The pod’s carbon-glass canopy revealed the truth up close: the filaments were not solid. They were trillions of microscopic machines, each one a universe in miniature, braided into shimmering curtains of light. The machines parted like living silk as the pod approached. No clang of docking clamps, no hiss of equalizing pressure. Only a soft sigh, as though the structure had been holding its breath for twelve thousand years and could finally exhale.
