The record didn't disappear overnight.
That had been his quiet hope—that whatever his mind had conjured up would fade by morning. Stress reaction. Sleep deprivation. A temporary glitch.
Something explainable.
He opened his eyes and knew immediately that wasn't going to happen.
The ceiling was the same. The crack was still there. And at the edge of his vision, calm and patient, the words waited.
Record initialized.
He let out a slow breath.
"Still here," he muttered.
No response.
He went through his routine again, but this time he paid attention to things he normally did on autopilot.
Long shower or quick one.
Coffee or skip.
Phone in hand or face down on the counter.
None of it felt important. But noticing made everything heavier, like suddenly becoming aware of your own footsteps.
The record didn't comment.
On the walk to work, he tried something small.
He took a different route.
No real reason. Just curiosity. A minor deviation that shouldn't matter.
Nothing happened.
A block later, he crossed the street earlier than usual and cut through a quieter stretch of road lined with closed storefronts. The city felt slower there. Less polished.
Still nothing.
"So you're not tracking everything," he said under his breath.
That was… reassuring.
At the office, the record stayed silent through emails and routine tasks. It didn't react when he finished something early. Didn't care when he stared at an unfinished report longer than he should have.
For a while, he almost forgot it was there.
Then, just before lunch, the text shifted.
Not abruptly. Not like a notification.
It simply updated, as if it had been waiting.
Behavior pattern confirmed.
His fingers hovered above the keyboard.
Pattern.
He leaned back, jaw tightening. There was no accusation in the phrasing. No judgment.
Just statement of facts.
And that made it hard to argue with.
Lunch came and went the way it always did—fast, distracted, already thinking about the afternoon. The record didn't care.
But when a meeting ran long and his energy dipped, something changed.
The urge to bail crept in.
Tell himself he'd finish tomorrow. Mentally clock out and coast.
The thought was familiar. Comfortable.
And for the first time, the record reacted before he acted.
Avoidance detected.
He stared at the words.
They were right.
He closed the useless browser tab he'd been half-scrolling and went back to the document. The work wasn't inspired. It wasn't clean.
But it got done.
A minute after he saved the file, the text updated again.
Action logged.
That was it.
No praise. No reward.Nothing.
Just confirmation.
On the ride home, he watched people through the reflection in the train window—tired faces, scrolling thumbs, quiet resignation.
He wondered how many of them felt stuck.
And how many of them would ever notice.
That night, lying in bed, he stared at the ceiling crack again.
Just before sleep took him, one final line appeared.
Consistency pending.
He frowned.
Pending meant unfinished.
It meant tomorrow mattered.
And for once, that thought didn't feel like a threat.