The world was breaking.
I could feel it in my bones, see it in the cracks forming around me.
Street signs flickered, shifting between names I didn’t recognize. A woman in a red coat crossed the street, only to appear back on the sidewalk seconds later, trapped in a loop that shouldn’t exist. Cars rolled by with an eerie smoothness, their tires barely touching the pavement. I turned to look at a shop window, but my reflection wasn’t right—too slow, too delayed, like it wasn’t just a reflection at all, but something watching me back.
I exhaled sharply, pressing my palm against my temple. Focus. I had been running for what felt like hours, but I couldn’t stop now. Not with the way reality itself was shifting around me, bending to the will of something unseen. The Overseers were tightening
