We didn't start the day. We continued it.
The map hovered over the ops table in the Tycho dome—no grid, just a clean Moon with our new spine lit in soft gold. Four anchors glowed where we'd set them. A thin, pale line circled the equator like pencil waiting for ink.
"The belt," Elias said, tapping Oceanus Procellarum, then Imbrium, Tranquillitatis, Crisium. "Four braces, then tie-ins to the spine. Once it closes, the Mesh stops acting like islands."
"And once it closes," Seraphina said, not looking up from her notes, "we will have eight ears instead of four."
Nobody at the table except the people who'd been in my kitchen understood why she said it like that. Kade understood enough to stop chewing his pencil.
"Procellarum first," I said. "Biggest sea, so it's the first place anyone throws a stone."
