Outside the car window, ripples in the sky pulsed gently, as if responding to his thoughts.
The city stretched out below, broken yet tenacious, like a wildflower growing through a crack in the stone.
Chen Mo suddenly felt that perhaps hope had never been found in perfect victory.
Perhaps it lay in imperfect perseverance.
And humanity, the noisiest, most contradictory, most disobedient flower in the garden of the universe, was ready to reveal all its chaotic, beautiful potential.
Time passed.
Flowers grew.
The story continued.
