Page 94 of Dose

“Anyone can find anything if they know where to look. This shouldn’t give them a reason.”

Better than a promise of invisibility.

Procurement records and shipping schedules move onto the encrypted drive. Shell companies resolve into customer codes. Tacoma appears where expected: a conduit, not the producer. Seattle’s specifications include pharmacy-linked lot requirements that may fill the gaps in Isla’s stabilization grids.

“Stage three,” I report quietly. “Data capture in progress. Site unchanged.”

Marcus acknowledges. The reserve stays where it is.

Dominic opens a directory stored on a concealed partition.

“This isn’t part of Cascade’s business system,” he says. “Different encryption, different backup schedule. Looks like the supplier has been used as a relay archive.”

The first layer contains research reports disguised as equipment-calibration files. Beneath that are Project Architect facility designations.

One folder reads SITE NINE — OPTIMIZATION PROTOCOLS.

I know what I will find before I open it.

The author field confirms it.

I. SUMMER

The first report is eighteen months old. A modification to the V-117 side chain. Four seconds removed from onset time, improved penetration across the blood-brain barrier, stable above the temperature that had degraded the previous formulation. The prose is clean and exact. Problem. Hypothesis. Method. Result. Implication.

I would recognize the cadence without her name attached.

The footer records implementation at four facilities.

The next report reduces synthesis time. Another extends storage life. Eleven reports in total, each a precise improvement to a system designed to make children easier to control. Adoption dates stretch across six years. The most recent is less than a year old.

“Theon,” Dominic says.

I have stopped breathing.

For one moment, I consider closing the folder. I could copy it, encrypt it separately, give Isla a few hours before she has to see her own history laid out as evidence.

The instinct feels protective. It is also a decision about what she is allowed to know.

I leave the file open.

“What is it?”

Her voice comes from the doorway.

I turn. “You’re supposed to be in storage.”

“Corbin’s still in the records room. Deb is helping him.” She touches her earpiece. “You missed the private check.”

I had not heard it.

“Isla.”

She’s already seen her name.

She crosses the room and reads over my shoulder. Her expression does not break. It narrows into the same concentration she used on the storage cabinets, only now she is examining herself.

“That’s my formatting,” she says. “I always wrote the implication section last.” She scrolls. “I remember this one. I was twenty-two. The compound kept degrading above forty degrees, and I spent four months changing the side chain.”