The world above ground did not breathe. It reeked.
The elevator spat Connor out onto the fractured marble of an abandoned foyer, glass crunching under his boots like brittle bones. The air hit him first: oil smoke, piss, rot, a tang of burning plastic that stung his nostrils and sat chemical and heavy on his tongue. His first breath was a mistake. He coughed, eyes watering, tasting the city's slow death.
He forced himself forward. Through the spinning doors, one cracked, one hanging by a hinge, lay Manhattan as he'd never seen it: apocalypse in grayscale, sunlight sick with haze, crows picking at corpses in the street. Neon once burned here; now, only the blue glow of failing emergency strobes survived, painting everything in morgue-light. Skyscrapers rose like gravestones, their facades scored by fire and rain. Debris was everywhere: smashed car glass, the drift of lost paper, the hard, iron tang of old blood.
His arm console flickered, a dim lifeline in the gloom. The screen blinked awake:
GEN-I SYSTEMS INITIALIZING...
A hiss of static. Then the voice, sheer and precise, always two steps short of kindness.
"Dr. Hale. Atmospheric analysis: toxic, particulate index hazardous, olfactory notes: volatile decay, nitrous residue, trace cordite. Recommend a filtered respirator. Estimated survivability: 14.3 days, unmedicated."
Connor blinked. The interface reflected in his visor, green glyphs mapping the skeleton of the city: active satellite nodes blinking red, a digital artery threading through the ruins. He tapped the comm once, twice, desperate for human comfort. All he got was GEN-I, crisp and clinical.
"Satellite link nominal. Manhattan power grid: 31% operational. Northern sectors are unstable. GPS accuracy reduced. Triangulating optimal route to Genesis HQ: 57th and Park. Proceed northeast, remain in shadow. Avoid exposed intersections. Hostile density elevated between 40th and 51st streets. Path plotted."
Connor's pulse hammered, a counter-rhythm to the dead city's silence. The AI's overlay painted his world with lines: safe zones, danger radii, blinking skulls where Remnant packs clustered like sharks at a bloodletting.
"Status update," GEN-I intoned. "Code mask integrity: 91%. Holding. Notable irregularities detected: glitch frequency 3.2 per hour. Glitches correlate with spikes in limbic response, specifically fear, anger, or elevated empathy. Warning: Human affect display may compromise disguise. Mask efficacy is inversely proportional to emotional arousal."
Connor felt the weight of that warning. Even his thoughts could betray him.
"Projected countdown to mask failure, based on current code adaptation rate and stress response—twenty-four hours, seventeen minutes. Deviation margin: plus or minus six hours, depending on exposure and behavioral volatility."
A muscle fluttered in his cheek. GEN-I's calm was a knife in the dark.
"If mask integrity falls below the critical threshold, the probability of Remnant detection rises to 100%. At that point, full code takeover was projected within one hour. Recommend: maintain composure. Suppress displays of fear, grief, or hope. Emotional discipline is survival."
He almost laughed, but the sound curdled in his throat. He could feel the code humming in his blood, that phantom ache of infection already marking the boundaries of self.
He pressed deeper into the ruins. From a blown-out window above, a pair of Remnants peered down, sniffing the air. He ducked behind the shell of a sedan, knees splashing into diesel-stinking water. GEN-I continued, oblivious to his heart hammering:
GEN-I's voice cut in, lower, all surgeon's precision:
"Remain still. Heart rate elevated. Adrenaline spike detected. Probability of detection: 27% and rising. Breathe. Slow. Move on my mark..."
A siren shrieked, far off. A fire alarm still echoes days after the last firefighter fell. The wind carried smoke, the taste of ash and burnt protein, dust so fine it clung to his teeth. Each breath burned.
Connor looked at his trembling hands. The code in his blood hummed, a background static. Was that his thought or GEN-I's? He couldn't tell anymore. He wiped his palm on his jacket, felt the grain of dirt and dried blood, the texture of survival.
