I Want a Divorce!

The sickening, wet sounds of Frederick and Rose echoed through the door.

Ten minutes ago, Kacey might have collapsed in tears. Now, knowing the horrific death they had orchestrated for her in the previous timeline, she felt nothing but a thrilling, icy anticipation.

She pulled her phone from her purse, hit record, and didn’t bother knocking.

Kacey kicked the door open.

It slammed against the wall with a deafening crack.

Frederick yelled, violently scrambling backward off the leather desk chair. Rose shrieked, frantically pulling her scattered dress up to cover her chest. The camera captured every pathetic, naked second of their panic in ultra-high definition.

"Kacey!" Frederick gasped. His face was completely drained of blood. He tripped over his own trousers, crashing to his knees on the carpet. "Kacey, wait, please! This... this isn't what it looks like!"

"It looks like you are burying yourself in my best friend on the executive desk I paid for," Kacey said. Her voice was terrifyingly steady. The red recording light blinked in the dim office.

Rose trembled, her fake sweet demeanor completely shattered. She clutched her blouse against her chest, her eyes wide with terror. "Kacey, please, let me explain! We were just... it was a mistake! We had too much to drink!"

"A mistake?" Kacey laughed. It was a cold, hollow sound that made Frederick flinch. "You were just talking about taking my company and leaving me with nothing. That sounded pretty intentional to me."

"Honey, put the phone down," Frederick pleaded. He crawled slightly toward her, his hands raised in surrender. "I swear to you, I love you. It was just stress! The quarterly reports have been killing me, and she just—"

"Frederick, don't say that!" Rose cried out, her eyes welling with actual tears of panic. "You said you loved me! You said she was just a stepping stone!"

"Shut up, Rose!" Frederick roared at her, his face twisting in ugly desperation. He turned his pathetic eyes back to Kacey. "I'll do anything. I'll fire her right now! I'll never see Rose again, I promise!"

Kacey looked down at the man she had once fed, clothed, and elevated to high society. He was pathetic.

"Save it," Kacey snapped. She stopped recording and tapped her screen, saving the file to multiple cloud servers in seconds. "I want a divorce. My lawyers will have the papers ready by tomorrow morning."

"A divorce?" Frederick’s eyes widened in sheer terror. His entire lifestyle, his sports cars, his status, it all belonged to her. "No! Kacey, please! You know the prenup! I'll leave with nothing! Please, Kacey, give me another chance!"

"You will absolutely leave with nothing," Kacey smiled warmly, dropping her phone back into her purse. "I have the infidelity on tape. You’ve violated the morality clause in the prenup. You are completely done."

She turned her back on them and walked out, leaving the door wide open.

"Kacey, wait! Please!" Frederick screamed from down the hall, but she didn't even break her stride.

The private elevator doors slid shut, cutting off Frederick's wailing. Kacey leaned against the mirrored wall, a genuine, radiant smile stretching across her face. It was almost too easy.

She pulled her phone back out and dialed a number she knew by heart. It rang three times before a deep, gruff voice answered.

"Kacey?" Gordon Pierce sounded bewildered. As the CEO of Pierce Tech, he was her biggest, most aggressive rival in the industry. "It's almost midnight. To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"I'm selling," Kacey said directly. "Everything. The patents, the infrastructure, the subsidiary contracts. The entire company."

There was a long, stunned silence on the line.

"Is this a joke?" Gordon asked, his tone hardening. "Because if this is some sort of tactic to leverage the upcoming government contracts—"

"Five hundred million," Kacey interrupted. She injected a deliberate, ragged tremor into her voice, forcing a pathetic sniffle. "Cash transfer. I want out, Gordon. I just want to be done with it."

Gordon paused. "Five hundred million? Kacey, your valuation is at least eight hundred. Why the hell would you take a three-hundred-million-dollar haircut? What is going on over there?"

Kacey squeezed her eyes shut. She channeled the crushing, freezing grief from her past life to make the tears sound incredibly real. "I just walked in on Frederick." She let her voice crack perfectly. "He was with Rose. My best friend, Gordon. In my own office."

"Jesus," Gordon muttered. The ruthless corporate suspicion bled out of his voice, replaced immediately by uncomfortable, awkward pity.

"I can't look at this company anymore," Kacey sobbed softly into the receiver, thoroughly enjoying the performance. "I can't look at this city. I just want to liquidate everything, finalize the divorce tomorrow, and disappear to Europe. But I need it done instantly. I cannot drag this out through months of board meetings and press releases while he tries to claim my assets."

"Kacey, I'm so sorry. Truly. But an acquisition of this size overnight... it's nearly impossible—"

"It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, Gordon," Kacey snapped, playing the part of the erratic, heartbroken woman perfectly. "I am giving you my life's work on a silver platter for a fraction of its actual worth. If you don't want it, I will call Richard at LOS Tech right now. He will jump at it."

"Wait, hold on," Gordon said quickly. Corporate greed was such a wonderfully predictable beast. "Don't call Richard. You really want to do this? Five hundred million, flat?"

"Have your legal team at my office by 9:00 AM tomorrow," Kacey sniffled, wiping a non-existent tear from her cheek. "I will sign the transfer of ownership the second the five hundred million hits my private offshore account."

"I'll have them there," Gordon said, his voice tight with suppressed excitement. He was already doing the math in his head. "I am sorry about Frederick, Kacey. Truly. But you are making the right business decision."

"I know I am," she whispered. "See you tomorrow."

Kacey ended the call. Her faux-tears vanished instantly, replaced by a gaze as cold and unyielding as the coming apocalypse.

She stepped out of the elevator and into the underground parking garage. The air was comfortably warm, the city above humming with electricity, completely oblivious to its impending doom.

Five hundred million dollars.

To Gordon Pierce, it was the steal of the century. To Frederick, losing it meant the end of the world.

But Kacey knew the real truth. In exactly three months, the global power grid would shatter. The oceans would freeze over. Society would violently collapse into a primitive, blood-soaked fight for survival.

In the new world, a bank account with five hundred million dollars would not buy a single loaf of moldy bread. Digital currency would be nothing more than dead pixels on a useless screen. Gold and diamonds would be tossed into the street like gravel.

She climbed into her sports car and gripped the leather steering wheel. She had a brutal divorce to finalize, an empire to sell, and an infinite spatial dimension to fill.

"Money means absolutely nothing," Kacey murmured to the empty car, her eyes reflecting the harsh dashboard lights. "Only food. And fire."