasperated.
And voilà — I had the attention of the entire class. Dozens of eyes turned toward me, the quiet hum of scattered whispers dying down all at once.
A fighting pair of friends is already chaotic — but for us introverts? That's borderline catastrophic.