Retail Stores

Retail stores spread along commercial roads at the edge of the Financial District, changing from corner shops, supermarkets, and clothing stores into shopping buildings with indoor pedestrian streets. Shutters, shelves, fitting rooms, freezers, and checkout counters are mostly intact, and the lighting and refrigeration still operate. Some storefronts look identical from outside, yet their interiors extend far beyond the building outlines, while rear doors connect to city warehouses, loading alleys, and service roads. There is no stable process of resupply. New goods appear on shelves when nobody is watching, while advertisements and price labels change by themselves. Taken objects do not return from nowhere, but an empty display is eventually filled with something different. The Institute's private army controls the main shops, storage passages, and adjacent blocks, placing the continually appearing supplies under unified control; the hum of freezer compressors is therefore often mixed with patrol footsteps and the distant crash of shutters closing.