Silver Saint

Twenty-Five: Good Intentions

//Report: Quinn, Jackson.

//Saint Corp Plaza.

//Horizon City.

//Greece.

//Resume log.

Much like the rest of Saint Corp Plaza, the boardroom we now occupied was stately and well-lit, a chamber of sleek wood perched high above the city. As one of the highest rooms in the tower, an immense glass window stretched from floor to ceiling on one side, offering an uninterrupted view of Horizon City's glittering skyline, and the center was dominated by a stately wooden table. The spires of buildings far below still shimmered with light, and the grid of streets below pulsed with late night traffic, oblivious to our presence. We were close enough to the city's massive energy shield generator that I could see the blue waves of light pulsing from a few floors above us, sweeping out across the horizon.

This high off the ground, it almost felt like we could reach up and touch heaven itself.

We'd abandoned Blackwell to his solitary confinement once more, taking the laptop with us to a higher floor of the tower to talk in private. The server was still connected to the laptop—the entire tower was interconnected in ways I had only heard of in stories about life before the Third World War.

Inside the boardroom, the air was heavy with exhaustion, but charged with anticipation.

Amani leaned back in one of the sleek chrome office chairs, her eyes half-lidded as she tried not to fall asleep. Kedrick sat cross-legged on the floor beside her, arms draped across his knees, watching Dan work with quiet intensity. Lucas had poured himself a cup of stale coffee from the automated dispenser in the corner, cradling it like a lifeline as he stood near the window, eyes flicking between the skyline and Dan's frantic typing.

Laura, on the other hand, hadn't sat down once. She hovered near the table, pacing in a slow, deliberate arc behind Dan, her arms crossed and her gaze locked on the screen like she could will the truth out of it faster. Every so often she'd pull a small phone from a thin pocket in her dress and typed something before tucking it away.

I sat in the chair closest to Dan's, trying to see as much as possible without getting in his way.

Daniel Stonewood was a man possessed. He muttered to himself as his fingers flew across the keyboard, sweat beading on his forehead despite the room's perfectly regulated air. He'd pulled the chair close enough that his knees pressed against the table's underside, completely unaware of how cramped he looked.

"This isn't just access," he whispered, more to himself than to any of us. "This is admin control. This is full-spectrum clearance. I can see server architecture. Command logs. Experimental branch indexing protocols—this isn't just Project Cold Iron. This is..." He stopped, shaking his head, then laughed once—short and sharp. "This is insane."

"Try to stay sane long enough to explain it to the rest of us," Laura remarked.

Dan barely heard her. "There's subroutines buried in here I've never even seen referenced before. Prototypes. Ghost branches. Applications for the IRON chips I never even considered."

"Applications like...?" I prompted.

He tapped a few keys, then spun the screen slightly so we could all see. "See for yourself."

Dan tapped through screen after screen, his expression illuminated by the cold glow of the device.

"There's indexing here for limbic interface bridges, neural routing enhancements, hormone suppression tools for combat scenarios—hell, there's even a rejected subroutine for full BCI."