The stairwell room had once been a janitorial checkpoint — or maybe a guard post, long since forgotten. Now it was just four cracked walls, a half-dead ceiling lamp buzzing like a tired insect, and a warped window looking out across Sector Nine. A place where dust gathered on purpose. The kind of place the city had long since given up trying to clean.
Rain tapped at the cracked glass — not pounding, just scraping. The kind of rain that smeared rather than soaked. A thick cable snaked through the ceiling, humming faintly with borrowed power, making the whole room feel like it was breathing wrong.
Aya sat on an overturned crate by the window, gloves off, fingers curled as though they'd been holding something and forgot what. Her hair hung damp around her face. She looked like someone who'd stopped shivering a while ago, not because the cold left — but because she'd decided it didn't matter.
