Freedom did not feel like triumph.
It felt like exposure.
The night after Continuity fractured, Anna stood on the roof of the bookshop wrapped in Lexus’s coat, watching lights flicker across the city as if the world were testing whether it was still allowed to exist. Sirens were gone. The pressure was gone. But something else had taken its place—an open, aching quiet, like a held breath released too fast.
“People think the worst part is over,” she said softly.
Lexus leaned against the ledge beside her. “It’s not.”
“No,” Anna agreed. “It’s just not decided anymore.”
Below them, voices drifted through open windows. Arguments. Laughter. A child crying. The city sounded messy. Alive in a way it hadn’t been for a long time.
Mara had not joined them. She hadn’t vanished either. She was in
