The 42nd Floor
Rain lashed at the glass, streaking the London skyline in warped silver. The Thames below churned black, a river swallowing light. Forty-two stories up, the headquarters of Erevos Energy glowed like a cathedral to profit: walnut paneling, polished brass, leather chairs arranged around a table that gleamed as if it had absorbed the blood of centuries of deals.
At the head sat Sir Alastair Whitcombe, knight of the realm, empire-builder, a man who had spent five decades crushing rivals and carving pipelines across continents. Time had bent his spine, but not his will. His pale eyes swept the room like a hawk scanning for prey.
To his right, Margaret "Maggie" Rowe, the numbers-queen, CFO of Erevos. She was not old, but her eyes were cold in the way of ledgers and balance sheets: unforgiving. Every rumor said she could turn billions to dust with a red pen.
Opposite her, Dr. Henry Klein reclined easily, his silver hair perfectly combed. He wore the smile of a man who had ordered deaths under the banner of "national security" and slept well afterward. Before the corporate world, he had been MI6's knife in the dark. Now, he sold that expertise to men who needed power maintained.
Daniel Okafor, tall, broad, and sweating beneath his tailored suit, tapped his ring against the table. He had seen riots burn his refineries back home, seen mobs chanting for justice. His fortune came from oil flowing through Lagos and Port Harcourt. Helios threatened all of it.
And finally, Lucien DelaCroix — the French exile. Once the darling of Paris boardrooms, now the snake in their midst. He lit another cigarette, ignoring the "No Smoking" signs. His face bore the lines of scandal and mockery, but his smirk suggested he enjoyed being the villain everyone cursed.
The room of jackals.
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The First Strike
Maggie's nail clicked against a page. "Helios."
Her voice cut the silence. She pushed the dossier into the center of the table. "If this is real—if Rivers has cracked it—we're finished. Sixty percent of our market share gone within five years. By ten, Erevos is a relic."
Lucien chuckled through smoke. "Then perhaps it's not real. Boys dream. Men build."
Daniel slammed his palm against the table. "Dreams ignite nations. I've seen it. You think this is theory? In my country, a rumor of free energy could collapse a government overnight."
Klein leaned forward, fingers steepled. "And yet Rivers is already dying. Six months. Maybe less. A man who bleeds cannot lead a revolution."
Whitcombe's cane tapped once against the marble floor. His voice came low, measured, like a judge delivering sentence. "Time isn't short. That's the lie. The truth is that we waste most of it. This boy wants to waste ours. He doesn't want his six months. He wants our decades."
The words landed heavy.
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The Philosophy of Survival
Maggie's lips curved. "People forgive death. Fathers die, mothers die, and grief passes. But take a man's fortune away? His inheritance? That wound never heals. Helios isn't about death. It's about theft. Rivers isn't killing us—he's robbing us blind."
Klein's smile sharpened. "I've buried men for less. Rivers is already dead. All we need to do is sharpen the epitaph. History won't call him savior. It will call him fool."
Daniel shook his head, sweat glistening at his temples. "You don't understand. You've never watched a spark turn into fire. I've stood in cities where one rumor emptied banks and toppled presidents. You call him a fool. I call him a match."
Lucien leaned back, smoke curling around his face. "History isn't truth. It's a trick. The living tell it however they want, and the dead can't object. Kill him now, and Rivers becomes a cautionary tale. Let him live, and he writes us as villains."
Silence. The kind that only came when every man knew the other was right.
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The Serpent's Envoy
Maggie slid the envelope across the table. Heavy parchment. Wax seal: a coiled serpent. Its ink smelled faintly of smoke.
Klein didn't touch it. "Instructions," he murmured. "We don't act directly. We let pawns cut pawns."
Whitcombe's knuckles whitened around his cane. His voice was almost a whisper. "The Serpent."
The name hissed across the air, more curse than word. None of them had seen him. None of them wanted to. But they all knew: his coils reached further than governments.
Lucien smirked, blowing smoke toward the ceiling. "Tell the Serpent the board is his playground."
At the door, Catherine Haldane stood. She hadn't spoken once. She didn't need to. Her stillness unnerved even Whitcombe. Everyone knew she was the Serpent's mouthpiece, yet she never carried more than silence.
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The Window
The meeting adjourned. Chairs scraped, voices dropped to murmurs. Deals would be made in private tonight, whispers traded like currency.
Whitcombe lingered at the window. Rain streaked his reflection, distorting him into a man already drowning.
"Every empire falls," he said softly. "But some of us… some of us get to choose when."
Behind him, the serpent's seal gleamed faintly in the dim light.
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