Chapter 13 - The Return of the Dissident Board
Three hundred miles away in a high-security federal penitentiary, Victor Hale received a visitor.
The man wore an expensive charcoal overcoat, his face half-hidden beneath the shadow of a fedora. He bypassed the prison guard checkpoint with a flash of a black-seal badge that bore no agency name—only the crest of the pre-1845 Whitmore Directorate.
"Counselor," the visitor murmured, taking a seat across the scratched steel table in the visitation booth.
Victor sneered, his eyes bloodshot behind thick glass. "You took your time, Sterling. I told the board that boy would ruin everything the moment he touched the core."
"The boy is a temporary aberration," Sterling replied smoothly, adjusting his cuffs. "He thinks dismantling the foundation ends the dynasty. He doesn't understand that capital and power are hydras. Cut off one head, and three more grow in its place."
"The core is bound to him," Victor spat. "You can't just take it back by force. The elemental feedback turned our tactical squads into statues. You saw what happened at Crystal House."
"We aren't going to use force, Victor," Sterling smiled, revealing teeth too white for a man of his age. "We are going to use family. A bloodline can always be legally challenged if the primary heir is proven legally incompetent. And thanks to your old medical logs, we have proof that Ethan Whitmore's genetic makeup is legally classified as non-human property."
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Victor’s eyes widened slowly as a cold, calculating grin crept across his face. "The foundational charter clause 9-B."
"Precisely," Sterling whispered. "The game isn't over. It's just moving to a higher court."
