Lena slept, but not deeply.

She woke twice to the sound of her own pulse, and once to the distant hum of a siren sliding past her apartment window. The third time, she didn’t fall back asleep. She lay still beneath the thin light of dawn, letting her breathing align with the slow expansion of morning. Her body was steady enough. Her mind was not.

The conversation with R. Marrow had settled into her like cold water—clear, heavy, and impossible to ignore. Two people had tried to expose the anomaly. One was her father. The other was someone known only as J. And both had been removed from the frame in ways that didn’t leave physical traces, only shadows.

Her phone buzzed at 6:42 a.m.

She sat up sharply, but it wasn’t an alert.  

It was a message.

**S. Trent:**  

Don’t enter through the lobby today. Use the west side entrance. I’ll meet you on 32.

Her breath hitched.

She typed: Why?

His reply came immediately.  

**Because they’ll be waiting.**

She didn’t ask who *they* were.  

She didn’t need to.

She dressed with quiet efficiency—dark slacks, fitted sweater, hair pulled back cleanly. Nothing that drew attention, nothing that carried softness. She paused only once, fingers hovering over the emergency kit before sliding it into her coat pocket.

Outside, the morning was brisk. Havenport’s towers cut through the sky with their usual metallic indifference, but the light felt colder today, the reflections sharper. She walked the long block toward the west entrance—rarely used, tucked between a loading bay and a narrow alley.

She half expected someone to be standing there already.

No one was.  

But the absence itself felt designed.

Inside, the elevator bank was noticeably emptier. She entered an express lift alone and pressed 32. The ride felt longer than usual, a hollow ascent that hummed against her ribs.

When the doors opened, Silas was waiting.

Not in the usual composed way.  

In a deliberate way.

He didn’t speak at first. He waited until the elevator doors closed behind her, sealing them into the corridor’s muted quiet.

“Morning,” he said.

It wasn’t casual.

“Morning,” she replied.

He studied her—not her face, but the tension in her shoulders, the way she held the strap of her bag. When he seemed satisfied she hadn’t been followed or stopped, he nodded toward the main walkway.

“Come with me.”

She followed.

The walk felt unfamiliar, even though she knew every step of this floor. Something in the air had shifted; conversations were quieter, glances more contained. She could feel pressure moving invisibly—redirected, concentrated, masked.

Silas led her to a small corner alcove lined with frosted glass.

“They moved the meeting,” he said. “Compliance is reviewing access logs at nine. They plan to pull you in before lunch.”

Lena felt her chest tighten. “On what grounds?”

“None,” he said. “Which is the problem.”

She swallowed. “So they’re doing it anyway.”

“Yes.”

He held her gaze for a long moment.

“Did you receive anything unusual last night?”

Her breath stalled.

He watched her too carefully for her to lie.  

She answered truthfully.

“A phone call.”

“From?”

“I don’t know. Someone named R. Marrow.”

Silas exhaled once—sharp, precise, not surprised. “Of course.”

“You know who that is,” she said.

“I know what department they were part of,” he said. “Before everything shifted.”

“Systems?”

He didn’t answer.  

Which was an answer.

“Did you tell them?” Lena asked quietly.

“No,” Silas said. “And you won’t either.”

He stepped closer—close enough that she could feel the weight of the unspoken calculations behind his voice.

“Whatever they told you,” he said, “you need to be careful repeating it. Even to me.”

That surprised her. “Why?”

“Because they were erased once,” he said, voice low. “And whoever erased them will do it again if they think their story resurfaced.”

Lena’s pulse jumped painfully. “Then why contact me?”

“Because you’re already inside the pattern,” he said. “And they know it.”

She steadied herself. “They told me J wasn’t just an analyst. They said J helped build the container that hid the anomaly.”

Silas didn’t blink.  

But something in his posture changed—barely, subtly.

“I know,” he said.

Lena froze. “You knew?”

“I didn’t know the extent,” he said. “Not until recently. But I suspected the model had more than one architect.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because knowing too much too quickly makes you a threat,” he said. “And threats get isolated.”

She lowered her voice. “They said J’s story wasn’t finished.”

“This story rarely finishes,” Silas replied. “It just shifts hands.”

He didn’t elaborate.

