[POV: Lyon Darlington]"State the military requisition parameters," Lyon said, his fingers resting motionless against his titanium armrest as the heavy blast doors sealed shut behind him.The central briefing hall inside the Capital Citadel was vast, cold, and lined with high-density acoustic dampening panels. At the center of the stadium-style tier sat seven high-ranking officials from the Ministry of National Defense, flanked by twelve armed guards in full tactical body armor."Sit down, Lyon," Major Hayes commanded, pointing toward a single steel chair placed in the middle of the floor, fifty feet away from the main bench.Lyon did not move his wheelchair an inch closer. He stopped precisely at the threshold line, his dark eyes analyzing the biometric scanners mounted along the upper ceiling."I do not take instructions from field officers," Lyon said, his voice flat, icy, and completely devoid of vibration. "If the Supreme Defense Council wishes to discuss Blackwood Medical assets

[POV: Lyon Darlington]"The neural bridge parameters for patient block gamma are locked," Lyon said, his voice flat as his fingers hovered above the glass terminal. "The micro-actuator frequency is calibrated to zero point zero zero three hertz.""The calibrations are fine," Jessica said, setting her digital stylus down onto the steel desk with a sharp, metallic click. "I reviewed the surgical telemetry twice before coming up to your office.""Then state your operational purpose," Lyon replied, not shifting his eyes from the blue diagnostic streams scrolling across his monitors. "The morning trauma briefings begin in precisely four hours.""It's two in the morning, Lyon," Jessica said, her voice quiet as she walked around the edge of the desk, stopping two feet from his right arm. "The operating bays are clear. The night shift staff has taken over the monitoring consoles. We have forty minutes of unscheduled time.""Unscheduled time is an inefficiency," Lyon stated, his hands dropping

[POV: Lyon Darlington]"Place four private tactical officers around Doctor Jessica's residence," Lyon said into his collar microphone, his fingers resting motionless against his titanium armrest as the main server terminal processed the security deployment."The unit is in position, Master Lyon," Lancelot replied through the encrypted link. "They are operating in plainclothes. The perimeter covers her apartment building, her vehicle, and her primary route to the research spire.""Keep the distance at forty meters," Lyon commanded flatly, his dark eyes analyzing the live biometric telemetry coming from her wristband monitor. "She possesses high spatial awareness. An overt physical presence will disrupt her focus during tomorrow's surgical schedule.""Understood," Lancelot said. "We intercepted a secondary data ping on her personal network twenty minutes ago. An untraceable server in the capital ran a background query on her family's medical license records.""A low-level probe," Lyon n

[POV: Lyon Darlington]"The perimeter sensors on the eighty-eighth floor registered three separate optical pings at two in the morning," Lancelot said, his voice flat as he pointed at the glass terminal screen. "They came from a satellite array using Capital High Command encryption."Lyon did not raise his eyes from the diagnostic telemetry running across his wall monitors. "They are testing the electromagnetic dampening fields. It is a standard preliminary surveillance sweep.""They know Doctor Jessica is living inside the secure wing," Mandolin added, stepping up to the edge of the mahogany desk with a thermal coffee carafe. "Her presence here changes the defensive calculation. General Blackwood's analysts will assume she is a primary pressure point.""Her classification is invariant," Lyon stated, his fingers tapping a precise sequence into his trackpad to lock the server node. "She remains the chief clinical officer of Blackwood Medical. Her physical location inside this building

LYON POV"Inject forty milligrams of pralidoxime into the secondary IV line," Lyon said, his voice a raspy, low whisper that barely scraped past his raw vocal cords."Your cardiac rhythm is still wildly irregular, Lyon!" Jessica shouted, her gloved hands trembling slightly as she adjusted the emergency ventilator tubing beside his hospital bed. "The synthetic neurotoxin almost paralyzed your phrenic nerve completely! You shouldn't even be speaking!""My internal metabolic rate is thirty percent higher than normal," Lyon stated flatly, his dark eyes fixing on the digital monitor mounted above his head. "The atropine bolus you administered neutralized the immediate muscarinic shock. The pralidoxime will reactivate the cholinesterase enzymes within six minutes.""You almost died on that stage!" Jessica snapped, leaning over the bed rail, her face pale, her dark eyes wide with an intense, furious dread that shook her entire frame. "If I had been two seconds slower with the syringe, your d