In the year 2084, the world had reached an equilibrium of sorts — a strange, unbalanced balance that no one had aimed for but had settled into, like dust after a storm. The skies, once bustling with the egalitarian hustle of air travel, had quieted down, reserved now for the sleek, whispering jets of the elites: politicians who crafted the future from the clouds; entertainment superstars like Brittany Quick, whose laughter filled the air more than any long-gone bird’s song; and tech billionaires, the new deities who decided what the world needed next.
Below them, the world moved on wheels and rails, in silent electric vehicles and trains that snaked through the landscapes, their schedules dictated not by the clock, but by the whims of the power grid.
Electricity, the lifeblood of this new era, was in perennially short supply. The irony was palpable. Humanity had finally turned its back on burning the ancient remains of a bygone era, only to find itself shackled to the caprices of the sun and the wind. The earth, a patchwork of solar arrays and wind turbines, no longer sang with the chirps of birds or the flutter of bats. They had vanished, casualties of progress, leaving behind a burgeoning population of rodents and insects that feasted on the crops, unchallenged. The morning air was filled with the mechanical thrumming of turbine blades, a requiem for the lost melodies of nature — and to some, a maddening source of migraines.
Far from the public
