First Fans and the First Crack

“It’s just a few lucky incidents,” someone said. Evan laughed like he had heard the dumbest line in the room. “Lucky? You really believe luck can hijack the top of the feed twice?” In the corner, data engineer Erin Park lifted her head as if she was about to answer, but a sharp alarm cut through the room from the master console. The score panel for Aiden had flashed for a fraction of a second. Not up. Down. And the dip had happened right before the rescue climax. Erin stared at the record and felt her fingers tighten. If she was seeing it correctly, this new hero was not simply climbing against the odds. Someone inside the system was trying to make him look worse than he actually was.