The seven minutes became a headline.
Not because of the blackout itself—cities flickered all the time—but because of where it happened. The coastal megacity that had launched the imitation brand went dark at exactly 11:42 p.m., local time. Transit froze. Smart grids failed into safe mode. Emotional analytics platforms—those that tracked sentiment and consumer "well-being"—returned null values.
No panic.
Just emptiness.
News outlets called it a systems error. Engineers blamed cascading dependencies. Influencers blamed "overdesigned empathy."
But beneath the explanations, something else spread.
Unease.
---
In GarudaCity, the silence arrived like a held breath.
Wirasmi felt it while walking through a night market—vendors smiling, lanterns swaying, fabrics layered with stories instead of slogans. The thread beneath the street did not react, did not flare, did not warn.
It simply… stayed still.
"They're looking for us," Danindra said later, reviewing encrypted requests routed through five intermediaries. "Not for help. For validation."
Aulia shook her head. "They want us to say it wasn't their fault."
"And we won't," Melindra added.
Because to speak now would be to endorse the premise that such power required permission.
---
Ace watched the aftermath from LionCity Raya, his reflection faint in the glass wall overlooking the harbor. He had lived through moments like this—when markets mistook quiet for weakness.
This was the phase where acquisition offers would follow.
And they did.
One by one, polite, carefully worded, heavy with urgency.
"We believe your model could stabilize global systems."
"We're offering partnership, not control."
"The world needs guidance."
Ace declined them all.
Not publicly.
Privately.
Completely.
---
The next morning, something unexpected happened.
GarudaCity was removed from several global trend indices.
Not blacklisted.
Not attacked.
Simply… excluded.
"This could hurt visibility," Aulia said carefully.
"It will," Danindra agreed.
Wirasmi listened, then smiled faintly.
"Good," she said. "Then those who come will come because they feel it—not because they're told to look."
---
In the days that followed, letters arrived.
Not emails.
Letters.
Handwritten notes from designers, engineers, teachers—people who had tried to build systems that respected humans and failed.
They didn't ask for secrets.
They asked a single question:
How did you stop yourself?
Wirasmi read them slowly, one each evening.
There was no single answer.
Only a practice.
---
On the seventh night after the blackout, GarudaCity's hum shifted—not louder, not broader, but clearer. The thread recorded no new rules, no protocols.
Only a recognition.
Silence, when chosen, becomes instruction.
And somewhere far away, a different city—watching carefully this time—paused before copying.
That pause changed everything.