“No,” I said.
Russ leaned in. “Something just rerouted.”
I didn’t answer.
Because I could feel it.
That subtle wrongness in the air—like a door closing somewhere you didn’t know was open.
“Pull the cascade,” I said quietly.
Boone hesitated. “Logan, this isn’t a breach. It’s… internal.”
“Exactly,” I replied.
The feed resolved into layered architecture—decision trees folding in on themselves, priority threads reordering, stress-response algorithms drifting just off center.
Not enough to trip it.
Enough tochange outcomes.
My pulse slowed.
There you are.
“She didn’t escape,” Russ said slowly. “So what did she do?”
I stepped closer, eyes locked on the flow.
“She rewrote the logic,” I said. “Just a hair. A fraction.”
Boone swallowed. “That’s… insane. How are we even seeing this?”
“No,” I said. “That’s precise. I don’t know how the hell we are seeing this.”
I pointed to a thin deviation line, barely visible unless you knew where to look. This equipment was the best there is.”
“See that?” I asked. “That’s a hesitation loop. Sentinel won’t see it yet. He’ll think it’s environmental lag.”
Russ exhaled. “But it’s not.”
“It’s a trap,” I said. “And it’s not meant for him.”
They both looked at me.
“It’s meant for me,” I continued. “She just told me how his system reacts when pushed.”
The cascade deepened.
More pathways began to drift—controlled, intentional, elegant.
Scout wasn’t fighting the machine.
She wasteaching it to fail.
“But how is she doing this?”
“He’s going to notice,” Boone said. “Soon.”
