The next morning arrived not with sunlight, but with haze.

New York always found a way to turn dawn into something cinematic shafts of gold fighting through the smog, sirens echoing like restless prayers, the city itself trembling awake beneath a sky that never quite cleared.

Violet sat on the edge of the apartment balcony, a steaming mug of coffee in her hands, watching the world unfurl below her. The city looked normal people rushing to work, taxis honking, a couple arguing at a crosswalk and for the first time in what felt like years, that normalcy terrified her.

Because how could the world go on so easily when they...