The faction leader brought a broken fitting to the meeting.
He set it on a cloth between the contract copies. It came from a barrier damaged during a recent disturbance, not from Juno’s own prototype. Its torn edge needed no explanation to make people remember the failed foundation and the operator carried away after the shock. Eli saw the planned site’s representative look at it before opening the contract.
“This is why a network needs one authority for protected installations,” the leader said. “An attacker only needs one bad component. You cannot argue over every revision while people are trying to keep a field standing.”
Juno asked whether the fitting had been examined to establish the cause of failure. It had. The leader supplied the report. A strike and a faulty retaining piece had both mattered. The example was real enough to deserve attention, though it did not prove the contract was the only way to answer it.
The offer covered trained guards, scarce equipment, and a command structure that could respond rapidly. Several local officials favored it. They had spent too many days asking independent crews for help those crews were already giving elsewhere. A single committed force looked like the first stable promise in weeks.
