Chapter 20: The Ledger of Blood

Valkyrie’s POV 

The only light in the small s the weak blue glow of the recently refurbished, panelless monitor. 

Outside, the night ocean kept hitting the base of Port Campbell cliffs with a continuous, thundering rhythm that shook the pane of cracked glass fitted into the frame.

I dashed my fingers over the old mechanical keyboard, the sound clattering like dry bones breaking in the dark.

On the screen, line after line of financial data poured across the screen in harsh blocks. Shell companies registered in the Cayman Islands, nominee accounts handled by private banks in Zurich, and offshore trusts concealed behind numerous Panamanian law firms. To anyone, it looks like an utterly incomprehensible mess of corporate complexity.

To me, it was a map of the blood in my body.

Every transaction displayed on that screen was a part of my life which Victoria Vance had taken away from me four years ago.

The dividend payments issued by Vance Global were financed by the stolen core framework that I had designed over a period of sixteen months alongside Kaelen in his glass tower. 

They called me a thief, a mercenary, and a disgraced software architect who sold out her fiancé for a quick sum of money.

They didn't know about Aegis Capital.

They weren't aware that, over a period of four years, living on baked beans and stale bread in cold coastal rental homes, I had been creating a ghost entity in secret. 

Each spare penny I managed to save, each one that remained after having bought Chloe's medical supplies and Lachlan's winter boots, was channeled via encrypted secondary transactions, slowly and systematically consuming the floating Class-B shares of Vance Global.

I stopped typing and leaned back, placing my elbows on the rough plywood table. I put my palms over my dry, stinging eyes. My skin was hot and tight from exhaustion.

"Just a little more," I whispered to the cold air inside the shed 

I pulled my hands away and forced myself to look at the bottom right corner of the terminal screen, where a single golden percentage counter pulsed slowly against the dark background:

AEGIS EQUITY STAKE: 9.9 PERCENT

THRESHOLD FOR A SPECIAL BOARD GENERAL MEETING: 14.9 PERCENT

9.9 percent, I was actually at the very edge of a cliff.

If I could secure just five percent more of the voting shares in Vance Global, Aegis Capital would reach the fifteen percent figure which is required by Australian corporate law in order to demand an emergency, unannounced special general meeting of the board of directors.

At fifteen percent, Victoria Vance could no longer freeze me out using her private security team or her expensive legal firm. 

At fifteen percent, I would walk into the boardroom on Collins Street not as a criminal fleeing a warrant, but as a major shareholder with the legal right to call for a complete, independent forensic audit of the 2022 asset allocation accounts.

I'd make her face the light by placing the compiler logs on the table in front of the board, showing them the dummy file she had used to frame me.

I'd take away her position in the company, clear my name, and ensure Lachlan had a life where he wouldn't have to jump every time a car engine turned down our driveway.

I stopped breathing for a moment with my thumb above the execution key.

Buying five percent of a blue-chip conglomerate in one trading session without causing an automated market halt was almost impossible; to do so meant having to carry out seven hundred micro-transactions over four different dark pools in less than sixty seconds, a sequence so tightly timed that if a single node lagged by two milliseconds, the Vance Global market surveillance algorithms would trace the buy orders directly back to the static IP address of this old shed.

A shadow fell across the doorway behind me.

I flinched, my hand moving underneath the edge of the workbench towards the iron spanner I kept hidden behind the battery array.

“It's just me, Val,” Hamish said in a quiet voice from the threshold.

He stepped in, pulling his heavy oilskin coat more closely around his neck. The black coastal mud caked on his boots, his face appearing lean, with deep shadows beneath it under the pale fluorescent lighting. In his hand was a hot mug of chicory coffee, the steam rising towards the low rafters.

“You should be sleeping," he said, placing the mug on the edge of my workbench, careful not to touch the exposed copper wiring leading to the boat batteries. "The fishing boat will be at the inlet by two in the morning; if you’re running on empty, you won't be able to take Lachlan down the cliff trail.”

“I can't leave this unfinished, Hamish,” I remarked, my voice tight and raw. I pointed at the flickering terminal. "See it? We're five percent away. Five percent, and then I can put an end to this nightmare forever."

Hamish didn't look at the screen. He looked at me with his eyes, filled deeply and frighteningly with sorrow, that made my stomach fall.

"Do you think a board meeting will save you from Victoria Vance, Val?" he asked, his voice no louder than the wind blowing outside. 

"Do you really think showing them the ledger we make her hand you your life back? She controls the judges. She runs the medical board that licenses Chloe's care. The second you set foot in that building, she won't bother arguing about the share percentages; federal marshals will put hand irons on your wrists."

"Not if I have the master ledger," I replied, my voice trembling as I pointed at the screen. "The ledger shows that she falsified the charges of corporate espionage! It shows…"

"It doesn't matter what it proves if Chloe dies while you're standing in the court dock!” Hamish snapped, his composure breaking in a sharp, terrifying manner that made me jump back.

He drew a rough breath, closing his eyes for a long time, forcing his hands to remain steady by his sides. As he opened his eyes, the cold, clinical distance was back, but underneath it was something dark and desperate.

"I went back to the cottage to pack Chloe's portable ventilator, "Hamish whispered, stepping closer to the table. "The landline was ringing. I picked up the receiver."

My blood froze in my veins. "Who was it?"

"No, it wasn't a corporate lawyer, Val," Hamish said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a small, heavy silver signet ring bearing the Vance family crest, shining ominously under the fluorescent light. "It was Kaelen. He didn't phone the police. He didn't call his security team."

Hamish set the signet ring on top of the open notebook, directly onto my hand-drawn schematics.

"He's currently at the bottom of the lane, "Hamish whispered, his eyes fixing on mine with a terrifying intensity.

“If you refuse to walk out to him within five minutes, he's going to operate the remote kill-switch on Chloe's secondary life-support network."