The sound of the console's humming cooling unit dominated the atmosphere inside the bustling dome. I stood sipping a cup of warm stimulant from the mug held in my right hand, watching Kael and Risha busy sorting rolls of insulating wire in the corner of the room. In the distance, the clinking of metal echoed as Grox installed his first seismic sensor plate."L, you need to see this," Wallen called out, his voice breaking my concentration.I turned around. The blue-scaled Fyskk was staring at the holographic screen floating above the main console.I approached, stepping up beside him. Vex, who had been sitting and cleaning the barrel of her sniper rifle, rose as well and walked over to Wallen."Did you find something?" Vex asked, crossing her arms over her chest.Wallen tapped his fingers onto the virtual keyboard. A three-dimensional star cluster instantly bloomed in the air, displaying a galaxy navigation map filled with bright points of light. "Far more than just something. I filter

The proxy rotation algorithm ran, mapping the void. Wallen's console screen displayed data blocks from Sector Six. We watched the holes left behind by Aegis Combine, Zenith Mechanics, and Solstice Vanguard. Every five minutes, Cora severed our server connection to the outside network, resetting the route through dozens of random transit points.The indicator light on the communication panel blinked red. Its blink frequency stabilized, overriding Wallen's scanner screen."There's an incoming transmission," Wallen reported, his fingers moving swiftly across the virtual keyboard. "Someone just breached our protective layer."Cora shifted to the second console, pulling her data cable. "They aren't hacking. They're using a high-priority protocol. This message came through the band gap we use for proxy rotation.""Is that them?" I asked. I moved toward the center of the room. "The group we're watching?"Cora shook her head, reading the string of identification codes scrolling across her scr

Wallen’s console screen displayed thousands of Sector Six power distribution nodes. The holographic map overlapped, forming an intricate web of industrial layouts. I stood behind the Fyskk, watching the electrical anomaly tracking algorithm comb through every block of the industrial zone."Sector Six is a logistics nightmare," Wallen reported. His fingers stopped typing. He rotated the map ninety degrees to reveal the topography of level 1298. "This lower district has thousands of heating reactors operating independently. Toss in millions of illegal cable hookups siphoning power straight from the main circuits. Finding a single electrical consumption spike in the middle of this ocean of energy theft will take weeks.""How many candidate locations did you manage to filter down, Wallen?" I asked.Wallen pressed the filter button on his screen. The points of light dimmed, leaving dozens of coordinates still glowing yellow. "Forty-three locations. All of them are warehouse complexes logge

The holographic screen cast a bluish glow across the entire room. I observed the rows of numbers and data trajectory diagrams moving constantly. The atmosphere inside the dome felt dense with anticipation, triggered by the deadline shrinking second by second.Cora sat behind the console desk. Her hands moved swiftly across the virtual keyboard, sorting through the incoming stream of information."Verification complete," Cora reported. She slid a data window toward the main display so the entire team could read it. "I managed to breach the Noctis Reach Authority's bureaucratic archives and cross-reference Governor Marek Dravon's threat with the Imperium constitution. His authority is real, but it has territorial limits."I leaned forward, reading the summary of those security clauses. "How far does his jurisdiction reach?""Right now, Dravon holds full control over the administration of Noctis Reach," Cora explained, highlighting several lines of legislation in yellow. "He indeed posse

​The separatist collaborator label published by the Noctis Reach Authority worked faster than a fleet of military warships.​The morning after Governor Marek Dravon's decree went active, a flurry of transaction cancellation reports filled Cora's console. Three suppliers who had agreed to ship power cell components unilaterally cut off the transaction. They returned the credits through anonymous nodes, refusing to deal with a group whose name plastered the Noctis Reach announcement screens. The alternative supply route Wallen prepared in Sector Six only survived partially, sustained by old ties that cared nothing for our label.​"The supply of spare parts and ammo cells Kael bought yesterday has arrived at the transit point," Wallen reported. The Fyskk tapped the cybernetic plate on his face, observing the traffic graph. "The courier there refuses to deliver them to our rendezvous point. If those goods aren't picked up before noon, patrol officers will confiscate them as unclaimed comm