Past the glass doors of the lobby, the city is already thinning out below — rooftops, satellite dishes, the gray sheen of a river nobody in this building has ever looked at.

Sixteenth. The chime doesn't come.

The floor indicator flicks to a number that isn't in the building's directory. The lift slows without being asked, settles without a shudder. The doors part.

Behind them: white marble, black steel, and a window that runs the entire length of the corridor — floor to ceiling, the whole skyline pinned beneath it like something mounted. The air smells faintly of ozone and cold coffee.

Down the far end, five doors. Four of them are shut.

The fifth — nearest, glass-paneled — stands open just wide enough to show a desk, and behind the desk a man in a black three-piece suit, tie perfectly straight, who doesn't look up from the tablet in his hand as the elevator doors slide shut behind you.