CIATB Chapter 136: Trend Lines? (Bonus - )
Chapter 136: Trend Lines? (Bonus - )
Jake leaned back in his executive chair, the gentle hum of the boardroom’s ventilation system the only sound in the room. On his laptop screen, the secure banking portal remained open, the digits of his balance staring back at him with absolute certainty: 10,015,000,000 Veyra Marks.
Ten billion marks. He had started the afternoon with less than half of that.
’At this rate,’ Jake thought, his fingers lightly tapping the edge of the polished mahogany desk, ’by tomorrow or Wednesday at the latest, the capital pool will clear twenty billion. The moment it hits that threshold, I can confidently move on with the acquisition for the Apex Plaza building.’
Apex Plaza was a towering monument of glass and steel in the heart of the financial district. Turning it into the permanent corporate headquarters for Golden Investments was the ultimate goal. Right now, Golden Investments consisted of just himself and Alice, but with a foundational asset like Apex Plaza, the infrastructure would match the scale of the capital he was pulling from the global markets.
Then, it hit him.
It didn’t start as a slow, dull ache like the previous times. It was a violent, blinding spike of pressure that slammed directly behind his left eye, as if a hot iron rod had been driven straight through his skull. The glowing numbers on the laptop screen shattered into a chaotic blur of white light.
Jake let out a sharp, choked gasp, his hands flying to his temples. The sheer intensity of the pain was paralyzing, entirely eclipsing any migraine he had experienced before. His vision went completely pitch-black, the roaring sound of rushing blood filling his ears. Before he could even call out for Alice or Elias, his body went entirely limp, and he slumped forward in his chair, losing consciousness.
When Jake’s eyes flickered open, the room was cast in deep afternoon shadows.
He sat up with a sudden, violent jerk, his breath coming in ragged, shallow gasps. His shirt was uncomfortably damp with cold sweat, and his hands were trembling uncontrollably. He immediately checked the digital clock on his laptop screen.
Four minutes. He had been completely blacked out for four minutes.
With a shaking hand, Jake reached for the glass of water sitting on the edge of the table. He brought it to his lips, his teeth clicking against the rim as he swallowed the cold liquid, trying desperately to steady his racing pulse.
A deep, unsettling dread settled in his chest. ’This is getting worse, he thought, staring blankly at the wall. The first time, it was just a fleeting wave of pain and dizziness. The last time, I lost consciousness for a few seconds. Today, it was minutes.’
The heightened clarity from his eye ability was clearly demanding a physical toll he didn’t fully understand. ’If the severity continued to compound at this rate, the next blackout could be catastrophic. I need to consult a specialist,’ he realized, rubbing the bridge of his nose as the lingering static of the headache slowly receded. ’I’ll check in with a doctor later tonight, right after I visit the hospital.’
Tomorrow was Tuesday, the day Aliya was scheduled to be discharged. She had been admitted just yesterday after a nightmare scenario—a reckless driver had slammed directly into her car. Though the truth was more than that.
Jake slowly stood up, testing his balance. His legs felt slightly heavy, but the vertigo had passed. He closed his laptop, cleared his desk, and adjusted his cuffs. A glance at his watch told him he had skipped past midday entirely. He decided he would stop by the Meridian Crown for a quick lunch to get some real food into his system before heading over to the hospital.
He walked over, opened the boardroom door, and stepped out into the main executive suite.
Alice was seated at her desk, typing rapidly on her tablet, her face framed by the soft glow of her monitors.
Jake walked toward her, intending to let her know he was heading out for the afternoon. "Alice, I’m going to—"
He stopped dead in his tracks.
The words caught completely in his throat, his breath hitching as his muscles locked up. Jake stared at his personal assistant, his eyes widening in absolute shock, as if he were looking at a ghost.
Floating exactly three inches above Alice’s head was a glowing, translucent line. It wasn’t a hallucination of light or a trick of the shadow; it was a perfectly defined chart coordinate. The line extended outward, moving upward at a steady, aggressive angle. It was a textbook bullish trend line, moving with clear, unrelenting positive momentum.