Instead, he reached into his jacket and withdrew a small envelope—thin, unmarked, folded once. He held it out.

“What is it?” she asked.

“Something they’ll ask you about today,” he said. “Better you see it before they show it to you.”

Lena took the envelope, hands steady. Inside was a printed screenshot—grainy, low-resolution, obviously pulled from an old internal directory.

It showed a document revision history.

2015 — Project Delta Variants  

Editors:  

— C. Monroe  

— J. Dalton

Lena’s breath left her.

C. Monroe.  

J. Dalton.

C.  

J.

She stared at the names, the initials, the clean link between them.

Monroe.

Her voice felt small. “Is that—”

“Yes,” Silas said. “Tessa’s older sister.”

The world tilted.

“She worked here?” Lena asked.

“A long time ago,” Silas said. “Before the 2015 incident. Before she left the city.”

“And J?” she whispered. “Dalton?”

He closed his eyes briefly, like something heavy shifted behind them.

“He was in Compliance,” Silas said. “Before the department was restructured.”

Lena felt cold. “Were they—”

“Working together?” Silas finished. “Yes.”

The glass walls around them seemed to grow louder.

“And you didn’t tell me,” she said.

“I couldn’t,” he replied. “It wasn’t my information to give.”

“It concerns me.”

“It protects you,” he corrected. “The fewer pieces you hold, the harder it is for them to claim you’re assembling them.”

Her pulse thudded against her ribs.

“Why show me now?” she whispered.

Silas’s voice was almost a whisper.

“Because today is the first time they might ask you directly.”

A chill rolled down her spine.

“What do I say?”

“You don’t recognize the names,” Silas said. “You’ve never seen the revision record. You don’t know the connection.”

“That’s a lie.”

“No,” he said. “It’s survival.”

He stepped closer, lowering his voice further.

“If they believe you know who J is,” he said, “they will not let you leave the building today.”

Silas wasn’t dramatic.  

He wasn’t emotional.  

He didn’t exaggerate.

Which meant he believed every word he just said.

Lena swallowed carefully. “What about Tessa?”

“She doesn’t know,” he said. “C. Monroe left before she joined the company. Her family never talked about it.”

“And if she finds out?”

“She won’t,” he said. “Not today.”

The hall outside hummed with footsteps. Someone’s voice carried briefly, then faded.

Silas looked at Lena with a precision that wasn’t professional anymore.

“There’s more,” he said quietly. “Upstairs, they’re drawing a connection between you and J.”

She felt her heart stop.

“Why?”

“Because both of you got close to the anomaly,” he said. “And because neither of you were meant to.”

Lena’s voice barely emerged. “Silas… what happened to him?”

Silas’s jaw tightened.

“They called it a reassignment,” he said. “But no one saw him again after that week.”

“Dead?” she whispered.

Silas didn’t blink.

“Erased,” he said. “The kind that doesn’t need paperwork.”

She felt the floor tilt again—not physically, but in a way that forced her breath into smaller pieces.

“What do we do?” she asked.

Silas answered without hesitation.

“We stay ahead of the version of the story they’re writing,” he said. “And we don’t let them place you where they placed him.”

“How?”

Silas exhaled slowly.

“By making sure,” he said, “you never stand alone in the glass.”

The door opened abruptly.

Both turned.

Two Compliance officers stood outside.

“Lena Carrow?” one asked.

Her pulse spiked.

Silas stepped forward—not blocking, but positioning.

“She’s expected at nine,” he said calmly. “It’s 8:42.”

“We’re early,” the officer replied.

Silas’s expression didn’t shift. “She isn’t.”

The two officers exchanged glances but didn’t push.

“We’ll return,” one said.

When they walked away, the silence snapped back into place.

Silas turned to her.

“You understand now,” he said quietly.

She nodded. “Yes.”

“Good.”

He stepped out of the alcove, but before he left, he looked back once more.

“Lena,” he said, voice low, “whatever they say today—remember this.”

“Remember what?”

“You’re not repeating your father’s story,” Silas said. “You’re finishing someone else’s.”

He walked away.

Lena stayed still, breath held, the envelope in her hand.

Two names.  

Two initials.  

Two erased stories.

And now—  

hers.