The sound that filled the continent of Aethel-Terra was not heard through the ears.
It was a deep, underground sixty-hertz magnetic hum that shook directly through the bones of every living creature.
Across three thousand leagues of railway track, the steel rails began to hum like massive, drawn violin strings.
In the freight marshaling yards at North Junction, switchmen stared in disbelief as empty coal hopper cars were drawn together by invisible magnetic attraction.
Iron coupling pins magnetized so powerfully that switchmen couldn’t pull them free with crowbars.
In the underground railway shelters beneath Haven-Hold, twenty-two million citizens pressed their hands against their jaws.
Their teeth rattled in their gums. Their dental fillings ached with phantom spark warmth.
Loose iron nails on carpenter benches stood on their heads and spun like tiny tops.
