The market was alive with movement and voices when Aria and Virel arrived—canvas bags at their sides, an envelope tucked carefully into Virel’s jacket. The paper had lived a long life: its edges worn soft, the old address crossed out and replaced with new lettering in Virel’s steady hand. Inside, a note and a single pressed mint leaf from their garden, bound for a cousin at the coastal cooperatives.

At the postal co-op booth, a clerk sorted letters into bins marked for solar-rail transport. Deliveries might take weeks, even months, but they would get there. In this rebuilt world, news you could hold still mattered.

Past the stalls, the season’s rhythm had shifted. Even in winter, sunlight carried warmth. Linen shirts and sleeveless vests replaced heavy coats, and hats shaded faces flushed with color. The scent of grilled vegetables drifted over the hum of mesh-powered cooling fans, blending survival with comfort in ways no pre-collapse market ever had.

They followed the crowd down a shaded stairwell into the subterranean farms. The air cooled instantly—thick with basil, moisture, and the pulse of machinery. LED strips glowed like veins along the ceiling, and shafts of redirected sunlight cut clean lines across rows of greens and root vegetables.

Virel knelt beside a grower fighting with a stubborn humidity sensor.

“It’s been short-cycling again,” the man said.

Without a word, Virel pulled his multitool and adjusted the wiring. Aria moved through the rows, tracing her fingers over planters made from reclaimed polymer, her steps slow and listening.

The rhythmic hum of pumps and fans echoed softly—an artificial heartbeat beneath the soil. It reminded her of something older and deeper waiting beneath the ridge.

Her watch buzzed twice. A glyph bloomed across the digital strip—fluid, organic, symmetrical. Like roots seeking light.

Clem’s voice crackled through her earpiece, dry as ever.

“That symbol’s not in your notification settings. Tell your new friend to stop flirting with your peripherals.”

Aria covered the watch with her hand.

“Not now.”

Virel looked up, questioning. She met his gaze and said, “It’s fine.” But her eyes lingered on the dark soil beyond the hydroponic walls, as if she expected an answer.

They finished their errands—a loaf of bread, a coil of twine, a packet of seeds—and started the climb home. The air cooled, and the first stars began to bloom overhead. Each season since the collapse, the night sky had grown sharper, reclaiming what the cities had taken.

Virel tilted his head upward.

“You notice it too?”

“Hard not to,” Aria said. “More stars every season.”

Clem chimed softly,

“More stars, fewer billboards. I call that progress.”

As they reached the ridge, the horizon deepened into blue-black. Beneath the soil, faint arcs of light traced through stone—shardlight threading like constellations mirrored underground. Above them, the true stars turned in their ancient rhythm. For a single breath, the two maps—sky and earth—aligned.

The moment hung between worlds.

The season was right.

All it needed now was an answer.