The dreams changed. No longer flickers of unknown skies or crumbling cities. Now they were... personal. Intimate. But not mine.
I saw Lyra's childhood, her mother's voice in another language. Keene's nightmares of being dissected by creatures of light. Nolan standing on a cliff, screaming into a wind that didn't carry sound.
I felt what they felt. Tasted what they tasted. Woke up crying someone else's tears.
We stopped talking openly about the signal. We feared saying too much would invite it closer. HALCYON no longer responded to vocal commands—it would only interface with thought. And sometimes, it anticipated what I wanted before I asked.
The crew began locking their quarters. Then barricading them.
I watched a video of myself, recorded while I was asleep. I whispered the phrase "nothing ever ends" over and over again.
The static isn't just in our heads. It's alive.