That evening, Aren returns home covered in dust and the faint green pollen that drifts from the Verdant Abyss.
Lira meets him at the door, worry soft in her eyes.
"Did you eat?" she asks.
He nods. Lies.
Daren returns late, exhausted, his clothes stained with mechanical oil. He barely speaks. The filters are breaking again, and workers are collapsing from oxygen rot.
At dinner, Nira tells them about a story she heard — about a man who caught a falling star and wished for a new world.
Aren smiles and plays along, though something in that story lingers.
When the lights flicker and the purifier hum fades for a moment, he looks out the cracked window.
Far beyond the city, deep in the green horizon, something glows — faintly golden.
---