The data from the Panacea warehouse incident was not a report; it was an insult. It flowed across the main holographic display in Cyprian Hasek’s Redaction Hub as a torrent of corrupted files and chaotic telemetry. Forklifts moving without operators. Automated shelving units collapsing into clouds of expired protein dust. Two bio-signatures—the Hybrid and the cyber-terrorist Sabine Weil—vanishing into the city’s reclamation system like flushed waste. It was a symphony of failure, a beautiful flaw in a system that should have no flaws.
Hasek stood before the display, the cool, recycled air of the Hub tasting of ozone and his own quiet fury. The only sound was the pure, unwavering 400-hertz sine wave that scrubbed the room of all other noise, a constant reminder of the cognitive purity he fought to maintain. This incident was the opposite of that purity. It was messy. It was inefficient. It was a data-stain on the clean operational record of his Division. He had to erase it.
He gestured, and a specific data packet isolated itself from the stream, hovering before him. It was the asset file for Dr. Julian Croft. Hasek expanded the file, the data spooling out into a three-dimensional cascade of mission logs, psychological evaluations, and raw biometric feeds. He was searching for the justification he already knew he would find. He needed a narrative, a clean line of logic that would lead Commissioner Holland to the only possible conclusion. Redaction.
His fingers moved with surgical precision, editing the timeline of the warehouse incident. He highlighted the moment Croft fired his primitive ballistic weapon, the audio spike a vulgar roar in the otherwise quiet suppressor fire. He tagged it: Unsanctioned Escalation. He trimmed the seconds before, where the Panacea team had opened fire first. That was irrelevant noise. The asset had escalated. That was the signal.
He delved deeper into Croft’s file, into the diagnostic fragments captured during the Hybrid’s unstable REM cycles. Most of it was garbage, the nonsensical output of two warring parasites. But one fragment caught his attention. It was a flickering, unstable schematic, a logic diagram of a mind at war with itself. Lines of code and contradictory imperatives overlaid a map of a human brain, the whole thing glitching like a corrupted file. Hasek tagged the image with a clinical designation: Cognitive Instability—Pattern Failure. This was not a tool for reason; it was a symptom of the disease. It was the perfect exhibit for his case.
With the narrative constructed, he initiated the holographic call. The air shimmered, and the dispassionate face of Commissioner Wardell Holland materialized above the central map. Holland’s expression was, as always, a perfect mask of neutrality.
— Commissioner, — Hasek began, his voice as calm and even as the sine wave humming through the Hub. — An update on the Gamma-7 anomaly.
He sent the data file. Holland’s grey eyes, the color of wet concrete, flickered as he absorbed the information. Hasek let the file speak for itself first: the unauthorized contact with Sabine Weil, a known cyber-terrorist. The violent altercation in a corporate facility. The complete loss of contact.
— The asset has gone rogue, — Hasek stated, letting the conclusion hang in the sterile air. — He has allied himself with a hostile agent and engaged in destructive, unsanctioned actions. He is no longer an asset. He is a contamination.
He brought up the edited footage of the warehouse, showing Croft firing his weapon, the chaos of the forklifts, the collapse of the shelving. He presented it as a rampage, the inevitable result of allowing a compromised mind to operate in the field.
— He is spreading chaos, — Hasek said. — The only logical course of action is to neutralize the threat before it metastasizes. I am requesting authorization to redact the asset.
Holland was silent for a long moment, his gaze fixed on the data stream. Hasek could feel the weight of the Commissioner’s adherence to protocol, a force as powerful and unthinking as gravity. It was the system’s greatest strength and its most infuriating weakness.
— The data is incomplete, — Holland’s synthesized voice finally stated, flat and devoid of emotion. He gestured, and the unedited timeline of the warehouse incident appeared beside Hasek’s version. The initial shots from the Panacea team were clearly visible. — The asset responded to a lethal threat. His actions, while extreme, were within the parameters of survival.
Hasek felt a cold spike of anger. Holland wasn’t seeing the pattern. He was getting lost in the noise of individual data points.
— He is with Sabine Weil. He has abandoned his mission.
— His mission was to investigate the anomaly, — Holland countered. — The data suggests he is still pursuing the primary objective, albeit through unorthodox means. The request is denied.
The words hit Hasek like a physical blow. Denied. The system was choosing to protect its own disease. The price of Holland’s rigid procedure was the continued existence of an intolerable flaw.
— Commissioner, your refusal to act will have consequences.
— All actions have consequences, Director, — Holland replied, his voice unchanged. — Adherence to protocol is what separates us from the chaos we fight. The asset remains active. You will continue to monitor. Holland out.
The hologram vanished, leaving Hasek alone in the silent, humming room. His face was a cold mask of fury. He had been denied. He, the director of Redaction, had been ordered to stand by and watch a cancer grow within his own Division. The clean, logical lines of his authority had been tangled and broken by a man who couldn't see the purity of the necessary act.
He stared at the dark sector on the map, the spreading void of the Hush Meme. He looked at the file on Croft, the flickering, chaotic diagram of his mind. They were two sides of the same coin: a void of belief and a storm of it. Both were impurities. Both had to be cleansed.
If the system would not act, he would act for it.
The decision was made in a cold, clear moment of absolute certainty. He would circumvent the official chain of command. He would commit an act of insubordination so profound it bordered on treason. He would risk his career, his position, everything he had built, on the conviction that he was right. The price of order was a necessary sin.
He turned to his private console, the black ceramic slab cool beneath his fingertips. He opened a secure, back-channel communication link, a ghost line that bypassed Holland’s official network entirely. The encryption was his own design, a perfect, unbreakable loop.
The face that appeared on the screen was hard, disciplined, and utterly loyal. Commander Valerius, head of Scrubber Team Delta. A man who understood that some stains required more than just soap.
— Commander, — Hasek said, his voice low and steady.
— Director, — Valerius replied. His eyes were watchful. He knew this channel was only used for one purpose.
— The Hybrid asset, Dr. Croft, is compromised. He has allied with the terrorist Weil. They are a vector for a new and dangerous form of cognitive contagion.
Hasek transmitted Croft’s last known location, the coordinates of the noodle bar where he and Sabine had contacted Echo. He didn’t need to know about Echo. He just needed a target.
— Official channels are… compromised by political concerns, — Hasek continued, choosing his words with care. — The threat requires immediate and decisive containment.
Valerius nodded slowly, his expression unreadable. He understood the subtext. He was being given an order that did not officially exist.
— Your orders are to hunt the asset, — Hasek said, his voice dropping to a near whisper. — Discretionary protocols are authorized. Contain the spread with maximum prejudice.
Discretionary protocols. A clinical euphemism for lethal force. It was an order to kill a fellow agent of the CI-Div, an order that would see Valerius redacted himself if it ever came to light. But it was an order from Hasek.
— Understood, Director, — Valerius said, his voice a flat, steady baritone. There was no hesitation. No question. Just the clean, simple logic of a loyal soldier following a command he believed in.
— Report directly to me. No one else, — Hasek commanded.
— Yes, Director.
The line went dead. Hasek stood in the silence of his Hub, the pure sine wave washing over him. He had crossed a line. He had broken the system to save it. A cold, clean satisfaction settled over him. The blade was sharpened. The hunt had begun.
The city pulsed with its chaotic, messy life outside his walls.
But a new, purer order was coming to cleanse it.
