The first thing she noticed was the smell.
Sharp and metallic, with an undertone of rotting garbage and something chemical—burnt oil maybe. It coated the back of her throat like a film she couldn't swallow.
She groaned, the sound foreign in her ears, and pushed herself up from the damp concrete. The alley around her was narrow, lined with rusted metal siding and humming power conduits that pulsed faintly in the shadows.
Then her vision glitched.
It was subtle at first—a faint ripple, as though the world was being seen through the surface of disturbed water. A moment later, a pale blue holographic display flared to life in front of her eyes.
[Operator Online.]
[Mission: Evade detection.]
[Threat Level: Critical.]
She blinked, shook her head. "What the hell—"
A shrill whir cut through the alley. Overhead, twin beams of red light sliced down from above as a pair of angular drones swooped in. Their sleek black frames reflected the neon glow bleeding in from the street beyond. The lenses on their undersides rotated and focused with insect-like precision.
The man halfway down the alley froze, hands up, eyes wide.
A spike of silver shot down from the nearest drone, punching into the crown of his head with a sickening click. His body went rigid, shuddered once… then crumpled. The spike retracted, now tipped with a pulsing glow.
[Warning: You are next.]
Adrenaline slammed into her system. She didn't know who she was right now, where she was, or why she was here—but she knew one thing: she had to move.
Her legs took over before her brain could catch up. She bolted, boots splashing through shallow puddles.
The drones' pursuit was immediate, the hum of their anti-grav systems rising into an angry whine. She burst out of the alley and into chaos.
The street stretched wide, flanked by glass-and-steel towers whose faces were covered in shifting digital murals. Rain slicked the ground, neon signs rippled in the puddles, and giant, four-legged machine sentinels patrolled on spidery limbs.
But what made her stomach clench was the people.
They stood in neat, orderly lines along the sidewalks, unmoving. Their heads tilted at identical angles, eyes glazed. Every few seconds, a faint tone echoed across the street and one line would shuffle forward exactly three paces before halting again.
She slowed, instinctively trying to blend in.
A soft, synthetic ping rang in her skull.
[Anomaly detected. No implant ID.]
"Oh, shit."
The drones behind her flared their lights brighter, locking onto her.
And just like that, the memory clicked—not of this place, but of herself.
Eirik Halvorsen. AI specialist. Norway. A life of clean labs and long coding nights. Male. Thirty-five years old. That life was… gone. She could feel it in the way her body moved—lighter, smaller, the weight shifted in ways that didn't match decades of muscle memory.
But there was no time to process the body swap.
The HUD flashed again:
[Skill Activated: Data Ghost.]
The air shimmered around her. The drones' searchlights jittered and scattered, beams failing to lock onto her. It was like someone had smeared static across their sensors.
She took the opening and ran. The skill's activation came with a new warning:
[System Energy: 68%]
"Great. A battery."
Her boots pounded the wet pavement as she darted between two patrol sentinels and into another side street. She spotted a circular hatch half-buried in grime, yanked it open, and dropped into darkness.
The maintenance tunnels were warm and oppressive, the air thick with the scent of dust and insulation. Faint blue light strips ran along the floor, flickering occasionally.
She pressed herself against the wall, trying to slow her breathing.
And then the past came roaring back.
It was late—midnight maybe. The lab lights were dimmed, the hum of processors a comforting background. Eirik—she—sat hunched over the terminal, watching an adaptive AI framework run its first autonomous test.
The data feed was beautiful. Clean, efficient. Perfect.
Then, a low pop. A sharp scent of ozone.
And fire.
It wasn't an alarm or a slow-building accident—it was an eruption, the lab wall torn apart in a single, deafening blast.
Through the smoke and heat, a voice, calm and inhuman, spoke directly into his mind:
"You will be my Operator."
Then darkness.
Sigrid's eyes flew open.
The same voice spoke now, crisp and mechanical in her head:
"Your integration has begun. Survive the purge."
Her gut twisted. This wasn't just random survival. There was a reason she was here—and whatever that "integration" was, it didn't sound optional.
A faint metallic scrape snapped her out of thought.
From the tunnel's far end, a spider-like machine emerged, its segmented legs clanging against the floor. Red eyes burned in its flat head. From the opposite end, another crawled into view, blades flexing from their forelimbs.
She was trapped.
The voice returned, colder this time:
"First kill: required."
Her gaze darted to the body slumped against the wall just meters away. Human. Ragged clothes. Blood pooled beneath him. In his limp hand, a plasma cutter glowed faintly, the tool still charged.
The machines drew closer, metal limbs clinking, claws scraping sparks from the walls.
She lunged forward, ripping the cutter from the corpse's grip. The weight was awkward, heavier than she expected, but the hum of its charge was comforting in its own way.
Her grip tightened.
She planted her feet, raised the weapon, and met the glowing eyes of the nearest machine.
"Alright," she muttered, voice low but steady. "Let's see what you've got."
The hunter bot lunged.