The mag-lev elevator ascended in absolute, engineered silence, its synthetic chime sounding only when it breached the highest security tier of the Alpha Silo. The steel doors parted, but Allison was already moving, her boots leaving faint tracks of surface dust on the unblemished marble floor.
She didn't walk into a cozy family dining room. The Director's Tactical Suite, suspended at the absolute apex of the subterranean city, looked exactly like the trading floor of a Wall Street hedge fund manager who was actively betting against the survival of the human race. The vast, circular room was plunged into darkness, illuminated entirely by the harsh, kinetic glare of twenty massive, high-definition monitors curving along the far wall.
