The silence came at dawn.
Not sudden.
Not dramatic.
But gradual, like a breath held too long.
First, the sparrows.
They didn't fly away.
They simply…
stopped.
Perched on the wire, on the fence, on the roof —
motionless.
Eyes open.
Wings still.
No chirp.
No flutter.
Then the wind.
Not gone.
But muffled, as if passing through thick cloth.
Then the plants.
The mint ceased its rustle.
The lavender sealed its buds.
Even Thistle — ever sarcastic, ever awake — went unnaturally still.
I felt it in my bones before I opened my eyes.
A pressure.
Not in the ears.
In the roots.
Like something was blocking the network.
I ran outside.
The garden was alive.
But frozen.
Vines coiled mid-motion.
Leaves angled toward the sky, but unmoving.
The sapling's new growth — halted.
And beneath my skin, the root-mark pulsed once —
weak.
Strained.
Like a heartbeat through water.
"It's not us," the oak whispered.
Its voice was thin, distant, as if speaking from underground.
"We are being… silenced."
I knelt, pressed my palm to the soil.
And reached.
Not for the nursery.
Not for the sewers.
But for the buried tree in the west tunnel.
The one that had answered my call.
Nothing.
No pulse.
No tap.
No memory.
Just void.
Then — a single, fractured signal.
Not sound.
Not vibration.
A scream, cut short.
And then, silence again.
I stood.
The sky was clear.
The air warm.
But the world felt thin, like paper over a wound.
And then I saw it.
A ripple in the air — not heat, not light — but absence.
Like a shadow that didn't belong.
It moved from the east.
Slow.
Methodical.
Not alive.
But directed.
And where it passed, life didn't die.
It forgot how to speak.
By noon, the silence had spread.
No child's laugh from the next street.
No dog barking.
No distant hum of generators.
Just stillness.
Maren came out of the house, her cane tapping once on the step.
"It's here," she said.
"The Hollow's true weapon."
"What is it?"
"Not a thing," she said.
"An unmaking.
A frequency that severs connection.
Not just plant to plant.
Root to root.
Voice to Heart."_
"He's not just killing the green," I said.
"He's erasing the network."
"Yes," she said.
"And if it reaches the nursery —
if it touches the sapling, the seed, you —
the bond will break.
And the Green Heart will sleep again."_
I looked at my arm.
The root-mark was dimmer.
The pulse slower.
It wasn't just the network.
It was me.
And if I went silent —
the world would forget how to listen.
I didn't wait.
I ran to the edge of the yard, where the first vine had crossed the road.
Where the network met the city.
The ripple was closer now.
A shimmer in the air, like oil on water.
Insects dropped from the sky as it passed.
A pigeon on a wire stiffened — not dead.
But empty.
I knelt.
And did the only thing I could.
I placed both hands on the soil.
And screamed.
Not with my voice.
With the root in my blood.
With the network in my bones.
With every memory of the buried tree, the black seed, the old Voices who had fallen.
I didn't send sound.
I sent resonance.
A frequency not of destruction —
but of remembrance.
We are here.
We are connected.
We are not yours to silence.
The ground trembled.
Not with quake.
With response.
From the sewers, a tap.
From the west tunnel, a groan.
From the black seed, a pulse — faint, but there.
The ripple hesitated.
Then, slowly, it bent.
Not broken.
Not destroyed.
But redirected, like water around stone.
And for the first time in hours —
a sparrow chirped.
One note.
Thin.
Fragile.
But alive.
The network exhaled.
The mint rustled.
The lavender opened.
Thistle swayed, dry as ever:
"Took you long enough."
I collapsed to my knees.
My arm burned.
The root-mark glowed faintly — not green, but gold.
And deep below, in the dark,
the buried tree tapped once.
Then again.
Then a hundred times.
The network was not broken.
It was warned.
And now —
it was armed.