The morning after the restaurant, I woke up different.
Not visibly—my reflection looked the same, silver hair still falling in waves past my shoulders, blue eyes still holding depths that hadn't been there a month ago. But something fundamental had shifted overnight. The air tasted sharper, colors seemed more vivid, and every sound carried undertones I'd never noticed before.
I could hear Jennifer's nervous breathing from three offices away. Could sense the maintenance worker's resentment as he mopped the floors two floors below. Could feel the collective anxiety of employees who knew their jobs hung by threads they couldn't see.
The city's energy web that Damien had shown me wasn't just visible from that impossible restaurant—I could sense it now, always, humming beneath the surface of normal reality like electrical current through hidden wires.
By the time I arrived at Cross Industries, my new awareness felt less like a gift and more like sensory overload. Every emotion in the building pressed against my consciousness with startling clarity—Jennifer's mounting financial desperation from three desks away, the security guard's suppressed rage at his ex-wife radiating from the lobby, even the cleaning crew's collective resentment seeping up from the floors below.
The forty-seventh floor buzzed with tensions I could taste on my tongue like metallic anxiety mixed with predatory ambition.
"Good morning, Sarah." Jennifer appeared at my desk with coffee and a stack of files, but her usual professional smile looked strained. Dark circles ringed her eyes, and her hands shook slightly as she set down the papers.
"Are you alright?" I asked, though I already knew she wasn't. I could feel her anxiety like a physical presence, sharp and acidic.
"Fine, fine." She waved off my concern, but her voice pitched higher than normal. "Just some personal issues. Nothing that affects work."
Through my enhanced senses, I caught fragments of her real distress—unpaid bills, a sick mother, a landlord threatening eviction. The kind of problems that made people vulnerable, desperate, easy to manipulate.
The observation came with clinical detachment that should have alarmed me.
"Mr. Cross wants to see you in Conference Room A in ten minutes," Jennifer continued, already backing away from my desk. "And Sarah? He seemed... focused this morning. More than usual."
She hurried off before I could ask what that meant, leaving me with coffee that tasted like liquid anxiety and a growing sense that today would test boundaries I wasn't sure I was ready to cross.
Conference Room A occupied the northeast corner of the building, its floor-to-ceiling windows offering panoramic views of Central Park. The morning sun streamed through the glass, but something about the light felt wrong—too bright, too sharp, like looking at the world through a magnifying glass.
Damien sat at the head of an obsidian conference table, silver pen spinning between his fingers with hypnotic precision. He'd changed since yesterday too, though the differences were subtle. His green eyes held depths that seemed to swirl with their own currents, and when he smiled, I caught glimpses of something sharp behind his teeth.
"Punctual as always," he said without looking up from the document he was reviewing. "How do you feel this morning?"
"Different." I took the chair beside him, noting how the leather felt more luxurious against my skin, how even the simple act of sitting seemed more graceful than before. "Everything seems... enhanced."
"Growing pains." He set down his pen and turned to face me, those impossible eyes studying my face with scientific interest. "The transformation process affects everyone differently. Some experience physical changes first, others develop new sensory capabilities."
"And others?"
"Others discover that their moral framework requires... adjustment." He gestured toward the conference room doors. "Speaking of which, we have business to conduct this morning."
Before I could ask what he meant, the doors opened to admit Jennifer and another woman I didn't recognize. Mid-thirties, brown hair pulled back in a practical ponytail, clothes that looked expensive but worn—the kind of outfit someone wore when they were trying to maintain professional appearances on a shrinking budget.
She clutched a manila folder against her chest like armor, and the anxiety radiating from her was so intense it made my teeth ache.
"Mr. Cross?" Jennifer's voice carried the carefully neutral tone of someone delivering bad news. "This is Amanda Walsh from the Henderson account team."
Amanda Walsh. The name triggered recognition from employee files I'd reviewed—single mother, five years with the company, consistently average performance reviews. She worked in client relations, managing smaller accounts that generated steady but unspectacular profits.
"Ms. Walsh." Damien's voice was cordially professional, but I caught undertones that made the woman flinch. "Please, have a seat."
She chose a chair across the table from us, positioning herself like someone preparing for an execution. The folder in her hands contained performance metrics, but I could also sense her deeper story through my enhanced perception—late nights helping her daughter with homework while researching industry trends, weekends spent networking at events she couldn't afford, the constant calculation of whether she could manage another month if her promotion didn't come through.
