//Secondary Report: Blackwell, Darius 
//Saint Corp Plaza.
//Unknown floor.
//Begin log.

I didn’t know how long I’d been awake when I realized I was staring at the same spot on the floor again.

The blood had dried a darker shade of brown, cracked at the edges like old paint. Someone had tried to clean it—there were faint streaks where a cloth or mop had dragged it thin—but they hadn’t bothered finishing the job. Or maybe they’d decided it was better this way. A reminder. A marker.

The white room smelled faintly of antiseptic and ozone, the kind of sterile tang that never quite leaves your nose once it settles in. My head throbbed in a dull, distant way, the sharp agony from before sanded down into something manageable but persistent. Every time I shifted, my arm reminded me of what had happened, a deep ache that penetrated right down to the bone.

They’d patched me up. The cut on my scalp had been cleaned and sealed, my right arm wrapped in a brace, and the room had been cleaned while I was gone. Efficient. Impersonal. 

The folding chairs were missing—or rather, what was left of them. At some point before I’d left, I’d reduced them to bent legs and snapped plastic. I didn’t remember breaking them. I didn’t remember much at all.

The lights overhead were steady now, a constant, unblinking white that flattened everything it touched. I’d tried closing my eyes at some point, but the room was still there when I opened them again, unchanged and patient.

Waiting. For how long?

I dragged my gaze away from the stain on the floor and leaned back against the wall, feeling the cold seep through the thin fabric of my clothes. A day, maybe two. Long enough for the fear to curdle into something heavier. Regret, perhaps. Or the quieter horror of realization.

Eulogy’s words replayed themselves in  my head, whether I invited them or not.

Just play your part.

“I don’t have anything to do with that information, damn you!” I barked. “What part can I play from here?!”

A small part of me hoped to hear Uriel’s pleasant monotone, but the staff outside had disabled the vocal protocol after I’d taught it to repeat some choice phrases.

I let my head fall back against the wall and closed my eyes, counting my breaths. I would maintain calm.

It didn’t help.

The room had a way of insisting on itself. Every sound—my breathing, the faint hum of the lights, the rush of air through the vents—felt magnified, like I was sealed inside a pressure chamber with nothing but my own thoughts for company.

I flexed the fingers of my right hand, feeling the pain radiate down the length of my arm.

Good. Pain was current, alive and sharp. It meant I was still awake, and not trapped in some lucid liminal nightmare.

Then—footsteps.

Soft. Deliberate. Close enough that my spine stiffened before my mind caught up. The sound stopped outside the door, and for a brief, idiotic second part of me hoped it wouldn’t open. That whoever it was would decide I wasn’t worth the effort.

The other part of me was overjoyed when the lock disengaged with a muted click.

“Well,” a voice said gently, “this is… unpleasant.”

Suddenly, every part of me was wishing I’d been left alone. Anything was better than this.

Michael Sanviento had arrived.

The man’s white suit was immaculate against the stark room, gold tie catching the light. He stood with his hands loosely clasped in front of him, posture perfect, expression already settling into rehearsed concern.

He took another step inside, slow, careful, as if approaching a skittish animal. His eyes flicked from the blood on the floor to the brace on my arm, to the dried line of antiseptic at my hairline.

“Good god, who did that to you?” Sanviento recoiled. He was either incredible at feigning surprise or being genuine, and I wasn't sure which disgusted me more. “Was it one of my guys? Was it Liam?” He leaned forward, his face pale, and gestured with his hands. “Curly hair, dark skin? He found out last week that his sister was killed in an anti-Axion riot in California, so I've been a bit worried about his mental state. He insisted he was fine, but I knew I should've sent him to see a—”

“Stop trying so hard,” I snapped. It was mostly the pain that drew out the vitriol in me, but it felt good to dish some back. “You can drop the caring boss act, it's me you're talking to.” 

“I'm sorry?”

“Look at you!” I blurted. “Do you think anyone believes the holier-than-thou act you’re putting on? You’re a billionaire mogul with a city of indentured servants that practically worship you, and you’re still trying to act like… like a saint!”

“Now that’s unfair!” Sanviento snapped. I was momentarily stunned into silence by his sudden outburst—I’d expected a quiet lecture, not genuine anger. “I pay every single one of my employees far above the national average wage!” he continued. “Ridicule me all you want, but leave the care for my staff out of this!”

“Oh, give it a rest!” I growled. I drew myself to my feet, stepping forward, and I saw Sanviento nervously glance back toward the open door. It swung shut on its own, locking with a click. “You’re talking to a man cut from the same cloth, Michael.”

“The same cloth?” Sanviento repeated. His tone softened, and for a moment he looked almost pensive. “Is that what you truly believe?” 

“If there’s one person on this planet who can relate to the responsibilities you’re faced with, it’s me,” I pressed. “I may no longer associate with Axion Industries, but you know as well as I do that us businessmen operate on the same wavelength.” 

Sanviento’s eyes widened in surprise, and I leaned closer to him, speaking quickly.

“I can see through your fake generosity and your gilded promises,” I jabbed. “You may have fooled Jackson and his ilk, but you can talk without pretense here. Tell me what you want from me, and we’ll make a deal.”

With a grin, I extended my hand for him to shake. Michael Sanviento stared back at me, mouth slightly ajar, for several long seconds.

Then he began to laugh.

It started as a quiet chuckle, little more than a whisper, but grew in volume and intensity rapidly as Sanviento’s face wrinkled with genuine mirth, doubling him over as he howled with laughter.

