The presence in the distance grew stronger with each passing day.
It was not a threat. It was not a promise. It was something in between—a whisper that seemed to come from the very fabric of existence, a call that Sarah felt in her bones. It was familiar, achingly so, but different. Like a song she had heard before but could no longer remember.
Julian noticed the change in her almost immediately. "You've been distant again," he said one evening, standing beside her at the window of their home. "Like you're listening to something I can't hear."
Sarah nodded slowly, her eyes fixed on the horizon. "There's something out there. Something that's been waiting for us. It's not like the others. It's not a threat. It's not a warning. It's something else."
The First Ones appeared before them, th
