The blue light of the digital projection died, but the image of Julian’s signature remained burned into the back of my eyelids. It throbbed there, a neon brand of my own stupidity, a luminous, pulsing ghost that refused to fade even when I squeezed my eyes shut.
I stood frozen in the exact center of the dark bedroom. In my hand, the silver communication disc felt less like a piece of high-tech espionage gear and more like a chunk of dry ice. It was freezing, a biting, metallic cold that seeped past my calloused skin, traveled up the radius of my forearm, and lodged itself directly in my chest. The silence of the Fortress pressed against my ears, suffocating and thick. Outside the massive arched windows, the distant, rhythmic crashing of the ocean waves against the jagged cliffs below sou
