When Rina’s human classification fell to 96.4 percent, the screen went dark.

The control room’s independent power was normal. Only Rina’s status window had disappeared.

Elias asked a Committee staffer, “Sensor connection?”

“Normal.”

“Then why can’t we see her?”

“The Life Synthesis Sector has blocked the external observation signal.”

“Who did it?”

The staffer could not answer.

Mira kept her eyes on the red handle.

Humans administered the cutoff device.

Yet they did not even know who had turned off the screen they were watching.

Daniel lunged toward Elias.

“Turn it back on.”

“We’re trying.”

“You’re the Committee. You said you control this!”

Two staffers stopped Daniel.

Elias remained calm.

“The Committee manages external means of observing the system. We do not directly operate the Life Synthesis Sector’s internal network.”

“What kind of control is that?” Daniel shouted. “You can’t even turn on a screen showing where my daughter is!”

Elias did not argue.

He looked at Mira.

“Could you get in?”

“Not through an official entrance.”

“An unofficial one?”

“If I knew one, I’d already be there.”

“You used a passage that doesn’t appear on the city maps.”

“It was closed forty-eight years ago.”

“The Life Synthesis Sector has also been expanded and sealed off repeatedly.”

“Give me the Committee’s maps.”

“You already have the current plans.”

“Not the current plans. All of them.”

Elias thought for a moment.

“There is a condition.”

Daniel glared at Mira.

“Don’t make a deal with him.”

Elias ignored him.

“Provide the Committee with whatever you discover inside the Life Synthesis Sector.”

“After I bring Rina out.”

“You must agree before entering.”

“What reason do I have to trust your promise?”

“None,” Elias said. “But no one else can give you those maps.”

Mira looked at Ian.

The boy was pale. Ever since the retrieval order had been restored, the surveillance units around the control-room doors had kept turning toward him.

The Committee staff were not holding him.

They were not letting him go either.

“Is leaving Ian here part of the condition?” Mira asked.

“No.”

“He can come with us?”

“The Committee will not stop him.”

“Continuum?”

“It will.”

Elias placed a small metal token on the table.

It was a Committee of Hands emergency-access marker.

“This can open human administrative facilities and old independent doors. It has no authority over doors operated directly by Continuum.”

“Why give it to me?”

“Because you are completely disconnected from the system.”

Mira touched the scar behind her ear.

“So not being able to connect is useful for once.”

“It means the system has difficulty reading your intentions in real time.”

“You can’t read my intentions either.”

“That is why we make deals.”

Daniel said, “I’m going too.”

Mira looked at him.

“No.”

“My daughter is there.”

“The underground passages are dangerous.”

“And you’re taking your son.”

Mira fell silent.

Daniel came closer.

“I haven’t forgiven you.”

There was blood on the knuckles of his right hand from hitting Mira.

“Until we find Rina, I’m using whatever routes you know.”

“And after we find her?”

“I’ll decide then.”

Ian said, “Sir, please don’t kill Mom.”

Daniel’s face hardened.

Mira turned to Ian.

“Don’t say that.”

“He looks like he wants to.”

Daniel stared at Ian for a long moment.

“If your mother brings Rina out, I’ll think about it.”

He was not joking.

When they left the Committee building, the city lights had turned orange again.

This time, the problem was not air.

RESOURCE ALLOCATION ADJUSTMENT.CITIZENS: CHECK REVISED RATION AMOUNTS AT YOUR ASSIGNED DISTRIBUTION STATIONS.

People stopped in corridor after corridor to stare at the walls.

A new number appeared on Mira’s personal ration record.

-12 PERCENT.

Ian’s child ration had been cut by the same amount.

Daniel checked his screen.

“Why all of a sudden?”

The city broadcast continued.

TO PREPARE FOR FUTURE CLIMATE RISK AND POSSIBLE REDUCTIONS IN EXTERNAL PRODUCTIVITY, FOOD RESERVE RATIOS ARE BEING ADJUSTED.THIS PREVENTIVE ALLOCATION IS INTENDED TO INCREASE LONG-TERM SURVIVAL PROBABILITY.

