Power doesn't feel like fire, Fire burns out.
Power feels like ice, It preserves and it numbs.
I sat in the back of the black sedan, the leather seat felt against my spine, as the car navigated the gridlock of downtown.
In my lap, the tablet was displaying the world as it truly was: a stream of data, vulnerable and exposed.
ASSET ACTIVE: THE WATCHTOWER.
CONNECTIONS: 14,203 CAMERAS.
AUDIO FEEDS: 8,900.
ACCESS LEVEL: UNRESTRICTED.
I dragged my finger across the screen. The feed shifted.
I was looking through a traffic camera on 5th Avenue. I saw my own car, a black beetle moving through a vein of red tail lights.
I swiped again, an ATM camera three blocks away. A woman was withdrawing cash, looking over her shoulder, I zoomed in and I could read the numbers on her card. I could see the fear in her eyes.
I swiped again, the front camera of a laptop inside a coffee shop. A teenager was typing a screenplay, oblivious to the fact that I was watching him from the backseat of a moving car half a mile away.
It was intoxicating and terrifying.
This was what my father had built? This wasn't just a company. This wasn't just "leverage." This was an omnipresent view. He hadn't just made money; he had collected the city's secrets like a bees collecting honey.
And now, this collection belonged to me.
I tapped the search bar and typed in a name.
JOHN GABLE.
The screen flickered, cycling through feeds until it locked onto a signal.
GPS coordinates: The parking garage of the Capital Grille.
Source: Dashboard camera, Tesla Model S.
The video feed popped up. It was dark, little light of fluorescent lights of the garage. Senator Gable was sitting in the driver's seat of his car head was resting on the steering wheel, shoulders were shaking.
He was weeping.
I watched him, the man who had vowed to bring down the corrupt elite, the man who stood for justice, broken by a twenty-year-old with a tablet and a lie.
I felt a pain in my chest a sharp, stabbing pain of guilt. I had destroyed a good man to save a murderer.
Bzzt.
The tablet vibrated, sensing the hesitation in my pulse rate via the fingerprint scanner.
ANALYSIS: EMPATHY IS A LIABILITY.
RESULT: GABLE IS NEUTRALIZED.
OUTCOME: FAMILY SECURED.
DON'T LOOK BACK, DAVID.
"Family secured," I whispered to the empty car.
I closed the feed of the crying senator the screen went black, then returned to the map of the city.
The car slowed to a halt the valet stand of the St. Regis.
"We're here, sir," the car's voice system announced.
I put the tablet away and buttoned my jacket. I checked my face in the rearview mirror.
I was ready to face the only person left who remembered the fire.
When I entered, the lights were dim. The curtains were drawn, shutting out the afternoon sun. My mother was sitting on the floor by the window, wrapped in a hotel bathrobe that was too big for her, she wasn't looking at the view. She was looking at a spot on the carpet, tracing the pattern with a finger.
She looked like a ghost haunting her own life.
"David," she said without turning around. Her voice was thick with exhaustion and alcohol. "I saw the news. Senator Gable... he issued a statement saying it was an accidental fire and Case is closed."
"I handled it," I said, taking off my jacket and wraping it over a chair.
"You handled it," she repeated, a bitter laugh escaping her lips. She turned to look at me then her eyes were bloodshot, the makeup from yesterday smeared into dark bruises under her eyes. "You handled the police and the Board and handled the Senator. You've been busy."
"I did what had to be done," I said. "We're safe and money is secure. The company is mine."
"Yours?" She tilted her head. "Or his?"
She pointed a shaking finger at the tablet peeking from my jacket pocket.
"You think you're in charge, David? You think you're the King now? You're just the new host. That thing... that machine... it's eating you i can see it. You walk differently and talk differently. You sound like him."
"I sound like a survivor," I snapped. I walked over to the mini-bar and grabbed a bottle of water. "If I hadn't listened to the machine, Mom we would be in a cell right now. Miller would have arrested us. Gable would have buried us. I saved you."
"Did you?" She struggled to her feet, clutching the robe tight. "You saved the body but what about the rest? Look at you. You're twenty years old and you have the eyes of a killer."
"I am a killer!" I shouted. The words echoed off the walls, sudden and violent. "I killed Miller. I killed him to protect your secret. So don't lecture me about morality you started this and you cut his head off."
She flinched as if I had slapped her, she took a step back, hitting the glass of the window.
"I had to," she whispered. "He was going to...."
"Going to what?" I interrupted and stepped closer, looming over her. The tablet had hinted at it, but I needed to hear it from her. "What was he going to do that was so terrible you had to do that to him in the living room?"
She looked at me, her lip trembling she looked terrified. Not of me but of the memory.
"He was going to initiate the Plan," she said softly.
"What Plan?"
"He called it 'The Reset,'" she said. "He told me that night after he sat me down and poured me a glass of wine, and told me he was bored. He said the company, the empire, the life... it had become boring. He wanted to burn it all down liquidate everything and destroying the legacy. He wanted to take us to some compound in South America and live like... like refugees and He said it was a test."
