The outside pressure escalates.
Not all at once. Not in a way that demands panic or even announces itself cleanly. It comes the way weather does when the sky looks the same but the air starts to feel wrong against your skin. Heavy. Charged. Waiting. The kind of pressure that makes you aware of your own breathing, of the space your body takes up in the world.
I notice it before anyone says anything.
The first sign is a false flag near the border.
It’s subtle enough that someone less familiar with our patterns might log it and move on. Scuffed ground. A broken branch bent at the wrong angle. Scent layered just thick enough to be noticed if you’re looking for it. Too obvious to be an accident. Too contained to be an attack. It’s an invitation disguised as noise.
I don’t need a report to