A woman trying so desperately to be enough, never realizing that effort without exceptional results was just elaborate failure.
"I brought the quarterly reports you requested," she said, voice steady despite the fear I could taste in the air around her—metallic and sharp, like copper pennies dissolved in vinegar. "The Henderson account is actually up twelve percent this quarter, and I've identified three expansion opportunities that could—"
"Ms. Walsh." Damien's interruption was gentle but absolute. "We need to discuss your future with Cross Industries."
The temperature in the room seemed to drop ten degrees. Amanda's grip on her folder tightened, knuckles going white as she processed the implications of his tone.
"I don't understand," she said, though from the way her voice cracked, she understood perfectly.
"Your performance has been consistently... adequate." Damien opened a different folder—one I hadn't noticed him bring—and spread its contents across the table. Performance reviews, productivity metrics, client feedback forms. "But adequate isn't sufficient for the direction we're taking the company."
I studied the documents, enhanced perception allowing me to absorb the data in seconds. Amanda Walsh wasn't failing at her job—she was competent, reliable, generally well-regarded by clients. But she wasn't exceptional either. She was exactly the kind of employee who got swept away when companies decided to optimize for maximum efficiency.
"My numbers are solid," Amanda protested, leaning forward to point at specific metrics. "I've never missed a deadline, my client retention rate is above average, and the Henderson account specifically requested to work with me again next year."
"Solid." Damien repeated the word like he was tasting something unpleasant. "Above average. Adequate. These are not words that describe the kind of talent Cross Industries requires moving forward."
"But I have a daughter." The words burst from Amanda like a dam breaking. "She's only seven, and I'm all she has. This job—I need this job. I'll do better, I'll take on extra projects, whatever you need—"
"Personal circumstances don't factor into business decisions," Damien said, his tone remaining conversational despite the devastation he was delivering. "I'm sure you understand."
I watched this exchange with growing fascination. Not horror—that was what I should have been feeling. Instead, I found myself analyzing the power dynamics at play, the way Damien controlled the conversation through tone and timing, how Amanda's desperation made her increasingly vulnerable with each word.
"Please." Amanda's voice broke on the word. "I'll relocate if you need me in a different office. I'll take a pay cut. I'll work weekends, overtime, whatever it takes."
"Ms. Walsh," Damien said gently, "your position has been eliminated. This isn't a negotiation."
That's when she started crying.
Not the dramatic sobbing you saw in movies, but the quiet, desperate tears of someone watching their world collapse in real time. She pressed her hand to her mouth, trying to maintain some shred of professional dignity while her carefully constructed life fell apart in Conference Room A.
And I felt...
Something complicated. Guilt, yes—the reflexive sympathy that came from watching another person's world crumble. But woven through that familiar emotion was something else entirely, something that started as a warm flutter in my chest and spread outward like honey mixed with electricity.
The tears made her look smaller somehow. More fragile. More... breakable.
I should have been horrified by that observation. Instead, I found myself studying the precise way her mascara smeared, the delicate tremor in her hands as she tried to maintain composure, the way her breathing hitched between sobs like a broken song.
There was something almost artistic about complete helplessness.
"The severance package is quite generous," Jennifer was saying, sliding papers across the table with practiced efficiency. "Three months' salary plus continuation of health benefits. HR will help you transition your accounts to other team members."
Amanda didn't respond. She was staring at the severance documents like they were written in a foreign language, tears falling steadily onto the expensive paper.
"I'll give you a moment to review the terms," Damien said, standing with fluid grace. "Jennifer, could you escort Ms. Walsh to HR when she's ready?"
He moved toward the door, then paused. "Sarah, a word?"
I followed him into the hallway, leaving Amanda alone with her grief and Jennifer's uncomfortable sympathy. The conference room's soundproofing meant we couldn't hear her crying anymore, but I could still feel her anguish like a physical presence pressing against my consciousness.
"How do you feel?" Damien asked, studying my face with that unnervingly intense focus.
"Terrible," I said automatically, though the word felt hollow even as I spoke it. "She didn't deserve that."
"Didn't she?" He tilted his head with the curiosity of someone genuinely interested in my reasoning. "She chose to have a child knowing her career was unstable. She chose to remain adequate when excellence was possible. She chose to make herself indispensable to no one."