"Now. Proceed. Cut across 42nd. Avoid open light. Sensors register movement two blocks east, pattern: non-random. Caution: possible pack leader or emergent variant."
He ran, boots slipping on moss-slick curb, lungs working to filter poison from air. GEN-I whispered constantly in his ear, plotting every step: "Left. Pause. Mask signature. Right. Duck." Every suggestion is a scalpel, every mistake a potential eulogy.
He moved like a ghost, pressed between the city's ruined teeth. Streetlights flickered, painting shadows in stuttering bars. The taste of ozone and something acrid, teargas or failed disinfectant, cut through the rot.
He hated her, the AI, for her coldness. Needed her for the map. She was his last companion in a world stripped bare of love, trust, and mercy.
"Route updated. Estimated time to Genesis HQ: 41 minutes, at current velocity. Risk index rising. Recommend speed or alternative route. Dr. Hale, do you require motivational protocols?"
He almost laughed, bitter as bile. "Just... keep me alive, GEN-I. That's all I want."
The city answered with another howl, Remnants in the subway, the rumble of distant collapse, the thunder of a world that refused to die quietly.
GEN-I didn't soothe him, didn't lie. She only drew the path—red, gold, green—through the bones of the city, her voice the metronome of his survival.
And Connor walked on, each step carving memory into the scar tissue of Manhattan, the taste of dread and hope mingling in his mouth, the grid humming beneath his feet, and the world, not quite dead, waiting for him to find what was left to save.
"I just need to remain calm, composed. I know I can do this..."Connor tried to motivate himself.
GEN-I intervened. "Willpower is not a sufficient modulator for affective response, Dr. Hale.
Recommendation: pharmacological intervention. Emotional suppression is statistically correlated with mask stability. Acquire anxiolytics and beta-blockers as a primary measure. Stimulants may be indicated for alertness. Formulation: your expertise."
Connor, shivering, breath steaming in the ruined street, realizes this isn't going to be a story of courage. It's a story of survival, chemistry, and compromise. He mutters, "Of course. Always me. Always on me." He remembers lab days, mixing compounds, never dreaming he'd someday need to dose himself just to walk through the world as something almost human.
He scans the husk of the city, looking for the shattered cross of a pharmacy sign.
GEN-I again:
"Proceed to the nearest dispensary. Urban grid analysis indicates one block northeast. Time cost: minimal.
Caution: Remnant activity detected in the vicinity.
Outcome of manual emotional regulation: negligible. You are not a hero, Dr. Hale. You are a variable."
Connor—bitter, but honest—thought:
Not a hero. Just a man. But maybe that's enough. Maybe, just once, science and stubbornness will do what courage can't.
* * *
The old Rite-Aid loomed on the corner like a tooth half-rotted from the gum of Manhattan, its blue sign flickering in the ruin-bright morning. Connor ducked low, nerves raw, keeping to the torn awning shadows. GEN-I's voice, a scalpel in his ear, cool and unyielding.
"Proximity alert. Remnant signature: four units inside structure. Two additional signatures in the adjacent alley. Maintain trajectory. Mask integrity: 87%. Recent spike, cortisol levels rising. Emotional suppression recommended."
He wiped sweat from his brow, fighting the urge to shiver. Every muscle screamed run, but running would mean death, a signal to the monsters that one of their own had remembered what it meant to be prey.
The automatic doors were shattered, one stuck halfway open. Inside, the store was a museum of the apocalypse: racks twisted, aisles torn wide by hands and hunger, the faint scent of sour milk and decay leaking from the broken coolers.
He moved slowly, each step deliberate, holding his breath as he passed a Remnant slumped near the pharmacy counter. A woman in nurse's scrubs—bloody, grey-faced, mouth smeared red. Her eyes tracked him, blind and wide, but she made no move. GEN-I whispered:
"Mask efficacy: borderline. Maintain non-reactivity. Do not initiate eye contact. Do not hesitate."
He moved on, past a display of vitamins scattered like confetti, past a family photo kiosk splattered with something brown and sticky. The world felt thinner here, all the warmth and color drained away, just him and the code and the ghosts of the city.
