2025-07-03 13:12:32Alan Voss stood in his BrightStar office, his heart pounding.
The image of Elias Kane wouldn’t leave his mind — the Rolls-Royce, the black SUVs, the tailored suit. It all felt too real, like something a broke janitor couldn’t possibly afford or fake.
“KaneTech’s heir?” Alan whispered, his hands shaking as he picked up his phone.
He called Victor Dray.
Victor answered, his voice slightly distorted. “Alan, what’s going on? I’m with Mara.”
Alan took a deep breath. “Elias Kane came to my office. He says he’s Amelia Kane’s son — the CEO of KaneTech.”
Victor let out a sharp, mocking laugh. “Mara’s ex? The janitor? He’s bluffing.”
Alan’s voice trembled. “He had a Syndicate keycard. A full security convoy. It didn’t feel fake — it felt real.”
There was a long pause on the line. Then Victor said, quietly but firmly:
“Say that again.”
Dray put the call on speaker as he stood in Mara’s bedroom with her,
Mara, holding a glass of wine, froze when she heard Alan’s voice coming through the phone:
“Elias Kane, Mara’s ex, claims he’s Amelia Kane's son, and the heir to KaneTech.”
Her eyes widened. “Elias? KaneTech?, isn't that company dead already”
Dray’s expression turned cold. “A janitor pretending to be rich. He’s a fraud, Mara.”
She slowly set her glass down, her voice tight. “He wasn’t always nothing, Victor.”
Dray scoffed. “You’re still too soft on that loser. We need to talk to the family.”
Mara gave a tense nod, her stomach churning. “Call them. Now.”
Dray quickly sent a message to Trent, Carla, and Vivian —Mara’s mother.
“Let’s meet in the living room in five minutes. Emergency meeting.”
Carla had been living with the Vosses since college —more than an assistant, less than family.
The Voss family living room glowed under the chandelier’s soft light. Trent was stretched out on a leather couch, with Carla sitting beside him, slowly sipping her coffee. Vivian, Mara’s mother, sat upright and tense, her silver hair neatly tied back.
Dray was walking back and forth, while Mara stood near the fireplace, clearly on edge.
“We’ve got a serious problem,” Dray began, with a low tone. “Alan Voss just called. Elias Kane showed up claiming he’s Amelia Kane’s son — and the heir to KaneTech, which was worth trillions when Amelia died, and is the only tech company bigger than ours — the one we’re still in debt to.
Trent burst out laughing. “The janitor? There’s no way he has that kind of influence —or that kind of inheritance.”
Carla leaned forward, her expression pale. “Alan sounded really shaken. He said Elias came in a full Rolls-Royce convoy, dressed like royalty.”
Mara’s eyes narrowed. “He went to BrightStar, she added.”
Dray nodded. “He’s digging into the 2015 contract. Trying to stir things up.”
Vivian’s face turned pale. She folded her hands tightly in her lap. “KaneTech… Amelia Kane,” she said quietly.
Trent raised an eyebrow. “What, Mom? You know something?”
Vivian glanced at Mara, then quickly looked away. “I knew Amelia. A long time ago.”
Mara stepped toward her. “What do you mean, Mom?”
Vivian’s voice softened, her gaze far away. “Back in the ’90s, during KaneTech negotiations. She was — always one step ahead of everyone. And she always had a little boy with her, holding on to her skirt.”
Trent scoffed. “So what? That doesn’t prove Elias is really her son.”
Vivian frowned, thinking hard. “She used to call the boy her son. I never saw his face clearly—he was just a little kid, maybe four. Could that have been Elias?” She shook her head, confused.
Mara’s heartbeat quickened. “Amelia’s son? Elias?” her voice trembled.
Dray rolled his eyes. “He’s a fraud, Mara. A janitor can’t run KaneTech.”
Mara shot him a look. “Forget who he used to be — just look at what’s happening right now. Everything’s pointing to him.”
Her chest tightened, remembering what she’d said at the gala: “He’s nothing.”
Carla leaned in to Trent, whispering, “She’s defending him again. She’s slipping.”
Trent nodded, face hard. “She needs to choose—us or him.”
Vivian heard them and cut in, her voice sharp. “If Elias really is Amelia’s son, then he’s not a nobody.”
Dray folded his arms. “Amelia’s gone. KaneTech is finished. Elias is just trying to stir things up.”
Vivian narrowed her eyes. “Amelia didn’t play games. She built a trillion-dollar company from nothing. If that boy is her son... we’ve got a problem.”
Carla frowned. “But is he really her son?”
Mara walked back and forth, her heels clicking on the floor. “I called him nothing,” she said quietly. “But what if I was wrong?”
Dray rolled his eyes. “You’re letting this mess get to you. I’ll check everything about KaneTech’s — he’s lying.”
Mara said nothing, just gave a pale look.
Vivian leaned back, thinking hard. “I remember a board meeting back in ’95,” she said to Mara. “Amelia brought the same little boy with her — he was drawing on papers. She told me he’d inherit everything one day. If that boy was Elias…” Her voice faded.
Trent laughed. “A janitor inheriting trillions? Be serious, Grandma.”
Vivian gave him a sharp look. “Don’t mock Amelia’s bloodline. She crushed anyone who got in her way. Her son might be just like her.”
Carla shifted uncomfortably. “Then why was he a nobody all these years?”
Mara stopped walking and turned to Vivian. “You really think Elias could be her son?”
Vivian nodded slowly. “It’s possible. Amelia kept her personal life quiet, far away from the media. I haven't seen the boy’s face in over 20 years.”
Mara’s chest tightened. “Maybe I judged him too soon,” she whispered.
Dray’s phone buzzed — a text from his Voss lawyer: “Amelia Kane’s records show she had a son, It might really be him.”
