Chapter 1
“I’m going to be a few days late, I’m sorry.” Nuri braced himself for the annoyance and the disappointment, two things he seemed to constantly illicit in his younger sibling whenever he found the time to call her.
Sure enough, Neve groaned, the sound filling Nuri’s right ear where his communicator was located.
It was tempting to tap the tiny silver cuff he wore there, the communication device that wirelessly connected to the multi-slate he wore on his wrist, and tell her later that he’d been disconnected. Only the fact that he’d used that trick more times than he could count stopped him.
“You promised!” Neve whined.
“I know, I really am sorry, but work—”
“You said that last year, and the year before. This was the first time you were even going to make it and now you’re saying the seven days we were supposed to get is turning into two?! It’s always work. That’s why you were supposed to quit the second that Imperial Asshole—”
“Don’t say that,” he scolded, glancing around him to be certain no one nearby had overheard.
With the way these devices were made, it should be impossible, but he found himself paranoid whenever his siblings were the subject.
Her comment could be considered treasonous, and even though she was currently on Vitality, an entirely different planet, Nuri knew better than most that Silver could get to anyone he wanted to.
If word got back to him that Nuri’s younger sister had spoken ill of him…
“You’re ridiculous,” Neve told him.
“Putting your life at risk to blow off a little steam is ridiculous,” he corrected.
He was in the west hallway of Rien Inc’s main building.
A few office workers passed him, bowing their heads as they went, and he was walking by a room filled with researchers.
Plenty of ears around to note his discomfort if they paid attention.
Nuri forced himself to calm down, his expression going lax as he evened out his steps and continued on his way with his head held high.
As the emperor’s secretary, everything he did, right down to the way he presented himself to the world, reflected on Silver.
It was a lesson he’d learned at a young age before either of them had even finished High School.
No matter his official title, whether he was the roommate to the Imperial Crown Prince, the secretary to the CEO of Rien Inc, or the Royal Secretary to the Emperor, Nuri always had to be vigilant of himself and his presentation.
“It’s not like I’m wrong,” Neve continued in his ear, completely unaware of the turn of his thoughts. “He’s worked you to the bone since you were kids. Enough is enough, brother. You said you were going to quit.”
He’d been planning to. A year ago, after the crowning, he’d been all ready to go through with it. But then the broadcast had been hacked, and that video had been revealed to the public and Silver’s character had been called into question.
While the people of Ignite couldn’t de-throne him, they could remove him from his position as CEO at Rien Inc, the very company he’d built from the ground up.
Silver’s contributions to the technology field had put Ignite on the entire universe’s radar.
The already prosperous planet had tripled its worth practically overnight when the release of his first invention hit the markets.
The translator device that was currently attached to Nuri’s other ear was worn by practically everyone who dealt with international dealings, as well as used by the Intergalactic Police Force.
It allowed immediate translation of any language to the wearers without needing a multi-slate.
Like the communicator, it processed the translated words through vibrations, so that what the wearer heard were words spoken in their own language.
Since many of their partnerships took place with other planets, some not even in their galaxy, the translator was immensely useful to Nuri and the people working jobs like his.
It certainly made cleaning up after his boss a million times easier.
Nuri had been there, through every late-night session, picking up the notes Silver had left strewn about their living room when they’d roomed together in college, sorting through the information as best he could to be of some use.
He’d listened when Silver had needed someone to bounce ideas off of, and though he hadn’t given much advice, he’d still always felt like he’d been an intrinsic part of the creation of this first device and Rien Inc in general.
Which meant there was no way he could have walked away when Silver was at risk of losing it all.
So he’d gone into business mode, organizing a hunt for the perpetrator who’d hacked into the hospital systems and stolen the footage, speaking with the local detectives, and taking phone calls to do damage control.
They’d spun the story, painting Silver as a man overwhelmed by grief who had reacted in the moment.
Though that reaction was different from what was typical of someone in his situation, everyone grieved differently, and it was horrible to attack him for the way he went about it.
Nuri had added in a comment here and there about how Silver had been mostly grateful toward his father for fighting the illness as long as he had, and had been trying to sooth the grief with the knowledge that at least his father was no longer in pain.
It’d been a good front if he did say so himself, but the media had only mostly bought it at first. It’d taken another week for Nuri to convince Silver he needed to make a public statement to show everyone that it was true and prove to them that he did feel sadness at having lost his father.
Only the two of them could know that wasn’t the case.
Within five minutes of talking, Silver won any lingering disbelievers over and the dust had settled in that department.
But there’d still been the matter of finding the culprit.
Nuri had been in close contact with those in charge of the investigation, and had combed through all employees at the hospital and at the event who would have had contact with the computers storing the footage and attached to the broadcast screen.
The hospital footage should have been deleted right after the Emperor’s death, and yet someone had gotten their hands on it, which had thrown them all for a loop.
It wasn’t until another six months had passed that they finally got a lead.
An ex-employee of Silver’s, one who’d been fired at the start of the company’s first year, had been caught and confessed.
He was currently being held in the Sept Royal Prison on a treason charge that would see him kept there for at least another twenty years.
Nuri had intended to dust off his resignation letter after the trial, but…Then there’d been an issue with one of their vendors and he’d been sent to the other side of the planet to deal with it.
And after that, there’d been a problem with a part in customs…
A never-ending string of things had happened, one after the other, and before he’d realized, he was back to doing his job as per usual, with thoughts of quitting pushed so far to the recesses of his mind they rarely resurfaced unless he was talking with one of his siblings.
Like right now.
“We’re in the middle of a big project,” he said, painfully aware of how he sounded. “I can’t leave.”
“Sure, and once this project ends, there will be another. And another. And another. It’s never going to stop, brother.” Neve sighed, her disappointment in him apparent. “You aren’t the CEO or the Emperor.”
“Of course not.” He made it to the end of the hall and paused in front of the elevator.
At his feet, the tiny glass orb that was always with him came to a stop as well.
It sent a signal to the elevator so that Nuri didn’t have to worry about figuring out how to push the button with his hands full, and they waited.
The orb was also a product released by Rien Inc.
, known as N.I.M. It stood for Networking Intelligence Machine—not Silver’s finest moment when it came to naming, but Nuri wasn’t going to be the one to tell him that—and was an A.I.
assistant. It could access most computer-operated systems in under a second and was programmed to function fully within all buildings run by Rien Inc.
N.I.M. also had access to Nuri’s multi-slate, making it easier for him to get tasks done with the help of the orb, and was voice-activated to ensure that no one else could ever steal and use him.
There were other handy functions, but not all of the N.I.M.
had them. As a prototype, this particular one had been crafted more toward Nuri’s personal needs.
After testing out what worked and didn’t, his feedback had been used to help mold the official, publicly released product that made it to market.
After the trials, he’d tried to give it back to Silver, but the emperor had merely waved him off and told him to keep it, too distracted over notes for his next invention to even glance Nuri’s way during the discussion.
Admittedly, Nuri was pretty glad. He’d grown attached to N.I.M in the two months the trial had run for, and now six months later, he was even more so.
Even though he knew logically that N.I.M wasn’t a living being, he’d connected with the AI on a level his job prevented him from doing with actual people.
Hell, the only real friends he had were his siblings, and he hadn’t seen them in over two years.
“I’m still coming, I promise.” He knew how important it was for her that he be there. Neve was going to be graduating from college with honors and it was a big deal.
“You’re missing the entire ceremony,” she said.