Rook’s order was four pages long, and Eli had spent the morning expecting it to be a lie.
The commission clerk placed a witnessed copy beneath the table lamp. Its authorization covered rapid removal of the coastal core under unstable conditions. There were conditions, reporting duties and a signature from an authority outside the expedition. The date preceded the most disputed decisions in the chamber.
Eli read the first page again because he disliked what it did to the argument he had prepared.
Across the room, Rook waited without smiling. His composure seemed deliberate, but the order itself did not become false merely because its bearer understood its effect.
The opening session occupied a harbor administration hall where a faded line on the wall showed the reach of an earlier flood. Commission staff had arranged the witness tables so that neither Aegis nor the expedition team sat at the head. The public gallery was small. Several people who had spent the previous week searching for relatives stood behind the seats until an usher cleared an access lane and found additional chairs.
Eli had submitted an inventory of his records. His personal ledger remained with him. The commission had accepted a separate functional statement for this session, reserving any further request to a defined review process. That acceptance did not settle every future dispute, but he could answer a question without wondering which private page was circulating behind him.
