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It was the kind of night that didn’t blink. Just stared back at you, glassy-eyed and wired, like a boxer who’d taken too many hits and still wouldn’t stay down. The river didn’t ripple. It pulsed. Slow and steady, like the heartbeat of a city trying to remember what it used to be.
I was on the Windsor side, boots scuffed, coat collar turned up against a wind that didn’t care. The cigarette between my fingers glowed like a warning flare. I lit it with a match that hissed like the city’s last breath. Took a drag. Let the smoke curl out like a confession.
Across the water, Detroit stood tall. Not proud—just stubborn. The skyline was a cocktail of ambition and exhaustion. The Civic Center gleamed like it hadn’t yet learned how to lie. Cobo Hall, the City-County Building, the Veterans Memorial—all dressed in their Sunday best, pretending the party hadn’t ended.
But I knew better. Cities don’t shine unless they’re trying to distract you from the rot underneath.
Somewhere down there, a man was getting mugged. Somewhere else, a woman was selling something she didn’t want to name. And somewhere, in a boardroom lit by fluorescent lies, someone was signing away another block to the highest bidder.
The city had already stopped pretending. The skyline blinked like it was trying to stay awake, like it knew something was coming and didn’t want to miss it.
And then he came.
Not in whispers. Not in blueprints. In metal. In motion. In the kind of silence that makes grown men flinch. Robocop wasn’t prophecy anymore—he was present. A badge bolted to a corpse, walking the streets like vengeance had a pension plan. They said he was justice. But justice doesn’t hum like a turbine or bleed motor oil.
He patrolled the Civic Center like it was sacred ground. Cobo Hall, the Veterans Memorial, the City-County Building—he moved between them like a ghost with a gun. His visor caught the skyline, reflected it back in cold chrome. The city looked cleaner in his eyes. But it wasn’t. It was just quieter.
Behind me, Windsor was still watching. Still pretending it wasn’t part of the story. The rail lines rusted. The gravel crunched. The night was foggy and silent. I took a drag. The smoke tasted like regret and transmission fluid. Detroit didn’t move, but it wasn’t still either. It pulsed. It waited. It knew the future had arrived early. And somewhere in that concrete jungle, behind the flickering neon and the echo of sirens, he walked. Not a man. Not anymore. A guardian forged from grief and circuitry. A warden with a badge and a memory full of pain. Robocop didn’t blink. Didn’t flinch. Just moved like justice had a deadline.
Robocop didn’t speak. He didn’t need to. His footsteps said everything. They echoed off the buildings like a verdict. The city had asked for protection. It got precision. It got protocol. It got a man who couldn’t forget what was done to him, and a system that didn’t care.
I still have it. That postcard. The one with the skyline all lit up, selling a dream that never landed. It’s faded now, edges curled like it’s trying to hide its own story. But I keep it. Not for the lie it tells, but for the truth it hints at.
Detroit wasn’t beautiful. It was brutal. Honest. And in its own way, sacred. A city that fought itself every day and still managed to stand.
I flicked the last of my cigarette into the river and watched it vanish. The skyline blinked back at me. Somewhere out there, Robocop was still walking. Still watching. Still waiting.
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