The first rays of sunlight bathed the city in a warm orange glow, slowly revealing an urban landscape that felt both familiar and oppressively foreign. Isaac walked through the nearly deserted streets, his steps heavy and slow, his thoughts still muddled by recent events. The inspectors had finally released him after a seemingly endless night of interrogation and tense waiting. Their condition had been clear: remain in the city, available to the justice system, or be immediately flagged as a high-level threat. Isaac hadn't protested he knew this wasn't the time to challenge authority.
The sounds of the city waking around him felt strangely distant. The sputtering engine of an old scooter struggling to start, the metallic groan of shop shutters rising, the muffled conversations of early commuters... All of it seemed to belong to another world a world he no longer felt fully part of.
