I pull the code strings into overlay alignment—committee authorization hashes against public hearing exclusions, internal reference markers against the inquiry docket. The missing links line up too neatly to be accidental.
“Yes,” I say. “Public hearings stripped out reference to Senate ratification. Vol took the fall as operational architect, but the legislative groundwork was buried.”
The apartment is so quiet I can hear the slight static crackle of the projection field.
Outside, rain finally starts again, tapping softly against the windows like someone trying not to be overheard.
Rhyx sits back a fraction, one hand flattening against the table. “If that becomes public?—”
I already know.
That’s the problem.
I know before he finishes.
The political math unfolds in my head with brutal efficiency. Senate committee complicity means no isolated villain. It means the doctrine wasn’t merely command corruption—it was partially legislated under wartime emergency logic. It means public reform becomes public prosecution of sitting or recently seated legislative factions. It means the League fractures along lines far worse than post-tribunal outrage. It means Coalition hawks point to Senate ratification as proof the entire oversight state acted in bad faith during ceasefire architecture. It meansevery bad actor who wanted the tribunal to ignite retaliation gets handed a barrel of accelerant and a public match.
It means ceasefire stability—fragile, ugly, imperfect, but real—could snap.
I sit very still because if I move too quickly, I might break something in the room with my bare hands.
Rhyx watches my face. “You’ve done the calculation.”
“Yes.”
“How bad.”
I laugh once, and the sound is awful. “Bad enough that even I don’t want to be right.”
He says nothing.
That, more than anything, is mercy.
I zoom further into the packet, forcing myself to document before emotion takes over. Senatorial subgroup IDs masked behind code abbreviations. Committee circulation tags. Ratification channels. I cross-check every code against the fragments Talis included and the public unsealing index. Enough to confirm authenticity. Not enough to publicly name every individual without a deeper breach I do not currently have.
Which almost makes it worse.
The files prove structure without offering clean human targets. Exactly the kind of truth that destroys systems and then leaves survivors to pick through debris for faces.
I whisper, “Vol operationalized it, but they enabled the authority.”
Rhyx’s voice is rougher now. “Yes.”
“And the hearings knew enough to bury that part.”
“Yes.”
I lean back and close my eyes for one second.
I see the memorial wall.
The names.
The protest signs.
Commissioner Serr naming the doctrine as if naming it was the whole exorcism.
And now this. The deeper rot. Legislative hands in clean rooms authorizing casualty thresholds months before anyone outside the sealed chain had language for what that would become.
