“We’re done here, Victor,” Ethan said. He stood, thanked Victor for his time, and ended the meeting. In the elevator, his hands shook once, then steadied. “He wanted to own us,” he muttered. Mara nodded. “He wanted to own the work,” she corrected.
After that, Victor filed a messy provisional patent using phrases that sounded familiar. Mara recognized her language inside it, distorted. She and Ethan moved fast, pulling dated notebooks, commit histories, and drafts into a clean evidence bundle for their lawyer.