The silence that followed the keystroke was the loudest thing I had ever heard. In the digital world, I had just detonated a nuclear device. The names of the donors, the logistics of the collisions, the price of my own skin—it was all drifting across the global web like radioactive fallout.
Mikhail froze three steps into the room. His weapon was raised, but his eyes were fixed on the terminal screen behind me. The scrolling white text reflected in his pupils, a cascading obituary for the world he had intended to rule.
"What have you done?" he whispered, his voice cracking. The predatory grace was gone, replaced by a hollow, frantic confusion. "You... you just gave it away. The leverage. The power. It's gone."
"It was never power, Mikhail," I said, standing up from the terminal. My legs felt heavy, but my mind was clearer than it had ever been. "It was a leash. And I just cut it."
Yuri appeared in the doorway behind Mikhail, his suit jacket shredded and his face streaked with soot and blood. He didn't fire. He saw the red "RELEASED" notification and lowered his weapon, a look of profound, weary relief washing over him.
"The Board is watching this in real-time, Mikhail," Yuri said, stepping into the room. "The men who funded our father, the men who signed off on Jessy's accident—their bank records are hitting the front page of every major news outlet in the next ten minutes. You aren't a King. You're a liability."
Mikhail let out a jagged, hysterical laugh. He looked at the pressure plate under his table, then back at us. "Then we all go together. If I'm a liability, I'm a permanent one."
His thumb tightened on the detonator.
"Wait," I said, my voice cutting through his panic. "The code I released? It didn't just leak the files. It locked the UNI's remote-trigger frequencies. Your detonator is a paperweight, Mikhail. I didn't just set the data free; I turned off your world."
Mikhail pressed the button. Once. Twice. The red light on the table blinked a mocking green—the signal of a neutralized circuit.
The air seemed to leave his lungs all at once. He sank into the folding chair, the gun slipping from his fingers and clattering onto the concrete floor. He looked like a child who had realized the dark wasn't empty—it was just indifferent.
Yuri walked over to me, ignoring his brother. He reached out, his hand trembling slightly as he brushed a stray lock of hair from my face.
"You did it," he breathed. "The 'Fractured Grace'... it's over."
"No," I said, looking at the glowing screen one last time. "It's not over. It's just fair now."
Outside, the first light of dawn was beginning to gray the New York skyline. The sirens were getting closer—not the private security of the UNI, but the real authorities. For the first time in my life, the sound of the police didn't feel like a threat. It felt like a chorus.