We are shadows, dim and wavering, sprawled across frost-cracked pavement, trudging past rusted chain-link fences. Hollowed out, we move, through streets choked with litter, under bridges where the wind hums low. Our hands, gray as ash, claw at empty air, brushing against graffiti-stained walls.A streetlamp sputters, its weak orange pulse dangling above a shuttered storefront. We shuffle closer, but the light frays, eaten by the weight of endless night.No heat reaches us. The city stays mute. We press on, past skeletal bus stops, hunting a glow that won’t flicker out, our footsteps a faint scrape in the vast, gnawing dark.