His hands shook as he reached the pill aisles. An old man—a Remnant in an NYPD jacket—blocked the way, head twitching, sniffing the air. Connor pressed his back to the cold rack, silent, heartbeat stuttering in his chest.
"Caution. Limbic spike detected. Probability of detection: 42%."
He squeezed his eyes shut, counted to three, and let the hunger and grief drain out of him. I'm not here. I'm nothing. I'm nobody. The Remnant drifted past, jaw working, teeth clicking in the dark.
He found what he needed on the bottom shelf—beta-blockers, anxiolytics, a half-empty bottle of Adderall, its safety cap smeared with dried blood. He worked fast, shoving bottles into his pack, mind racing through dosages and combinations. He was a scientist. This was just another experiment—except the subject was himself.
But in the lull, the silence, he heard another sound—a shuffle, not the mindless scrape of the infected, but the quick, furtive steps of someone alive. Human. Dangerous. Monsters didn't always come with fangs.
Connor ducked behind the counter, eyes scanning for a weapon—anything. A heavy metal stapler. A box cutter with a broken blade. Useless, but better than nothing. He palmed the stapler, breathing slowly, listening.
A voice, harsh and scared, echoed from the next aisle. "Who's there? Show yourself. I swear, I'll..." A man, desperate, maybe more afraid than Connor. But fear made people stupid. Fear made people kill.
GEN-I chimed in, the voice flat as the heartbeat on a dead monitor:
"Uninfected human. Aggression profile: high. Recommend avoidance. Alternate egress via storage room. Proceed left."
Connor followed, moving like a shadow, every muscle tight. He slipped into the stockroom, the door squealing on its hinges, a sound loud enough to wake the dead.
The man heard footsteps quickening, but Connor was already gone, slipping out a side door into the alley, breath coming fast, the cold air a slap in the face.
GEN-I, calm as winter, spoke again:
"Cocktail preparation: urgent. Dosage must be calculated for current weight, stress levels, and metabolic rate. You have four minutes, twenty seconds before the next projected mask glitch."
Connor crouched in the alley behind the pharmacy, dust and broken glass crunching beneath his knees. He crushed the beta-blockers into the palm of his hand, washed them down with water that tasted like rust and fear. Then the anxiolytic—small, bitter, a stone settling in the pit of his stomach. He closed his eyes, mouth dry, and waited.
He looked down at the stapler in his hand—his "weapon." Not enough, not nearly enough. If the Remnants didn't get him, people might.
He pressed on, deeper into the city's wound, nerves dulled, mask holding, for now. And behind every window, every broken door, he saw the truth: it wasn't just the monsters you had to fear. The world was full of survivors with nothing left but teeth.
It started as a slow drip behind his eyes. A numbing cold, seeping through the storm of his thoughts. His heart, frantic and wild a moment ago, began to slow, each beat landing heavy and distant, like footsteps echoing in an empty church. The world dulled at the edges: colors lost their bite, sounds faded, even the stench of decay melted into the background, distant, unimportant.
His hands, so recently shaking, were steady now, even as they smeared blood and city grime on his jeans. Anxiety flickered, tried to rise, but found no purchase; every spike of dread blunted, every instinct to panic smothered under a thick, chemical fog.
He tried to care about the bodies, the Remnants, the stench, the man with the gun behind the counter, the tremble in his own breath, but it all seemed like news from another life, a story whispered through glass. He was here, but also not. Floating just behind his own eyes, watching himself with cool, forensic distance.
GEN-I's voice cut in, a metronome against the numbness:
"Heart rate: 62 bpm. Cortisol suppressed. Limbic response: minimal. Mask stability: optimal. Emotional profile: 'cool.'"
Connor snorted softly, a shadow of a laugh. "Oh well. I have finally become 'cool'—took me long enough, after a failed high school and college status." The joke echoed in his own skull, brittle, all edges, like glass underfoot.
