I stare at the number until it feels like it’s stamped onto the inside of my skull.
“Forty-three percent,” I whisper, and my throat tightens around it.
My parents’ names rise in my mind uninvited—Tomas, Lysa—and for a moment I see them not as data points in a manifest, but as hands, voices, the smell of my mother’s hair when she hugged me too tight, the sound of my father’s laugh when he tried to pretend the war wasn’t eating the universe.
Forty-three percent.
My compad vibrates against the console, startling me out of the memory before it can become a collapse.
A tribunal notification blinks:
SECURITY INBOUND — ARCHIVE LAB.
The words are followed by a cold little countdown icon, as if the building itself has decided my time is a resource to be managed.
“Of course,” I mutter. “Right on schedule.”
I barely have time to minimize the projection layers before the lab doors slide open with a crisp hiss, and two tribunal security officers step inside, their uniforms slate-dark, their posture rigid, their eyes already scanning the room the way predators scan terrain. Their boots make controlled, muted sounds against the lab flooring, and the faint scent of weapon lubricant follows them in, sharp and industrial.
“Liaison Ardent,” the taller one says, voice neutral in that way neutrality becomes when it’s backed by force. “You’re running unauthorized classification layers.”
“I’m running evidence reconstruction,” I reply, keeping my hands visible, palms resting lightly on the console as if I’m demonstrating I haven’t touched anything dangerous. “Authorized under Transparency Reform reconstruction statutes.”
The shorter officer’s gaze flicks to the projection logs hovering at the side of my interface. “Convoy classification layers are outside the negligence charge scope.”
“Negligence charge scope is a prosecutorial framing,” I answer, and I hate how quickly my tone sharpens, but I refuse to soften it into compliance. “Evidence reconstruction statutes permit contextual overlays where relevant to corridor mapping.”
The taller officer steps closer. “Relevant how?”
I tilt my head slightly, letting a fraction of my irritation show because playing meek has never saved anyone. “Because the corridor was shifted to clear a shield perimeter around a League convoy vector. That’s how.”
Silence lands hard.
The shorter officer’s eyes narrow. “You’re alleging deliberate reroute.”
“I’m not alleging,” I say. “I’m modeling and correlating. That’s my job.”
The taller officer’s compad pings, and he glances down at it, then back at me with a slight change in expression—something less interrogative, more cautious. “Senior Legal Architect Thane requests your presence. Immediately. Bring your access logs.”
Of course he does.
I exhale slowly through my nose, forcing my voice into procedural calm. “My access logs are recorded automatically.”
“He wants them in-person,” the officer replies.
“Great,” I say, unable to keep the dry edge out of my voice. “Nothing says ‘we trust our systems’ like demanding a human deliver a digital record.”
The officer doesn’t react. He gestures toward the door with a politeness that is not optional. “Now.”
I secure my station, encrypt my model output, and tag the files under provisional reconstruction, because if I leave anything open they’ll call it sloppy and if I lock it too hard they’ll call it suspicious. Then I follow them into the corridor, my heartbeat steady but loud in my ears.
As we walk, the tribunal halls feel narrower than usual, not in architecture but in atmosphere. Eyes follow me and then look away. Compads pause mid-scroll. Conversations evaporate like mist. The building is full of people pretending they don’t see a fire while smelling smoke.
Thane’s office is two levels up, behind biometric gates that open with the soft reluctance of a system being asked to facilitate conflict. Inside, the air is warmer, carrying the faint scent of citrus antiseptic again, like he bathes in it to keep reality at arm’s length. He stands behind his desk, immaculate, composed, and irritatingly unruffled, as if he has never once been surprised by anything in his life.
“Liaison Ardent,” he says, and my name sounds like he’s testing it for weakness. “I’m told you accessed convoy classification layers.”
“I did,” I reply.