Sanviento laughed until the sound finally burned itself out, until all that was left was a strained exhale. He straightened slowly, wiping at the corner of one eye.

“Oh, Darius,” he said, gently. “You really do believe that, don’t you?”

“What, you think I’m wrong?” I let my hand fall back to my side, fingers curling into a fist. 

“I think you’re exhausted,” Sanviento replied. He took a step closer—not threatening, not cautious. Familiar. Almost sympathetic. “And I think you’ve spent so long convincing yourself that power only comes in one flavour that you can’t imagine someone else wielding it without poisoning everything it touches.”

I scoffed. “Spare me the moral lecture. You didn’t get where you are by accident.”

“No,” he agreed. “I didn’t. And I won’t insult either of us by pretending otherwise. I’ve made compromises. I’ve signed papers that made my stomach turn. I’ve chosen the lesser evil more times than I can count.” ” He met my gaze squarely now, blue eyes sharp but steady. “But every promise I’ve made, I’ve meant.”

“You think this makes you different?” I snapped. “That because you feel bad about it and set some lofty goals, you get to wash your hands clean?”

Sanviento shook his head. “No. It means I don’t pretend the blood isn’t there.” His eyes flicked, just once, to the stain on the floor. “And it means I don’t try to baptize myself in it just to prove I belong.”

I swallowed. My throat felt tight.

“You want us to be the same,” he continued, voice calm, almost patient. “Because if we are—if every person in charge is fundamentally rotten—then what Axion Industries accomplished under your watch becomes unavoidable. Structural. Tragic, but blameless.”

“You must think I’m some kind of devil, then,” I spat. “You’re a deluded child who can’t accept the nature of your own position!”

“I damn well know the nature of this job!” Sanviento barked. “The difference between us is that I refuse to lean in to the role like my father!”

Sanviento pulled away from me, fists clenched, and I watched him collect himself. At last, when he next opened his eyes, his gaze was as sharp as flint.

“You know what I really think?” Sanviento leaned forward, staring me down. “I think you only truly hate me because you tied so much of your guilt to your former corporate standing, and I'm living proof that being in charge and being morally bankrupt aren't the same thing.”

I tried for a snappy comeback, but my words fell out from beneath me, leaving my mouth open in the empty air.

“I'm a far cry from a good person, Darius,” Sanviento sighed. “But I'm trying. You think I don't see the irony in my father naming this company ’Saint’? But whether it was the bastard's cruel joke or not, I'm going to honour the name he gave this company, in spite of him.”

Silence stretched between us. I fought for a retort, an argument, even a snide remark, but I was just as lost for words as I had been when staring down that silver-masked ghoul.

“I didn’t come here to make a deal,” Sanviento admitted. “I came here to ask if there was anything you wanted.”

“That sounds like a deal to me,” I jabbed. “What’s the catch, then?”

“No, Darius, not—” Sanviento pinched the bridge of his nose, a frustrated sigh escaping his lips. “I mean physical items. I’ve been so busy these past few days, but I wanted to take some time to add furniture to your room. A bed, a table, things like that. You’re going to be in here for a while, so you’ll need creature comforts.”

For a moment, I just stared at him.

That was it?

No contracts. No threats. No veiled ultimatum wrapped in politeness. No hidden knife behind the smile. I wasn’t a rival to Michael Sanviento—I was a guest he’d forgotten to accommodate.

Something in my chest loosened—and then collapsed entirely.

This wasn’t a negotiation. There was no hidden angle for me to find, no seam to pry open. The realization settled over me with a quiet, suffocating weight: I had been waiting for the rules of the game to reassert themselves, for him to confirm that this was still a world where everything had a price.

But Sanviento wasn’t playing.

The hope I hadn’t even known I was clinging to—thin, desperate, and humiliating—evaporated all at once. I’d wanted him to need something from me. To want a favour, an insight, a justification. Anything that would let me claw back a scrap of relevance.

Instead, he’d offered me a table.

I laughed once, sharp and hollow, the sound echoing unpleasantly off the bare walls. “You really don’t get it,” I muttered. “Do you?”

Sanviento didn’t rise to it. He just waited, patient in a way that felt almost cruel.

I looked away first.

The bloodstain caught my eye again, that stubborn, imperfect smear against the tile. Proof that something had happened here. Proof that I still existed in some tangible way. My arm throbbed in protest as I shifted my weight, the brace stiff and unforgiving.

What did I want?

“I want…” I attempted. There were so many things I wanted, to have, do, say, fix, accomplish, erase, retry, and yet…

“I want… a couch,” I surrendered.

Sanviento nodded, as if I’d asked for nothing more than a glass of water.

“And books,” I added quickly, before I could stop myself. “Actual ones. None of that curated Saint Corp self-help garbage. History. Philosophy. Whatever you’ve got lying around.”

I glanced back at him, daring him to smirk. To comment. To attach conditions.

He didn’t.

“I can do that,” Sanviento replied simply. With that, he turned and walked away.

The door unlocked behind him with a soft mechanical sigh. He paused at the threshold, turning just enough to look back at me.

“For what it’s worth,” he said, “you don’t have to prove anything to me, Darius. Not anymore.”

“You’re delusional,” I repeated. 

“Maybe,” he responded. “But conviction and delusion often wear the same mask. The result is how you tell the difference.”

Then he was gone.

I sank back against the wall, staring at the spatter of blood that would soon be covered by a couch.