The cry grew louder. It bounced off the tiled walls, a siren of life.

Karly wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. It came away red.

Dr. Vance stood frozen. His hand was still outstretched, inches from Karly's shoulder. He looked at the baby. He looked at the crude incision.

It was perfect. Dead center. No damage to the vocal cords. No nicked arteries.

"My god," Vance whispered.

Nurses swarmed in. They pushed Karly aside, tending to the baby, putting a proper oxygen mask over the face.

Security guards burst through the door. "Where is she?"

Hakeem stepped forward, phone still raised. "Her! My sister! She stabbed the kid! I got it all on video!"

The guards grabbed Karly's arms. They wrenched them behind her back.

"Get off me," Karly said. She was too tired to fight.

"Take her to the station," the head guard said.

"Stop."

Dr. Vance's voice cut through the chaos.

He walked over to the guards. "Release her."

"But Doctor, she-"

"She just performed a textbook cricothyrotomy with a utility knife," Vance said. He looked at Karly with a mixture of horror and awe. "She saved that child's life. The nurse was bagging a complete obstruction. She would have killed the patient."

The nurse in the corner went pale.

Hakeem's jaw dropped. "What? No, she's crazy! Look at the knife!"

Vance turned on Hakeem. "You. Get out of my hospital. If I see you here again, I'll have you arrested for interfering with a medical emergency."

Hakeem lowered the phone. He looked at Karly. She was covered in blood, hair messy, wearing a cheap uniform.

But she was smiling. A cold, shark-like smile.

"Delete the video, Hakeem," Karly said softly. "Or I tell the cops why you were really here."

Hakeem scrambled backward and ran.

"Come with me," Vance said to Karly.

In his office, Vance poured her a glass of water. His hands were shaking slightly.

"Who taught you that?" he asked. "That wasn't luck. You knew the anatomy."

"I watch videos," Karly lied. "I have a photographic memory."

Vance studied her. He didn't believe her. But he couldn't deny what he saw.

"You're wasted in high school," he muttered.

"My father," Karly said. "Surgery. Tomorrow."

Vance nodded. "I'll do it. Pro bono. I'll write it off as a teaching case."

"And the waiver my brother signed?"

Vance picked up the paper Hakeem had given him. He crumpled it into a ball and tossed it in the trash.

"What waiver?"

Karly stood up. "Thank you, Doctor."

She walked to the door.

"Wait," Vance said. "What's your name?"

"Karly."

"Karly. If you ever want a recommendation for med school... come find me."

Karly didn't look back. "I won't need it."

The next day, the school was buzzing. Not about Karly. Nobody cared about Karly.

They were buzzing about the upcoming Spring Gala.

Karly opened her locker. A note fluttered out.

Study group. Tonight. 8 PM. CyberZone Café. Be there or fail AP Bio.

It was written on pink stationery. Holli Talley.

Karly knew this setup. In the original timeline, she had gone. She had been desperate for friends. She remembered Holli's friends whispering in the hall earlier, something about "teaching that trash a lesson tonight." It was all the confirmation she needed.

The police had raided the place at 8:15. Holli had slipped a bag of ecstasy into Karly's backpack. Karly had been expelled.

Karly looked at the note. She smiled.

She needed a high-speed connection. And she needed a secure IP address. CyberZone had both.

She went to the library first. She used a privacy screen on one of the computers, her fingers flying across the keyboard. In minutes, she slipped through a forgotten maintenance portal into the city's network, pulling up the contact information she needed from a digital ghost file she'd left for herself years ago in another life. It was a long shot, but Bertrand Norton's private Signal line hadn't changed. She printed out fifty pages of AP Biology notes. She highlighted them until they were neon yellow.

At 7:55 PM, she walked into CyberZone.

It was a dungeon of neon lights and clicking keyboards.

Holli was in a booth in the back with three other girls. They giggled when Karly walked in.

"Over here!" Holli waved. "We saved you a seat!"

She pointed to a computer station in the corner, isolated from the group.

"Thanks," Karly said loudly. "I really need to study."

She sat down. She blocked their view with her body.

She pulled a USB drive from her bra. She plugged it in.

The screen flickered. The café's OS vanished, replaced by the Tails operating system. Untraceable. Encrypted.

Karly opened a secure browser. She navigated to Signal.

She typed in the number.

Bertrand Norton's private line.

She created a new ID. She paused, a flicker of dark amusement in her eyes. It was reckless. It was provocative. It was the only way to guarantee he'd feel it like a physical blow. A name he couldn't ignore. Mrs. Norton.

