Chapter Text
A long time ago, an ancient race of star explorers reached the pinnacle of physical existence. They had conquered the forces that bound them to ground and took to the skies. They triumphed over the vast distances that separated them from one galaxy to the next and travelled further than anything had ever before. They mastered the limitations of entropy and harvested power from entire stars at a time.
But still, they hungered. Hungered for power. And for control over their fleeting Time. As powerful as they were as a species, their existence was but a heartbeat in the eyes of the eternally shining cosmos and the guardians who watched over the universe.
The Guardian of Civilisation, an owl who took their form, watched over them as they grew. From their earliest days around a campfire to their glorious civilisation around their shining sun.
When they became advanced enough, she introduced herself to them and walked amongst them as one of their own. Time went by, and they grew more powerful. She warned them when they became too destructive. She tried to stop them as they greedily dominated everything in their path.
But in the end, she could do nothing more than sit idly by as they reached for their final goal.
After it was all over, this ancient race ceased to exist in this mortal plane. They had achieved what they wanted, but at a terrible price.
The Warden of Time, Kronii, was damaged. Fractured. To protect herself, she scattered her own existence across the aeons, each fragment of her former self manifesting as a member of her favourite species at any point in time, across multiple different timelines.
Mumei, once the revered Guardian of Civilisation, now only had one job. She would get Kronii back. Even if it meant she had to walk across every single planet in every single universe to find every single fragment of the Warden.
Kronii would be whole again, she promised herself. She would make it happen.
Steam hissed violently and a low, grinding horn blasted through the frigid air. The tent shuddered as the rumbling of the horn shook snow loose.
Kronii grumbled. Another day in the city.
As a teenager, she had grown up in a perfect world of technological advancement, but she had watched it all come crumbling down as the world froze over. She was now one of the few survivors on this frozen planet. Every day she worked to ensure the city remained warm, and the human race survived, if only for one more day.
The horn that had violently woken her was the morning horn. She had two hours of free time before work began.
Sluggishly rolling out from under her blankets and away from what one could call ‘warmth’, Kronii grumbled incoherently. She clumsily changed into warmer clothes, the cold air already biting at her skin through her sleepwear.
Even before the Great Freeze, Kronii was not a morning person, nor was she fond of the cold. Now, every morning was an early rise, and the days kept getting colder and colder.
Over the loudspeakers, she heard a crackling, and then the low voice of an Engineer spoke up.
“Good morning, workers. Today looks like business as usual, albeit a temperature drop to -80 degrees is to be expected. Remember that the city needs you.”
One of Kronii’s roommates snorted.
“Yeah, as if. Needs us to work to death, more like.”
A round of barely audible here-here’s and murmurs of agreement sounded.
The tent was packed with nine other people, of all genders, ages and races. This was the same for all the other tents in the city. Only the Engineers got houses, which were considerably warmer given their superior construction as well as proximity to the Generator, which provided all the warmth in the city.
As Kronii was still fumbling with her clothes, her roommates gradually left one by one.
“Aye lass, ya best hurry now before the cookhouse empties ey?” One of them said to her as he opened the tent flap. Kronii merely nodded, teeth chattering in the cold.
She walked over to the heater and slipped her feet into the boots which had been drying off. Then she made her way out of the tent as well.
The heater was just a glorified pump that channelled hot air from the Generator into the tent. Even the thick insulation in the tent walls wouldn’t keep them alive through the night in this freezing weather.
The cold was even worse outside of the tent, Kronii’s nose immediately started running and she struggled to get her already numb hands into her gloves.
“Ugh darn. What I wouldn’t give for a hot mug of chocolate,” she grumbled darkly, remembering warmer days.
Pushing that aside, and finally getting her hands into the gloves, she rushed off towards the cookhouse to get her breakfast. Though she didn’t expect much, it was just going to be sloppy meat mixed with sawdust anyway, same as every meal.
The workers worked hard, slept poorly and ate even worse. They were the backbone of this city but it was the Engineers that got to sit in offices and sleep in warm houses, eating fresh food.
They justified this because they worked in workshops and infirmaries, doing work that needed qualifications from institutions that had frozen over ages ago.
Many workers had already voiced objections to this hierarchy, but their voices were heard by no one. But with terrible living conditions, harsh work and worsening weather, things would have to change if both parties were to keep thriving in the city. Dark mumblings said the Engineers would recognise the workers, or they would be forced to.
