The situation room at NATO Headquarters in Brussels was a monument to modern strategic power, all polished dark wood, banks of glowing screens, and secure communication lines to every major capital on Earth. Today, it felt like a tomb. The air was thick with the smell of cold coffee, stale sweat, and a new, acrid scent: sheer, undiluted terror.
General Mark Fletcher stood before a digital map of Europe. London, Paris, and Berlin were still pulsating red, their "anomaly zones" now clearly defined and slowly, inexorably expanding. The initial reports of localized chaos had hardened into a chilling, consistent picture: the complete and total failure of the 21st century.
