The walk toward the fifth-floor elevators took Ryan past the communal kitchenette, its fluorescent strip lighting buzzing softly in the near-empty office. Pausing with a sudden, nagging thirst before stepping out into the evening commute, he pushed open the swing door to rinse his travel mug. The small room smelled of stale dish soap and the bitter dregs of the day's corporate brew, but something unfamiliar caught his eye on the laminate counter beside the battered kettle.
Tucked neatly behind the communal sugar caddy sat an unbranded glass jar of instant coffee granules, completely devoid of standard supermarket labeling or local import stamps. Its matte black lid was entirely blank, and the simple paper strip wrapped around the cylindrical glass featured only a stark, block-lettered designation—K-09 Roast—printed in a sharp, clinical font that looked thoroughly out of place among the usual grocery-store tins and half-used tea boxes. Ryan reached out, his fingertips brushing the cool glass; the jar felt remarkably heavy, filled with a coarse, almost metallic-looking dark powder that bore no resemblance to the soluble coffee brands stocked by Corravale’s office supply vendor.
Frowning at the strange addition, Ryan set his travel mug down in the sink without filling it, a quiet unease tightening the base of his neck. None of the marketing pod drank instant, let alone specialty blends from unknown distributors, and the cleaning staff rarely left orphaned provisions on the communal benches. Deciding he had spent quite enough time unearthing phantom paperwork and corporate ghosts for one evening, Ryan backed out of the kitchenette, let the swing door click shut behind him, and headed straight for the elevators to catch the evening train back to Rhodes.