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TERMINATION AUTHORIZED IF RECOVERY CANNOT BE GUARANTEED.

I read it twice.

Not because the instruction was unclear.

I had received termination orders before.

I had carried them out against males I respected, citizens who believed themselves untouchable, and targets whose guilt I never personally witnessed because the evidence belonged to compartments above mine.

I had never required certainty.

I required valid authorization.

And this authorization was valid.

The problem was that the target still did not fit.

Human.

Laboratory worker.

No operational history.

I expanded the image of her on my screen, though I knew better than to think a photograph could reveal danger. Danger rarely wore the face inexperienced males expected. What bothered me wasn’t the woman herself, but the construction of the file. Too much accusation layered over too little substantive evidence.

I pulled up the access log tied to the security breach and found it filled with routine archive entries, compatibility files, and deceased-warrior records. But then I saw them. Restricted biological identifiers. That category changed everything.

I leaned back. Whoever she was, she had touched something protected. Perhaps without knowing what it was, perhaps with intent. Either way, intent did not remove risk, and the file gave me no way to decide which possibility was true. The console chimed again, and an encrypted command channel opened. No image came through, only audio.

“Ghost.”

I recognized the voice, though the distortion of the Veil channel made it impossible to place. That was by design. Every vocal marker scrubbed, every syllable flattened into the same encrypted monotone.

“I am listening.”

“The Mercer assignment is immediate.”

“I have received it.”

“Then proceed.”

I turned back to the file on my screen and let a moment pass before I spoke. “She remains inside the central settlement.”

“Yes.”

“Why deploy Veil assets?” A laboratory worker, in a secured district, surrounded by civilian traffic—ordinary recovery protocols existed for exactly that scenario. They could’ve sent a regular bounty hunter.

Silence. Not long. Long enough.

“Because ordinary recovery is no longer advised.”

The answer told me nothing. I said nothing, and let the channel hold.

The voice on the channel continued, its flat tone giving nothing away. “She has accessed material beyond her authorization. We do not know what she retained or whether copies exist.”

“Has she attempted transmission?” I asked, watching the star-charts shift on my console.

“Unknown.”