The horn sounded again. 8AM.
An Engineer’s voice called out over the loudspeakers, “Work begins. Sacrifice for your city.”
The workers would be coming in to clock on anytime soon. The foreman yawned and rummaged through the papers on her desk for some documents. As she found the pages she was looking for, the heavy duty blast doors on the factory floor swung open with a screech of metal.
Clipping the paper to a clipboard, she walked out of her office to greet the workers.
They saw her as soon as she saw them. Giving them only a nod in greeting, she began switching on machines and light switches as the workers began to prepare their workstations. Some people grabbed shovels while others began wheeling around trolleys.
Almost immediately the noise level in the building increased to deafening, a stark contrast from the silence that had reigned before the shift had started.
The foreman grabbed a pen from her pocket and began writing on her clipboard. She didn’t actually do any manual labour. That was beneath her. She was an Engineer. Her place was to direct and manage the workers, a role she liked to think she performed perfectly, ensuring maximal efficiency in her factory.
They were currently working in one of the city’s coal thumpers. It sent pressurised water underground to wash coal up through fissures in the ground. The coal could then be collected and dried before being delivered to the Generator.
This was one of the most crucial buildings and jobs in the city as coal was now more precious than gold was before the Great Freeze. Without coal, the Generator would stop, and without the Generator, the city would stop.
The foreman nodded as she observed the machinery working correctly. The first trolley full of coal was already being carted off towards the resource depot.
They did hard work here, but it was important work. It kept the city going.
Kronii wiped sweat from her brow. The fine dust of coal coating her gloves rubbed off on her forehead as she wiped away the beads of liquid. She might be sweating now, but that only meant she was warm now. As soon as she stopped working, it would be cold again and her sweat would quickly become cold and chill her even more.
She sighed and quickly put her hand back to work operating the machine before her. Her job at the coal thumper was the ensure the coal that washed up was dried and ready to be burnt. It was demanding and physically taxing. She would trade her job for one at the hothouses, where they grew crops, in a heartbeat.
A strand of her midnight blue hair had come loose and she spared a coal-covered finger to tuck it back into her hat. But she paused as she spotted the signature brown hair with white streaks of the foreman approaching from the corner of her eye.
“Hey, boss,” she said without looking up from the bronze dials and switches before her.
“Worker, make sure you’re focused on your job. We can’t afford any setbacks, especially with the temp drop today,” the foreman said demandingly. Without waiting for a reply, she turned and walked away, writing in that darn clipboard.
“Yeah, sure,” Kronii grumbled to the foreman’s back.
Damn, that woman was always so rude! And frankly, a bit of a snobby piece of-
A single chime interrupted Kronii’s thoughts. Kronii quickly made a final check of the readings on the machine before rushing over to the side and pulling a lever that opened the oven door and let the now-dried coal to slide out and a new tray of wet coal to replace it.
She sifted through the piping hot coal to check no particularly large chunks had clumped together and prevented any irregular drying. After the check, she hefted the tray with a grunt of exertion and delivered it to a nearby conveyor belt. She did this with four separate coal drying machines, twice every minute.
It was a simple job, but it got tiring fast.
The third horn reverberated across the city, shaking loose more snow.
“Put down your tools. The city thanks you for your service,” boomed an Engineer’s voice from the loudspeakers.
Kronii whooped a quiet yell of celebration. Another hard day’s work was done. She quickly checked the last trays of coal and sent them on their way before switching the machines off and walking to the blast doors.
A fellow worker clapped her on the back and invited her to the bar for drinks, to which she declined, citing she was far too tired. Despite the city's struggle to provide adequate housing and quality food, drinks were easy. The public house always served Moonshine. Kronii knew it was just one of the ways the Engineers kept workers down after their shifts to prevent an uprising.
As soon as she left her workplace behind, she made a beeline for the cookhouse, an early dinner and early to bed, as usual.
While waiting in line to collect her sludge which everyone called dinner, Kronii spotted the brown hair with white streaks that she had associated with her foreman. The woman also seemed to see Kronii, but only met her eye for a second before turning away. The foreman skipped the lines completely and entered the cookhouse through a door that said ‘Authorised Personnel Only’.
Kronii clicked her tongue. Engineers and their privileges.
