Kira Forge's Arc

Chapter 3 of 5

Kira made it halfway across the exhibition grounds before she heard footsteps crunching through the snow behind her. She turned. The man from inside was hurrying toward her, his formal coat open and flapping. He stopped a few feet away, breathing hard. "Miss Forge," he said. "We need to discuss your assessment." Kira kept walking. He followed, talking faster. "You cannot make claims about structural failures without proper documentation. The exhibition board has already been notified of your inspection, and we need to clarify your findings before any misunderstanding reaches the press." Kira stopped at a metal storage shed near the edge of the grounds. She set down her tool case and pulled out a small metal box from inside it, its lid dented and hinges crusted with ice. She opened it and showed him the photographs inside — close shots of the hairline cracks, measurements written on the backs. "This is documentation," she said. The man stared at the box, then at her. "You're going to make us look incompetent." "You displayed a flawed piece," Kira said. She looked past him at the billboard mounted near the mansion entrance — a massive image of a glass plate gleaming against white snow, advertising the exhibition's success. "You're the ones claiming it's perfect." The man's jaw tightened. "If you publish these findings, the rival workshop will withdraw their partnership. The entire exhibition depends on their reputation." Kira closed the box and put it back in her case. "Then you should've checked the piece before you put it on display." The man didn't move. Kira picked up her case and walked past him. He called after her, voice sharp. "We can make this difficult for you. Access to future exhibitions, collaboration opportunities — all of that depends on good faith." Kira stopped and looked back. For a moment she thought about the years she'd spent losing to the material, the weight of watching someone else claim victory with a lie. She thought about the breastplate cracking slowly under its own curves, and the wooden form that didn't match a real body. "I'm not retracting anything," she said. "If they want to prove me wrong, they can fix the cracks." She turned and kept walking. Behind her, the man stood silent in the snow. The billboard loomed over the grounds, its perfect glass plate untouched by truth. But Kira's metal box held something the display didn't — proof that the material still had rules no one else wanted to admit.