Thorne
773 Words
The moment Mr. David Cohen, VERITAS's General Counsel, stepped back into the Legal Department, he was intercepted by his immediate subordinate, Mark. Mark's face was pale, his eyes wide with urgency.
"Mr. Cohen, you need to see this," Mark stammered, practically pulling his superior towards his computer screen.
The monitor displayed a damning article on a prominent online news portal. The headline screamed about VERITAS's "Shadowy Financial Practices" and "Neglect Leading to Worker Harm." Below it, a cascade of public comments scrolled by, venomous and rapid.
Mr. Cohen's calm demeanor evaporated. His eyes scanned the text, and a vein began to throb visibly in his temple. "What... what are the PR team doing?" he demanded, his voice dangerously low, then rising sharply. "What the hell are they doing?"
"They're attempting to get the articles taken down, sir," Mark replied quickly. "But we wanted to bring it to your immediate concern."
Mr. Cohen slammed his fist lightly on Mark's desk, the sound echoing through the cubicles. "Then what the hell are you still doing?!" he roared, his voice cutting through the office chatter. He turned to the entire department. "Find those bastards who published this! Sue every single one of them! Make sure every account spreading this false news is held accountable! I want their careers in ashes!"
A jolt of adrenaline shot through the Legal Department. The team, initially stunned, suddenly moved with renewed vigor. "Yes, sir!" several voices shouted in unison as they scrambled to their terminals, fingers flying across keyboards, a renewed sense of purpose fueling their frenzy.
After a moment, Mr. Cohen forcibly calmed himself, running a hand over his face. He turned back to Mark, his voice now a low, dangerous growl. "Who," he asked, the single word heavy with menace, "who was the first person to break this story?"
Mark hesitated, swallowing hard. "It... it was a man named... Marcus Thorne, sir."
Mr. Cohen’s eyes widened, and he repeated the name, almost a whisper of disbelief. "Marcus Thorne?"
"Yes, sir," Mark confirmed, his voice barely audible. "The very same, sir."
Meanwhile, in a sleek, modern office several districts away, a woman paced restlessly. The room, decorated with sharp, minimalist art and dark, reflective surfaces, hummed with a nervous energy that mirrored her own. She walked from one end of the office to the other, her expensive heels clicking a frantic rhythm on the polished concrete floor. After nearly half a minute of this agitated movement, she stopped abruptly, fidgeted with the cuff of her silk blouse, and then stormed out.
Her secretary, a young man, sat at his desk, his fingers hovering over a keyboard. Clipped to his tailored blazer was a gleaming press badge, the bold logo of "The Daily Sentinel" emblazoned above his name: Ben. He rose instantly when the woman emerged.
The woman, trying to project a calm she clearly didn't feel, asked, "Where is he?"
Before Ben could respond, a figure appeared from around the corner of the corridor. He was a man in his late thirties, possessing an almost predatory elegance. His tailored suit seemed to cling to a physique honed by relentless discipline, and his eyes, a startling shade of ice-blue, held an unsettling intensity. A faint, almost imperceptible smirk played on his lips, as if he found the world, and everyone in it, mildly amusing.
The woman’s strained composure shattered. "Marcus!" she exclaimed, her voice sharp with barely contained fury. "To my office, now!"
The woman stormed back into her office, leaving the door ajar. Ben, her secretary, looked at Marcus with a mixture of exasperation and fear as he passed. "Marcus, what have you done again?" Ben whispered, shaking his head.
Marcus Thorne merely offered a sly, unbothered smile. "Who knows?" he replied, his voice a low, smooth purr, before sauntering into the office, the door swinging shut behind him.
Marcus stepped inside, the click of the closing door echoing in the tense silence of the office. Still with that unsettlingly sly smile, he turned to the woman, addressing her with a casualness that grated. "Miss Thorne, I heard you sent for me."
Before the words could fully settle, the woman fired back, her voice low and simmering with barely contained rage. "Cut the crap, Marcus! You know exactly why I called you! If you weren't my brother, I'd be strangling you right now!"
She threw her hands up in exasperation, pacing a tight circle in front of her desk. "The problem regarding your feud with Corel Company hasn't even been solved yet, and you dared to go against... not just anybody, but Arya Brown? Are you crazy, or what?!"
- Writer
