By sunrise, Basa had stopped looking like a city at peace.
It did not panic.
That was important.
People still went to work. Children still entered classrooms. Mechanics still argued beside open engine compartments while engineers complained about material shortages and fuel allocation schedules. Market stalls opened on time, and the smell of coffee still drifted through the residential districts.
But beneath that ordinary rhythm, something had changed.
Soldiers stood closer to intersections. Patrol vehicles moved in pairs instead of alone. Drones circled higher above the outer sectors, their faint buzzing hidden beneath the noise of daily life. At every military checkpoint, guards checked identification twice and studied faces longer than usual.
The city continued living.
But now it watched.
