The footage was still playing when Mara walked into the room.
No sound, just light flickering blue and red from the arch, the shimmer of the shield outside, the smear of lightning across the civic center's facade. Someone had zoomed in on the boy.
Tal Riss, youth liaison.
Standing under the convulsing ring, eyes wide, jaw set, the words CONFLICTING DATA stuttering over his head.
The Board Chair stabbed the pause control.
"That," he said, "is what your compromise looks like, Captain."
Mara did not bother sitting.
"Which part," she asked. "The glitching machine, the crowd that didn't break, or the shield that did not quite hold."
A few of the assembled members shifted, some from Orion, some from Civic Oversight, some from departments that tried very hard to pretend they were neither.
Internal sat near the front, expression carved from stone.
