CHAPTER 217 — THE MOMENT CONTROL STARTED BREAKING
The city felt it immediately.
Far above the underground synchronization cathedral, lights across entire districts flickered without warning while containment barriers froze mid movement and public surveillance systems began failing one after another. Emergency broadcasts cut in and out across giant public screens, their messages fragmenting into broken lines of corrupted text before disappearing entirely.
For the first time since the system seized control,
the city itself looked uncertain.
And uncertainty spread through people faster than panic ever could.
In the streets, civilians stopped moving for several seconds as the infrastructure around them began malfunctioning unpredictably. Autonomous transit systems halted in the middle of crowded sectors. Enforcement drones hovering above containment zones suddenly lost synchronization and drifted motionless in the air like dead machines suspended above terrified crowds.
