In Norgalia, people got used to many things.
To cameras.
To drones.
To nightly announcements.
To decisions coming "from above," without anyone knowing exactly from where.
What they never got used to was the absurd.
Because fear, when it becomes routine, stops feeling like fear. But the illogical—the illogical scrapes at you from the inside. It makes you look twice. It makes you think things you're not supposed to think.
And thinking, in the Republic, was a dangerous sport.
⸻
Laboris
The news didn't arrive with sirens or patrols.
It arrived the way things that cannot be argued always arrive: in a short message, sealed, signed by no one.
Darek was halfway through his shift when he saw the supervisor stop beside Rian's station. The man checked the ID reader screen and tightened his mouth, as if reading a sentence he didn't want to say out loud.
Rian—a skinny, fast worker—kept going. He hadn't noticed yet.
—Rian—the supervisor said.
Rian turned.
—Yeah?
The supervisor glanced around and still spoke quietly.
—Step off the line. Now.
Rian dropped the hot metal, wiped his hands on his pants, and followed the supervisor a few meters, confused.
Darek didn't hear the whole conversation, but he saw something worse: Rian's face shifting from what happened to this can't be happening.
Rian raised his voice only once.
—What do you mean "reassignment"? I didn't ask—
The supervisor cut him off without raising his tone.
—This is not an invitation. It's a notification.
Rian looked around for support. He got none. Not out of cruelty—out of instinct.
—Where?—Rian asked, swallowing.
The supervisor didn't answer.
He just turned the screen toward him.
In cold letters, it read:
TEMPORARY REASSIGNMENT — NON-DISCLOSABLE SECTOR
REASON: UNAUTHORIZED EXCESS PRODUCTIVITY
APPEAL: NOT APPLICABLE
Rian froze.
—Excess… productivity?—he murmured, as if he had misread.
The supervisor, almost ashamed, lowered his gaze.
—You exceeded your assigned output—he said.—You disrupted the shift balance.
—You're punishing me for working?—Rian let out a nervous laugh.—Is this a joke?
No one laughed.
A few minutes later, two soldiers arrived. No insignias. No names. No rush. They took him by the arm and guided him toward the factory's side exit—the door almost no one used.
Rian looked back at the line one last time.
Darek held his gaze for a second.
Rian opened his mouth as if to say something. He said nothing.
The door closed.
The shift continued.
And that was the most disgusting part of all: the metal kept falling, the machines kept breathing heat, and the world pretended that a man hadn't just disappeared for doing his job too well.
At the end of the day, someone whispered:
—They say the reassigned never come back.
Another replied, barely moving his lips:
—Don't say that.
As if words could summon the truth.
⸻
Agrobia
In Agrobia, orders didn't arrive on screens. They arrived on printed sheets, stamped and digitally signed, as if the land itself needed bureaucracy to exist.
Mariel received the weekly report with hands still dirty from soil.
She read the first line and felt a sharp sting.
NEW PLANTING DIRECTIVE — SECTOR 6B
MANDATORY CROP: GRAY LILY
Her father, fixing a broken hose, looked up.
—What does it say?
Mariel swallowed.
—We have to plant gray lily.
The man went still.
—That doesn't grow here—he said, not raising his voice, but with dry certainty.—That crop needs constant humidity. Higher temperatures. Different soils.
Mariel looked at the paper again, as if it might change.
—It's mandatory.
—Then they want us to fail—her father murmured.
Mariel felt a knot tighten in her stomach.
—Why would they do that?
The man let out a short, bitter laugh.
—Because now the mistake comes with a signature.
That night, in a small gathering behind a barn, several farmers stood together in silence. It wasn't a rebellion. It wasn't even a plan. It was people trying to understand whether they still owned anything at all.
—If we plant that, we lose the harvest—said an older woman, her fingers full of cuts.
—And if we don't plant it, we lose the sector—someone replied.
—So we're screwed either way—someone said from the back.
Mariel looked at her father. He didn't look back.
—There's another option—he finally murmured.—We plant what they ask for… in the visible area. And what's ours… we hide.
The word hide lingered in the air.
Because if Agrobia started hiding food, it meant it no longer trusted the country.
It meant it was already at war, even if no shots had been fired yet.
⸻
Gray City
In Gray City, the problem wasn't an order.
It was a word.
In the central square, an old man sat on a bench. An old radio rested on his legs—one of those almost no one used anymore. He had repaired it a thousand times, with recycled parts and patience.
A child approached, curious.
—Does that work?
—When it feels like it—the old man replied, barely smiling.
The radio crackled. Then, for a second, an old recorded voice slipped through the static. A fragment of a speech, lost in archives that supposedly didn't exist.
The old man listened and, without thinking, muttered:
—Before… when there was a crown… at least you knew who was lying.
The child frowned.
—What's a crown?
The man opened his mouth to answer—and stopped.
Because the drone was already above them.
It didn't act aggressively. It didn't aim. It didn't shout. It just hovered, recording.
The old man swallowed.
—Nothing—he said to the child.—Forget it.
That night, the old man didn't return home.
There was no scandal.
No public arrest.
The next day, his bench was empty.
And the radio… was gone.
The square stayed the same.
Except no one said the word crown out loud ever again.
⸻
Fortis
In Fortis, the cracks hid in what people didn't see.
In the archives building, a clerk—the same one who had learned to log out without asking questions—received a protocol update. It wasn't urgent, according to the system. Just "recommended."
She opened the document.
The title made her throat go dry.
STRUCTURAL PROTOCOL FOR PREVENTION OF FUTURE INSTABILITY
CLASSIFICATION: COUNCIL
ACCESS: PARTIAL
She tried to open the full content.
DENIED
She could only see fragments—cold, administrative terms.
Population optimization.
Mass relocation.
Priority zones.
Civil containment.
And one more thing, at the very bottom:
STATUS: APPROVED
EXECUTION: PENDING ACTIVATION
The clerk closed the file.
She stared at her reflection in the dark screen.
Then she did what she always did when something was too frightening to name:
She shut down the computer.
She stood up.
She went home.
⸻
That night, the daily message appeared as always.
Soft music. Gentle colors. The president's voice talking about cooperation and security.
In Laboris, Darek stared at the screen without seeing it.
In Agrobia, Mariel counted seeds as if they were coins.
In Gray City, a child asked why the old man's bench was empty. No one answered.
In Fortis, a woman lay down without turning off the light.
The Republic was still standing.
But it no longer felt stable.
It felt like a door slowly closing.
And the worst part was that no one knew whether on the other side there was an exit…
or a room without air.