The forty-eight hours didn't pass.
They pressed.
Every second felt weighted, stretched thin between what was known and what could no longer be unseen. Daniel slept in fragments, his dreams stitched together by faces from the screens in the terminal—people who had never asked to become leverage.
Morning brought no clarity.
Aisha sat cross-legged on the floor, surrounded by floating projections, code cascading like rain. Dark circles framed her eyes, but her focus was unbreakable.
"They weren't bluffing," she said without looking up. "Someone lost access to the transit grid last night. Selective outages. Quiet panic."
Kieran leaned against the wall, arms folded. "A warning shot."
Daniel stared at the city beyond the glass. "They're teaching us consequences."
Aisha's fingers paused. "They're also testing boundaries."
She expanded a projection—financial feeds, civic sensors, encrypted backchannels. A pattern emerged, subtle but deliberate.
"They're not everywhere," she continued. "They just want us to think they are."
Kieran's mouth curved into a grim smile. "Good. That means they can bleed."
Daniel turned. "At what cost?"
No one answered.
The first casualty came at noon.
Not a death—but something almost worse.
A journalist Daniel recognized from the early days of the exposé posted a public retraction. He called his own work exaggerated. Misinterpreted. Harmful. Hours later, his accounts vanished. His voice went silent.
Aisha closed her eyes. "They erased him."
Daniel felt something crack inside his chest.
"This is what happens when we hesitate," Kieran said. "They win by making examples."
Aisha looked up sharply. "And we lose by becoming the same thing."
The room fractured with tension.
Daniel raised a hand. "Enough."
Both of them stilled.
"We don't answer terror with terror," Daniel said quietly. "But we don't go quiet either."
He stepped toward Aisha. "You said they're not everywhere."
She nodded. "They rely on fear to fill the gaps."
"Then we give them something else to manage."
Aisha's eyes widened slightly. "Distraction?"
"Exposure," Daniel corrected. "But not the way they expect."
Kieran straightened. "Decoys."
Aisha's mind was already racing. "Multiple leaks. Incomplete, but loud. Make them chase smoke while we trace the fire."
Daniel met her gaze. "Can you find the core?"
Aisha hesitated—just for a second. "Yes. But once I do, there's no undoing it."
"Truth never comes with an undo button," Daniel said.
Outside, sirens wailed—distant, restless.
The city was beginning to feel the strain.
Hours later, the lights flickered.
Not off. Just enough to be noticed.
Aisha froze. "They're responding."
Kieran checked the windows. "Or escalating."
Daniel's phone buzzed.
Another message. Same sender.
You misunderstand balance. Pressure creates order. You are standing on a fracture line.
Daniel typed one response before he could stop himself.
So are you.
The reply came almost instantly.
Then let's see who breaks first.
Across the city, systems trembled—barely, but unmistakably.
Invisible fault lines spread beneath the megacity's polished surface.
And somewhere deep within the network, something old had begun to stir.
Not a weapon.
A reckoning.
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