The moon is honest. No air to carry noise, no weather to smear the lines. Just white stone, black shadow, and the work you bring with you.
I stood on Tycho's southern rim with a low, conjured map hovering between Elias and me. Lines of light showed what we'd already raised—our first bastion at Tycho Yard, the research dome, the bone-lanes for cargo—and what still needed to exist if the moon was going to be more than a mine and a prayer.
"Four new anchors today," Elias said, finger tracing arcs that crossed craters like measured brushstrokes. "Clavius Spur, Plato Basin, Serenitatis Rim, and the Tycho West saddle."
"Do Clavius first," I said. "If a demon throws a rock, that's the angle they'll choose."
He nodded once. Elias doesn't waste words when the plan is good. He lifted his wrist, pinged crews, and the warp pads below answered with a soft blue: ready.
