The city hadn’t stopped bleeding.
The streets hummed with tension, even in the hours when the city used to breathe. It didn’t sleep anymore. Every sound carried weight now — the growl of an engine in the distance, the snap of a bottle breaking in some alley, the sharp staccato of sirens screaming down streets that no longer belonged to anyone. The buzz of choppers overhead. The occasional thunder of an explosion that rattled windows miles away.
Every corner of Eastgate dripped chaos—sirens wailing into the night, smoke painting the horizon, whispers of the Knight’s crew barely holding the streets together. But inside the warehouse, the air was worse. Too still. Too sharp. Like even the walls knew something was about to break.
Julian’s voice cut through first. “The Dock Street lead was c
