The old woman sat on her porch swing, a worn shawl draped over her shoulders. The air was thick with the scent of pine needles and the distant hum of crickets. She watched the sky, a canvas of twilight deepening into indigo.
"Another one," she murmured, her voice a rasping whisper.
A single star, brilliant and sudden, streaked across the heavens, leaving a trail of shimmering dust in its wake. It was a sight that should have been awe-inspiring, yet it filled the old woman with a chilling dread.
For every child lost, a star fell.
It had started subtly. A child vanishing in the park, a toddler slipping away from a crowded beach, a teenager disappearing on their way home from school. At first, it was dismissed as accidents, mishaps, the occasional tragedy that plagued humanity. But then the stars began to fall.
One for the little boy who drowned in the river. Two for the girls snatched from their beds in the dead of night. Three for the children who vanished without a trace.
So many in wars.
The old woman had lived long enough to witness horrors, to see the darkness that lurked beneath the surface of human society. But this… this was different. This was a cosmic echo of their grief, a celestial indictment of their failures.
So many wars!
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