The air inside the Titan Core server room felt as though it had turned to liquid glass. The ambient hum of the towering supercomputers was drowned out entirely by the frantic, chaotic shrieking of the life-support alarms. On the 8k holographic display, Kakek Edward’s neural pathways were lighting up like a city grid during a catastrophic power surge, his brainwaves degrading into a frantic, jagged scrawl that signaled impending, irreversible brain death.
Dr. Vance Sterling, the Chief of Trauma, was hyperventilating, his eyes locked on the eight-inch meteoritic alloy needles resting in my hand.
"You cannot do this," Sterling pleaded, his voice cracking, entirely stripped of its corporate arrogance. He took a step toward the gurney, his hands raised in a desperate attempt to physically int
