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Forty-seven percent.

The church bell began to ring. Eleven o’clock. Download-3.49MB-

Eighty-three percent.

Outside her apartment pod, the Sprawl hummed its endless hymn of traffic and algorithmic commerce. But inside, the air had gone thin. Cold. The kind of cold that doesn’t come from a broken climate seal. Forty-seven percent

Her implant pinged. A new message from an unknown sender. The subject line read: One more file. 1918. Download? " he whispered. "In case."

Twenty-three percent.

Elara felt her body move against her will. She was a passenger in a vessel made of scar tissue and desperation. A young man—no older than eighteen, with her exact shade of brown eyes—handed her a letter. "For my mum," he whispered. "In case."