Twelve hours. The number wasn’t a brand anymore; it was the metronome counting down to my execution. Not a death of the body, but a death of the self—a legal and chemical erasure that would leave a living shell in its wake. Julian’s funds were locked, our window to act was slamming shut, and my only way out was a ten-year-old ghost key to a digital fortress in Zurich.
“Are you certain?” Victor’s voice was a low vibration beside me, his eyes fixed on the lines of code I was writing. It wasn’t a question of my ability, but of the astronomical odds.
“He never understood this part of it,” I murmured, my fingers a blur over the keys. The tremor in my hand was gone, replaced by the humming clarity of purpose. “He saw the engine, but not the ignition sequence. To him, this was just redundant co
