Power did not retreat.
It adapted.
That realization unsettled Aria more than open resistance ever had. She had learned how to respond to force, to ideology, and to urgency. Waiting was different. Waiting was patient. Waiting disguised itself as reason.
The city felt it before it named it.
Projects slowed without explanation. Meetings were postponed under the language of review. Decisions lingered in committees where nothing technically stalled, yet nothing moved.
Marcelo noticed first.
"They are decelerating intentionally," he said one evening, reports spread across the table in the smaller conference room. "Not blocking. Not denying. Just extending."
Luca frowned, arms crossed. "They think we will lose momentum."
"Yes," Marcelo replied. "They believe time favors systems over people."
Aria listened quietly, Elena asleep against her chest, her small weight steady and grounding. She did not look at the reports. She had already felt the shift.
