"Security! Arrest them immediately!" Shannon Thorne’s voice shrieked through the vaulted ceilings of the theater, shattering the hallowed silence of the backstage area. She stepped out from the shadows, her smartphone held aloft like a holy relic, the screen glowing with a half-composed report of "Unlawful Trespass."

  Rumani froze, pulling Barbara slightly behind him. He didn't look like a hero; he looked like a panicked accountant. "Miss Thorne? We... we were told we could be here. The man at the front said—"

  "The man at the front is a fool, and you are a criminal!" Shannon marched forward, her heels hammering the stage's aged oak. "I’ve been tracking your movements for three blocks. You’ve bypassed four 'Staff Only' signs. In the Second Multiverse, intent to trespass in a historical landmark carries a mandatory five-year minimum. My father will ensure you don't see the sun until the next decade."

  Two massive security guards—3x scale Enforcers equipped with Registry-standard kinetic dampeners—thundered onto the stage from the loading dock. Shannon smirks, pointing her umbrella at Rumani’s chest. "There they are. Take them down. Use the level-two restraints."

  The guards looked at Rumani, then at the master-key card hanging from his lanyard—the one the Guest Relations manager had given him. They then looked at Shannon, who was currently vibrating with a level of frantic aggression that set off their "Public Disturbance" sensors.

  "Ma'am," the lead guard rumbled, his voice like grinding stones. "We’ve been monitoring the internal feeds. We saw you following this couple from the lobby. You’ve been hiding in the wings for six minutes, recording civilians without a Registry warrant."

  "What?" Shannon’s face went from triumphant red to a pale, sickly white. "Do you know who I am? I am Shannon Thorne! I am the one reporting the crime!"

  "The Chairman’s Syracuse relatives are our guests of honor today," the second guard said, stepping past Rumani and placing a heavy, gloved hand on Shannon’s shoulder. "You, however, are a known person of interest with a 'Harassment Warning' issued by Agent Sabrina Thorne not twenty minutes ago. Following guests into restricted zones constitutes stalking under Section 14-B."

  "Get your hands off me! This is a mistake! Kian will have your heads!"

  "Save it for the processing center," the guard replied, his tone bored. He clicked a pair of magnetic cuffs around Shannon’s wrists. As they marched her off the stage toward the service exit, her screams about "unapproved haircuts" and "federal lawsuits" echoed until a heavy soundproof door slammed shut behind her.

  The lead guard turned to Rumani and Barbara, tipping his cap. "Our apologies for the disturbance. Some people can’t handle the scale of this city. Please, continue your tour. The Chairman should be in the private lounge shortly."

  Barbara let out a long breath, her hand clutched over her heart. "Oh my goodness, Rumani. That woman is... she's terrifying. But how did he know we were the Syracuse relatives? You really did pull out all the stops for this anniversary surprise, didn't you?"

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  "I just wanted it to be special, honey," Rumani said, his voice soft, though his mind was already back on the Temporal Resonance Array hidden in the orchestra pit.

  He knew he only had a few minutes before the real relatives arrived or the Chairman appeared. While Barbara walked to the edge of the stage to marvel at the 30x scale chandelier, Rumani knelt by the conductor’s podium. With a microscopic flick of his finger, he sent a Sub-Dermal Data Pulse into the Registry’s hidden equipment.

  The data flooded his mind. The Registry wasn't just watching the alley; they were tracking a specific energy signature—one that matched the man with the scowl from the Boston meeting. The logs showed three "pings" in the last forty-eight hours.

  The last ping wasn't at the theater. It was at the Providence Registry Archives—the exact place Sabrina Thorne had headed to investigate the "Aether-Marrow Pylons."

  Rumani stood up, his face as pale as the stage lights. He realized the man from the Boston meeting wasn't just a background actor; he was hunting the same paper trail Rumani had just created.

  "Barbara," Rumani said, his voice steady but urgent. "I just remembered... I think I left the stove on. We might need to cut the tour short."

  The heavy velvet curtains of the theater had dampened the sound of Shannon’s protests, but the cold weight in Rumani’s chest remained. Barbara caught the rigid line of his shoulders and knew the "look" immediately. In their world, a bad feeling from Rumani was a weather vane for trouble.

  "Rumani," she whispered, her hand trembling as she reached for his. "We need to go. Now."

  They moved through the lobby and out onto Weybosset Street, where the 30x scale shadows of the skyscrapers felt like teeth closing over the historic district. The ride home was tense, the high-speed rail carriage vibrating with a frequency that set Rumani’s teeth on edge.

  By the time they reached their apartment, the sun was a dying ember behind the Superman Building. With Collin away in Mystic, Connecticut, the house was unnervingly silent. The lack of their son’s energy made the hollowed-out air feel heavy.

  Barbara immediately began a circuit of the rooms. She checked the deadbolt, then moved to the kitchen, her eyes darting to the shadows behind the pantry.

  "The stove is off," she called out, her voice tight. "But Rumani... the air. It’s too still. It feels like the oxygen is being sucked out of the room."

  She moved to the back of the apartment, checking the window locks in the living room and lingering at Collin’s bedroom door.

  "Everything is locked," she said, returning to the hallway. Her face was pale. "I’m going to draw the blackout curtains. If the Registry is running another containment drill, I don't want us blinded by the flares."

  Rumani nodded, his persona masking the three different threat vectors he was currently processing. "Thank you, Barb. I'll check the service entrance. The latch has been sticky."

  As she turned the corner, Rumani’s posture snapped into a sharp focus. He leaned against the door, closing his eyes to let his Oversight bleed through the walls. He was looking for a breach.

  A rhythmic vibration pulsed from the roof—the high-frequency hum of Registry-grade surveillance spikes being driven into the masonry. Someone was tagging the building.

  His eyes snapped open. The figure from the photo was using the distraction of the singularity to shadow-mark the homes of everyone who had been in the vault. A sharp thud echoed from the roof directly above Collin’s room.

  "Rumani?" Barbara’s voice came from the bedroom, rising with panic. "Did you hear that? It sounded like something landed on the roof."

  Rumani reached up, his hand passing through the ceiling's molecular structure. His fingers found the vibrating metal spike embedded in the roof joist. With a surge of Localized Kinetic Erasure, he crushed the device into dust.

  "Just the wind catching the vents, honey!" Rumani called back, his voice shaky. "The building is settling."

  He pulled his hand back, the dust of the Registry tech coating his sleeve. The danger was silent, intimate, and far from over.