I left the gallery. The winter air felt different. Sharper.
I pulled out my dead phone from habit. The screen was still black.
I walked aimlessly for twenty minutes, the adrenaline from the writing fading into a deep, weary emptiness.
Then, my phone vibrated in my pocket.
A single, violent shudder.
I fumbled it out. The screen was alive. Signal bars glowed. Notifications began to flood in dozens, hundreds. Message previews from Kasia. Emails. Fistoria alerts. Bank security codes.
The blackout was over.
The digital cage was gone.
I stood on the sidewalk, people flowing around me, and felt a wave of disorientation. The silence was broken by a cacophony of connection.
My first move wasn't to read the messages. I found a bench, sat down, and took a deep breath. I needed to be centered. The Audit had changed the rules. I couldn't just revert.
I opened the messages from Kasia. They were a timeline of her silent panic, followed by frantic planning, then a final, recent one.
