She had started it three weeks ago.
Not because something had broken — because she was good at knowing when things were going to break before they did, and the math had been pointing in one direction long enough that the contingency file was no longer optional. It was the kind of planning she had done before: identify the failure state, document the necessary responses, ensure that the people who would need to act could do so without requiring her to be present and functional.
The difference was that this file was not about EMBER.
She spread the contents on the meeting table at 7 a.m., before the team arrived. The EMBER Studio was hers at this hour — her particular quiet, the early light, the sound of the building before anyone else was in it.
Legal custody documentation: three sets, n
