Chapter 1 - THE PHARMACOLOGIST'S VERDICTThe laboratory at Columbia University smelled of stale coffee, old paper, and absolute, immutable truth. Dr. Vera Palermo adjusted his thick spectacles, his hands steady despite his seventy years. Under the heavy microscope lens lay a single, unassuming white pill with a faint groove down the middle—the exact twin of the medicine Domenico Vossi had swallowed twice a day for half a year.
Domenico sat in his wheelchair in the shadowed corner of the office, Bruno standing silently like a monolith beside him. The hum of the fluorescent lights felt deafening.
"Domenico," the old professor began, his voice dropping to a gravelly whisper. "Where did you get this?"
"Does it match Dr. Cole's prescription, Vera?" Domenico's voice was a low, dangerous rumble, devoid of any warmth. "Answer me that first."
Vera looked up, his eyes heavy with sorrow and cold fury. "Match it? Domenico, this isn't a nerve regenerator. This isn't even a standard painkiller or muscle relaxant. This is Tetrodotoxin-Derivative B, a synthetic neurotoxin designed to mimic total paralysis while slowly attacking the central nervous system. Whoever gave you this wasn't trying to heal your severed nerve... they were actively ensuring it never healed, while systematically shutting down your motor neurons to keep you permanently trapped in this chair."
Bruno's hand instantly dropped to the grip of his shoulder holster, a low, lethal growl escaping his throat.
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Domenico didn't flinch. Instead, a terrifying, dead silence settled over him. Six months of helpless dependence. Six months of watching Silvio Marchetti sit in his chair at the head of the boardroom table, patting his shoulder with a sympathetic smile. Six months of Camille Vitale whispering wedding plans into his ear while treating him like a fragile piece of antique furniture.
"It wasn't an accident," Domenico whispered, his knuckles turning pure white against the armrests of his wheelchair. "It was a cage. Built by the hands I trusted most."
