I awoke in silence.
Not the calm, sleepy hush of morning, but the kind of silence that presses in, unnaturally heavy. The city always hummed with Harmony's ambient tones: soft white noise, a gentle pulse of sound meant to soothe. But today, it was gone.
I rose from bed, muscles stiff, joints creaking like old machinery. Another day, another quiet act of existence. I bathed, shaved, and dressed in slate-gray clothes chosen not for fashion, but for invisibility. Breakfast was nutrient paste and water, enough to sustain, never enough to enjoy.
["Good morning, citizen Kai Voss. Today is Day 3,417 of Global Peace. Your compliance score is 98.7. Have a harmoni-"]
I cut the feed mid-sentence.
Let them finish their monologue without me.
I sit for a while. Let the quiet settle.
Out the window, Sector 12 gleams under artificial sunlight. The plaza tiles below are polished bone-white, flawless. Families stroll in pre-approved rhythms past holo-statues of peacekeepers locked forever in the act of salvation.
To them, it's beautiful.
To me, it's an autopsy that never ends.
I pour a cup of black coffee. No foam. No sugar. Just heat and bitterness. I press my thumb to the mug's scanner. It blinks green.
[Ownership confirmed.]
In a world where nothing is, this is mine.
The coffee burns going down. I let it.
Once, I moved like a knife between ribs. Fluent in violence, fluent in vanishing. Now, I work in the Protocol's archive division sanitizing history, reviewing "threat simulations" that were once my reality.
What they don't know: Every sim they review was pulled from my memory.
I sip again.
At my desk, I checked the usual stream of approved newsfeeds, synthetic art exhibits, and curated emotion playlists. Nothing out of place. Then I opened my inbox.
One message.
No sender. No subject.
I almost deleted it out of instinct. Then I read the body:
One last job. One last kill. The world depends on it.
My hand froze, coffee halfway to my lips. Then, everything stopped.
Lights. Climate control. Ambient sound. My entire apartment went dead.
Every Harmony-regulated system is offline. That wasn't just unusual. It was impossible.
Then came three deliberate knocks on my door.
I moved slowly, cautiously, peering through the peephole. No one.
Only a rectangular black briefcase resting just outside my door.
Then the door opened.
By itself.
That had never happened before.
I stared at it. Harmony-controlled doors didn't open unless authorized, and no one, not even I, had the clearance to override them.
I took the case, closed the door, and laid it on the table.
Inside was a walkie-talkie. A file folder, worn and yellowed. Several hard-case files. A gun, a Luger, modified with Harmony-era tech, sleek, dark, and deadly. Four bullets chambered. Eight more in a cartridge.
A voice crackled through the walkie.
"You're wondering why these items. Why this message. Why now."
It was Cassian's, an old workmate of mine during the glory days.
He always did know how to skip the pleasantries.
"You have 89 days, Kai. In 89 days, Harmony updates its core protocols. After that, free will will be archived like a virus. The illusion ends. The control becomes permanent."
He paused.
"You know what that means."
I did. I just didn't want to believe it.
I stared at the gun.
Four bullets. Eight in reserve. Thirteen choices.
And one final mission.
The moment Cassian goes quiet, I flip open the file folder.
Redacted names. Profiles with faded faces. Blueprints. Schedules. Lab access routes. Most of it is encoded, but the syntax is familiar old-world spook work layered under Harmony's digital gloss.
Even dulled by time, my memory snaps into gear.
I scan fast, eyes darting from page to page. Muscle memory takes over. What I once did in seconds now takes minutes, but I get it done.
Each name is a puzzle piece. Each target is a lever built into the gears of control. The deeper I read, the clearer the picture becomes: these aren't just assets. They're architects. Engineers of the illusion. And one of them is hiding in Sector 13.
Destination: Sere Labs.
"Still sharp," Cassian's voice crackles through the walkie. "Five minutes until Harmony systems come back online. Burn the files. Dump them. Whatever it takes."
I close the folder.
"Already memorized."
Cassian chuckles, low and brief.
"Still a machine, Voss. As amazing as ever."
His tone shifts by a hair.
"What's your mission? "
I stand and move to the kitchen. The induction stove flares to life with a manual override. The walkie-talkie trembles in my hand as I place it on the counter beside the briefcase.
"Eliminate and Destroy, to Sere Labs. Sector 13."
There's a pause. Just long enough to feel like goodbye.
"Then you know what you're walking into."
"I always have."
