The Grand Rotunda of the Federal Assembly had been transformed from a battleground into a trial of the human species.
Where seventy-five tons of shattered quartz had fallen hours earlier, a temporary geodesic dome of high-tension polymer membrane had been stretched across the ceiling heavy beams by Vanguard building drones, bathing the circular auditorium in crisp, clean white light. The toxic purple spores were gone, replaced by the faint, refreshing scent of wild mint and mountain rain left behind by Echo’s spatial cleansing.
Perched atop the main broadcast boom thirty feet in the air, Pip looked down upon the four hundred delegates with royal vigilance. The golden raptor’s main feathers glowed with a warm, steady amber light that provided the main light for the television cameras, his head tilting with brisk avian pride every time a camera lens pivoted toward him.
At the center of the auditorium, behind the polished silver-steel speaker’s rostrum, stood Arthur Wright.
He wore no patrician robes, no gold-braided general’s sash, and no corporate heraldry. He wore a clean, dark-gray Vanguard field surgeon’s tunic, its collar open, his sleeves rolled to his forearms to reveal the fresh razor-sharp stitches on his shoulder muscle. Around his neck, draped in regal, four-meter silver splendor, Vesper slept. The newly climbed White Tiger Sovereign had her chin resting comfortably over Arthur’s right shoulder, her razor-thin whiskers twitching sometimes in exact timing with her deep, rhythmic purr that hummed through the audio pickups.
