The air in the office felt heavier by Tuesday.
Not loud. Not confrontational.
Just... pressurized. Like the whole place was holding its breath.
Anna noticed it first in the small things.
People looked at her a little too long or not at all.
Slack channels that used to ping with brainstorm noise went quiet when she typed.
The shared drive folders began to lag when her name appeared in the metadata.
It wasn't a freeze.
It was a slow, deliberate drop in temperature.
And everyone could feel it.
By 9:00 a.m., Leah was already at her desk,hair up, sleeves rolled, typing like survival depended on speed.
But something was off.
Anna noticed it as soon as she stepped in: Leah's jaw was tight, her posture rigid, too focused. Not her usual sharp-chaotic rhythm. This was a different kind of urgency.
Anna set her coffee down. "What happened?"
Leah didn't look up. "Someone tried to overwrite our Lux deck again. Last night. 12:16 a.m. The system didn't register a user, but I caught the rollback in the sync logs."
Anna's chest tightened. "Which version?"
"Yours. Phase One through Phase Three. Cleaned it like it never existed."
Anna exhaled through her nose. Steady. Controlled.
Leah clicked a few more times, then added, quieter: "They're not just removing edits anymore. They're trying to erase the thread, like the story was never ours to begin with."
Anna approached slowly, standing behind her.
"They want plausible deniability," she said. "No name to pin. No author to defend."
Leah finally turned, her voice soft but shaking.
"It's like I'm watching you disappear from the inside out."
Anna blinked.
That wasn't just about the deck.
It was about Leah.
What she feared would happen to her, too.
Anna crouched beside her.
"They'll try to ghost both of us," she said. "But they can't kill what we keep offline."
Leah swallowed hard.
Anna reached out and squeezed her hand once—brief but anchoring.
"We document everything. We version it on our own. And when they try to wipe us, we show the receipts."
Leah nodded. Eyes glassy, but jaw set.
Anna stood again. "You're not just my assistant, Leah. You're the second author."
__
At 10:15 a.m., the creative alignment meeting began.
The war room was full. Too full.
People from Sydney's team. A couple of strategy leads. Even Jules—the ever-neutral project director—had shown up early, a rare sign that someone expected friction.
Anna sat at the far end of the table. Not by choice.
The seating chart had been rearranged.
Ben entered just before the door closed. He looked around once, scanned the table, and saw what had happened.
He didn't say a word.
But he crossed the room and sat beside her.
Jules cleared his throat. "Let's review the Lux Phase Two narrative, shall we?"
Sydney was all poise and polish.
Her voice floated, calm and confident, as she introduced a new framework: Post-authentic connective storytelling.
Anna blinked.
That term. That phrasing.
It wasn't new. It was hers.
She'd used it in a closed-door session three months ago. One where the recorder had been "malfunctioning."
Leah, seated in the second row, caught Anna's glance and mouthed: We have proof.
Anna nodded once.
Then turned her attention back to the screen.
And took notes—not on the presentation.
On the theft.
__
After the meeting, Leah followed her out.
"That framework," she hissed, "was lifted word-for-word from your prototype doc."
Anna didn't slow her pace. "Do we still have that file?"
"Of course."
Anna stopped.
Leah did too.
"You're not going to let her publish that, right?"
Anna met her eyes. "I'm not going to stop her."
Leah blinked. "Wait. what?"
"If she pushes it first, we have the paper trail. And if she doesn't, then we put it out ourselves with the receipts."
"That's risky."
"So is letting the fire go out just because it's not our turn to hold the torch."
Leah didn't argue.
But her hands were shaking when she put her phone away.
Later, Ben caught Anna in the corridor.
He looked tired. More than usual.
"I know what that was," he said.
Anna raised a brow. "Which part? The stolen IP or the rearranged table?"
"Both."
"And?"
He didn't look away. "It's not just Sydney. There's pressure from the top. If you get too much credit, especially after leaving, they worry what it signals to the rest of the creatives."
"That a woman can walk away and still win?"
He didn't reply.
He didn't have to.
She crossed her arms. "Let me guess. You're supposed to keep me from making too much noise."
"I'm supposed to help keep the ship balanced."
She leaned in, voice dropping. "The ship's already leaking, Ben. You just don't want the deck to look wet."
He said nothing for a long beat.
Then: "Are you sure you're not fighting ghosts?"
Anna's face changed, just slightly.
"I'm fighting silence. It just happens to wear expensive perfume and legacy logos."
Just after 3:00 p.m., Leah returned from a short break—two steps behind herself, face pale, lips pressed tight.
Anna caught it immediately.
"What happened?"
"They pulled me from the Phase Three prep call."
Anna straightened. "Who?"
"Jules said they're keeping it 'leaner.' Only senior voices. But it wasn't the others—he made the call himself."
Anna's mouth was a hard line.
Leah added, voice cracking just slightly, "He said it's not personal. Just procedural."
"That's how they get away with it," Anna said. "They name it process so you stop calling it what it is."
She stood.
And without hesitation, walked to Jules' office.
The door was half-shut. She didn't knock.
He looked up as she entered, startled. "Anna—"
"You cut Leah."
Jules sat up straighter, smoothing his tie. "It's a scheduling constraint. Just simplifying the discussion flow."
"By removing the person who helped build the architecture?"
"She's not—technically—on the leadership track."
"She's on my track," Anna said. "And this call is built on our framework. Without her, you lose context. And integrity."
Jules blinked. "This isn't personal."
"Of course it is," she snapped. "Every strategic decision that silences the people who did the work is personal."
He raised both hands. "Okay. She's back in."
Anna took a step closer.
"I don't want her back in because I forced it," she said. "I want her in because you understand the cost of building without her."
Jules didn't respond.
But he didn't argue either.
Back at their workspace, Leah looked up as Anna returned.
"You're in," Anna said simply.
Leah let out a shaky breath she hadn't realized she was holding. "You didn't have to..."
"Yes, I did," Anna interrupted. "Because today it's a call. Tomorrow it's a credit. Then a chair at the table."
Leah looked away, blinking fast.
"I'm not asking for glory," she whispered. "I just want to know I'm not invisible."
Anna sat beside her.
"You're not," she said. "But they'll make you think you are, if you don't fight to be seen."
__
That night, Anna didn't write right away.
She sat by the window, notebook untouched, watching lights blink in office towers across the skyline. Some other Leah was probably still inside one of them, being told she was "too junior" to present her own idea. Some other Anna was still holding her tongue.
Not tonight.
Finally, she opened her notebook and wrote:
Day Eleven
They don't say your name.
They say:
She's difficult.
She's too opinionated.
She's hard to manage.
What they mean is:
She doesn't flinch.
She remembers too clearly.
She's not afraid to make the silence awkward.
Let them whisper.
I'll name the room louder than they can erase it.
She closed the book.
No applause.
No clarity.
Just resolve.
And a war she had no intention of losing quietly.