The darkness was absolute, and the silence oppressive. It wasn't the tranquil hush of night that carried the crickets' song and the rustle of wind across the grass. No—this was a suffocating stillness, heavy and unnatural, as though the desert itself had forgotten how to breathe. The air felt thick, weighty, and each step or exhale seemed to echo too loudly against the void.
It wasn't the silence of peace. It was the silence of absence—the kind that hinted, no, screamed, of the lack of any living creature nearby.