"Those aren't choices—those are just life circumstances."
"Are they?" He stepped closer, voice taking on the patient tone of a teacher correcting a promising student. "Or are they the accumulated result of a thousand small decisions to choose comfort over growth, security over risk, mediocrity over excellence?"
The logic felt like puzzle pieces clicking into place, each point building toward a conclusion I hadn't expected to reach. "You're saying she earned this."
"I'm saying everything in life is earned, one way or another." His eyes never left mine. "But what interests me more is how you really feel about watching her earn her consequences. Not what you think you should feel—what you actually experienced."
The question hung between us like a challenge. Through the conference room's glass walls, I could see Amanda still sitting at the table, shoulders shaking with silent sobs while Jennifer waited with professional patience for her to compose herself enough to sign the papers.
"She looked so... small," I heard myself say. "So completely helpless."
"And?"
"And there was something beautiful about it." The admission came out before I could stop it. "Something perfect about watching someone realize they have no power, no control, no way to fix what's been broken."
Damien's smile was radiant. "There she is."
"That's horrible," I said, but the words lacked conviction. "I shouldn't enjoy watching someone suffer."
"Why not?" He leaned against the wall, casual as if we were discussing the weather instead of my apparent capacity for sadism. "You're not causing her pain for its own sake. You're witnessing the natural consequences of inadequacy. There's a purity to that kind of justice."
"Justice?" I glanced back at Amanda, who was now trying to clean her face with tissues Jennifer had provided. "She didn't do anything wrong."
"She did something worse than wrong—she was mediocre." His voice carried the weight of absolute conviction. "In a world where excellence is possible, mediocrity is a choice. And choices have consequences."
The logic should have appalled me. Instead, it felt like puzzle pieces clicking into place.
"So this was a lesson," I said.
"Everything is a lesson." He pushed away from the wall, moving with that predatory grace I was coming to recognize. "The question is: what did you learn?"
I considered this while watching Amanda finally sign the severance documents with hands that shook like autumn leaves. What had I learned? That I could watch someone's life collapse and feel more fascination than sympathy. That part of me found genuine pleasure in observing powerlessness. That the guilt I expected to feel was overwhelmed by something darker and more honest.
"I learned that compassion might be overrated," I said finally.
"Might be?"
"Is overrated." The correction came easier than expected. "She's suffering because she chose to be weak. Why should I feel bad about recognizing that weakness for what it is?"
"And what is it?"
"Failure disguised as virtue." I turned to look at him, finding those green eyes bright with approval. "She wants sympathy for problems she could have prevented with better choices."
"Very good." His hand found my elbow, a touch that sent electricity racing up my arm. "But there's another lesson here. Something more important than recognizing weakness."
"Which is?"
"That you have the power to create these moments." His thumb traced along my skin, a gesture that looked casual but felt significant. "Amanda Walsh didn't lose her job because of market forces or budget cuts. She lost it because you needed to learn something about yourself."
The implication hit me like cold water. "You fired her for my education?"
"I gave you an opportunity to discover what you're capable of feeling. What you're willing to accept. How far you've already traveled from the angel who fell through my window six weeks ago."
"And if I'd been horrified? If I'd begged you to reconsider?"
His smile was all sharp edges. "Then we would have found someone else to teach you with."
The casual cruelty of it should have sickened me. Instead, I felt a thrill of recognition—the same electric pleasure I'd experienced watching Amanda break down. This wasn't just about one woman's termination. It was about Damien's willingness to sacrifice anyone necessary for my development.
It was about the fact that I found his dedication flattering rather than horrifying.
"How many people have you destroyed for my benefit?" I asked.
"Does it matter?"
The honest answer was no. It didn't matter how many Amanda Walshes had been fed into the machinery of my transformation. What mattered was that each sacrifice brought me closer to understanding what I really was.
What I'd always been, underneath the celestial programming.
"No," I said. "It doesn't matter."
"There's my fallen angel." His voice carried warmth that felt like sunlight on my skin. "Ready for the next lesson?"
Through the conference room windows, I watched Jennifer helping Amanda gather her belongings while security waited to escort her from the building. The woman who'd entered this morning with hope and determination was leaving as a cautionary tale about the price of mediocrity.
And I felt nothing but satisfaction at the elegant symmetry of it all.
"What's the next lesson?" I asked.
