Brendan had managed to get only a minimum amount of sleep between shifts.
Once he stopped limiting himself to high priority items, processing the King's current workload was filling every waking moment that he could spare. He wasn't sure if that was because there was more than usual piled up in the King's queue, or because it was taking him longer to process each request than it would have taken his father. He could see how something could be slipped in, and expected to be approved without verification, if things were always this piled up.
Kensa had reached the King's residence, and investigated carefully enough to discover the light hearted farewell their father had left in his residence's core system. Despite the cheerful tone, the information about where the King had gone was more than a little ominous.
You may have noticed that chapters have not only not gotten more frequent, but have gotten shorter. Sorry. I feel like I'm dying lately. (I'm not actually, I'm pretty sure.) I really hope my CSF pressure can be stabilized soon.