Rad Studio Xe3.slip -

The office lights hummed a low, sickly fluorescent tune. Marcus stared at the single sheet of paper in his hands. It was crisp, official, and utterly damning.

The project was Prometheus —a real-time guidance system for autonomous shipping freighters. Twelve million lines of Pascal and C++. Eighteen months of work. A beta launch scheduled for tomorrow. And now, the RAD Studio IDE had detonated its own license. Rad Studio Xe3.slip

Then the lights flickered.

“Call Embarcadero support,” Marcus said, his voice hollow. The office lights hummed a low, sickly fluorescent tune

was typed across the top in a sober Courier New font. The office lights hummed a low

Not a brownout. A pattern. Long flash. Short flash. Long. Long. Short. Morse code. Marcus didn't know Morse, but Lena’s face went pale.