Chapter 38: The Sub-Floor Protocol
The Black Spire breathed with a low, electric hum—the sound of a billion data packets moving through the walls every second. At 03:00, the "Sanctuary" was bathed in the artificial blue glow of the Atlantic moon, but the air inside was thick with the scent of ozone and the quiet, vibrating tension of a hunt. I stood in the center of my glass-walled prison, watching the dark silhouette of the Nigerian coastline. Somewhere out there, the real world was sleeping, unaware that the ceiling of their reality was about to be torn open.
I didn't use the elevator. The elevators in the Spire were biometric traps, weighing the occupant to the gram and scanning for the specific hormonal markers of cortisol or adrenaline. Instead, I accessed the maintenance conduit be