At the front of the line, the cook, a worker, just like the rest of them in line, handed her a bowl of ‘food’ and told her, “Good job today.”
Kronii smiled and turned, finding a place to sit to wolf down her semi-warm dinner before it froze. Thankfully although the dining area was open air and exposed to the cold and snow, it wasn’t too cold as the Generator was only two streets away, the immense heat it pumped out was enough to keep the air at a 'comfortable' -10 degrees.
She laughed inwardly, a rueful smile coming to her face as she realised darkly that negative ten degrees was considered comfortable. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught the light of the cookhouse door opening and the foreman exited with another Engineer. Each carrying a bottle in each hand, they walked quickly in the direction of the Generator. As they passed Kronii’s table, the foreman caught Kronii’s eyes once more, but again, the eye contact didn’t linger and, in an instant, the two Engineers were gone.
Her humour was wiped away in an instant. How could those Engineers sleep at night in their warm beds after eating a hearty meal and drinking quality liquor knowing that other humans bore the brunt of the freezing cold and worked to the bone just to keep them warm?
She detested Engineers. Any worker with a spine hated the Engineers. However, it was with great reluctance that the workers admitted that the Engineers’ technical know-how and experience was invaluable to the survival of the city.
Not the foremen though. They were the worst kind of Engineer. They just yelled at workers to keep working. People could stay motivated well enough without someone breathing down their neck. Not all Engineers earned the privileges they’d been allowed.
Kronii hurriedly slurped up the rest of her dinner and returned the bowl before trudging through the snow back to her tent. Her sweat was already beginning to freeze, and she felt disgusting.
Kronii awoke with the rest of the city when the horn sounded.
“Time to wake. Today’s temperature is holding at -80. Another day to provide for the city,” blared an Engineer’s voice.
Another day indeed. The same day as every other day. Engineers would call this lifestyle a small price to pay for survival. But those who actually did the work knew that with better work standardisation, safety procedures and management organisation, the work could be done more efficiently and without risk of harm to workers, both in long and short term.
The Engineers were just afraid to put power in the hands of the workers. They were cowards, trying to hold onto a superior position even while the world froze around them.
While everyone in the tent was getting ready for the day, the sound of heavy boots crunching on the snow outside approached. Suddenly the tent flap was ripped open and an Engineer walked in.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I apologise for interrupting your free time,” he began in a posh voice, he did not sound sorry at all.
“We have a build order. Please make yourselves available at district 29 to assist the construction of a hunter’s hangar.”
Almost immediately cries of outrage sounded from some of the workers. There was no designated construction team in the city. Instead, workers were expected to use their free time to build new structures if they were demanded.
“Hey, then what do we do about breakfast, huh?” One worker yelled.
“This is too much! How are we supposed to work today without our breaks?” Another called from the back.
The Engineer didn’t respond, instead turned to Kronii, who was closest to him, and thrust a document into her chest.
He turned to leave, but he paused while holding the flap open, letting the warm air out and causing the several few still underdressed workers to shiver in the sudden chill.
“We expect your share of the site to be complete before work starts today. Make it so,” he growled over his shoulder before exiting the tent, not bothering to close the flap properly.
While someone went to close the flap, Kronii crumpled up the paper and threw it with a shout of frustration. It bounced off the wall of the tent feebly before another worker caught it, also grumbling angrily.
The worker read from the document out loud while everyone else went back to getting ready.
“Alright lads, looks like the structure is done; we just need to clad the roof and ceilings. Pack your harnesses for this one,” he sighed before wadding up the paper again and tossing it away.
A few weak murmurs of acknowledgement could be heard as Kronii shuffled her feet into the boots. And put her snow goggles on.
As a group, they trudged through snow that had reached knee-height overnight towards the construction site. When they got there, an Engineer, greeted them and directed them to the materials and equipment.
Thankfully, they couldn’t have to be working in the negative eighty-degree cold, even with their heavy insulating clothes, they would freeze within half an hour, the area had been heated by a steam hub, which continuously pumped warm air from the Generator, warming the site up considerably.
“Now get to work, quickly now before your shift starts,” he gestured rudely to the building behind him.
Up on the roof, they were almost done, and with half an hour to spare. If they were lucky, they could catch something to eat before the second horn.
Kronii’s partner shivered in the cold as he handed her another metal plate for her to rivet onto the beams. However, as he was leaning over, a frightening snap was heard. His old and worn harness had snapped.
