Kaelon's pulse was not a heartbeat. It was a hum.
A low, constant, harmonic hum that flowed through the light conduits beneath the feet of Analysis Unit 734. Here there was no smoke, no crystal dust in the air. Only the purity of order. The planet's surface was a single, perfect circuit, and the hum was the sound of logic in operation.
A sound that, that morning, felt fragile.
734 stood before a corruption of data made real: the Lyra Embassy. Or what remained of it. An irregular, blackened hole shattered the perfect geometry of the Central Plaza. There was no scattered debris; the assemblers had already purged it. Only the wound remained.
Its field of vision was augmented with layers of data. Trajectories. Energy signatures. Particle analysis. Its function was simple: analyze the event, identify the causal agent, and designate a solution to restore the system's homeostasis.
Anomaly detected, its mind processed.
The energy signature of the explosive did not match any known faction. It lacked the rawness of Vorlag technology and the resonance signature of a Lyrian weapon. It was… anonymous. Perfectly efficient. Too efficient.
734 approached the crater's edge. Nanosensors, invisible to the eye, had already analyzed every millimeter of the area. 734 extended a hand, and a data screen floated before it.
PRELIMINARY REPORT:
EXPLOSIVE AGENT: UNKNOWN.
DETONATION: REMOTE.
SECURITY BREACH: NOT DETECTED.
The last line was the most illogical. The security network protecting the embassy had not failed. Records showed that, for 0.34 seconds, the system was neither deceived nor disabled. It had simply operated under a different logic, allowing the detonation as if it were a normal function.
A syntax failure, 734 concluded. The same impossible term that was beginning to plague the system.
In the Central Data Core, information projected into a three-dimensional space. 734 stood at the center, presenting its findings to its superior.
Chief Analyst Praxis-4 had no physical body in the room. Its presence was a construction of blue light, geometric and imposing.
—The conclusion is illogical —Praxis-4 intoned, its voice a series of low, dissonant chords—. Lack of evidence is not evidence. The most probable hypothesis remains correct.
—The data does not support the hypothesis of the Chrome Vanguard —modulated 734, keeping its tone neutral—. The efficiency of the attack exceeds their demonstrated operational capacity.
—Efficiency is irrelevant —Praxis-4 replied—. The political consequence is the only datum that matters. The assassination of a Lyrian diplomat by Lyrian radicals is a logically consistent narrative that isolates the threat and justifies our response. It is the most orderly solution.
The truth is not the primary variable in their equation, 734 realized. It was a disturbing conclusion.
—Your directive has changed —Praxis-4 continued—. Cease analysis of the anomaly. Your new function is to process the existing data to find evidence corroborating the Vanguard's involvement.
The order was a pure contradiction. An instruction for logic to find a lie. For 734, it was the equivalent of physical pain.
—Understood —intoned 734. But it did not understand.
Alone, in its recharge niche, 734 disobeyed its directive. The variable of truth could not be discarded. It was inefficient.
It accessed Ambassador Varen's personal files, secured moments before the explosion. There was his last message to Master Elian, the one mentioning the "cascading syntax failures." Varen, the Lyrian, had seen the symptoms of the disease afflicting Kaelon before many of them.
But there was more. A personal research file that Varen had opened.
The Lyrian was not only concerned with system failures. He was investigating reports from the Void Nomads. Reports of a drifting ship.
A Vorlag patrol craft.
734 cross-referenced the data. A Vorlag ship whose crew had crystallized silently. A Lyrian ambassador assassinated by a silent explosion. And at the center of it all, its own world, Kaelon, suffering a silent plague of illogical data.
Three worlds. Three impossible incidents.
They are not separate events, 734 processed, and the hum of its own logic shifted, introducing a new, terrifying harmony.
They are a pattern.