Alice, noticing the sudden silence, stopped typing and looked up. Seeing Jake’s pale face and his rigid, wide-eyed stare, her professional composure cracked into concern. "Mr. Rivers? Are you alright?"
Jake didn’t answer. His mind was spinning, trying to process the impossible visual overlay cutting through the air above her desk.
"Mr. Rivers?" Alice called out a second time, her voice louder as she stood up from her chair, stepping around her desk toward him. "Is something wrong? Do you need me to call Elias?"
The second call snapped the fog in his mind. Jake blinked rapidly, shaking his head as he forced his muscles to relax. He took a shallow breath, smoothing down the front of his suit jacket to hide the lingering tremor in his fingers.
"No... no, I’m fine, Alice," Jake said, his voice a bit raspy before he quickly smoothly adjusted it into his usual calm register. "I apologize. I was just... trying to remember a specific clause in the Sterling contract documents. I got lost in my thoughts for a second."
Alice studied his face for a moment longer, clearly not entirely convinced, but she gave a professional nod. "Understood, sir. Are we still on schedule for the operational review?"
"Yes," Jake said, composing himself fully. "I’m heading out to the Meridian Crown to grab a late lunch, and from there, I’ll be heading directly to the hospital to check on Aliya’s discharge files. If anything urgent comes up with Silas or the accounting templates, send it directly to my personal device. Oh, and remember to tell your bodyguard to go pick up the vehicle down at the Zenith garage."
Alice offered a slight, reassuring smile. "He has already left to collect the car, Mr. Rivers."
"Perfect," Jake replied, giving a quick nod as she stepped back to her desk.
Jake turned and walked out of the executive suite, his heart hammering against his ribs. The moment he stepped into the long, carpeted hallway, he stopped against the wall and pressed his hand to his forehead.
’What the hell was that?’ he thought wildly. ’A bullish trend line? On a person?’
He tried to rationalize it. The massive headache, the four-minute blackout—his brain had to be misfiring. His neural pathways were probably so saturated with analyzing market data that his mind was projecting financial charting models onto his physical surroundings. It was a hallucination. It had to be.
"Mr. Rivers."
Jake jumped slightly, looking up at the sound of the deep, gravelly voice.
Elias was standing at the end of the corridor near the elevator bay, his large frame dressed in his sharp security suit, his eyes scanning the space with his usual quiet vigilance.
"Elias," Jake said, straightening his jacket.
But as Jake looked fully at his bodyguard, his breath caught in his throat yet again.
Floating directly above Elias’s head was another distinct, glowing, translucent line. Just like the one above Alice, it was a perfectly constructed trend line—crisp, clean, and slanting sharply upward. A powerful, unyielding bullish trajectory.
Jake gripped the edge of his suit, his mind reeling as he stared at the glowing asset path riding above his bodyguard’s shoulders. Two separate people. Two identical, rock-solid bullish formations.
’If this isn’t a hallucination...’ Jake thought, a chill running down his spine as the true weight of his eye ability began to twist into an entirely new dimension. ’What exactly am I looking at?’
Elias walked forward a few steps, noticing Jake’s brief hesitation. "The vehicle is in the garage, sir. Where are we heading first?"
Jake forced his eyes down from the glowing marker, keeping his expression entirely neutral as he met the bodyguard’s gaze. "We’re going to grab a late lunch at the Meridian Crown, Elias. After that, we need to head over to the hospital to see Aliya."
"Understood, Mr. Rivers," Elias replied, reaching into his pocket and pulling out his radio. "I’ll bring the R8 around to the front entrance right now so you don’t have to walk down to the garage level. Give me two minutes to clear the driveway."
"Sounds good. I’ll meet you at the front doors," Jake said.
Elias gave a brief nod, turned on his heel, and walked briskly toward the service stairs to fetch the car. Jake watched his retreating back, the glowing bullish trend line moving flawlessly through the air above the bodyguard’s head until he disappeared through the heavy exit door.
Jake stood alone in the quiet hallway for a long moment, taking a slow, deep breath to steady his mind. He walked toward the main glass doors of the building’s front entrance, his mind racing with a mixture of intense curiosity and profound unease. The ability wasn’t just reading the markets anymore. It was reading the people around him.
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