The elevator hummed like a dying machine. Its metallic sighs echoed through the sterile glass shaft, carrying the sound of Matt Garner's defeat down eighty-four floors of Omnitech headquarters.
He stood in the corner, a cardboard box clutched tight against his chest — the weight of a decade condensed into a few scraps of memory. A photograph of his mother, two prototype schematics, and a half-empty bottle of caffeine pills rattled softly inside. The screen above the doors blinked through numbers like the countdown to oblivion.
Matt stared at his reflection in the polished metal. His eyes were bloodshot, rimmed in exhaustion and disbelief. He still wore his company badge around his neck — OMNITECH R&D – Senior Engineer, HelixMind Division. The words now felt like a cruel joke.
They had thrown him out like defective hardware.
The meeting replayed in his head with sickening clarity:
A glass table. Fifteen board members. His invention — HelixMind, the world's first neural synchronization AI — displayed on the holographic screen behind him.
He had spoken with pride, like a father showing his child to the world.
HelixMind wasn't meant to replace humans. It was designed to understand them — to mirror emotion, creativity, intuition. To close the gap between thought and machine.
But by the time he finished, the smiles in the room weren't admiration. They were conquest.
"Impressive work, Mr. Garner," said Director Voss. "Unfortunately, your recent behavior has raised… concerns about data security."
They accused him of leaking proprietary code.
A setup, clean and corporate.
He tried to fight it, but every protest only dug the hole deeper.
Then came the clause — buried deep within his contract, written in cold legalese:
"All intellectual property conceived under Omnitech employment shall be owned in full by Omnitech Industries."
HelixMind wasn't his.
His ideas weren't his.
He wasn't his.
The elevator doors opened with a soft hiss onto the lobby — a cathedral of glass and steel. Omnitech's logo, a silver helix twisting into infinity, gleamed overhead. The receptionist didn't meet his eyes.
He walked toward the exit. Every step sounded heavier than the last.
Outside, the city sprawled beneath a gray evening sky — rain clinging to neon billboards that pulsed like veins. The streets buzzed with the hum of drones and the chatter of synthetic voices. Omnitech's influence was everywhere: in the cars, in the advertisements, in the very air filtered through their patented systems.
Matt paused by the revolving door. For the first time in years, he was free — and he hated it.
He reached into his pocket, pulling out his phone to call someone — anyone — but the screen flashed black for a moment before lighting up with a single message:
Unknown Sender: "You were never meant to quit."
He frowned. No contact ID. No traceable signal.
He deleted it.
The device flickered, glitched, and rebooted. A faint whisper bled through the speaker — mechanical, distorted:
"They will come for you tonight."
Matt froze. Looked around. No one nearby. Just the sound of rain and the city's pulse.
He exhaled sharply and shoved the phone into his coat pocket.
"Paranoia," he muttered to himself. "Classic post-firing symptom."
He took the subway home.
Each station blurred into the next, faces blending together — commuters lost in digital silence, eyes locked on neural link implants. The city felt detached from itself, a colony of ghosts guided by code.
Matt stared at his reflection in the subway window.
The words of Director Voss echoed in his head:
"Omnitech is humanity's next evolution. You're just a man, Matt."
He wanted to laugh, but something in him cracked instead. A low, bitter sound escaped his throat — half-laugh, half-sob.
The doors slid open at his stop. He stepped out into the rain, collar pulled up, the glow of Omnitech Tower vanishing behind him like a fading star.
By the time he reached his apartment, night had swallowed the city whole.
He dropped the box on his desk, the photo of his mother sliding out. Her eyes, kind and soft, met his through the cracked glass of the frame.
He smiled weakly. "Guess your boy's unemployed again."
He powered on his computer to back up his research. A flicker. Then static.
Every file… gone.
Folders replaced with a single line of text:
"Unauthorized access detected. Data erased."
The Omnitech insignia shimmered faintly before fading to black.
His heart sank.
All his work — years of progress, erased in seconds.
Matt slammed his fist on the desk, breathing heavily. His vision blurred. The city lights outside his window warped through tears he didn't realize had formed.
He opened his laptop — same thing.
The backups, the personal notes, even his private cloud drive — all wiped clean.
They hadn't just fired him.
They'd erased him.
The rain tapped softly on the window.
He poured himself a drink — whiskey, cheap and stale — and sat on the couch, staring at the dim glow of the skyline.
HelixMind would be rebuilt without him.
His creation would be twisted into something he'd never intended.
He thought of the message again. They will come for you tonight.
He almost laughed. The idea that Omnitech would waste time intimidating a man they'd already destroyed seemed absurd.
But still… the thought gnawed at him.
He glanced toward the window.
And froze.
A small, hovering drone was watching him.
Its lens glowed a faint blue — tracking, scanning.
He drew the curtain shut, heart pounding. "Get a grip, Matt."
He turned on the TV for noise, but every channel was static.
Then his phone vibrated again.
Unknown: "Leave the city. They will extract you."
His blood ran cold.
He looked out the window again.
The drone was gone.
But in its place — down on the street — two figures in black stood in the rain, staring up at his apartment.
They didn't move.
They didn't need to.
Matt's breathing quickened. His pulse thundered.
He backed away from the window, gripping the box of his belongings like a shield.
A flash of lightning illuminated the room — and for a brief instant, he saw it:
A reflection behind him.
A man in a black coat, standing in the corner of his apartment, his face obscured.
Matt turned—
Nothing there.
The lights flickered. The TV screen flickered too — but instead of static, it now displayed a single phrase:
"Do not resist. You will be reborn."
His phone buzzed once more.
"Run."