By morning, nothing official had changed.
No announcement.
No update.
No public acknowledgment that Level 14 had even happened.
That was the first tell.
If Oversight had secured leverage, they would have framed it.
If they had felt threatened, they would have corrected it.
Silence meant uncertainty.
And uncertainty, inside a system built on projection, was friction.
Dreyden didn't look different when he stepped into the outer courtyard at 07:18.
That was intentional.
Same coat.
Same measured pace.
Same lack of urgency.
But he did not sit in his usual rotation.
He did not stand at any cluster longer than fifteen seconds.
He did not occupy a center of gravity.
Lucas noticed immediately.
"You're drifting," Lucas said quietly as they walked separate but parallel paths along the west corridor.
"Diffusion," Dreyden corrected.
Lucas kept his eyes forward. "That makes you harder to monitor."
"Yes."
"It also makes you harder to follow."
"Yes."
"That's risky."
