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Chapter 5 - The Impossible Assignment
The briefing room is a perfect, featureless cube of sterile white walls and polished chrome, a space meticulously designed to be unmemorable and to offer no tactical advantages. There are no windows, only the faint, almost subliminal hum of sophisticated surveillance equipment that I can feel in my teeth. My handler does not introduce themself. They remain a ghostly silhouette, their face and voice completely obscured by advanced cloaking technology, a true ghost in the system who now holds my future and my dream of escape in their intangible hands. Their presence fills the small room, a palpable aura of cold, professional, and absolute authority.
“The payment you received earlier confirms your acceptance of this assignment,” the distorted, synthesized voice says, devoid of any human inflection. “The risk involved is commensurate with the reward. Failure, let me be clear, is not an option.”
On the polished chrome table that separates us, a small, black, military-grade data case sits. With a gesture, the handler bids me to open it. Inside is a single, encrypted data chip. “The target is a man named Kieran Voss,” the handler continues as I retrieve the chip. “Your assignment is to erase a single, classified memory from his mind. The specifics of the memory itself are not your concern. The file on this chip will provide its precise location and temporal signature within his consciousness. You will remove it completely, leaving no trace of the original event or of your intrusion.”
I slot the chip into my reader, and the file unfolds across my screen in a cascade of heavily encrypted code. My fingers fly across the holographic interface, my own custom decryption software slicing through the layers of security with practiced ease. The details provided are sparse but simultaneously chilling. The target is a Truthspeaker.
I feel a knot of ice form and tighten deep in my gut. Tampering with the mind of a Truthspeaker is not just illegal under a dozen different city statutes; it is considered a capital offense, with the sentence carried out swiftly and without appeal. Their minds are genetically engineered to be perfect, incorruptible, and living recorders of objective fact. They are walking, talking archives, the most valuable and protected assets of the state. To even attempt to manipulate one is a suicidal act of the highest order.
“He’s a Truthspeaker,” I state, my voice a marvel of control, betraying none of my internal shock. “Their minds are hardwired with neurological safeguards. What you are asking is impossible.”
“For most, yes,” the handler replies, the distorted voice showing no change in tone. “But your professional reputation suggests you are capable of the impossible. That is precisely why you were chosen. And it is why you were paid so generously.”
The money. The dream of an exit. My gaze falls back to the file, to the cold, clinical details of the man whose life I am now meant to irrevocably violate. Kieran Voss. Age twenty-nine. A linguistic analyst for the Memory Control Bureau. He lives a solitary existence in a high-security apartment in the city’s affluent Crystal District. The memory I am tasked to erase involves a classified incident that occurred at a Bureau facility three weeks ago.
And then, I see his photograph.
The sterile, white world of the briefing room seems to fall away, leaving only his face. It is not the hardened, cynical face of a government agent I had expected. His dark hair falls untidily across his forehead, and his eyes, a soft, thoughtful, and intelligent gray, seem to hold a profound and weary sadness. There is a gentleness in his expression, a quiet quality of loneliness that feels startlingly, achingly familiar, a silent ache that mirrors something buried deep within myself. In a city of hard, guarded faces, his is open, vulnerable, and unbearably human. The recognition hits me like a physical blow, stealing the very air from my lungs. This is no longer an abstract target, a collection of data points on a screen. This is a person.
The sheer, audacious challenge of the job pulls at my professional pride. To be the one who successfully breached a Truthspeaker’s mind would make my reputation legendary in the underground. But as I continue to look at Kieran’s photograph, another, far more dangerous thought takes root in my mind. A man who looks like this, a man who lives his entire life in a world of enforced, immutable honesty, what could he possibly have seen that was so dangerous? What truth did he witness that the state now wants to bury forever? In that instant, my motivation shifts. The money is still the key, the only path to my escape, but now a fierce, protective, and dangerous curiosity burns alongside it. I need to know what they want to take from him. I need to understand the secret that is hidden behind those thoughtful gray eyes.
