Silence tore John Gray from sleep. Not a cry, not light, not pain-silence, thick as coal dust in a flooded mine. It stood in the room, crushing his chest like water over a drowning man.
His heart was mute. John, Minister of Resources, fifty years buried in decrees and ash, sat on the edge of the bed.
Digits flickered on the clock: 00:55... 00:56
London beyond the window was dead. No hiss of tires, no wind's breath, no trembling lights under the bridge. The city waited-for him to rise, or to fall forever.
His feet met the parquet-cold as a hospital's steel.
On the table, in the empty kitchen, lay a file: Briefing Pack №12/7-C.
He had signed it yesterday-a stroke like a blade before an execution. Now the cover breathed. Warm, alive, it stirred like a beast's hide under the knife. At its edge, dark runes-or crosses? - glinted, unseen before.
The tablet flashed. Once. Twice. Thrice.
Reports struck like nails:
Vysheslav-7 - seam collapsing, thirty-eight trapped below.
Radomir-15 - wedge shattered. One dead.
Cold - minus 11,247 homes dark. Three hours, forty-six minutes left.
His mines. His signature. His sin.
Like before, when he'd rushed degassing, and the shaft devoured nineteen. The lift descended empty. Returned with smoke.
That stench clung to him now, seeping from the file that judged him.
The tablet woke at his touch. He opened the registry.
Override. Halt extraction. Evacuate. Cancel Vysheslav-7.
The system demanded a live signature.
The screen pulsed: 00:46:21...
He gripped the pen. His fingers fused to YES
- You think a signature saves? - his conscience whispered. - It damns you
He exhaled. And scrawled: NO
The bulb shattered, glass ringing like bones in a grave. Outside, a transformer howled-or was it a wolf? The phone stirred:
- Reverse it. You've crashed the grid. They'll bury you
- If the grid stands on corpses, let it burn, - he said, and killed the call.
The file burst. From it rose a book-no title, no author. Only his number. White. Breathing. Across its cover, letters burned: ALEXANDER
Pages parted. Pulse. 93. 94. 96. His pulse.
The ink of his signature rose, seeped into his skin. The paper drank his blood. He tore his hand free-a page ripped with flesh. Pain flared. The book exhaled, silent, and released him. A heart beat. Not his.
The screen flickered: 00:44:47
The system slid into auto-sign mode. He seized the phone:
- Mine Thirty-One. Everyone up. Compensation's mine
- Sir, that's criminal...
- Do it
The line quaked.
He awaited orders. Judgment came.
Evacuation: 34 of 38. Four lost. Under his signature.
The book stirred. A page trembled like a petal in frost. He didn't hold it. It held him.
The room dissolved. Darkness. Bells rang. The scent of resin and honey.
He opened his eyes. Not London. Kyiv. Wooden towers rose through smoke. A voice called:
Alexander