Aldric Vasek had a habit that his staff had learned not to mention.
When he was thinking — really thinking, not the performative deliberation he used in briefings and authority sessions, but the actual private work of his mind — he went still in a way that made people uncomfortable. Not motionless exactly. Just reduced. Like something essential had pulled inward and left only the minimum necessary for the body to keep running.
His assistant Merrel had worked with him for eleven years and still found it unsettling.
She found it unsettling now, standing at the chamber entrance while the Director stood in front of the column and did not move and did not speak and did not acknowledge the three field operatives waiting for instruction.
Two minutes. Three.
"Sir," she said finally, because someone had to.
Vasek turned.
