Chapter 2

They didn't even give me a day. I was still packing the few personal items from my desk when Caleb and two other architects from the team cornered me. Their faces were tight with greed and fear.

"Our bonuses are frozen because of you," one of them, Mark, spat.

Caleb stepped forward, a smug look on his face. He held a stack of papers. "We've talked it over. There's a way you can make this right."

He slid the papers onto my desk. A contract.

"Your little pet project," he said, gesturing to the rolled-up blueprints for my sustainable community design. "The one that won the Vanguard Award. You're going to sign the intellectual property rights over to the team. We'll submit it for the new city development proposal. It's the least you can do to compensate the firm for the damage you've caused."

I looked from his face to the contract. It was my passion, three years of my life, my heart and soul poured onto paper.

I looked for Jen. She was standing by the door, arms crossed, watching.

"Jen?" I asked, my voice barely a whisper.

"He's right, Ryan," she said, her tone cold and distant. "It's the best way to make amends. Let's be honest, what good is a groundbreaking design to an unemployed architect? It's useless to you now."

Useless. The word echoed in the empty space where my heart used to be.

"Sign it, Scott," Caleb pressed. "Or Jen will make sure you never work in this city, or any other, ever again."

I looked at Jen. She nodded, confirming the threat. That was it. The final break. The last thread of love and loyalty inside me snapped.

I picked up a pen. Caleb smiled, a predator sensing victory. Jen looked relieved.

I clicked the pen, then slowly, deliberately, I reached for the blueprints. Their eyes followed my hands. Instead of signing the contract, I unrolled my project, the beautiful, intricate lines I knew by heart.

Then I started tearing.

Rip. The sound was clean and loud in the silent office. I tore the main elevation.

Rip. The community center.

Rip. Rip. Rip. The residential blocks, the green spaces, the water reclamation system. I tore them into smaller and smaller pieces until they were just a pile of meaningless scraps on my desk.

"What are you doing?!" Jen shrieked, her composure finally cracking.

Caleb stared, his mouth hanging open in disbelief.

I brushed the paper scraps into the trash can. I looked at Jen, at her furious, contorted face.

"You're right," I said calmly. "It's useless."

I picked up my box of personal belongings and walked past them.

"You're finished, Ryan!" she screamed after me. "You hear me? You are nothing!"

I didn't look back. I just kept walking.