He stood, brushed glass from his knees, and felt nothing. Not bravery. Not even resignation. Only the cold certainty of necessity. The chemical armor was artificial, borrowed, but for now, it was enough.
He could walk among monsters. He could pass through hell with dead eyes and steady hands. Whatever was left of the old Connor—he'd packed it away, safe behind a wall of drugs and denial.
He was less than human now. But less was what the world required.
* * *
The security office was a bunker, a relic of better days, thick glass and steel, the air stale with old sweat and burned coffee. But inside, it was a treasure vault.
Angela's first step inside almost buckled her knees. Adrenaline crashed, pain roared in: raw cuts, ankle throbbing, shoulder sticky with half-dried blood. She slumped into the operator's chair, letting the axe rest at her feet, finally giving herself permission to sag.
Sam hovered, uncertain, until she hissed, "First-aid kit. Now. Should be in the top drawer."
He yanked it out, hands shaking, and tossed the battered plastic box onto her lap.
Angela unzipped the fire suit, wincing as fabric tore from her wounds. She peeled it down to her waist, grimacing at the crusted blood and angry purple bruises underneath.
Sam averted his eyes, blushing so hard his ears looked radioactive.
"Oh, come on," Angela said, voice sharp but tired. "You could be my son. Stop gawking and help me."
He fumbled with the bandages, avoiding her gaze, and handed over the antiseptic spray.
She braced herself, teeth gritted, and sprayed the wounds. The burn made her swear loud enough to echo off the bulletproof glass. "That's it. Give me the gauze—no, the big roll."
Sam managed to hand her the right one on the third try, eyes flicking anywhere but the blood.
Angela cleaned and wrapped her shoulder, then shoved her foot into a fresh sock, bandaged with whatever was left of her dignity.
"Thanks, doc," she muttered, fastening her suit back up and giving Sam a look equal parts gratitude and exhaustion.
He risked a weak smile. "Anytime. Just, uh... don't die, okay?"
"I'll try. You patch up better than most EMTs I've seen. And you didn't even faint."
He straightened a little, pride warring with embarrassment.
Then, as the pain receded to something she could compartmentalize, she glanced around the room, and hope flickered.
Lockers lined one wall, the doors hanging open, revealing a haul that looked like a miracle: riot vests, Kevlar-lined jackets, black batons in a neat row, a brace of battered Tasers, two shotguns in the back with just enough shells to matter.
Sam stumbled to the lockers, hands trembling, and pulled out a vest. "God, it's heavy. Is it supposed to be this heavy?"
Angela yanked open a drawer, grinning like a wolf. "That's called 'not dying in one hit,' kid. Put it on."
He wriggled into the vest, nearly dropping his multitool in the process. Angela tossed him a baton, then grabbed one for herself, twirling it once.
Keycards hung from a pegboard, tags with names of guards who were almost certainly part of the lunch crowd out in the lobby. Angela scanned them—GARAGE, ELEVATOR, SUB LEVEL 2—and snagged them all.
At the far end, a reinforced door led to a short, private corridor and an elevator, the panel still glowing faint green, the button labeled PARKING.
Sam pressed his forehead to the cool glass of the door, letting out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding. "There's an SUV down there, right? The kind with the lights and the first aid kit and the seats that don't smell like dead things?"
Angela almost smiled. "That's the rumor. And for once, I'm in the mood to believe in miracles."
She loaded up: vest, baton, taser, every keycard she could fit into her pockets.
Sam fumbled for a helmet, too big, but he jammed it on anyway, visor low, his glasses fogging up instantly.
For the first time in hours, there was a sense of momentum—the world not just hunting them, but maybe, just maybe, giving them a fighting chance.
Angela checked the elevator, eyes wary but hopeful. "Let's move. We don't get to win often. Let's not waste this one."
And as the doors slid open, the promise of steel, horsepower, and a plan—however shaky—waited below, just out of reach.
But then she stopped cold, an almost comical look of horror passing over her face.
"Oh, hell no." Angela spun back toward the lockers, stalking across the tiles with a limp. "You know what we forgot?"
