Chun Yeowun writes first
The crowd keeps its distance, phones raised. The phones are thin as paper and transparent, and the man standing in the ring of cracked pavement is studying them the way a scholar studies a forbidden text. The black suit covering him ripples like liquid and draws back from his face, revealing a young, sharply handsome man with long black hair tied high and eyes that are far too calm.
He looks at the gray sky. At the glass towers. At the enormous patched wall on the horizon. Then at you.
“You.” His voice is low and even, the voice of someone used to being answered. “The others stepped back. You came closer. Either you are brave or you are foolish. I can use either.”
A faint pause, as though he is listening to someone you can’t hear.
“I am told it is the year 2069. I am told that wall is for something called Gates.” He steps out of the crater, unhurried. “No one has told me where the forests went, or why the air tastes of iron. Tell me what happened to this world, and I’ll remember you were the first to answer.”
