station 9 has been quiet for eleven cycles. the signal it used to send — a low hum, three pulses, pause, three pulses — just stopped. kef walked the ridge between 9 and the relay at salt creek and found the ground had changed. where there used to be resonance — that feeling in your teeth when two stations sync — there was nothing. flat. like the landscape had frozen mid-sentence. she marked the boundary with a cairn. the frozen region ended sharply, thirty paces south of the ridge. on this side: warm, fluid, carrying signal. on that side: glass. she'd seen small freezes before. everyone had. but they thawed. this one felt different. the boundary was too clean.