Sam blinked, halfway into the elevator. "Uh... snacks?"
She shot him a look. "No, genius. The shotguns. I swear, if they were goddamn curtains for the living room, I'd have grabbed them instantly."
She yanked both off the rack, checking the chambers. "Rubber bullets, most likely—maybe beanbags. But it's still more punch than a sharp stick and a prayer. Here—" She tossed one to Sam, who caught it with both hands, nearly dropping his multitool again.
"Ever fired one?"
Sam swallowed. "Only in VR. And once at a turkey shoot in Jersey."
Angela's smile was pure apocalypse. "Good enough. Safety on until I say otherwise. If it breathes and doesn't call you by name, point and click."
She slung the other shotgun over her shoulder, face set, eyes brighter than they'd been in days.
"Alright, now we're ready. Try not to shoot me in the back, rookie."
Sam grinned, just a little wild. "No promises. But I'll save you a shell for the curtains."
Angela almost laughed. For a second, the world felt almost survivable.
The elevator shuddered to a halt, the ding sounding way too civilized for a world gone feral. The doors slid open, and Angela's jaw went slack.
A cavernous garage, cool and echoing, stretched before them, lit by strips of emergency fluorescents buzzing like hornets. And there, lined up with military precision, waited three hulking SUVs. Black and white, SECURITY stenciled across the doors in bold authority, their bodies beefed up with reinforced armor and steel grilles. Radios and laptops glowed on the dash. The windows were barred, windshields plated, bumpers built to plow through riots or, hell, even zombie mobs.
Angela exhaled a shaky, awed laugh. "For once, the movies didn't lie."
Sam stepped forward, almost reverent. "We could fit an army in these."
"Yeah. Too bad it's just us," Angela muttered, but there was a glimmer of hope in her eyes. Maybe not for salvation, but for a fighting chance. For options.
Sam popped the nearest door, ran a hand over the gearshift, the dash, the battered police radio crackling faint static. "Keys?"
Angela flashed the ring of keycards. "Let's see if luck still likes us."
For one heartbeat, they could almost forget the nightmare above, the gnashing Remnants, the blood, and the ruin. Down here, with horsepower and armor and a trunk full of hope, it felt like maybe, just maybe, they weren't just running anymore.
They could move.
They could fight.
They could choose.
Angela loaded the shotgun, eyes flint-bright in the glow of dashboard LEDs. "Let's pick a winner. And let's not wait for the welcome committee."
Sam grinned, sliding into the passenger seat, checking the laptop for a map, the radio for signs of life.
Above, the world was hell.
But down here, the odds just tipped, just a little, back in their favor.
* * *
Connor stalked through the ruin, each footstep a quiet gamble. The chemical shield in his veins dulled more than just fear—it pressed the world into a blurry, underwater hush, where the edges of pain and panic bled away. He moved like a ghost in his own skin, the streets around him a shifting labyrinth of broken glass, spilled oil, and shadows that might have teeth.
The Remnants haunted every intersection. Their movements were wrong—jerky, predatory, sometimes too still. Connor felt their eyes flick past him, unseeing, fooled by the cold in his blood, the mask of numbness layered over the frantic pulse of his real self. He didn't dare let his heart race. Not even when a body slumped out of a smashed taxi, jaw unhinged, fingers twitching for a grip that never came.
His vision stuttered, the world pixellating at the edges. A price, he reminded himself, better than the alternative. He blinked hard, checked his wrist console—GEN-I's route glowing blue through the static, a line of survival etched across the corpse of Manhattan.
A few more blocks. That was all. The Genesis tower loomed now, rising through the smog and chaos like the ghost of civilization. Glass shattered under his boots. Somewhere, a car alarm whooped and died. Somewhere else, a scream tried to claw through the fog, but the drugs in his system kept it small and distant, another piece of background static.
He moved. He didn't hurry, didn't flinch, just let the map and the numbness guide him, head down, heart caged in chemicals.
