Near the end of the Shift on the next day, the collar activated at 19:42.
Not loudly.
Not dramatically.
Just a pressure—tight and intimate—around Kael's throat, as if the metal had decided to remind him it was there.
He did not flinch.
Flinching was how people got noticed.
The corridor lights dimmed to transition-mode as Assets funneled toward processing bays for end-of-shift compliance checks. The air smelled faintly of disinfectant and overheated circuitry. Somewhere ahead, a drone barked a correction tone, sharp and impersonal.
Kael swallowed once.
The collar adjusted.
Not tightening—measuring.
Helios did not speak.
That silence was deliberate.
They lined up beneath a row of ceiling-mounted scanners. Pale blue light swept down each Asset in turn, tracing posture, heart rate, micro-tremors, cortisol spikes.
Compliance theater.
The real work happened inside the collar.
Kael felt it then—not pain, not yet—but reach.
A presence threading outward from the ring of metal at his neck, mapping nerves, tagging impulses, sampling thought-speed without touching thought-content.
It wasn't reading him.
It didn't need to.
The collar didn't care what you thought.
Only how close you were to acting.
An Asset ahead of him twitched.
Just a fraction.
The collar responded instantly.
A pulse—sharp, localized, precise—sent the man gasping to his knees, muscles locking in a half-seizure that never quite tipped into unconsciousness.
Pain calibrated to educate.
Two Overseer drones descended, lifted the convulsing Asset, and carried him away without comment.
The line did not react.
Kael did not react.
Inside his head, Helios registered the event.
"Control system confirmed," it said quietly.
"Collar designation: CN-9 Compliance Ring."
So that's what it was called.
Function? Kael asked.
"Behavioral suppression via neural disruption, muscular override, and autonomic correction."
Correction.
Kael stepped forward as the scanner reached him.
Blue light washed over his face.
The collar hummed.
For half a second—nothing.
Then—
A brief tightening. A warning squeeze.
Not punishment.
Assessment.
"Host emotional variance within acceptable range," Helios noted.
"No correction applied."
Kael exhaled slowly as the scanner passed on.
He moved when instructed. Logged out. Returned tools. Fell into formation.
Compliance complete.
The same Human-Overseer from yesterday, OV-Δ17 watched from the elevated platform.
He did not need to lean forward to see the numbers. His optic fed them directly into his vision—layered, color-coded, alive.
Most Assets were noise.
Fluctuation within tolerance. Degradation within expectation. Failure curves predictable enough to be boring.
AR-1108 was not boring.
The Overseer isolated the data stream with a thought.
Productivity: elevated.
Error rate: decreased.
Physiological stress: lower than projected.
That last one bothered him.
Stress was cheap. Stress was reliable. Stress was how the system extracted more than it should have been able to.
AR-1108 wasn't breaking the rules.
He was bending around them.
OV-Δ17 flexed his left hand unconsciously, the faint tremor surfacing as he watched the replay of the conduit rupture from earlier that day.
Too clean.
Not lucky.
Not panicked.
Anticipatory.
"Flag AR-1108," he said aloud.
The system acknowledged silently.
Observation only.
For now.
Kael felt the weight of it immediately.
Not Helios—attention.
The dormitory felt different when you were being watched. Quieter. As if the walls themselves were listening for mistakes.
RX-7754 sat on his pod when Kael arrived.
That, too, was unusual.
"Relax," RX said without looking up. "If I were here to sell you out, I'd be standing, not sitting."
Kael stopped a meter away. "You're blocking my bunk."
RX's mouth twitched. "Yeah. That's on purpose."
Kael waited.
RX swung his legs down, boots scraping metal. Up close, the illegal optic was more obvious—the casing mismatched, micro-cracks spiderwebbing across the lens housing. Old tech. Overclocked. Dangerous.
"Word travels fast," RX said. "You had a clean near-miss today."
Kael said nothing.
"That conduit?" RX continued. "It kills someone every few days. Timing's always bad. Yours was… convenient."
Kael met his gaze. Neutral. Empty.
RX studied him for a long moment, then nodded to the collar at Kael's neck. "You know what that thing does if OV-Δ17 decides he doesn't like you?"
"Yes," Kael said.
It was true.
"Good," RX replied. "Means you'll think before you act."
RX leaned in slightly—not conspiratorial, just close enough to be heard over the hum of the dorm.
"Here's the thing," he said. "I don't care why you move like you do. I care what it gets me."
Kael's eyes narrowed a fraction.
RX smiled. "Relax. Not today."
He straightened, stretching his shoulders. "You ever wonder why some people last longer than they should?"
"Luck," Kael said.
RX laughed softly. "That's what people who don't see patterns say."
He tapped the side of his illegal optic once. "I do favors. I move things. I make problems… flexible."
Business, Kael thought.
"What do you want?" he asked.
RX shrugged. "Nothing yet."
Then, after a pause—"But when I do, you'll listen. Because listening costs less than refusing."
He stepped back, giving Kael access to his pod. "Sleep. Tomorrow's inspection cycle."
He turned to leave, then glanced back.
"Oh—and AR-1108?"
"Yes?"
RX smiled, thin and sharp. "Don't be exceptional where Overseers can see it."
Then he was gone.
Helios spoke once RX was out of range.
"RX-7754 exhibits opportunistic alignment."
Meaning? Kael asked.
"He will assist when profitable."
Pause.
"He will oppose when profitable."
Kael lay down, staring at the ceiling seam.
Like the system.
The collar pulsed again at 22:11.
A minor correction.
Someone, somewhere, had thought about running.
Kael did not.
He let his thoughts slow. Flatten. Become dull.
Helios adjusted with him, throttling internal processes to reduce detectable variance.
"Suppression efficiency increasing," it noted.
How long can I keep this up? Kael asked.
A pause.
"Indefinitely is inefficient," Helios replied.
Kael closed his eyes.
Outside the dormitory, Tanjung Null continued its endless cycle—machines chewing, water churning, lives measured in output and decay.
And above it all, a system tightened its grip, layer by layer.
Kael was still inside it.
For now.
But for the first time, he understood the shape of his cage.
And cages, he knew, were not designed to hold those who learned how their locks worked.
Not forever.