The shape on the far coast kept walking.
Each step crossed more distance than the last. The broken towers stayed the same size behind it. The Array could find no scale for the body.
Soma ran the distance field again.
```
RANGE:
-4.2 SECONDS
```
"It arrives before it leaves," he said.
Aren's black call box crackled.
"Close the view."
"Working on it."
"Work faster."
Continuity Bloc opened an emergency center vote across every surviving public screen.
```
OUTSIDE CONTACT CONFIRMED.
TEMPORARY CIVIC CENTER REQUIRED.
NOMINEE:
CALEB MERCER.
```
Restoration rejected the motion with Caleb's feeder kill behind its party seal.
```
THE SHIELD BELONGS TO NO THRONE.
```
Caleb read both.
"One wants my name. The other wants my face."
Rina stayed on the Array controls.
"Keep both out of the answer."
Sovereign Safety ordered a strike on the observatory ruins.
Tali blocked the route.
"You hit the Array blind, the fold takes the pressure spike as a response."
