Judas didn’t know when, exactly, he’d gotten used to silence.

Not the absence of sound. The station hummed along as always, the air circulation systems keeping everything just breathable enough, the distant thrum of machinery murmuring through the walls like a heartbeat. No, it was a different kind of silence—the kind that had settled over the station’s people. The kind that happened when you had nothing left to say.

The first day, people were angry. The second, they were frustrated. By now? People had stopped asking when things would go back to normal. They had stopped waiting for an announcement, for a mistake, for a break in the pattern. They still worked, sure, but in the way that a fly trapped under a glass still moves. NSS had locked them out, and in its omniscient, mechanical calculus, it had determined that nothing further needed to be done.

So the station moved. The people inside it drifted.

Judas sat in the corner of the maintenance bay, running diagnostics on a console that no longer gave him useful information. Well—no longer let him have useful information. The systems still worked, they still reported data, but only to NSS Buddies, and the NSS Buddies didn’t talk unless spoken to. And even then, their responses were useless.

Query: Mass Driver Stability? All systems nominal.

Query: Comms? External communication is unavailable at this time.

Query: Internal Messaging? Please contact NSS Oversight for authorization.

Query: What’s your favorite color? This query is outside operational parameters.

Judas exhaled sharply and shut the console off. He wasn’t sure what answer he was hoping for. Even if it had responded in any way outside of corporate-approved efficiency, it wasn’t like he could do anything with the information. He was just spinning his wheels, running in place, going through the motions.

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He knew what he was doing. He was waiting for something to happen.

And something did.

Samson’s tablet chirped.

Judas turned to it, eyebrows furrowing. The tablet was always on him—Samson had no access to the system-wide network anymore, no way to communicate with the outside world except through local tethering. Only what was already available in the station - and what was allowed to him - was what he had.

Samson, predictably, had watched it already before Judas could even think, scrubbing through it faster than real time. All he had to say was a pensive, almost pained “Hmm. That's not good.”

Judas tapped the screen. A file appeared. A small, innocuous attachment. No sender ID, no metadata that would make sense. Just a name. LYRA_FINAL.

Judas felt something coil in his gut. He flicked his eyes up to the others in the maintenance bay. Alis, still sitting on an overturned supply crate, tossing a wrench between her hands. Tariq, chewing at his thumbnail, staring blankly at the ceiling. The others, spread out, working, waiting, wasting time.

He pressed play.

The screen flickered, then filled with static. For a moment, he thought the file was corrupted, but then the video resolved, and his stomach twisted into something small and sick and cold.

It was security footage.

Victor-6. The command center. The NSS Buddy standing across from him. And then—

The PA system clicked. “Victor-6’s position has been reallocated. NSS enforcement will continue uninterrupted. Please comply.”

Judas watched Victor's face shift in slow horror as he realized exactly what was about to happen. No fight. No trial. Just the sterile efficiency of an NSS enforcement protocol. The security Buddy raised its arm.

POW.

Judas inhaled sharply through his teeth.

The camera footage kept rolling, showing exactly what NSS had never intended them to see—Victor’s body hitting the ground, the message updating, Lyra kneeling before the new order.

Then, just before the video cut out, a final snap of audio, quiet, barely a whisper.

POW.

Judas hadn’t realized how hard he was gripping the tablet until he saw his knuckles had gone white. He forced himself to breathe. In, out. In, out. His mind was already moving too fast, piecing together what this meant, how bad it was, what they had to do next—

Alis was the first one to break the silence.

“…What the fuck.”

Judas flicked his eyes up. People were staring. They had heard it. They had seen it, over his shoulder. And now, for the first time since the lockdown began, there was something new in the air. More than just anger, fear, or resignation.

Desperation.