PROLOGUE
QUEENS, NEW YORK
I waited by the hot dog cart, pretending to eat, pretending to be ordinary.
The woman sat alone on the bench.
Five hours.
That was the rule. Wait until the target felt safe.
My hand rested inside my jacket, wrapped around the gun.
Easy.
Clean.
End it.
Then the child appeared.
A girl ran toward the woman, laughing, and everything inside me stalled. My breath caught. The voices paused — not silent, just distant, like someone holding back a shout.
My finger wouldn't move.
Finish the job, the system urged.
I took the shot.
The gun clicked.
No recoil. No sound.
My vision blurred. Pain sparked behind my eyes.
Again, the voices commanded.
I stepped back instead.
I didn't understand why.
The woman looked at me then. Not afraid. Curious.
"They finally broke you," she said softly.
I turned and walked away.
Behind me, the system screamed.
And for the first time, it wasn't rage I felt.
It was fear.
CHAPTER ONE
The feeling didn't hit like before.
No bloodlust.
No command.
Just absence.
That scared me more than noise ever had.
I walked away from the park with my head down, every sense stretched thin, waiting for the system to correct itself. It always did. Silence was never allowed to last.
But it did.
Each step felt wrong, like walking without gravity. My hand kept drifting toward my jacket, checking the gun out of habit, not need.
You failed, a voice finally said.
Not the system.
My own.
I stopped at the corner and looked back.
The woman was still alive. Sitting exactly where I'd left her. Her daughter stood beside her now, tugging at her sleeve, saying something I couldn't hear.
They hadn't run.
That made no sense.
Targets fled. Targets screamed. Targets didn't sit calmly after surviving an execution window.
I should've left.
Instead, I crossed the street.
The woman noticed me immediately. Her posture didn't change, but her eyes sharpened.
"You're not supposed to be here," she said.
Neither was she.
"I didn't finish," I replied.
Her mouth twitched—not relief. Recognition.
"So it's happening sooner than they said."
My jaw tightened. "Who said?"
She looked at her daughter. "Go play by the fountain, Lisa."
The girl hesitated, then nodded and ran off, shoes slapping against concrete.
Lisa.
The name stuck.
"They told me there might be mistakes," the woman continued. "Glitches. People who hesitate."
"I don't hesitate," I said automatically.
She met my eyes. "You just did."
Something shifted behind my eyes—pressure building, like the system was waking up slowly instead of snapping to attention.
"Walk away," it whispered.
Not an order.
Advice.
I stayed.
"They're watching you now," the woman said quietly. "Not because you failed. Because you didn't panic."
I felt cold.
Targets weren't supposed to know that.
"Who are 'they'?" I asked.
She smiled faintly. "You don't remember, do you?"
Pain flared—sharp, bright, disorienting. I staggered back a step, pressing my fingers into my temple.
Images tried to surface. White rooms. Numbers instead of names. A child crying somewhere far away.
Stop, the system urged.
I obeyed.
When I looked up, the woman was standing.
"You should go," she said. "Before they decide what to do with you."
"And your daughter?" I asked.
Her expression softened. "She'll be fine. She always is."
That didn't reassure me.
I turned away, forcing my legs to move.
Halfway down the block, the pressure returned—not inside my head this time, but around me. Like invisible lines snapping into place.
Surveillance.
I crossed the street again. Changed direction. Reflections in windows shifted a half-second too late.
They were already tracking.
I reached my car and slid inside, breathing slow, controlled. The engine turned over without trouble.
Too easy.
As I pulled into traffic, something moved in the rearview mirror.
The girl.
She stood on the sidewalk, watching me leave. Not crying. Not afraid.
Just… studying.
Our eyes met.
And for a split second, I felt something I didn't have a name for yet.
Recognition.
I drove.
Three blocks later, my dashboard flickered.
A soft chime sounded in my ear.
RECALIBRATION IN PROGRESS.
I slammed the brakes.
The world tilted. My vision blurred at the edges as the system pressed inward, not violent—precise.
You deviated, it said calmly.
Correction required.
My hands shook.
"No," I said out loud.
There was a pause.
Then:
Explain.
That had never happened before.
I swallowed. "I assessed the situation. Termination was no longer optimal."
Silence.
I waited for pain.
Instead:
Acknowledged.
The pressure eased.
I sat there, stunned, heart hammering.
It let me go.
That was worse.
I drove until the city thinned and the sky darkened, my thoughts spiraling in directions I wasn't trained to manage.
Had I convinced it?
Or was this part of the design?
Hours later, I stopped at a gas station off the highway. Bright lights. Cameras. People.
Normal.
I leaned against my car, grounding myself in the cold metal, when I heard a familiar voice behind me.
"Mister?"
I turned.
Lisa stood there, clutching a juice box like it was a shield.
My blood ran cold.
"You shouldn't be here," I said.
She shrugged. "Mom said you looked lost."
I scanned the lot. No signs of pursuit. No tightening pressure. No alarms in my head.
Too quiet.
"Where's your mother?" I asked.
"She stayed behind," Lisa said. "She said you'd help me."
"I won't," I replied instantly.
Lisa frowned. "That's not what your face says."
I stiffened.
She studied me the way kids sometimes do—without fear, without filters.
"You're broken," she said matter-of-factly.
I laughed once. It sounded wrong. "You don't know what that means."
"I do," she said. "My mom says broken things still work. Just not the way they were built."
My chest tightened.
A sound echoed across the station.
Not loud.
Not explosive.
Just the soft click of a car door closing somewhere it shouldn't have.
The system stirred.
Not screaming.
Smiling.
I straightened.
"Get in the car," I said.
Lisa hesitated. "Are you going to hurt me?"
The question landed harder than any command ever had.
"No," I said. "I don't think I can anymore."
She opened the door.
As she climbed in, the pressure returned—not an order.
A warning.
And somewhere deep in my mind, a boy's voice whispered, calm and familiar:
This is where it starts.