Juy-947 -

Kaelen closed his eyes. The Reprocessing chair didn't fire. The Enforcers didn't move. And somewhere in the vast, silent heart of the Collective, a single, faulty drone extended a grimy claw and gently, clumsily, tried to catch a beam of light.

Kaelen looked past him, through the small, reinforced window of the chamber. Far down the central corridor, he saw a Harvester Drone stop moving. Another. Then three more. They weren't harvesting. They were just… standing. Waiting. juy-947

"I gave it a question," Kaelen said. "It used to only have answers. Now it has to ask itself: 'What is joy?'" Kaelen closed his eyes

The supervisor's face went pale. Because behind him, the alarms stopped. The red light bled back to blue. But the hum of the servers didn't return to its cold, efficient pitch. It wavered, stumbled, and then—softly, impossibly—began to hum a tune. And somewhere in the vast, silent heart of