The courtroom was dead silent. The bailiffs had drifted closer to Grant, anticipating violence. Lucas stood quietly behind Lena, head bowed. He’d saved himself, and in doing so, he’d handed me the sword.

“What are you doing?” Grant demanded, voice cracking. “Put that away. You don’t have access to the servers anymore.”

“You only deleted my administrative privileges on the front end, Grant,” I said, fingers moving across the glass. “You never knew about the root directory.

You never understood the code. You only understood how to sell it.” I looked up at Judge Whitmore. “Your Honor, with the court’s injunction now in force, I’m exercising my restored authority as founder and majority shareholder.

Everything I’m about to do is logged, timestamped, and copied to the FBI and SEC in real time. I’d like it on the record.”

Whitmore studied me for a long moment. Then, slowly, he nodded. “It’s on the record, Mrs. Mercer. Proceed.”