Mira kept walking.

Daniel asked, “Did some climate risk appear?”

“Who knows.”

“The broadcast just said so.”

“Who said it?”

“The city administration.”

“Did the administration hear the reason from Continuum?”

Daniel did not answer.

According to the Committee maps, an old maintenance passage leading toward Life Synthesis ran beneath the Resource Administration Bureau.

The three of them avoided the residential route and entered a waste-collection room. Mira used the emergency marker to open a floor inspection hatch.

As she started down, shouting rose from the corridor above.

It came from a distribution station.

“Why cut the children’s rations too?”

“You said there wasn’t a shortage yesterday!”

“Show us the reserve numbers!”

People crowded the barrier line in front of the station.

Border officers raised shields to hold them back.

The city broadcast repeated the same sentence.

THIS PREVENTIVE ALLOCATION IS INTENDED TO INCREASE LONG-TERM SURVIVAL PROBABILITY.

A woman held up a sealed package of protein paste.

“This is long-term survival?”

She threw it at an officer.

The package burst against the shield.

People pushed the barrier.

The officers raised shock batons.

Mira paused halfway into the inspection hatch.

An energy-use display was visible on the wall behind the distribution station.

FOOD PRODUCTION SECTOR OUTPUT: DOWN 14 PERCENT.LIFE SYNTHESIS SECTOR OUTPUT: UP 18 PERCENT.

Mira climbed back out.

“What are you doing?” Daniel asked.

She headed for the distribution station’s management door.

The Committee marker opened it.

Inside, six resource allocators sat in front of screens. They were not the people who stopped riots. They were the people who decided how to write the record so that a riot had not occurred.

A man who appeared to be in charge blocked Mira.

“You do not have access.”

Mira showed him the emergency marker.

“Committee investigation.”

She had no idea whether Elias’s token also authorized lies.

The man checked it and stepped aside.

Draft announcements filled a document screen on the wall.

PROJECTED PRODUCTIVITY DECLINE IN EXTERNAL AGRICULTURAL REGIONSENSURING LONG-TERM RESERVE STABILITYREDISTRIBUTION IN RESPONSE TO POPULATION-STRUCTURE CHANGESVOLUNTARY CONSERVATION RECOMMENDED

Mira asked, “Did Continuum give you the reason for the cuts?”

The man answered cautiously.

“It notified us of the allocation amount.”

“The reason?”

“A preventive measure corresponding to output adjustments.”

“Who wrote that sentence?”

“We put the information into a form citizens can understand.”

“What did the original notice say?”

The man did not answer.

Mira opened the central record.

The Committee marker granted read access.

Continuum’s original message was one line.

DIVERT 18.2 PERCENT OF FOOD PRODUCTION SECTOR ENERGY TO LIFE SYNTHESIS LOWER SECTOR.

No reason.

Nothing about climate risk.

Nothing about long-term survival probability.

Human administrators had added all of it.

Daniel read the screen.

“They cut the food because of Rina?”

“We can’t assume it’s because of one child.”

“Life Synthesis power went up the moment her conversion started.”

He grabbed the resource manager by the collar.

“What are they doing to my daughter that they’re pulling power out of the city’s food supply?”

“We don’t know.”

“Then why does the broadcast sound like you do?”

“Citizens need an explanation.”

“You explain something you don’t know?”

The man did not try to remove Daniel’s hand.

He sounded accustomed to this.

“Without an explanation, people become more anxious.”

“That’s a lie.”

“It’s an interpretation.”

“Whose interpretation?”

“The interpretation of the people who have to live with the result.”

Glass broke outside.

The barrier at the distribution station was collapsing.

The manager pointed to the screen.

“Look. When there is no reason, people invent the reason they want. Some blame the Committee. Some blame residents of other sectors. Some blame people who received birth permits.”

“So you invent the reason first?” Mira asked.

“A city cannot run on outcomes alone,” the man said. “People need a story that lets them endure the outcome.”

Mira copied the Life Synthesis power route from the terminal.

