And then?—
A chime.
Upload complete.
My pulse doesn’t spike. But my ribs ache like I’ve been holding air in for days. I disengage the terminal, stand slowly, and roll my shoulders once.
“Interface disconnected,” I murmur.
“Copy,” Tatek says. “Ready when you are.”
I reach for the mic switch, fingers trembling just a little now. I press it.
The camera tilts toward me. Red indicator on.
Live.
I stare into the lens.
“This isn’t a manifesto,” I begin, my voice low but clear, each syllable carved from something ancient and sharp. “It’s a memory.”
Across the room, the techs freeze. Every eye turns toward me. The feed echoes from the overheads—no delay, no filter. Just me and the truth and all the eyes that never saw me when I was dying inside this machine.
“I used to sit at a terminal like this one. I knew the relay commands by heart. I helped build them. I was proud. Thought I was making a cleaner future. Safer. Fairer. But we weren’t building safety. We were building silence.”
I swallow. My throat burns, but I push forward.
“My name was flagged for reclassification six months before they told me. I didn’t notice, because that’s how good they are. They don’t just erase your records. They erase your reflection. Piece by piece, they make you look wrong in your own skin.”
A technician starts to rise. I hold up a hand.
“Don’t.”
He stops.
“I’m not here to hurt anyone. I’m not here to break your systems. I just want you to see what they’ve done. What they’re still doing. Project Obol isn’t about peace. It’s about control. It’s about building people from scratch with loyalty written into their marrow and obedience coded into their smiles.”
I let the pause sit, heavy.
“I know, because I almost became one.”
I glance down for a second. When I lift my gaze again, the lights feel hotter. Or maybe it’s just the weight of what’s coming next.
“The only reason I’m here now is because someone refused to forget me. Because someone saw the parts of me that didn’t match, and said, ‘That’s her. That’s still her.’ And he was right.”
A tremor threads through my voice.
“I remember now. I remember the name they deleted. I remember the face they tried to replace. And I remember how it felt to be told I was broken—when all I’d done was resist.”
I lean forward slightly.
“To anyone out there watching this, wondering why your memories don’t match your profile, why your reflection feels like someone else’s—you’re not malfunctioning. You’re not crazy. You’re not alone.”
Silence.
Then, softly: “You’re still in there.”
The stream ends.
