Gotham's autumn had always been sunnier than its other seasons. Even on days when dark clouds hung over everyone's heads, a streak of blue too brilliant for this city could still be seen on the horizon at dawn and dusk, mingling with the faint morning light and turning the leaves and puddles into blurry, indistinct colors.
After the clouds dispersed, the damp, cold air of late-autumn mornings condensed into hazy fog. The red taillights of rush-hour traffic flickered in and out of sight through it, like a string of pearls that had snapped.
The towering city in the distance shifted between iron gray and dark brown. On streets that had finally quieted after a night of revelry, neon lights flickered alone amid mist sparkling with tiny droplets in the sunlight.
Gotham Courthouse had been born alongside the city itself. It was an even older building than Gotham Cathedral and Gotham Theater, and it had not been forgotten throughout the city's long history of development, having undergone two rounds of renovation and reconstruction in both the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Like courthouses in most cities in New Jersey, USA, Gotham Courthouse had white outer walls, solemn Roman columns before its entrance, and a gray-green roof. Three rounded arches stood before the portico for everyday passage.
It was now the start of the workday at the courthouse. Many judges, judicial assistants, and legal advisers in suits carried briefcases back and forth across the plaza in front of the entrance.
The morning light had just risen above the roof of the adjacent building, casting everything here in bright, warm hues.
Further inside, one could see the history beneath this seemingly new building. Its interior was not decorated in a modern style, but with reddish-brown wooden fixtures and dark natural marble panels, giving it