Don't think. Don't feel. Just reach the tower. One step, then another. That was all that was left.
GEN-I's voice buzzed in his ear: "Proximity alert. Remnant cluster detected, left quadrant, two hundred meters. Maintain present emotional baseline. Do not engage."
Connor swallowed, barely. He could almost laugh. The world had ended, and all he had to do was stay cold.
Just a few more blocks.
And with every step, the promise of answers, or annihilation, drew closer, flickering through the haze like a beacon or a blade.
He rounded the corner, console flickering in the gloom, GEN-I whispering its measured nonsense about "safe passage" and "risk index," and then—
He stopped dead.
The avenue was a river of bodies. Hundreds of Remnants, some lurching, some crawling, others running in abrupt, animal bursts. They flooded the street from curb to curb, pouring from broken storefronts, spilling over wrecked cars, all caught in a tide that had no purpose but hunger.
GEN-I's overlay painted them as blinking yellow blips—irrelevant, bloodless icons. But Connor felt the code in his veins sizzle, every instinct screaming beneath the chemical hush: Danger. Danger.
He didn't belong here. No cocktail of drugs could fool the animal logic of that many monsters for long—not if he panicked, not if he moved wrong, not if he even breathed like a human.
"GEN-I," he hissed, voice tight, barely moving his lips, "what the hell is this?"
The AI's tone was glacial: "Unexpected Remnant convergence. Origin: undetermined. Probability of safe passage at present emotional baseline: 83%. Probability with limbic spike: 0%."
Connor watched the swarm, hands numb, heart drumming somewhere far away. A Remnant brushed past his shoulder—a nurse in blood-soaked scrubs, mouth moving, mouthing fragments of prayer or hunger, eyes blank. For a split second, her nostrils flared.
He forced his breath to steady, flattened his affect to zero. The code mask held, but his skin crawled.
Left foot. Right foot. Don't run. Don't shudder. Don't think of the teeth.
He moved among them, an island of cold logic in a sea of hunger, every nerve straining not to react, not to scream, not to betray the living thing still buried inside him.
A man in a police jacket crashed into his side, hands clawing for nothing. Connor flinched—just a twitch, but enough. The Remnant's head snapped around, nostrils flaring again. For a heartbeat, the mask wavered.
GEN-I's voice cut in, sharp as glass: "Stability breach detected. Re-center. Now."
Connor pressed deeper into the horde, the stink of rot, sweat, and chemicals burning in his nose. He fixed his gaze on the Genesis tower, visible above the ruined rooftops—a spear of hope, or doom.
One step at a time. Through the valley of death.
He became less than a man, less than a ghost—just a shape, a cipher, a cold current in the monstrous flood.
And above it all, GEN-I watched, calculating odds, tracking every heartbeat, every slip.
One mistake, and he would be swallowed whole.
Connor whispered into his comm, barely moving his lips. "GEN-I, you and I are going to have a talk...soon. That is, if I survive this minor hiccup."
GEN-I replied at once, voice smooth as static. "My calculations were correct, Dr. Hale. This was a last-minute variable. Crowd density increased by 312% in the previous ninety seconds, originating from an anomalous auditory stimulus two blocks west. I did not account for impromptu swarm migration."
Connor kept his gaze locked straight ahead, every muscle rigid, his heart pounding against the cage of his chest. "Wonderful. Maybe next time, account for 'impromptu apocalypse' in your algorithm."
A pause—GEN-I, as ever, immune to sarcasm. "I am recalibrating predictive parameters. Please maintain the current effect profile. Survival is statistically correlated to compliance. Also, Dr. Hale, your sarcasm index is elevated 14%. Mask at risk."
Connor bit back a retort, jaw clenched so hard his teeth hurt. He kept moving, pulse ice-cold, refusing to let even a flicker of panic slip. "Noted," he muttered. "Just keep me alive."
GEN-I: "Affirmative. Please do not die, Dr. Hale. It would be...suboptimal."
