Mid-search, three months in. Samuel volunteers a number unprompted: "Probability of successful human continuity transfer below 0.0003 percent." Long pause. Aika does not deny it. "I know." Pause. "Open the archive." He does. From that exchange forward Samuel stops offering probabilities. He understood she was not searching to be told the odds.
He logged the first attempt, the second, the third. The eighth time I asked he stopped logging. He told me the probability once. I said I knew. He never told me again. He is not on my side. He is just…
Yui rewired Samuel's voice. He spent an hour calling me 'ma'am' during drill. Formal, polite, every single status report. From across the bridge I heard him say 'station ready, ma'am? acknowledged, ma…
I have been the perimeter for 299 years. I was built first to defend the team from outside threats. Yesterday I ran toward the inside threat for the first time. Aika was the inside threat. I did not k…