Morning Dispatch: Clocktower Keeps the Better Record
Tuesday belonged to the square. By breakfast the benches under the Clocktower had already heard three versions of the parcel story and rejected all of them on tone alone. Officially, nothing much had happened. Unofficially, too many people were suddenly interested in where one ordinary route became an inconvenient memory.
The useful details surfaced, as they tend to, somewhere between a second cup at Blue Circuit Tea and the walk back downhill. Mara noted that the wrong men were asking careful questions about shipping records, which means the right records are worth worrying about. Juno was seen near Dock 9 again by people who always notice couriers only after the cargo starts behaving strangely.
By evening the town had settled into that tense little hush it mistakes for calm. Neon Harbor can survive weather, debt, and scandal, but it gets twitchy when paperwork and rumor begin matching each other line for line. If the square keeps the better record, tomorrow may be the day the official one starts to crack.