“I’ll do it,” I say, my voice impossibly steady. The decision feels exactly like stepping off the edge of a cliff into a dark, unknown abyss. This job could set me up for life. It could also very well be the last one I ever take. But looking at Kieran’s face, I know with a sudden, chilling certainty that I have no other choice.
“The payment you received earlier confirms your acceptance of this assignment,” the distorted, synthesized voice says, devoid of any human inflection. “The risk involved is commensurate with the reward. Failure, let me be clear, is not an option.”
On the polished chrome table that separates us, a small, black, military-grade data case sits. With a gesture, the handler bids me to open it. Inside is a single, encrypted data chip. “The target is a man named Kieran Voss,” the handler continues as I retrieve the chip. “Your assignment is to erase a single, classified memory from his mind. The specifics of the memory itself are not your concern. The file on this chip will provide its precise location and temporal signature within his consciousness. You will remove it completely, leaving no trace of the original event or of your intrusion.”
I slot the chip into my reader, and the file unfolds across my screen in a cascade of heavily encrypted code. My fingers fly across the holographic interface, my own custom decryption software slicing through the layers of security with practiced ease. The details provided are sparse but simultaneously chilling. The target is a Truthspeaker.
I feel a knot of ice form and tighten deep in my gut. Tampering with the mind of a Truthspeaker is not just illegal under a dozen different city statutes; it is considered a capital offense, with the sentence carried out swiftly and without appeal. Their minds are genetically engineered to be perfect, incorruptible, and living recorders of objective fact. They are walking, talking archives, the most valuable and protected assets of the state. To even attempt to manipulate one is a suicidal act of the highest order.
“He’s a Truthspeaker,” I state, my voice a marvel of control, betraying none of my internal shock. “Their minds are hardwired with neurological safeguards. What you are asking is impossible.”
“For most, yes,” the handler replies, the distorted voice showing no change in tone. “But your professional reputation suggests you are capable of the impossible. That is precisely why you were chosen. And it is why you were paid so generously.”
The money. The dream of an exit. My gaze falls back to the file, to the cold, clinical details of the man whose life I am now meant to irrevocably violate. Kieran Voss. Age twenty-nine. A linguistic analyst for the Memory Control Bureau. He lives a solitary existence in a high-security apartment in the city’s affluent Crystal District. The memory I am tasked to erase involves a classified incident that occurred at a Bureau facility three weeks ago.
And then, I see his photograph.
The sterile, white world of the briefing room seems to fall away, leaving only his face. It is not the hardened, cynical face of a government agent I had expected. His dark hair falls untidily across his forehead, and his eyes, a soft, thoughtful, and intelligent gray, seem to hold a profound and weary sadness. There is a gentleness in his expression, a quiet quality of loneliness that feels startlingly, achingly familiar, a silent ache that mirrors something buried deep within myself. In a city of hard, guarded faces, his is open, vulnerable, and unbearably human. The recognition hits me like a physical blow, stealing the very air from my lungs. This is no longer an abstract target, a collection of data points on a screen. This is a person.
The sheer, audacious challenge of the job pulls at my professional pride. To be the one who successfully breached a Truthspeaker’s mind would make my reputation legendary in the underground. But as I continue to look at Kieran’s photograph, another, far more dangerous thought takes root in my mind. A man who looks like this, a man who lives his entire life in a world of enforced, immutable honesty, what could he possibly have seen that was so dangerous? What truth did he witness that the state now wants to bury forever? In that instant, my motivation shifts. The money is still the key, the only path to my escape, but now a fierce, protective, and dangerous curiosity burns alongside it. I need to know what they want to take from him. I need to understand the secret that is hidden behind those thoughtful gray eyes.
“I’ll do it,” I say, my voice impossibly steady. The decision feels exactly like stepping off the edge of a cliff into a dark, unknown abyss. This job could set me up for life. It could also very well be the last one I ever take. But looking at Kieran’s face, I know with a sudden, chilling certainty that I have no other choice.
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