The truth under all of it was simple: he had not built the machine to spend another month being careful. He had built it because every door in his life had already closed. Funding gone. permits gone. Reputation burnt down to ash and still smoking. If the machine worked, facts returned. If it failed, there would at least be no one else strapped inside it.

That last thought made it easier to move.

He crossed the platform, climbed into the chair, and felt the metal cold through his shirt. Restraints came over his shoulders and waist with hard mechanical clicks. Above the control arms, the primary ring gave off a faint blue seam where the current slept just below visible threshold. The hand controls sat under his palms. The brake lever rested to his right, deceptively plain. Forward displacement: one minute. Sixty seconds ahead. A step, not a leap. Enough to prove live occupancy, bounded transit, controlled return.

He keyed the interval in himself, though the system already held the value. 00:01:00.

His thumb hovered over the arm switch.

There was still time to stand up. Open the restraints. Call Jonas. Call Amara, even. Endure the fury, the supervision, the humiliation of being handled like a danger to his own work. There was still time to choose wisdom and let someone else say no for him.

He pressed the switch.