A look of shock crossed his face as suddenly he found himself leaning too far forward with nothing to support him.
In that split second, Kronii realised what happened and dropped her tools, trying to grab him before he fell out of reach.
But she was too late. The worker made a strangled noise as he plummeted downwards, bouncing off the edge of the freshly clad roof once before disappearing over the edge; the metal plate he had been holding clanged loudly, falling after him.
Other workers on the roof gasped, and a shrill voice yelled, “Someone’s fallen, help!”
Kronii quickly clambered her way down, hoping that he was safe. Maybe the snow cushioned his fall.
Several workers had already gathered around the body by the time Kronii had her feet on the ground. An Engineer was kneeling next to the worker, muttering to himself.
Kronii got close enough to see. She breathed a sigh of relief. He was still alive, but the metal plate had come down on top of his arm, slicing it off cleanly. Blood was coating the snow crimson red grotesquely.
The Engineer finished tying a makeshift bandage around the stump of the arm. “Right, you two, get him to an infirmary,” he said gruffly, pointing at Kronii and another worker.
Then he tossed the severed arm to another, who screeched in surprise but caught it, trying not to get blood on his clothes.
“Burry that in the corpse pit, would you?”
The worker eyed the Engineer for a second before turning away, grumbling, “Show some respect, would you?”
Kronii and the other worker gently shifted the injured worker onto a stretcher and began carrying him to the closest infirmary.
“The rest of you lot, get back to work!” She heard as they left.
The horn echoed through the streets of the city.
“Your shift begins. Get to work!” Commanded the Engineer over the loudspeakers.
The brown-haired foreman checked off items on her clipboard as one by one, machines switched on and workers began their work. She frowned when she saw that the coal drying station was left off and no one was manning the machines yet.
Her frown deepened when she looked around and didn’t spot Kronii who was usually punctual and reliable.
She marched over to a worker at the coal shovelling station and directed him to take over at the abandoned drying post.
The foreman went back to her office, she needed to report this. They would assign a new worker to fill up the empty slot either until Kronii turned up, or indefinitely if Kronii was-
No, she couldn’t think about that.
While on the outside, the foreman was cold and rude and looked every bit like the other Engineers in the city, Mumei was only maintaining a façade to ensure she was in a position that allowed her proximity and ability to protect Kronii.
This Kronii was but a fragment of a whole being, and Mumei vowed to watch over each fragment she found to the best of her ability.
Inside, she hated being rude and pretending she was superior. And it especially killed her when she spoke to Kronii as if she was worthless. But this Kronii didn’t know Mumei. She never would. But Mumei would do her best to guard her regardless, even if she had to be a terrible person to do it.
Mumei was moments from leaving the factory and searching for the wayward worker herself when the heavy blast doors creaked open and Kronii walked in.
The foreman breathed a big sigh of relief. She looked safe and well, although there was blood on her clothes. Mumei stormed out of the office. She called out to Kronii.
“Just where have you been, I’ve been worried…” Then she hesitated, “Worried about our production!”
“Sorry, ma’am there was an injury at the construction site this morning,” Kronii said, looking at Mumei squarely in the eye. Mumei saw the glint of malice in Kronii’s sapphire blue eyes.
She swallowed and gestured to the coal shovelling station. “Very well. A worker has taken over your post, you can fill in for him at shovelling.”
Kronii nodded once and brushed past without further comment.
Mumei breathed another relieved sigh. Kronii was safe, but it hurt so much to see her look at Mumei with such hatred.
In this frozen world, both deaths of workers and Engineers alike were concerningly common. Mumei tried to keep on Kronii as often as she was able, but she must have grown complacent because she didn’t even know Kronii had been assigned to a construction job this morning.
It chilled her to the bone to think something could’ve happened to Kronii and Mumei wouldn’t have even known until the daily list of the dead was read out later at night.
Only a few hours after Mumei resolved to be more diligent, the methodical and rhythmic sounds of the coal thumper were interrupted by a klaxon.
A worker cried in panic, “There’s a problem with the water pressure!”
There was no safety protocol in place, but common sense guided everyone’s actions. Machines were shut off and several workers gathered around the problematic machine while others left the factory to get help or ward others from getting too close.
Mumei rushed over to the crowd around the machine.
