The red didn’t explode.
It sagged.
A low, spreading failure that pulled things with it the way wet ground pulls at your boots.
The first sign was the sound changing.
Not louder.
Wrong.
The drone hum overhead slipped out of phase, a subtle sag like several notes falling out of tune at once. Beneath it, something answered — a hollow rattle from under the street, like a pipe being shaken to see who was still inside.
Then a thump.
Felt through the soles before it reached the ears.
Cameron swore and broke into a run.
They hit the corner and saw it.
A row of shopfronts had gone dark in a clean line, power sheared without drama. Beyond them, the pavement dipped. Not a collapse. A slump. Asphalt bending inward around a service hatch that had finally stopped pretending it was structural.
People clustered at the edge, phones up, narrating in real time.
“Is this part of it?”
“Oi, where’s the guy with the stick?”
“I thought they were fixing things!”
Above them, two drones slowed, hovering lower than before. Watching.
The hatch gave way.
Concrete cracked and dropped out, exposing a cavity underneath. Cables and conduit snarled like something dragged up from the city’s throat. Steam burst out in short, angry jets.
A kid screamed.
Tony was already moving.
“Clear the edge!” he shouted, hammer rising. He slammed it into the pavement just ahead of the crowd, the shock sharp enough to stagger people back.
“Back! This isn’t a show!”
Someone slipped anyway.
The ground softened under their feet and they went down hard, sliding toward the opening.
Lenny hit them from behind, Gravity Boots whining as they overcompensated. He skidded, grabbed the person by the jacket, and hauled them clear. Both slammed into a parked scooter.
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“Okay,” Lenny panted. “Boots are officially lying to me today.”
The cavity groaned.
One of the drones dipped lower.
Arthur was already talking, words coming out faster than he could organise them.
“Load transfer— wait, no—”
He shook his head, eyes flicking across the tablet.
“The secondary supports were flagged non-critical. That’s… that’s wrong. They’re carrying more than half the weight.”
Cameron stepped to the edge and planted the staff.
The vibration hit him like a punch.
Pressure stacked sideways here — stress flowing into the gap they’d left open by choosing the ambers. Every shortcut and workaround leaning forward at once.
He drove the staff down.
The hum deepened. Exposed cables shuddered and settled, metal deforming just enough to brace instead of tear.
Not a fix.
A brace.
The kind you trusted for minutes, not days.
“Hold,” Cameron said through clenched teeth. “That’s all I can give it.”
The crowd wasn’t backing up anymore.
They were shouting.
“Why aren’t you fixing it properly?”
“That’s it? That’s your solution?”
“My shop’s down there!”
A bottle flew. Missed. Shattered anyway.
Tony turned, hammer up, eyes hard.
“You want to help, move! You want to film, get further back!”
A woman pointed at Cameron. “You let this happen!”
Cameron didn’t look away from the hole.
“Yes,” he said.
That landed worse than denial.
The ground shuddered again. Harder.
Arthur’s voice cracked slightly.
“Cameron— this isn’t holding.”
He swallowed, steadied himself.
“Pressure’s coming back the wrong way. It’s pushing sideways now.”
A support beam below gave with a shriek of tearing metal.
Arthur stared at the tablet, then looked up.
“There’s a gas line under it. Old one.”
A beat.
“It’s marked decommissioned but—”
He stopped.
“—it’s still warm.”
Tony’s head snapped up. “That’s bad, right?”
Lenny barked a laugh. “That’s ‘everyone runs’ bad.”
Above them, the drones adjusted formation.
Cameron yanked the staff free.
The cavity sagged another inch.
“Tony! Right side. Hit the curb. Break the continuity.”
Tony didn’t ask how hard.
He swung.
The hammer crashed down, pulverising concrete and pipe together. Gas hissed out, venting violently into open air instead of pooling below. The smell hit a second later — sharp, oily.
People screamed and scattered for real this time.
Lenny was already moving, boots shrieking as he bounded up a wall, tore down a loose awning, and flung it over the exposed line, smothering sparks before they could form.
For a moment, the city held its breath.
The drones hovered. Recording.
Then the pressure bled off.
The cavity stopped growing.
Arthur stared at the tablet, hands shaking.
“It—”
He laughed once, breathless.
“It knocked the cascade risk down. Not by much.”
He swallowed again.
“Thirty-seven percent.”
Tony blinked. “That’s it?”
Arthur let out something between a laugh and a sob.
“That’s enormous.”
Cameron stepped back from the edge. His arms felt like lead. The staff vibrated weakly, unhappy.
Across the street, someone yelled, “They broke the road!”
Another voice answered, “They stopped it blowing!”
Arguments sparked instantly. Fast. Bright.
Phones were already up again.
One of the drones pivoted, framing the crowd.
Cameron looked at the exposed wound in the street — the brace holding by friction and luck.
“Pack up,” he said. “We don’t stay.”
Tony frowned. “We’re just leaving it like this?”
“We bought time,” Cameron said. “That’s all we were ever buying.”
Arthur nodded, then hesitated.
“The ambers are… yeah. They’re settling.”
“And the reds?” Lenny asked.
Arthur didn’t answer.
A new sound cut through the drone hum.
Engines.
Heavy. Coordinated. Closing from multiple directions.
Cameron felt the staff pull again — sharper now, resolved.
“Okay,” Tony said quietly. “That feels different.”
Cameron nodded.
The city had stopped observing.
It had started responding.