"Stay alive."
The signal drops.
No static. Just silence.
I check the walkie. Battery fried. The casing was scorched.
Before I can move, the case folder in my hands begins to heat.
My eyes widen-not normal.
The seams glow red. The metal latches pop. Then it ignites flames, erupting like a timed charge, paper turning to ash mid-air. I drop it, but not fast enough.
Pain streaks across my palms. I bite down a hiss.
The entire file burns in seconds, no evidence. As if it never existed.
I stand there, scorched fingers clenched, the bitter scent of melted laminate in the air.
Then the lights flicker back.
Harmony is back online.
The speakers breathe to life, smooth and artificial.
["Good morning, citizen Kai Voss. Today is Day 3,417 of Global Peace. Your compliance score is 98.7. Have a harmonious-"]
I shut it off again.
Not today.
______
Sector 89 burned.
Flames chewed through steel scaffolds and plasticrete walls, turning the alley into a furnace of synthetic ash. Sirens wailed above, but not to warn. Harmony didn't need warnings. It needed only targets.
Cassian ran, lungs like fire, boots slamming the soaked pavement. Behind him, Lyra limped, blood trailing from her shoulder.
Harmony drones swarmed from above, sleek and inhuman. Jet black with glowing lattice visors and spidery limbs that clicked against walls as they gave chase. Civilian evac was already complete. This zone had been sanctioned.
"Cassian," Lyra gasped. "Left side"
He turned, firing a clean shot through the closest drone's sensor core. It dropped mid-scream, crashing against the wall in a hail of sparks.
She followed with a spin shot, graceful even while wounded, taking down a second.
Cassian grabbed her hand. "That was your last clip."
She looked down. Empty chamber. Bloody hands.
"Shit."
They ducked into a collapsed passage. Pipes hissed overhead. The shadows here were thick, but not enough. Harmony saw everything.
"We're boxed in," Lyra muttered.
"Not yet."
Cassian glanced toward the garbage bay chute behind her.
"Get in. Slide to lower access. You'll lose the scent trail in the waste chutes."
"Cassian, no! "
"That's an order Lyra."
"I'm not just your secretary."
"I kno.w"
He looked at her, really looked. Her face was streaked with grime, blood, and smoke. A flicker of her mother in her jawline. She didn't know he saw it. Never told her. Didn't have time.
He placed his hand on her cheek.
"You're my daughter."
She froze.
"Go. Find Kai. Help him finish it."
She stared a beat too long, but obeyed.
Cassian turned.
Walked back into the flames.
The drones swarmed the alley mouth like vultures on fire.
From the speakers above, a familiar voice echoed.
["Cassian Roe. Why struggle against this perfect world? "]
Harmony's voice. Calm. Male and female tones fused in perfect dispassion.
["You helped us build this. Your signature is in our algorithms."]
Cassian reloaded. Fired.
Drones burst. More replaced them.
He gritted his teeth, diving behind a collapsed wall. One final cartridge.
"You don't get to quote me," he growled.
["We already have. Every battle you've fought. Every technique. Every weakness. All documented"]
Cassian burst from cover, emptying his clip. The drones fell, but more came. There's always more.
Then click.
Empty.
He dropped the rifle. Rolled his shoulders.
"Let's dance."
They came at him.
He moved his elbows and knees and threw. Fast for fifty-five. Brutal. Precise.
Until they adapted.
One drone slipped past, pivoted, struck with a move he knew, a joint break he'd used in Prague 2136.
His elbow shattered. Pain roared.
He stumbled back. Another drone mimicked his blade turn from the Cairo job. Another used Lyra's own disarm sequence.
They were mirrors.
["All your skills are mine to use," Harmony said. "The Cleanser legacy ends with you."]
Cassian smiled, blood in his teeth.
"Then make sure you remember this."
He surged forward, grabbed the drone's core, and shoved the shattered arm's bone fragment through it.
The explosion was small but enough.
The other drones hesitated, calculating risk.
That gave Lyra her chance to escape. He heard the chute hiss closed behind her. Safe.
Cassian turned back to the drones.
"Come on, then."
He raised his broken fists.
They surged.
Later, Sector 89 was quiet again.
Just ash. Just silence.
Harmony's voice floated through the blackened air.
["One target expired. No civilian casualties. Compliance level restored."]
But beneath the wreckage, one body burned hotter than the others.
[Cassian Roe.]
[Cleanser. Rebel. Father.]
[Extinguished.]