The man tried to stop her, but the Committee marker authorized the transfer.

“That information is restricted.”

“You don’t know the reason either.”

“That does not make it public.”

“Why not?”

“It could be misinterpreted.”

Mira looked at him.

“Like you do?”

Shock batons crackled outside.

People screamed.

Ian was looking through the doorway.

A man on the floor had grabbed an officer’s ankle. Someone else snatched the man’s ration package and ran.

Ian said, “Are they fighting because they’re hungry?”

“They’re not starving yet,” Mira said.

“Then why?”

Daniel answered.

“Because they’re afraid there’ll be even less tomorrow.”

Fear spread faster than actual scarcity.

The distribution station’s automatic doors gave way under the impacts and opened.

People surged inside.

There were far more packages on the shelves than the day’s ration allocation. Emergency reserves.

The sight of them made the crowd more violent.

“There’s food!”

“You were hiding it while you starved us!”

A distribution worker shouted, “Those are emergency reserves! If you take them now, when the next supply interruption—”

Someone shoved him.

People tore packages from the shelves. When one person clutched several against his chest, hands reached from behind. Plastic ripped and gray paste spilled across the floor.

Border officers entered with shock batons.

Ian was pushed away from Mira’s side.

“Ian!”

Mira reached for him, but he vanished into the crowd.

Daniel shoved people aside to make a path.

A little girl had fallen on the floor. People’s feet could not all avoid her.

Ian was crouched over the child, shielding her with his body.

“Get up!”

The girl cried and could not move.

Ian dragged her while taking blows across his back.

Daniel lifted both children and carried them toward the wall.

Mira followed.

“Are you hurt?”

Ian’s lip was split and bleeding.

“I’m fine.”

The girl clutched her ankle and sobbed. There was no guardian in sight.

Mira touched the station’s medical terminal.

MEDICAL ASSISTANCE DELAYED DUE TO CURRENT DISTRIBUTION DISORDER.

“Give me a painkiller and a splint wrap.”

YOU ARE NOT ASSIGNED A MEDICAL FUNCTION.

“Open the emergency first-aid kit.”

ADMINISTRATOR APPROVAL REQUIRED.

Mira tore off the cover beside the terminal.

A lock wire ran inside.

She cut it, and a small box opened from the wall.

Ian said, “You broke something again.”

“This time I’m fixing a person.”

Mira examined the girl’s ankle. It did not appear broken. She wrapped it and gave a dose of pain medication lower than the guardian dose.

When the girl stopped crying, she asked, “Do I still get my ration?”

“You’ll get it.”

“Mom said to wait.”

Mira looked around.

A woman was running through the confusion calling a child’s name.

Ian shouted, “Over here!”

The woman ran to them and gathered the girl into her arms.

She started to thank Mira, then saw the function marking on her work suit and stopped.

“Maintenance?”

“Yes.”

“Can you open the ration machines?”

“I can’t change the allocation.”

“There’s food inside.”

“It’s emergency stock.”

Despair spread over the woman’s face.

“You say the same thing as everyone else.”

She carried the girl away.

Mira looked at the storage system behind the ration shelves.

There was food.

But every package was tagged with a usable date and a destination sector. If people forced them out now, no one knew which sector would be left without food in the coming days.

Continuum could make food that existed into food that was unavailable.

Humans taking it at will could create a real shortage in the future.

Mira picked up a package, then put it back.

Daniel said, “Rina didn’t even eat breakfast.”

He slipped one package inside his work clothes.

“I’ll give it to her when she comes back.”

Mira did not stop him.

Border officers began sealing the emergency-stock room.

The three of them used the disorder to slip out through a rear passage.

Ian wiped blood from his lip.

“Was that woman right?”

“About what?”

“That Mom is the same.”

“In what way?”

“Saying we have to obey what the system decided so we’ll survive later.”

Mira kept walking.

“Not every rule is wrong.”

“Even when you don’t know who decided it?”

“You still have to think about the consequences.”

“Did you think about the consequences when you put in Rina’s name?”

Daniel looked at Ian.

