Mira’s deadline reached Eli in the same sleeve as the rejected junction.
A few hours for a plan that could grow beyond one captive. Not another statement that the research mattered. A sequence people could perform under the conditions they actually had, with shared trunks and working defenses accounted for. Eli read it while Juno laid the two configurations on the table.
The nearest candidate’s shared trunk was plainly wrong for an immediate repeat. The second offered a possible bypass, but the recess remained behind a monitoring station watching an occupied evacuation route. Mira’s engineer and escort were traveling with ordinary tools. Their presence would not make the monitor unnecessary.
“We run the sequence,” Juno said.
The independent crafter brought the bypass equipment from its agreed storage. Not enough for a living intervention here; enough to place the actual pieces in order, identify hands and timing, and find what the plan demanded twice. The settlement’s envoy accepted the role of local operator in the exercise because the community needed to see where its people would be asked to act.
Eli cleared the table.
A guide token represented the arriving engineer. A weighted block represented the monitor’s occupied position. Equipment labels named actual devices rather than imaginary spare capacity. The clock stood beside the model where everyone could see it.
