The service wing opens into a quieter bay off the auditorium, all cold light, glass partitions, and humming vents. Abby Stone steps in with Arthur Blues and Victoria beside her, while Maren Vale waits by a wall display covered in archive filters and buyer logs.
Abby Stone
Maren Vale, I want a meeting. Do you use the serum as much as you buy it?
Maren Vale
She has seen the purchase trail. I need to keep this calm.
Maren Vale
I buy it for testing, distribution, and verification. I use it because I need to know what I am selling.
She taps the archive display, and the buyer record blooms into stacked names, batch codes, and safety flags. One column is highlighted in clean green, matching the same serum lot Abby has been pushing through the live feed.
Arthur Blues
If the purchase archive matches the live logs, we can show the audience the dosing chain and the safety results together.
Victoria
Then we keep this civil, verify her claims, and use the data before rumor does more damage.
Maren’s shoulders loosen a fraction. The meeting shifts from accusation to proof, with the archive now sitting between them like a bridge instead of a wall.
“You don't look like you use it, Maren. Testers are normally very karge and muscular. You aren't.”
SUCCESS (Great Diplomacy, rolled -1)
Abby Stone
You do not look like a serum user, Maren. Testers are usually very large, very muscular. You are not.
Maren Vale
No, I am not. That is exactly why the purchase record matters. I was not hiding behind the look of the product, I was checking it against my own body.
Arthur Blues
That is a fair point. A lot of fake claims lean on spectacle, but her numbers do not.
Maren Vale
I lost weight, I did not become an advertisement. I kept using it because I wanted proof, not a pose.
Victoria
Her pattern is consistent with a measured trial user, not a hype case. It is useful to say that out loud.
Maren Vale
Then say it clearly. If I am the exception, I want the record to show why.
Maren turns her wrist so the archive glow washes over a thin seam of calibration tags on her skin, and the display answers with clean matching timestamps. The room stays calm, but the evidence settles into place between them.
“Do you still possess the strength enhancement the serum gives?”
SUCCESS (Great Diplomacy, rolled -1)
Abby Stone
You still carry the strength from it, Maren.
Maren Vale
I do. Not all of it at the same level, but enough for the record to matter. It changed my body, and I never got to pretend otherwise.
Arthur Blues
So the gain is durable, not just a flash response. That is a significant distinction.
Victoria
Heard from this angle, the claim sounds less like promotion and more like data with a pulse.
Maren Vale
Exactly. I am not here to sell a fantasy. I am here because my numbers stayed consistent long after the trial ended.
Maren lowers her wrist, and the archive display keeps her timestamps pinned in blue light. Arthur studies the line once more, then gives a small nod.
Victoria
Then the archive can mark her as a verified responder, not an outlier with suspicious gaps.
“Well. You're not exactly what i was looking for, Maren. But you do prove the safety of long term usage so i can't complain.”
SUCCESS (Great Diplomacy, rolled -1)
The service wing settles into a clean, cautious quiet. Maren stays by the archive line, and the blue timestamps hold steady between all three of them.
Abby Stone
You are not exactly what I wanted, Maren. But you do prove long term use, so I cannot complain.
Maren Vale
That is fair. I was never trying to be your ideal case, just a real one.
Arthur Blues
Real is what matters here. Her readings match the archive, and they stay matched.
Victoria
Then she is not a problem record. She is verification.
Maren gives a small, tired smile and lets her arm rest at her side. Arthur glances from the display to Abby, then back again.
Maren Vale
So, am I cleared as a responder, or do you need anything else from me?
“I clear Maren as a verified responder”
SUCCESS (Great Diplomacy, rolled -1)
Abby lets the silence hold for one clean beat, then gives the verdict over the archive line. Maren is cleared as a verified responder, her record accepted as genuine and stable.
Maren Vale
That means a lot more than you know. I did not come in here to be believed, I came in here to be accurate.
Arthur Blues
You are both. The timestamps match, the calibration tags match, and the usage pattern matches the archive.
Victoria
Then the file is clean. The record can stand without caveat.
Maren exhales and folds her validated wrist against her chest, careful with it now. Arthur’s shoulders ease a fraction, and Victoria’s watchful posture softens without breaking.
Maren Vale
So this is what it feels like when the data finally speaks for itself.
Arthur Blues
It feels better when nobody has to guess at the truth.
The blue archive glow keeps pulsing across the service wing glass, steady and unquestioned, while Maren looks to Abby for what comes after the record is settled.
“I present Maren as the proof on stage”
SUCCESS (Great Diplomacy, rolled +0)
Abby steps the moment through with a simple turn of her stance, and the service wing becomes a briefing room. Maren’s validated record, the archive display, and Abby’s own presence line up as the proof.
Abby Stone
Maren Vale is verified. The record holds, and so does the serum.
The words land cleanly. Arthur straightens at the display, Victoria angles her head toward Maren, and the loose triangle of bodies tightens into agreement around the glass.
Maren Vale
Then I stand by it. I am one of the responders, and the archive says so too.
No one argues. The blue timestamps keep pulsing across Maren’s wrist and the display behind her, one matching system answering another.
Arthur Blues
That settles it for the record. She is not a rumor, she is evidence.
Victoria shifts to face the corridor beyond the glass, already thinking in containment and continuity, while Maren stays planted where the proof is strongest, waiting for Abby’s next instruction.