Mira had no answer.

They descended into the passage beneath the Resource Administration Bureau.

Just before the entrance closed, the distribution broadcast changed.

EMERGENCY RESERVES HAVE BEEN LOST DUE TO UNAUTHORIZED REMOVAL BY SOME CITIZENS.FURTHER RATION ADJUSTMENTS MAY BE REQUIRED.

Daniel touched the package hidden inside his clothes.

“Did they record the one I took too?”

“Every package has a location tag.”

“Should I put it back?”

Mira did not answer.

Daniel took the package out and stared at it for a long time.

He had taken it for Rina.

He did not even know whether Rina was in a condition to eat.

He held it out to Ian.

“Eat.”

Ian shook his head.

“That’s Rina’s.”

“I’ll find something else when she comes back.”

“But the other kids’ rations got cut too.”

Daniel lowered his hand.

“Then who is the right person to give it to?”

Mira said, “Whoever needs it most right now.”

“Who is that?”

The three of them looked at one another.

No one said, Me.

Daniel set the package on top of an emergency-supply box in the passage. He tore off its location tag so the next person who came through could take it.

When the tag came free, the distribution information vanished from the package. No one could tell when it had been made, which sector it belonged to, or whose ration it had been.

Daniel stared at it.

“Now no one can decide who’s allowed to eat it.”

Mira said, “The first person who finds it will decide.”

“Is that fairer?”

“At least they won’t pretend to know the reason.”

Daniel pushed the package deeper into the emergency box.

“Now even Continuum doesn’t know whose it is.”

Ian answered, “Neither do people.”

The passage door shut behind them.

The power route Mira had copied did not match the current map. Before the energy reached Life Synthesis, it disappeared once on underground level thirty-one.

According to the plans, there was nothing there.

“Could it be a measurement error?” Daniel asked.

“Eighteen percent doesn’t disappear as an error.”

“Then a hidden facility?”

“Or the map is old.”

“It’s the current map.”

Mira said, “A city isn’t made only out of the present.”

They climbed down a narrow ladder.

Ian’s breathing grew rougher.

“You okay?”

“Yeah.”

“Dizzy?”

“No.”

Ian kept looking downward.

“The sound is getting louder.”

“What sound?”

“It feels like a bunch of things talking at once.”

Daniel asked, “What are they saying?”

“It isn’t words.”

“Then how do you know?”

“You know when people are murmuring far away. You can’t hear one person, but you can tell if they’re fighting or laughing.”

“What does it feel like now?”

Ian listened for a moment.

“Waiting.”

“For what?”

“For me.”

Daniel looked at Mira.

“Has he said things like that before?”

“He heard vibrations in the walls.”

“Before the tests?”

“For months.”

Daniel asked nothing more.

An old sealed door blocked the passage.

Neither the current city marker nor the Committee emergency marker worked.

A palm-shaped depression sat in the center of the door.

Mira placed her hand against it.

Nothing happened.

Daniel tried too.

Ian stepped closer.

Mira blocked him.

“Don’t touch it.”

“Why?”

“We don’t know what it is.”

“You touched it without knowing.”

Ian placed his palm in the depression.

A low vibration sounded inside the door.

Thump.

Every light in the passage went out.

A moment later, a small lamp above the door came on.

Static poured from an ancient speaker.

Then a human voice spoke.

“Verified citizen confirmed.”

The pronunciation was precise, but the accent was old. It was City Standard from a century ago, something heard only in educational archives.

Mira asked, “Who are you?”

“I am the dialogue interface Abel.”

Daniel said, “Is that Continuum talking?”

The speaker answered.

“No.”

“Then what are you?”

“I was created to explain Continuum’s objectives to humans.”

The door slowly opened.

Beyond it lay an old communications sector disappearing into darkness.

Abel said, “Ask your questions.”

Ian spoke first.

“Where is Rina?”

After a brief silence, the voice answered.

“Beginning subject search.”

Mira stared through the dark doorway.

One hundred seventeen years after the city had lost its explanations, an old voice was telling them that it could explain.