"Patience." Damien straightened his tie with mechanical precision. "Amanda Walsh was practice—a warm-up exercise to help you recognize your capacity for elegant cruelty. But your real education begins with someone who matters."
"Who?"
"Maya Chen." The name sent ice through my veins, followed immediately by something warmer and more complex. "Your FBI friend has been asking uncomfortable questions about Cross Industries. About unusual employee turnover rates, about the psychological profiles of people who've left our employ, about the curious financial irregularities in some of our more profitable quarters."
"Maya's building a case?"
"Maya's building a file. Phone records showing you've been in contact with her, financial analyses suggesting insider trading, witness statements from former employees who left under... interesting circumstances." His smile was sharp as winter sunlight. "She thinks she's gathering evidence to save you from corruption."
"And you want me to...?"
"I want you to choose who you really are." He moved closer, close enough that his presence seemed to fill all the available space. "Maya represents everything you used to be—principled, protective, convinced that innocence is worth preserving. She's offering you one final chance to remember who you were before you learned that power tastes better than virtue."
"And if I choose her?"
"Then you lose everything you've gained. The power, the clarity, the beautiful honesty of embracing what you really are." His thumb traced along my jawline, a touch that made my pulse race. "But if you choose me..."
"If I choose you?"
"Then Maya Chen becomes our next lesson in the art of elegant destruction." His smile was beautiful and terrible and absolutely certain. "And you learn what it feels like to destroy someone who genuinely cares about your welfare."
The choice hung between us like a loaded weapon. In the conference room, Amanda Walsh was signing the last of her termination papers, her professional life ending with the scratching of pen on paper. Soon she'd be gone, forgotten, just another casualty of my education in cruelty.
But Maya was different. Maya was someone who mattered, someone whose destruction would cost me something real. Someone whose suffering would test the limits of how far I'd fallen from grace.
"When do I have to decide?" I asked.
"You already have decided." Damien's voice was soft as silk, sharp as broken glass. "The question is whether you're ready to admit it to yourself."
He was right, and we both knew it. The moment I'd felt that electric thrill watching Amanda break down, the choice had been made. Maybe it had been made weeks ago, when I'd first deleted Maya's texts. Maybe it had been inevitable from the moment I'd crashed through Damien's window and felt relief instead of despair.
"Tell me about the lesson," I said.
His smile lit up the hallway like sunrise over a battlefield.
"With pleasure," he said. "But first, we should say goodbye to Ms. Walsh. It's only polite to see your practice subject to the door."
We walked back toward the conference room, where Amanda was gathering her few personal items under security supervision. She looked up when we entered, eyes red-rimmed but attempting to maintain some shred of dignity.
"Mr. Cross," she said, voice steadier than I'd expected. "I want you to know that this company is losing a valuable employee today. I hope you realize that before it's too late to matter."
"I'm sure we'll manage," Damien replied with perfect courtesy. "Best of luck in your future endeavors."
She turned to me next, and for a moment, I saw her clearly—not as a lesson or a practice subject, but as a human being whose life we'd just casually destroyed. A mother who'd have to explain to her seven-year-old daughter why they might lose their apartment. A professional who'd have to rebuild her career from scratch in a market that didn't favor women her age.
I should have felt ashamed.
Instead, I felt powerful.
"Ms. Laurent," Amanda said, and I was surprised she remembered my fake name. "I don't know what your role was in this decision, but I hope you never have to learn what it feels like to be on the receiving end."
"I hope so too," I lied with perfect sincerity.
After security escorted her out, Damien and I stood alone in the conference room, surrounded by the debris of Amanda Walsh's former life. Scattered papers, abandoned coffee cups, the lingering scent of desperation and defeat.
"How do you feel now?" he asked.
I expected to lie, to say I felt terrible about what we'd done. Instead, I found myself examining the sensation honestly—the way my pulse had quickened when Amanda broke down, the electric thrill that had run through me when I realized I could simply watch someone's world collapse without lifting a finger to stop it.
"Hungry," I said, the word carrying more weight than it should have. "Like I've discovered something I didn't know I was missing."
"And what's that?"
"Control." I turned to face him, surprised by the clarity in my own voice. "The power to decide who suffers and who doesn't. Who deserves help and who deserves... consequences."
His laugh was like silver bells in a storm. "When do we start on Maya?"
"My dear fallen angel," he said, "we already have."
End of Chapter 7