“We can’t shut it off, the water will backflow!” Someone yelled out.
“Is it blocked?” Another worker cried.
“Maybe it’s ice!”
“We could try switching channels,” someone suggested.
“Pressure’s still rising!”
“She’s gonna blow!”
Some workers began turning valves. A loud hissing suddenly started from somewhere inside the bronze casing of the machine. A worker had detached the cowling and was reaching inside the machine.
A violent clang followed by a rattle startled everyone.
“Foreman, we have to shut it off before it explodes, but it could potentially let coal and dirty water back into the pipes and into the rest of the city!”
Before she could respond, a pressure valve cracked and exploded. Pieces of glass flew by, narrowly missing a worker and Mumei.
Making a split decision, Mumei thundered in the loudest voice she could muster, “Everyone out! Get clear!”
There were several cries of protest.
Mumei didn’t listen to any of it, she grabbed the shoulder of a worker and pulled her away from the valve she was wrenching. Then she shouldered a man away from the machine and pushed him away.
“I said everyone, GET OUT!”
A small fiery explosion from a nearby auxiliary machine punctuated her words, and the workers started scrambling backwards. Another boom came from a pipe on the wall of the factory egged everyone to turn and run.
Everyone except the foreman who was now wrangling with the controls of the machine by herself.
Kronii noticed and slowed. She looked at the fleeing figures of the workers, then back to the Engineer who was struggling to pull on a lever.
“I’m going to regret this,” she muttered to herself before she turned and ran back towards the foreman.
Several fires had broken out and Kronii was already sweating like mad. She took off her heavy jacket and rolled up her sleeves. She came to the side of the foreman and put her hands on the lever, helping her pull.
Mumei looked up in shock when Kronii’s hands appeared in her vision.
NO! she thought to herself, the one person she didn’t want to be in here right now!
“You can’t be in here!” Mumei said heatedly.
But as soon as she said that one of the taller machines near the door toppled over, blocking the entrance off. Kronii shrugged at the timing and turned her attention back to the lever.
They both shouted as they struggled to budge the lever, fighting against the pressure that locked it in place. Kronii’s strong muscles flexed, firelight glinting off her sweat. Mumei caught herself staring before remembering her purpose here. With a final cry, Mumei put in an extra spurt of effort.
With a clunk, the lever flew open, catching both women off balance and they fell backwards. Kronii hit the ground hard and Mumei landed on top of her with an ‘oof’.
Mumei would’ve blushed if it weren’t for the dire situation. They didn’t waste any time lying on the floor. Picking themselves off, the pair returned to the machine. Kronii began frantically turning a large valve wheel while Mumei grabbed a wrench and reached into the body of the machine.
“I need a bypass on channel 8!” called Kronii.
“Got it!” Mumei yelled back, slightly muffled by the casing of the machine.
“What’s the reading on the expansion vessel?” Kronii asked between grunts as she strained her muscles on another lever.
“I don’t know, the valve’s busted!”
They worked like the possessed to reign the machine back into control. They yelled at each other and worked in tandem to stabilise the machine, trying to give the building pressure somewhere to go.
Finally, the hissing died down and the remaining undamaged dials crept back down out of the red zone. Kronii pumped her fist in celebration. There was no explosion and there was no dirty water flowing back into the city. Crisis averted.
A sinister crackling noise came from a pipe. Mumei, pulled her head out of the machine to see a pipe behind Kronii, spraying a small stream of water from the valve. It looked like the pipe was about to explode.
There was no time! Hurriedly, she took two steps to close the distance, and stumbled over some debris on the ground but she found her footing just in time to shove Kronii out of the way.
The valve popped off the pipe and the wheel embedded itself in the control panel with an almighty crunch, right where Kronii was standing a split second earlier.
The blue-haired worker looked up at Mumei in shock.
“We need to find a way out of here,” Mumei gasped breathlessly. She held out a hand to help Kronii up.
Kronii nodded and accepted the hand without a word. Now that the chaos of the disaster had died down, the factory was once more silent, except for the sound of crackling fires and hissing of pipes still leaking.
From outside, they heard the sound of people shouting. The fire had broken out to the external cladding of the building. Some people were desperately pouring snow over the fires while others were trying to find a way around the fallen machine blocking the entrance.
“Is anyone left in there?!”
“Yes, there’s two people in here!” Mumei shouted back.
