The placement window was 9:00 to 9:45.
Vane's building inspection ran from 9:00 and went north — toward the training grounds first, which put the east wing sub-level at the end of his circuit if he ran it at all.
Most Tuesdays, according to Elena's records, he skipped the sub-level section.
Most Tuesdays.
I went down the maintenance stairwell at 9:01.
The sub-level maintenance corridor was narrow and poorly lit by a series of low-grade crystal fixtures that ran at about forty percent output — enough to prevent total darkness, not enough for comfortable extended work. The stone floor was bare and cold and I could hear the ventilation system running in the wall to my left, the specific low-frequency sound that had been my company in the utility passage cultivation sessions since October.
Forty meters. Turn right at the junction. Another twenty meters to the east-side access panel.
I had walked this route in my mind approximately eighty times over the past three weeks.