She typed: The acquisition of Velos Pharm has a poison pill clause in subsection 44.c. You missed it. It will bankrupt you in three years.

Send.

Her heart hammered. This was the hook.

While she waited, she opened her biology notes. She spread them all over the desk. She made a show of studying.

The owner of the café walked by. A grumpy man named Stan.

"Hey," Karly said. "Your POS system is lagging, right?"

Stan stopped. "Yeah. Piece of junk."

"It's a memory leak in the driver," Karly said. She tapped a few keys on his terminal as he watched. "Fixed."

Stan blinked. The screen refreshed instantly.

"Whoa. Thanks, kid."

"Can I get a coffee? On the house?"

"Sure."

Now she had a witness. A witness who owed her a favor.

Behind her, Holli was texting under the table. Karly glanced at a mirrored surface. Holli was texting Principal Higgins.

She's here. She's dealing.

Karly checked the screen.

Read.

Bertrand had seen it.

Manhattan. The 40th floor of the Norton Tower.

Bertrand Norton sat at the head of a mahogany table. Lawyers droned on about liability caps.

His phone vibrated.

He ignored it.

It vibrated again. A pattern he had set for high-priority alerts.

He glanced down.

Mrs. Norton.

His lip curled in disgust. Another stalker. He'd had his security team block a dozen accounts with similar names. He moved his thumb to block and delete.

Then he read the message.

Subsection 44.c.

His thumb froze over the screen. It was too specific to be a guess. He swiped open the digital contract on his tablet. He scrolled, his eyes scanning the dense legal text.

It was buried in legal jargon, hidden in a footnote about pension liabilities. A clause that triggered a massive debt recall if the stock price dipped below a certain point.

It was a trap. A billion-dollar trap.

And his entire legal team, the best money could buy, had missed it.

Bertrand stood up. "Stop the meeting."

The room went silent.

He walked to the floor-to-ceiling window, his back to the room. "Trace this number. Now," he subvocalized into his watch. "I want to know who sent it."

An analyst's voice came back through a hidden earpiece a moment later. "Sir, it's untraceable. Bounced through a dozen proxies on three continents. The last physical access point was a public terminal in a place called… CyberZone Café in Northwood."

Bertrand's jaw tightened. Northwood. That wasteland.

"Any assets of interest in the area?" he asked.

"Negative, sir. It's a dead end. However… cross-referencing social media, Camisha Walters posted a photo from the coffee shop next door to that café three minutes ago. Could be a coincidence."

Camisha Walters. The ambitious, conniving daughter of a rival. Of course. It made perfect, sickening sense. A power play.

He turned back to his phone. This was a dangerous game she was playing. He texted back, his words clipped and cold.

Who is this?

...

CyberZone Café.

Karly saw the reply.

Who is this?

She started to type.

Your future.

Suddenly, the doors flew open.

"Nobody move! Police!"

Flashlights cut through the gloom, beams dancing across the faces of shocked teenagers. Principal Higgins strode in, flanked by two officers.

"There she is!" Holli shouted, pointing dramatically. "The girl in the corner! She has the drugs!"

Karly yanked the USB drive. She slipped it into her shoe.

She grabbed the bag of flour she had prepared earlier-a small Ziploc baggie she kept in her pocket.

In the split second of chaos as everyone froze under the flashlight beams, she saw Holli's hand dart toward her backpack on the floor.

Karly moved with a surgeon's precision. She grabbed Holli's wrist, her grip like steel. She twisted, a sharp, controlled motion that forced a gasp of pain from Holli. Using the same motion, Karly's other hand, its movements masked by her own body and the folds of her sleeve, shoved the flour baggie deep into Holli's open designer purse. It was over before the first officer took a step toward them.

The lights flickered back on.

Principal Higgins stood over Karly. "Ms. Lowe. I received a disturbing report."

"Principal Higgins?" Karly looked up, eyes wide and innocent. "I'm just studying."

She gestured to the pile of biology notes. The highlighted pages.

"Studying in a place like this?" Higgins scoffed. "Search her bag."

The officer dumped Karly's backpack. Books. Pens. A half-eaten sandwich.

Nothing illegal.

Higgins frowned. He looked at Holli. "You said she was dealing."

"She is!" Holli shrieked. "Check her pockets! Check the floor!"

"Check her purse," Karly said softly. She pointed at Holli.

"What?" Holli laughed nervously. "Don't be stupid."

The officer grabbed Holli's designer bag. He upended it.

Lipstick. iPhone. Wallet.

And a bag of white powder.

The room went dead silent.