The air in the Circle's subterranean control center hung thick with tension, a palpable weight of impending doom. My father, a man I barely recognized beneath the veneer of twisted ideology, stood poised to unleash a digital apocalypse, erasing the Circle’s misdeeds along with himself and everyone trapped within this vault. Seraphina, bruised and breathless but resolute, stood beside me, her hand gripping mine. The faint tremor in her fingers betrayed the fear she masked so expertly.