"I gave everything to this company!"
Scott's voice ricocheted off the bare walls of the conference room, sharp enough to cut.
"I worked myself to the bone for this company! You can't fire me! You can't!"
His tie was crooked. His hair was a mess. The Scott who had stood before his mirror that morning, preening and triumphant, now looked like a mad dog that had been stepped on, the whites of his eyes shot through with red.
"I cleared countless obstacles for this company! You can't do this to me over something so trivial!"
Then two security guards in black uniforms walked in, expressions blank, steps unhurried. One of them extended a hand in a polite but firm gesture.
"Mr. Scott, please cooperate with us."
Scott stepped back and collided with the conference table, producing a dull thud.
"You can't treat me like this! I'll appeal!"
The two guards moved to either side of him and took hold of his arms.
Scott began to struggle. He kicked, he twisted, he threw his weight against their grip.
"I gave my life for this company! Let go of me!"
His voice climbed higher and higher. People passing in the corridor turned to look, dropping into whispers. The glances that found him held a mixture of gleeful satisfaction and cold, detached scrutiny.
Then Scott went still.
Not because he had accepted his fate, but because something had suddenly come back to him.
He had a contingency plan.
In all his years of operating in this world, he had never made a move without leaving himself a way out. When he brought down a rival studio, he destroyed the evidence beforehand. When he made enemies of people who could hurt him, he prepared his defenses in advance. And even if someone tried to send him to prison, he had already taken care of that too.
He had a fabricated medical record.
A flawless one, detailed enough to get him rejected from any detention facility in the country.
A heart condition. The kind that could kill a man without warning.
It was his last card to play.
The guards dragged him into the elevator. The doors closed and it began to descend.
Scott drew a long breath and worked to steady himself.
"Gentlemen," he said, arranging his face into something resembling a smile as he looked at the two expressionless guards. "I understand you're just following orders. I don't blame you for that. But are you aware that I have a medical condition?"
The guards said nothing.
"I'm serious. I'm sick." The smile on Scott's face grew more earnest by the second. "Heart disease. Severe. My doctor told me I could go into cardiac arrest at any time. If you put me in a cell and I die in there, that becomes your problem too. You understand what I'm saying, right?"
The guards remained impassive. The elevator continued down.
Unease began to gnaw at Scott's chest.
But he pressed on.
"Think about it. If something happens to me while I'm in your custody, you're the ones who'll be dealing with the fallout. So why not do us all a favor, let me go, and I promise..."
The elevator stopped. The doors opened onto the ground floor lobby.
Three uniformed figures were waiting in the lobby.
Not company security. Real uniforms.
Officers from the Cybercrime Investigation Division.
The one at the front was holding a document. He walked toward Scott.
"Mr. Scott, you are suspected of organizing coordinated online harassment and malicious defamation. You are hereby summoned in accordance with the law. Please cooperate."
Scott's pupils shrank to pinpoints.
He whipped his head around toward the two guards behind him.
They released his arms, stepped back, and watched him without any expression at all.
There was no way out. Scott's hands began to shake.
"I'm sick!" he shouted. "I have a heart condition! You can't arrest me! If I die in your custody, you will not be able to answer for it!"
The lead officer looked at him without a flicker of reaction.
"Mr. Scott, we have already verified your medical records. They were forged. The clinic that issued them was shut down three days ago. The doctor who produced the falsified documentation has given a full confession."
The color drained from Scott's face in an instant.
His mouth moved, but no sound came out.
"Take him," said the officer, with a small wave of his hand.
Two subordinates stepped forward and took hold of Scott's arms.
And then, just as he was being hauled toward the lobby exit, it happened.
"Woof!"
Everyone froze. The lead officer turned around.
Scott was suspended between the two officers gripping his arms, his face twisted into something entirely unrecognizable. He bared his teeth. His tongue lolled out. And from somewhere deep in his throat came a sound that had no business coming from a human being.
"Woof! Woof woof woof woof!"
He was barking like a dog.
The Scott who had climbed to his position by stepping over countless others. The Scott who had stood before his mirror that very morning, smoothing his tie with self-satisfied hands.
Now, in full view of everyone in that lobby, he was barking.
"Woof woof woof! Woof woof woof woof woof!"
His eyes were stretched wide and wild. Saliva trailed from the corner of his mouth. His tongue hung slack, and the sounds that kept coming from his throat were wet, garbled, and unmistakably canine.
The entire lobby went silent.
The lead officer was quiet for several seconds.
Then he let out a quiet sigh.
"Take him," he said again.
Scott was dragged out of the lobby and bundled into the black vehicle idling at the entrance. His barking grew fainter and fainter, more and more indistinct, until the closing car door swallowed it completely.
In the lobby, a brief silence gave way to low murmuring.
"Who was that?"
"Someone from the Market Development Division, I think."
"Barking like a dog? Has he lost his mind?"
Someone had already pulled out their phone and caught the moment on camera: a hunched, struggling silhouette being pushed into a car. The figure of a man with nowhere left to run.
Back at the Under the Stellar Sky studio, a notification box appeared on Bronya's screen.
"Target secured. Evidence chain intact. Judicial proceedings to follow."
"Captain," she said.
Arthur looked up from a pile of documents.
"Scott's been arrested." Bronya delivered the information in her usual even tone. "Apparently he was barking like a dog when they took him away."
The office was quiet for exactly one second.
Then Kiana erupted.
"He was BARKING?! The guy who came after us all those times, and when they finally caught him, he was barking like a DOG?!"
Kiana doubled over laughing, tears streaming down her face.
Mei raised a hand to cover her mouth, but the smile reaching the corners of her eyes was impossible to contain.
Dan Heng adjusted his glasses. The faintest curve appeared at the edge of his lips.
Stelle and March 7th grabbed each other and dissolved into a chorus of laughter and exclamations.
And Arthur looked at the message on the screen, and then at the morning light that had begun to brighten outside the window, and then at this group of people in front of him, all laughing themselves to pieces.
He smiled.
It was a quiet smile, an understated one. But it felt more real than any victory he could remember.
"Alright." He clapped his hands once. "That's enough. We still have work to do."
Kiana pressed a hand to her stomach, looking up at him through watery eyes. "What work? The enemy just barked like a dog!"
"Elysia said she'd help us polish the soundtrack," Arthur said. "We have cooperation talks with Schicksal and Anti-Entropy to get through.
Elysia's fans are waiting for a response from us. And the game still needs to be updated. The story," he added, "isn't finished yet."
۞۞۞۞
~ Push the story forward with your Power Stones