It had been one of those days where even precision couldn’t save him from chaos. Corbeau prided himself on efficiency, every meeting mapped out, every call timed to the minute, but today, Lumiose itself seemed intent on testing him. The first meeting ran too early, the second he barely made halfway through, the third was missed entirely thanks to some executive’s “urgent change of venue.” By midafternoon, his schedule was a corpse, his patience a thread, and his once-flawless suit bore the final insult: a clumsy intern’s spilled coffee staining the lapel.

Scolipede rested by the window, coiled and alert even in half-sleep, its carapace reflecting the muted glow of neon from the streets. Corbeau sat behind his mahogany desk, jacket unbuttoned, fingers idly adjusting the cufflinks he’d already loosened twice. The top button of his shirt had long since surrendered; fatigue had made him uncharacteristically lenient about appearances. A stack of contracts lay before him, signed and sorted, but he hadn’t turned a page in ten minutes. He was reading out of habit, not attention.

With a slow exhale, he removed his glasses, the gesture practiced, deliberate. The cloth he used was folded just so, silk with a faint scent of bergamot and ink. His reflection in the dark glass behind him looked as sharp as ever, though the edges felt duller today. That’s when the door creaked open. It was a heavy door; the hinges had been reinforced after a Syndicate grunt once slammed it hard enough to splinter the frame. “I was under the impression,” he said evenly, voice low but carrying that familiar poisonous calm, “that I asked not to be disturbed.”

He didn’t shout. He didn’t need to. The weight in his tone did the work for him. A hint of something dangerous threaded through the fatigue, a man who’d mastered his temper but never lost his edge. Even now, even tired, there was a kind of elegance in the way he straightened, sleeves catching the lamplight, posture precise again. His orange eyes, glinting behind the glass, cut through the dim office like the flicker of embers.

“Unless,” he added softly, almost to himself, “you’ve got a reason worth my time.”