Concrete buildings of uneven heights crowded the Platinum Capital. With its defenses drawn inward and its footprint reduced, residents had been forced into towers dozens, even more than a hundred, stories high.
The company's alloy technology was twenty to thirty years ahead of its time. It had given the Platinum Capital the strongest wall, a source of pride for every resident—until today.
Pools of blood dotted the empty streets, but there were no bodies, only drag marks.
Inside a dilapidated, half-collapsed building, the furnishings were strikingly old. Blackened, pitted, and badly eroded, they had seen better days.
Several survivors hid there. Everything had happened so fast. That morning's news had shown potbellied company executives declaring with great passion that the disaster was over. Citizens of the Empire fortunate enough to live in the Platinum Capital, they said, were the lucky ones of a new era. They should put old pain behind them and look to the future.
The rich coffee, the beautiful morning-news anchor on the screen, the smell of baking bread—every detail seemed to linger on their tongues and in their noses. Then came a string of explosions and countless shrieks, and every hope of safety or a brighter future was shredded like toilet paper flushed down a drain.
Rotting furniture blocked the entrance. On the wall beside it, an enormous claw mark let in the only light. The gloomy weather outside left even that opening dim.
Eight people sheltered there: three students, a newlywed couple, a middle-aged company employee, a company guard, and one other person.
The last was a beautiful woman with a flawless figure and silver earrings. Unlike the others, she sat calmly atop a fallen wardrobe, studying a can of oranges in her hand. To her, the can was flimsier than paper, but she had