The Vault glowed.
No longer flickering. No longer bleeding.
Alive. Whole. Waiting.
Ava stood before the interface, her hands hovering over the final set of commands. The last lines of the rewritten schema blinked at her like a pulse from the planet's lungs—calm, full, awake.
[REWRITE REWRITE COMPLETE]
[APPLY TO ALL REGIONAL NODES?][Y/N]
Lucas watched in silence, leaning against the remnants of a collapsed pillar, blade sheathed, blood drying along his jaw.
He didn't say anything.
He didn't have to.
This was her moment.
Ava's voice was quiet. "Once I do this… there's no Military left."
"Good," Lucas said. "They don't deserve one."
She hesitated only a second more, then tapped:
[Y]
The command executed.
And the world—shifted.
Not in thunder. Not in flames.
But in permission.
From one end of the system to the other, the override chain dissolved. The hidden code nests burned themselves out. Control nodes went dark.
