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Errol absentmindedly swirls his root beer in its glass, staring at the contents with boredom. With a start, his ears perk up, and immediately he hears something. It’s faint, but growing. He can’t quite make it out.
“Y’all hear that?” He asks, setting his root beer on the counter and sitting up.
Gandy looks up. “No?” She says, twirling a poker chip in her fingers.
Augustus raises an eyebrow as he cranes his neck. “I might not uh- be so great at hearin’, what with the age of my terrible passin’, but-“
“Shut up, Gus,” Errol says, raising a clawed finger. He strains to listen. “It’s music.” He says.
And then, in an instant, the music is loud . It is sweet and smooth and strong .
All of them hear it, Errol and Gandy and Augustus and even Wilder behind the bar.
Remy is jumping from roof to roof, keeping pace as Nadiya and Kardala corner the crook on the streets below.
Nadiya wraps an arm around a light pole as Kardala chases the man through the street. Kardala chases the man around a corner, and he trips over Nadiya’s stretched arm and she quickly wraps it around his legs. Remy jumps down, a wide smile on his face.
“Hell yeah!” He shouts. “We did it!”
Kardala grabs the man and lifts him up and holds him under her arm tightly. “A mighty success!”
Nadiya brushes his hands together as if knocking off dust. “A piece of cake.”
Then suddenly, there’s sound. Loud and booming. Strong and assuring.
“What the-?” Kardala exclaims before the song drowns out everything.
Duck is in the woods with Aubrey and Ned, looking for clues to point them to the next abomination, when his keen ranger ears pick up something odd. He puts up a hand to halt, and the two stop walking behind him.
“Duck?” Aubrey says, igniting a flame on her hand, muscles tensing. “What do you hear?” She looks around quickly.
Ned swipes his flashlight around. “What’s out there, big guy?”
“I dunno,” Duck says quietly. “I just hear-”
The melody is sad. Genuine and heartfelt. It drowns out everything. Washing over like a tidal wave.
And it is not just a song. It is a story. Beautiful and harmonic and joyous and miserable and exhausting and triumphant. There is something coming for the heroes in that story. But when the song passes, there is just silence. The detectives in the Full Moon Saloon blink in silence. The trio of former Do Good Fellowship members stare at the sky and then each other, no words to say. The members of the Pineguard look at the gate to Sylvain without a word, but it remains empty and lifeless.