Beside her, Kronii tripped over her feet and crumpled to the ground. Mumei caught her across the chest and slowly lowered her.
“Hey, are you OK?”
“Yeah,” Kronii mumbled weakly, “Just tired.”
Suddenly a long, groaning creak broke across the relative quiet. The structure had been damaged in the destruction. A portion of the steel frame in the ceiling gave away, landing with a deafening crash, only meters away from the pair.
Mumei heard more creaking and tearing of metal. The building was coming down around them!
The coal thumper’s core machinery stretched high into the sky, there was tonnes of metal towering high above them, waiting to just flatten everything it fell on top of. Then there was an abrupt sound of metal cables snapping and the rending of metal.
Mumei, in blind panic, dragged Kronii underneath the frame of the roof that had fallen only moments before.
Seconds after Mumei and Kronii got under the shelter of the wreckage, the rest of the steel superstructure came thundering on top of them. Mumei clutched at Kronii protectively, trying to shield her if at all possible.
When the dust settled and the sound stopped, Mumei could no longer hear the voices of people outside. Only the settling of metal. Small shafts of light made it through the rubble. Snow had started to fall; the tiny snowflakes fluttered their way down with the miniscule amounts of light.
Kronii’s hand slowly reached up and grabbed her shoulder.
“Thanks for saving me,” she said quietly, teeth beginning to chatter in the cold. They had only been under the collapsed factory for a minute, but without the insulation of the building, and without her jacket, the below-freezing temperatures was very quickly becoming too cold for young woman.
She could see the sweat and water that covered Kronii beginning to freeze. Snow landed on her beautiful face. Mumei quickly lay Kronii on the ground and took off her own jacket, wrapping it around Kronii. But it wasn’t enough, the temperature was quickly plummeting.
“You’re welcome. Don’t worry, we’ll get out of here,” she said, brushing the crystals of ice off Kronii’s forehead.
“Help! We’re here!” Mumei yelled, “She’s freezing! Anyone! Please!”
No one responded. Mumei was growing more desperate. She didn’t want Kronii to die like this. Not again. She gritted her teeth as she clutched the worker closer to her, hoping to pass on her godly warmth to Kronii, but to no avail.
She was about to yell out for help again when Kronii rasped out something in between violent chattering of her teeth.
“I used to hate you, you know?” She said, looking at the pinprick hole in the debris above them, “I used to think that you were a spoiled and pompous Engineer.”
“I’m sorry, Kronii. I’m sorry,” Mumei cried quietly, eyes watering up.
“Then you put yourself in harm’s way to protect everyone else,” Kronii continued, voice growing weaker. Kronii’s strong muscles shrivelled as her blood vessels contracted, keeping the warm blood in the core of her body.
Kronii took a shuddering breath. Her eyes moved to look at Mumei’s.
“Now I don’t know what to think,” she laughed quietly but it quickly turned into a hacking cough, the dry and frigid air causing significant pain in her throat and lungs.
Mumei shushed the girl as she cradled her head on her lap. This fragment of Kronii was nearing its time. But she didn’t want it to be here, in the freezing cold covered in coal and soot.
“Foreman, I don’t even know your name,” Kronii whispered softly. It looked like every lungful of air she breathed caused immense pain.
“It’s Mumei,” she choked out between quiet sobs.
“Thanks… Mumei, I think I’ll be going first. I’ve had a long and tiring day…” Kronii took in one last breath and her eyes closed slowly. A final shudder travelled up and down her freezing body.
It was so cold that Kronii didn’t even have a chance to go into hypothermia.
Mumei held Kronii’s head to her chest as she cried.
A blue light rose from Kronii’s chest. The fragment.
Mumei, through overflowing tears, caught the orb of light in the face of a pocket watch that held the other pieces of Kronii’s soul she had collected so far.
She would be safe in there until Mumei could find the rest of Kronii.
After a whole day’s work, the debris was cleared. But they only recovered the body of the worker. She had frozen to death in mere minutes, trapped beneath the wreckage of the coal thumper. The foreman’s corpse, if there was one, was nowhere to be found. Both citizens were given the highest of honours before burial.
The wreckage of the faulty machine was salvaged, pulled apart and analysed by a team of dedicated engineers and workers. It was a testament to what they could achieve together as equals.
Maybe there was still time for the city to change.