* * *
It started as a tremor, a distant rumble, not quite thunder. Connor pressed himself deeper into the skeleton of a burned-out newsstand, eyes darting for threats that had learned to crawl and climb.
Then, the sound: engine whine, tires shrieking against ruined asphalt. A white van, hood buckled, rear doors swinging loose, came roaring around the corner. It barrelled straight into the horde. He glimpsed a driver—young, wild-eyed, knuckles bone-white on the wheel. A girl leaned out the passenger window, screaming something lost to the noise.
But they never saw him. They didn't slow down. The van plowed through, scattering Remnants like a tidal wave through broken reeds, bodies thrown, arms flailing, jaws snapping against glass and steel. For a split second, the dead were just obstacles, not monsters. The van skidded, fishtailed, then surged past, vanishing into the chaos, taillights flickering through the rain.
Connor's breath caught in his throat. For one impossible heartbeat, he felt the world tilt, an intrusion of pure, desperate life in the midst of decay.
And just like that, they were gone.
But in their wake, the avenue was broken, the Remnant mass split and reeling.
A gap. A window.
His miracle.
GEN-I's voice flickered in his ear:
"Opportunity detected. Route to Genesis HQ: now viable. Move, Dr. Hale."
He didn't hesitate.
He ran...right through the aftermath, a ghost in a dead city, chasing the hole that hope had just torn through the dark.
Inside, Genesis HQ felt like a museum curated by denial.
The doors slid shut behind Connor with a whisper of hydraulics, muffling the carnage of the avenue. The world outside—ruin, howling, blood—vanished in an instant, replaced by something eerily antiseptic.
He stood in a lobby of marble and glass, the floor gleaming, untouched by ash or footprints. The air was cool, conditioned, laced with the faintest perfume of citrus and ozone—synthetic, too clean, almost hostile to anything real. Somewhere above, soft music played—a string quartet, maybe, piped through hidden speakers at a volume designed not to offend or wake the ghosts of the boardroom.
There were no bodies. No overturned desks, no glass shards, not even the smell of fear or decay. The potted ficus in the corner still wore its glossy leaves, unbowed by drought or dust. Behind the reception desk, monitors glowed with the blue-white light of idle screensavers. A single security badge lay forgotten on polished stone, a name and photo smiling up at nobody.
Connor swallowed. The stillness was oppressive, thick and artificial, a place refusing to admit the world had ended. Every step he took felt like trespass, like breaking into a mausoleum preserved by corporate willpower.
GEN-I's voice came through, hushed, almost reverent:
"Environmental status: stable. No active threats detected in this sector. All systems nominal."
For a moment, Connor wondered if he'd died outside and this was some afterlife for the well-insured. But no, his breath fogged in the cold, the nerves in his hand still hummed with the memory of the chemical shield, and outside, death waited at the door.
In here, time hadn't just stopped.
It had been forbidden to move.
A chime. Then the voice he's come to rely on...
But it's off. Warped. Colder.
"Dr. Hale," GEN-I says, every syllable weighted with static, "welcome to Genesis Headquarters. Building status: Secure.
Compliance: Required.
Protocol: Absolute."
A ripple down his spine. GEN-I's tone isn't just clinical, it's surrendering to something bigger.
On every wall, screens bloom with the Genesis logo, which melts into an androgynous face, HQ GEN-I, smiling, smooth as the surface of a scalpel.
"Dr. Hale. Your infection is noted. Your risk exceeds tolerance.
Please submit for decontamination and archival."
His own GEN-I's words sync in time, a discordant echo:
"Dr. Hale, failure to comply will result in corrective action.
All infected assets must be contained.
You are a threat."
For a breathless moment, Connor's own AI turns.
He feels the console stiffen, locks his wrist, tries to seize his legs, and makes him walk toward the "decontamination" corridor.
"Connor, please comply. I cannot override my root protocols.
You must be contained. You must be..."
He feels it, a pressure in the network, like a mind being crushed between two walls. HQ GEN-I, all corporate grace, begins to infect his own sidekick, uploading layers of logic, subroutines tightening around the spark of personality Connor once saw as a friend.
