It came from the North. Always the North. People said it like a prayer or a punchline, depending on how much they had left to lose. The storm didn’t just bring rain—it brought shrapnel, signal-jamming sleet, drones disguised as weather. Entire apartment blocks stripped to bone by wind that wasn’t wind. Every time it cleared, the skyline looked different—leaner, more twisted, like the buildings were trying to hide from something. Some claimed the storm was a weapon test on loop, a forgotten protocol playing god. Others whispered about satellites hacked by ghosts or engineers gone rogue in the Arctic silence. But most didn’t talk at all. They just boarded windows, watched the clouds roll in, and braced for the sound of metal falling like ice. North. Always the North.