The tech basement hummed like it had a heartbeat. You could feel it — that quiet, dangerous kind of energy that only shows up when you're a few hours away from changing the world or blowing a hole straight through it.
Three floors underground, ARIA's quantum core glowed in her cage of matte black steel. Blue LEDs pulsed like veins, a rhythm too alive for a machine. Each pulse meant power — twenty years ahead of anything humanity was supposed to have — locked away beneath our feet like a sleeping god.
Charlotte sat at the main workstation, surrounded by curved screens that wrapped around her like a cockpit. Her fingers danced across the keys so fast it looked like muscle memory had taken over from consciousness. The code streamed faster than a person could possibly read, just pure thought translated into syntax.
