The first mistake was subtle enough to masquerade as coincidence.
That was what made it lethal.
Aria noticed it just after dawn, when the estate's internal reports began looping, not crashing, not erasing themselves, but repeating certain timestamps out of sequence. A data echo. The kind that slipped past surface audits and only revealed itself to someone who understood intent more than architecture.
She stood alone in the operations room, sleeves rolled to her elbows, eyes moving between screens faster than any of the analysts who would later swear they had seen nothing wrong.
"This isn't Cassian," she said quietly.
The system offered no response.
She activated a secondary channel. "Dante. Now."
He arrived within minutes, expression neutral but alert. "What am I looking at?"
"A rehearsal," Aria replied. "Someone is practicing sabotage without committing it."
Dante leaned closer to the display. "Internal?"
"Yes."
"High clearance?"
"Yes."
"Trusted?"
