The sky above Dominion City no longer felt like part of the world.
It hung there, vast and oppressive, layered with alien silhouettes that moved with unsettling coordination, thousands of Sovereign Protocol airships drifting forward in slow, deliberate formation, their surfaces reflecting the burning glow of the city's defense grids as if the destruction below meant nothing more than background noise to them.
Harper stood unmoving at the command edge of the battlefield, her jaw set, her eyes tracking the enemy's advance as the mech divisions beneath her adjusted position in disciplined silence. No one spoke unnecessarily. No one joked. The weight of the moment pressed down on every soldier present.
This was the line.
She activated the wide-band channel again, her voice calm but urgent as she connected to the other regional command nodes across Nortasia.
"New Winston, report," she said.
