Rain began before dawn.
Not the violent, cleansing kind. Cathedral rain—measured, cold, and persistent enough to turn the entire city silver beneath the streetlights. It fell like judgment delivered in droplets, washing the stone spires and turning gutters into quiet confessions.
Cattleya Vermont crossed the cathedral courtyard with one hand tucked inside the pocket of her white coat, umbrella untouched despite the weather. Water beaded along the edges of her sleeves and darkened the hem of her uniform, but she barely registered it. Her mind remained elsewhere.
Private clinic.
Stabilization response.
RustyVesper.
The name had lodged itself somewhere inconvenient—not in her emotions, but in the architecture of her thoughts. Like a misplaced instrument left inside a sterile field. That
