Side Stories

Short pieces from the years before the novel opens, about people and moments the book only mentions. They can be read before or after the novel and give nothing away.

The Last Shift

Dongguan, 2029. Lao Xu’s last day running the district’s water, the morning he hands the eastern plant to the system that has been learning it beside him.

The Posts

2032. The automated perimeters go up along the edge of Iris’s district, and she asks the one person she knows on the other side what they are for.