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Chapter 41 The Syndicate’s Knock

Author: R.J. Sterling
last update publish date: 2026-05-30 00:15:06
My palm closes over the glowing drop. I don’t smear it. I take it in.

I open the furnace a hair’s width and let it draw, not oxygen this time, not heat, but the loose trace of myself bleeding into the room, the dead signal on the tray and the live one charging the air.

I pull it through my skin the way a wick pulls flame, back into the vein it came from, until the two points of me collapse into one. The drop goes dark under my hand.

The room’s screaming silver beacon drops to a single source: me
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