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The Gentle Fall

  -----

  The Gentle Fall – Earth, Year 2077

  It started small.

  A missed call. A late bus.

  A name called out, swallowed by the city’s hum.

  A child stepped from the shadow of a red-leafed tree.

  His mother looked away—just for a moment.

  And when she turned back,

  he was gone.

  She searched the alley. The street. The sky.

  Her voice cracked as she cried his name,

  but there was no trace.

  No sign.

  Only a paper airplane,

  fluttering where he had stood.

  They called it a tragedy.

  Then a mystery.

  Then… a pattern.

  ---

  They Called It “The Crossing”

  It came every month.

  Without fail.

  Ten thousand souls—

  gone all at once.

  Across the world, like stars

  blinking out of the night sky.

  From kitchens where dinner was being stirred,

  to crowded buses, full of noise.

  From hospital beds where hands held tight,

  to lovers caught mid-goodbye—

  gone.

  The world held its breath—

  again and again—

  and every time it exhaled,

  someone else was missing.

  ---

  There Were No Clues

  No warning.

  No light.

  No final words.

  Only silence.

  Heavy. Smothering.

  Like frost beneath a sealed door.

  Families huddled, counting seconds.

  Teachers counted heads, again and again.

  Some recorded everything,

  desperate to catch the moment—

  as if truth could be frozen in a frame.

  But The Crossing took,

  and it didn’t care.

  ---

  The World Tried to Understand

  Governments assembled.

  Scientists scrambled.

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  Think tanks swirled with theories.

  They named it The Crossing,

  as if that gave it shape.

  But a name is not understanding.

  And this could not be understood.

  ---

  Every Theory Crumbled

  Disappearances were logged.

  Cities mapped. Timelines analyzed.

  Some blamed a virus.

  Others, a tear in time.

  Some whispered of other worlds.

  But every theory collapsed.

  The vanished were not sick.

  Not dead.

  Simply… gone.

  ---

  The Government’s Response

  At first—denial.

  Mass hysteria. Coincidence. A glitch in data.

  But people knew.

  They saw the pattern.

  They raised their voices—louder, sharper, breaking through silence.

  Investigations began.

  Searches stretched across the globe.

  But still—

  nothing changed.

  ---

  Year One: The Quiet Collapse

  Grief soaked into the air like fog.

  Empty chairs gathered at dinner tables.

  Laughter felt thin—

  glass barely holding shape.

  People clung to voicemails,

  pressing play again and again,

  just to hear a name.

  A breath.

  A goodbye that never came.

  The world tried to hold steady.

  But it was like trying to stop the sea

  with bare hands.

  ---

  And Then, at the End of That Year…

  Someone returned.

  Far from the cities—

  where snow hushed even the wind—

  a group of travelers climbed a forgotten mountain.

  There, they found her.

  Barefoot in the snow.

  Older than she should have been.

  Her hair tangled with petals

  from flowers that didn’t belong to this world.

  Her skin marked with strange, faint symbols—

  not glowing, not shining—

  but Resonance.

  She collapsed in their arms,

  trembling, whispering a name

  that wasn’t hers.

  And then—others followed.

  Pale. Distant. Eyes full of other skies.

  A man stepped forward.

  His clothes torn. His voice threadbare.

  He didn’t beg.

  He warned.

  “We are the ones who vanished,” he said.

  “And we’ve returned to tell you this:

  The Crossing is not done.”

  “Prepare… and do not fall into despair.”

  The mountain stood still.

  But the world below it trembled.

  ---

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