The rain over the capital turned heavy, drumming against the concrete roof of the municipal utility vault two blocks from the Sentinel Building.
Beneath the street, the air was warm, stagnant, and thick with the metallic scent of high-voltage transformers. A single yellow inspection lamp hummed overhead, casting long shadows across the heavy junction boxes and thick, bundle-wrapped fiber lines.
Rhea Sacramento stood before the primary junction panel, her gloved fingers resting on the heavy manual throw-lever. Beside her, Lyra had two diagnostic tablets hooked directly into the sub-station's fiber trunk via heavy-duty crocodile clips.
"Thermal signatures around the Sentinel Building are steady," Madam Vane reported through the comms. She was positioned on the third-floor fire escape o
