Chapter 1
As usual, Sally was out running near her home. It was the same quiet morning as always. This was her second year living in the village, and by next year, she would be leaving again. She couldn't say she was particularly fond of the place—only that she had grown used to it. Life here had a rhythm she no longer resisted. The winters were damp and grey, the rain frequent and uninvited. But no one here knew her, and more importantly, no one bothered her. And for Sally, that was enough.
Still, she had come to know a few people. During her morning run, she passed Lucy—the first person she had met after moving here. The first, perhaps, whom she might call a friend. "Friend" was a word that had grown unfamiliar to Sally over the years. It might be more accurate to say that Lucy was the first to offer her kindness, and Sally, in a rare moment, had accepted it. Maybe that's what friendship is—an unspoken exchange of small, quiet mercies.
Sally kept running until her watch beeped—signalling that she had completed her daily 10-kilometer goal. She came to an immediate stop and turned back toward home. Her villa, tucked away behind a small garden and set far from the main road, sat quietly on the edge of the village. With a population of just twenty thousand, the village offered a peaceful rhythm of life. There was a modest gym, a local supermarket, and even a small museum.
Most of the villagers had lived here for generations, their roots deeply embedded in the land. So, when Sally first arrived and purchased the house, her presence stirred quiet curiosity. With her reserved demeanour and unreadable expression, she seemed distant, perhaps even aloof. But one thing was certain: to the locals, she appeared to be a wealthy woman from an Asian country, may be Japanese due to her typical face and small-sized body.
Sally lived with an android dog named Boom, a creature of circuits and soft whirrs, who spoke every language known to humankind. Their dialogue was a quiet dance of tongues—Sally in English, Boom in French. They spoke of everything and nothing: the structure of the cosmos, the fragility of the human mind, the sorrow and promise in education. There was a kind of gentle magic in discussing the soul with a dog beneath the morning light.
Boom carried within him the weight of knowledge—every scientific concept, every taxonomic order, a walking encyclopedia stitched in steel and synthetic fur. Yet he lacked the fragile gift of insight into the human heart. But Boom was only three years old, still growing, still learning—perhaps one day he would understand.
Before the village, he spoke only English. But one morning, after Sally returned from her run, he greeted her in perfect French. She didn't ask why. She never did. Sally was not a woman bound to explanations. She drifted through the world with the grace of someone who cared only for things that could not be touched—poetry, sonatas, the philosophy of silence. She learned quickly, as if her mind were a vessel waiting only to be filled.
Sally lived alone—no friends, no family, not even a trace of herself left on social media. Sometimes, she didn't know if the world was real, as everything felt so distant, and she didn't know how to respond to it. Her presence in the village was quiet, almost spectral, like a shadow that passed through rooms without stirring the air. She led a simple life, stripped of noise and distraction. And yet, she was far from ordinary. Beneath her stillness lay a brilliant, curious mind—one that kept pace with the world's news, its shifts in power, its silent catastrophes and quiet revolutions. She knew things, though no one quite knew how.
Each morning followed a private ritual. Upon waking, she would sit in the soft blue light of dawn and recall her dreams in meticulous detail. Every fragment, every flicker of feeling was gathered and spoken aloud to Boom, as though casting spells into the air. Sometimes, Boom would listen patiently, ears tilted just so. Other times, he would flash a bemused smile, a flicker of mechanical scepticism across his face—as if to say, you didn't dream last night; you cannot dream.
But Sally never argued. She simply looked past the response, believing that dreams, like memories, weren't meant to be validated. They were to be felt, recorded, and released—like morning fog dissolving in sunlight.