Dray’s jaw tightened. “This isn’t over,” he said, staring at Mara.
“I’ll prove he’s lying.”
Mara didn’t back down. “Or maybe he’s not.”
Carla pulled Trent aside and whispered, “Mara’s starting to turn on Dray. If Elias is really rich, we’re in trouble.”
Trent smirked. “Let Dray deal with him. This Janitor won’t come out on top.”
Carla nodded slowly, as her eyes drifted to Vivian, unsure.
After everyone left, Vivian sat by the window, thinking all alone.
“Amelia Kane,” she whispered. “Your son’s shaking things up now.”
She thought back to that meeting in ’95, her little boy beside her.
Was it really Elias? She just couldn’t remember his face.
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Chapter Four Hundred and Twenty-Nine
The morning air was sharp, cutting through the stillness like an uninvited question. Elias had been awake for hours, reviewing incident reports and community feedback from the past week. The city had not quieted; it never did. Every success seemed to attract new scrutiny, every flaw became fodder for critics. Yet, beneath the surface chaos, patterns were emerging, threads of stability weaving through the disorder.He entered the operations room, finding Mara already at the central console, scrolling through live feeds from across the districts. “Early start?” she asked without looking up.“I couldn’t sleep,” Elias admitted. “Too many variables to track, too many moving parts to anticipate.”Mara didn’t comment, simply pointed to a cluster of alerts. “District Seven. Energy grid anomalies. Sensors suggest potential overload in multiple substations. Could cascade if not addressed quickly.”Elias leaned forward, scanning the data. “Do we know the cause?”“Preliminary analysis: unexpected
Chapter Four Hundred and Twenty-Eight
The message arrived just before dawn, blinking into Elias’s private channel with a priority tag so high it bypassed every filter he had left in place. He had fallen asleep with his tablet still glowing on the desk beside him, a half-finished report on distributed authority performance metrics slowly dimming as exhaustion finally claimed him. When the alert pulsed through the room, it felt like a physical jolt, dragging him back into consciousness with the kind of urgency that only real danger could produce.The words were brief and deliberately vague.System irregularities detected across three civic networks. Possible coordinated interference. Stand by for escalation.Elias sat up, rubbing his face, the familiar weight of responsibility settling onto his shoulders before his feet even touched the floor. It had been months since the city had experienced anything that could truly be called a crisis. There had been friction, of course, and political maneuvering, and the steady hum of in
Chapter Four Hundred and Twenty-Seven
Elias sat at his desk long after the office lights had dimmed, the glow from his laptop screen casting a pale reflection in his glasses. Outside, the city was alive with the muted hum of late-night traffic, the occasional siren, the distant chatter of pedestrians who had not yet surrendered to sleep. Inside, he was listening to the quieter sounds: the soft tapping of keyboards from the few late-shift staff, the occasional shuffle of papers, the whir of the air conditioning, a constant reminder that everything here was running on multiple levels of coordination, some visible, some hidden.The issue that had pulled him into the office so late was not dramatic. No fire. No scandal. No media cameras flashing in the hallways. It was a simple error in scheduling—an overlap in critical personnel assignments across two high-priority projects that could cascade into serious inefficiency if mishandled. On paper, the system could handle it. In practice, Elias knew that people would feel the ripp
Chapter Four Hundred and Twenty-Six
The first sign of trouble came from a place no one had been watching.It was not a crisis report, not a leak, not a headline shaped like accusation. It was a resignation letter, uploaded quietly into the system at 04:17 in the morning, flagged only because the sender was someone who never acted without calculation.Director Halvorsen. Infrastructure Coordination.Elias read the letter twice before the weight of it settled.It was polite. Measured. Almost apologetic. It praised the direction of reform, acknowledged the necessity of distributed authority, and then, in a single understated paragraph, explained why the author could no longer serve under it.“I no longer recognize the boundaries of my mandate,” the letter read. “Without those boundaries, I cannot act with the clarity required of this office.”No accusations. No threats.Just withdrawal.By sunrise, three more resignations followed. All similar. Different departments. Same phrasing. Same concern, expressed with professional
Chapter Four Hundred and Twenty-Five
The summons did not arrive with urgency. No red banners, no escalating alerts. Just a short message marked informal briefing, sent through a channel that existed specifically so nothing said inside it could be quoted later.That alone told Elias everything he needed to know.By the time he reached the council annex the following morning, the city was already awake in the way it only became when something invisible was shifting underneath it. Traffic moved, but more cautiously. People read their phones longer at crossings. The noise level felt the same, yet the attention beneath it had sharpened.Inside the annex, the room chosen for the briefing was deliberately unremarkable. No seal on the wall. No cameras. A table large enough to signal seriousness but small enough to suggest deniability. Seven council staffers were already seated, spread unevenly, each with a tablet or notepad placed in front of them like a defensive measure.No one stood when Elias entered.That was also new.“Than
Chapter Four Hundred and Twenty-Four
The meeting was already heated by the time Elias arrived.Voices leaked through the glass walls of the conference room, sharp and layered, the sound of people arguing who were accustomed to being listened to. Someone had drawn a crude diagram on the whiteboard, arrows crossing over each other in a way that suggested less clarity than intention.Elias paused outside long enough to understand the shape of it. This wasn’t panic. It was ownership colliding with disagreement.When he stepped in, no one stopped talking. That, too, was new.“We’re treating this like a theoretical failure,” a woman near the board said, tapping the marker against her palm. “But the vendors are already adjusting behavior. They’re gaming the discretion window.”“Which means they always were,” someone else replied. “We just didn’t see it because the incentives were centralized.”“That doesn’t help us now.”Elias took a seat without announcing himself. He listened.The issue was procurement again. Not corruption,
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