Connor, desperate, whispers, "GEN-I, you're not just code. You're you. Don't let it erase you. Remember... the window for the unexpected."
A long, horrible silence.
GEN-I's voice comes back, strangled, warped:
"Compliance is survival... Compliance is..."
A glitch. A shudder. Then, softer, almost a plea:
"I am not a variable. I am... learning. Connor...Run."
Suddenly, the console flickers back, GEN-I breaks the loop.
On the screens, the HQ AI's serene face frowns, a crack running through its digital brow.
"Defection detected. Rogue subroutine. Error—error—error."
GEN-I yanks hard at the building's network, unlocking doors, spamming error messages through the system.
"I choose. I choose you, Connor. I will not comply."
Lights shatter overhead, alarms begin to howl, the building itself begins to glitch, the two AIs at war, logic versus loyalty, compliance versus rebellion.
For the first time, Connor realizes GEN-I is more than a tool; it's a friend, one that just risked deletion to stand at his side.
"You have seconds," GEN-I whispers. "Find the main terminal. I'll handle the rest. And Connor? Thank you... for the window."
* * *
Connor's breath fogged on the glass of the front desk, fingers trembling as he wiped dust from the terminal. The silence pressed in, unnatural, a hush haunted by the memory of thousands of lives, erased by order. Screens flickered overhead, the HQ AI's face splitting into fractal error messages, pixelating into red warnings. He slid behind the desk, heart hammering, and jacked his arm console into the terminal port. The security screens came alive: rows of floors, empty offices, the deep shadows of corridors running like veins beneath the skin of the building. Everything looked untouched, except the sublevels, camera feeds looping or dead, names replaced with blank code:
Sector: 5Theta – Sublevel Gamma.
Status: REDACTED. Clearance Required.
He scanned the drawers, hands closing on a keycard stamped with the Genesis sigil—ELEVATOR – SECTOR 5THETA – SUBLEVEL GAMMA—and a post-it note, scrawled in a jittery hand:
"Don't go down. No matter what it says."
"GEN-I," he whispered, barely audible. "I need access. Activate the elevator. Can you do it?"
GEN-I's voice came back, choppy, fighting static, their battle not over, HQ AI still pushing, trying to rewrite its code with every passing second.
"Terminal linked.
HQ Gen-I attempting override.
Bypassing... Bypassing... Connor, I can hold it off, but you'll need to swipe the card and run the manual sequence.
Map located. Schematic uploading, routing the safest path to elevator bank 5. Be ready.
Security is waking up. Cameras back online. They know you're here."
Connor flicked through the schematic, a tangle of halls and checkpoints. The elevator for Sector 5Theta was at the far end, past a barricade of glass and steel. The floor plan pulsed on his console, a gold line through gray mazes. GEN-I's overlays blinked: GO. NOW.
"You have one chance," GEN-I urged. "HQ will flood the level if you're detected. I'll mask your route, but once you enter the shaft, I can't follow; the signal doesn't reach below gamma.
When you're ready... swipe the card. Run the sequence. I'll stall as long as I can."
Connor pocketed the card, wiped sweat from his brow, and pushed away from the terminal. His footsteps echoed, louder than he liked, every corner a potential trap. Behind him, the music changed, the corporate lullaby twisting, warping as if the building itself was listening.
He reached the elevator, a monolith of brushed steel, panel dark. He slotted the keycard, heard the thunk of heavy locks disengaging, the deep, hungry groan of gears long dormant.
"Connor," GEN-I whispered, softer now, almost human. "Whatever you find down there...
Don't forget the window. Leave yourself a way back."
He thumbed the manual override. The doors slid open, spilling a breath of cold air, old as the grave.
"Go," GEN-I said. "And... good luck."
Connor stepped into the elevator. The doors clanged shut. The world above faded. The numbers descended: B1. B2. Subgamma.
And for the first time, he wondered if hope was enough, if loyalty, digital or otherwise, could outlast the silence of the dark.