Vortiger Tower – Executive Wing, 9:27 A.M.
Cassien stood before the twelve-foot glass windows of his father’s old office, which he hadn’t set foot in since the fire five years ago.
The skyline looked the same. A sea of towers punctured the pale morning haze, glass and steel shimmering like teeth under a predator’s grin. The city below moved on as if nothing had shifted, taxis threading through traffic, vendors shouting, office towers blinking alive.
But everything beneath it had changed.
Behind him, chaos unraveled like dominoes in a hurricane. The air hummed with voices from two dozen televisions and the shrill of unanswered phones. Assistants sprinted between wings. Lawyers huddled with frantic whispers. Secretaries gathered gossip like ash drifting from a burning building.
The broa
