Time Remaining: 30 Days, 02 Hours. (Status: Level 1 Observation Clearance Granted. No Operational Authority.) Location: The Citadel - The Sanctum of Synchronization.
The ascent was not a journey through distance, but through noise.
Arthur, Vivian, and Overseer Silas stood in the Director's private elevator. It was a cage of polished brass and mahogany, lined with velvet to dampen the sound. As they rose from the depths of the Core Junction, the environment shifted. The guttural, 4-Hertz throb of the struggling engines faded. The screaming hiss of steam vanished. The smell of sulfur and wet coal was replaced by the scent of ozone and beeswax.
By the time the elevator reached the spire, the silence was absolute. It wasn't the empty silence of a void. It was the heavy, pressurized silence of a library, or a tomb.
