Her monitor flickered. The clock in the corner of her screen jumped back 13 hours. And somewhere, in a server room she’d never seen, a hard drive labeled ROYD-170 spun to life for the first time in ten years.

A message flashed: “You have opened the thirteenth seal of the ROYD loop. The REPACK was a warning, not a fix. Close this window. Destroy the drive. Do not look for part 14.” She should have listened. But the client’s payment had already doubled.

Part 14 wasn’t missing.