The station clicked when Nyx touched it.
We all stopped moving.
After two days of listening to a receiver answer itself, even a new failure sounded promising.
She withdrew her hand and inspected the connector. A cracked strip ran beneath the service plate. One side of the contact had blackened. The other still carried a weak, irregular light.
"Don't crowd it," she said.
Five of us moved back. I was already sitting against the opposite wall, which spared me the embarrassment of being included.
The route beyond the narrow shelf had brought us to an old maintenance station behind the core approach. Its markings matched the side branch on Valeria's equipment copy. This line joined the outer housing separately from the damaged contact beside the return seal.
Separately did not mean intact.
Valeria opened the ordinary service cover and examined the break without touching the active surface. Nyx held the lamp. Aiden watched the little test mark above the contact.
