Juna’s gaze, unflinching, swept from the comm device displaying Pia’s face to the patch panel’s amber pulse. Ten minutes. Ten minutes until the telecast cut in, ending either Brencis or Pia. She looked at Renzo, his face a mask of conflict. “There’s only one choice,” she stated, her voice steady, though a tremor ran through the air around them, a premonition of the violence to come. “Pia.” Renzo's mouth set in a hard crease; leaving the board meant walking away from months of calculated work. He nodded, a single, sharp motion. “I’ll come with you.” “No.” Juna gripped his arm, her fingers firm. “You stay here. You have to be ready.” She met his eyes, steady and deliberate. “When the time comes, flip the switch.” He held her gaze, hesitated, and gave a sharp nod, dropping his hand over the switcher panel. Juna ran through the maintenance corridors of the transmitter facility, the ozone and wet concrete sharpening with every metal landing. Gale wind rattled the sheet-metal louvers. Inesca's longer limbs carried her upward, foreign bones moving with Juna's disciplined balance. She burst onto the rain-slicked roof, the city lights below a blurred watercolor. The steel lattice of the transmitter tower groaned overhead, twin red beacons pulsing against low clouds. Rain pasted wet hair across her mouth, the sea chill scouring her cheeks. Brencis stood near the precipice, a grotesque silhouette against the glowing Cestian skyline. His hand was clamped on Pia’s arm, holding her dangerously close to the crumbling ledge. Pia's face ran gray with wash and rain, fixed on Juna. Tavia Lox stood a few paces back, a cruel smile playing on her lips, her gaze predatory. “Well, well, Inesca,” Brencis drawled, his voice carrying over the wind’s howl. “Look who finally decided to join us. I knew you wouldn’t be able to resist. You always were so… predictable.” He gave Pia a brutal shake. “Drop them. All of them.” Juna kept her focus on Pia's pinned wrist. Slowly, deliberately, she unclipped the holstered sonic stunner from her thigh. It clattered against the concrete. Next, the slim blade she’d hidden in her sleeve. It skittered across the wet roof, reflecting the distant neon signs. “Good girl,” Brencis sneered, his grip on Pia tightening. “Now, come closer. Let’s finish this little charade.” Juna took measured steps forward, the rain plastering her clothes to her body. She stopped a few feet from them, close enough to see the frantic pulse at Pia’s temple, close enough to smell the cheap, sweet perfume Tavia wore. “Such a shame,” Brencis continued, his voice dripping with false sympathy. “My dear, fragile Inesca. Driven to madness by grief, by the loss of your family fortune. Such a tragic end, jumping from the roof with your beloved best friend.” He glanced at Tavia, a conspiratorial glint in his eyes. “A murder-suicide. The perfect narrative, wouldn’t you agree, my love?” Tavia’s smile widened, a cold, predatory baring of teeth. “Absolutely perfect, dearest. A truly fitting end for the Ruz name.” “You see, Inesca,” Brencis leaned in, his voice dropping to a menacing pitch, “I’ve suspected for a while. Those eyes. They weren’t Inesca’s. They were… familiar. Juna’s. I knew you were too intelligent, too capable, to just disappear. But you were sloppy. The way you looked at Renzo Varga. The way you drove. You didn't factor in your own habits. You flinched at the sound of sirens the exact way she did on the harbor docks. It seems my little investigator survived, didn’t she? Reborn into a gilded cage. But the cage has no walls when you’re falling.” He chuckled, a chilling sound that scraped against the wind. Hearing the dead investigator's name cleared the persistent fog of Inesca's unfamiliar skin. She shifted her eyes beyond Brencis to the telephoto lenses mounted on the adjoining gantry, motor-driven optics tracing the gala perimeter. A slow smile bloomed on Juna’s face, a genuine, terrifying expression that held no warmth. “You’re right, Brencis,” she said, her voice clear, cutting through the wind and rain. “I didn’t come to surrender.” “I came to make sure you were standing right there.” She pointed, not at him, but at the array of cameras. In the control room, Renzo tracked the rooftop monitor, watching her angle her chin toward the gantry. He struck the main override. Across Cestia, millions of screens flickered, the telethon’s earnest host replaced by a rain-swept rooftop scene. Brencis Morante, pillar of high society, was clearly visible, illuminated by the promotional lighting. His voice, carried by the camera’s sensitive microphones, boomed out, detailing his plan for murder and his cold-blooded confession of Juna’s identity. Brencis’s triumphant smile faltered, then contorted into a mask of pure, unadulterated fury as he heard his own voice echo, loud and clear, across the entire city. The master feed cut immediately to the secondary deck, spooling Pia's forensic ledger of wire transfers and fake clinical records across every public screen. “No!” Brencis lunged forward, teeth bared. He lunged at Juna, his hands outstretched, aiming to drag her, and perhaps Pia, over the edge of the building, to finish what he started, to silence them both, even if it meant his own demise. He was a cornered animal, consumed by a desperate, murderous rage. His fingers, surprisingly strong, wrapped around Juna’s arm, his weight already shifting, trying to force them both into the void.

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