The city should have been asleep.That was what bothered Kael the most.Not the silence—there hadn’t been real silence in weeks—but the stillness. The kind that didn’t come from exhaustion or peace, but from something holding its breath.Lights burned in windows across the skyline, yet no shadows moved behind most of them. Streets were lined with people who weren’t walking anywhere, only standing, watching, waiting. Even the drones hovered lower than usual, as if uncertain whether they were still welcome in the sky.Kael stood on the balcony of the temporary command hub, gripping the cold railing as if it were the only thing tethering him to the ground. The air tasted metallic, heavy with storm and dust and something else he couldn’t name.The revolution clock was ticking again.Not audibly. Not visibly. But he felt it in the pressure behind his eyes, in the way his pulse refused to settle. The AI had gone quiet fifteen minutes ago.Not offline.Quiet.That distinction mattered.Mara