She swallowed hard. "I told him no and he was insane. He laughed and said the decision was already made. He said... he said I was 'the key.'"
I stared at her "So you killed him because he wanted to retire?"
"No!" She screamed "Because he wasn't just going to retire, David! He was going to erase us! He had the papers drawn up to annul the marriage, to disinherit you. He said you were 'too soft' to lead and he said you needed to be... forged."
Forged.
The word hung in the air.
Play the part, or you both die.
Dead Hand Protocol.
The Watchtower.
A cold realization seeped into my bones.
"Mom," I said slowly. "When you... when the blade hit him, Did he fight?"
She blinked, tears spilling over "What?"
"Did he fight back?" I asked. "He was six foot two and worked out every day. You're five foot five if you came at him with a sword, he could have stopped you. Did he try?"
She went still her eyes widened, focusing on a memory she had been trying to repress.
"No," she whispered. "He... he saw the blade and saw me coming. He was drinking his tea."
"And?"
"He put the cup down," she said, her voice trembling with horror "He put the cup down on the plate, Gently. So it wouldn't break."
"And then?"
"And then he looked at me," she sobbed "And he smiled. He smiled, David like... like he was proud of me."
The world spin.
He knew.
He hadn't just predicted it. He had provoked it and had pushed her until she snapped, knowing exactly what she would do.
He wanted her to kill him.
Why?
Because you were too soft.
Because you needed to be forged.
He sacrificed himself to turn his wife into a murderer and his son into a monster. It was the ultimate lesson. The final curriculum in the School of Marcus Thorne.
I looked at the tablet in my pocket. It wasn't a protector it was the teacher and I was the star pupil.
"He played us," I whispered "He's still playing us."
My mother sank back down to the floor, burying her face in her hands "I want to go home, David. I just want to go home."
"We don't have a home," I said numbly.
Bzzt.
The tablet vibrated. Long and Urgent.
I pulled it out and the screen was flashing red.
ALERT: ASSET COMPROMISED.
LOCATION: ST. REGIS HOTEL, SUITE 4002.
SOURCE: ELIZABETH THORNE.
I was shocked "What?"
ANALYSIS: SUBJECT'S MOTHER IS UNSTABLE.
PSYCH PROFILE: BREAKDOWN.
RISK: SHE WILL CONFESS.
PROBABILITY: 94% WITHIN 24 HOURS.
I looked at my mother. She was rocking back and forth, muttering to herself, She was broken. If the police came back and Miller's disappearance was investigated, she would crack and tell them everything.
INSTRUCTION: CUT THE LINK.
"No," I said aloud.
My mother looked up "David?"
OPTION A: PROTECT HER.
OPTION B: ISOLATION.
OPTION C: PERMANENT SILENCE.
Option C hovered on the screen, The same color as the Trump Card Option for Gable.
"No," I repeated, my voice shaking "I'm not doing that, She's my mother."
THE KING HAS NO FAMILY.
ONLY SUBJECTS.
DECISION REQUIRED.
IF SHE CONFESSES, THE 'DEAD HAND' PROTOCOL WILL PURGE HER.
YOU CANNOT SAVE HER IF THE SYSTEM TARGETS HER.
ACT NOW.
The machine was threatening her. If I didn't handle it, the "Janitors" would.
I looked at her. She was looking at me with those terrified, watery eyes. She trusted me and thought I was saving her.
I tapped the screen and my finger hovered over OPTION A.
"Mom," I said, my voice cracking "Breathe. You're in shock."
"I'm fine," she said, wiping her face "I just need a drink. I just..."
"I'm calling a doctor," I said. "A private doctor. They can take you somewhere... quiet and safe just for a while. Until the heat dies down."
"No," she stood up, panic rising in her "No doctors. I'm not crazy, David and don't you dare call them. I'm staying with you."
"You can't," I said "You're a liability."
The words left my mouth before I could stop them. They weren't my words. They were his.
She froze. The betrayal on her face was worse than the fire.
"David?"
I looked at the tablet.
CONFIRM: PROTECT HER.
TEAM ETA: 10 MINUTES.
I pressed CONFIRM.
"It's for your own good," I said, backing away toward the door "The car is coming, Pack your things."
"David, please!" She reached for me.
I stepped out into the hallway and pulled the heavy door shut between us.
I heard her scream my name from the other side and I heard her pounding on the wood.
"David! Open the door! Don't leave me! David!"
I leaned my back against the door, sliding down until I hit the floor. The tablet sat on the carpet next to me, glowing softly.
DECISION PROCESSED.
THREAT MITIGATED.
LEVEL UP.
NEW ASSET UNLOCKED:
CODE NAME: "THE SHADOW CABINET"
I closed my eyes and listened to my mother scream until the elevator dinged, and the men in the white coats arrived to take her away.
I didn't watch them take her.
I just listened to the silence that followed.
It was the same silence as the study. Heavy.
And completely, utterly empty.