The outdated pop music became background noise after a while. Most people either stopped noticing after a few weeks or went quietly mad and learned to live with it. Bert mostly treated it as a reminder that he was never going to be let down or given up on. By who, he wasn't entirely sure. Whatever the song was, it had apparently been emotionally devastating in the late eighties.
That, combined with the fluorescent tubes overhead humming at a pitch somewhere between fly and mosquito, made for a unique working environment. After eight hours beneath them, Bert's skin always looked faintly waxy, like he'd been preserved rather than employed.
He scanned another box and the scanner chirped.
Bubblegum and carrot soda.
He placed it on the shelf between the ‘Tastes Like’ ginger beer and the sugar-free artificial lemonade that tasted like regret.
It was 29p, though.
Sometimes, while stocking shelves, he'd catch himself staring at the endless rows that never seemed to stay full, listening to the buzz above him and wondering whether human beings were ever actually designed to spend eight hours a day filling empty spaces beneath artificial daylight.
The answer was probably no.
But the alternative was unemployment, and unemployment didn't pay for tortilla chips or the streaming service he used to watch Sarcastic Detective.
Priorities.
The store speakers beeped overhead, asking for someone to clean up a spill in Aisle 4, and reminded him he'd drifted off again.
Bert sighed and scanned the box once more.
"Bubblegum and carrot soda," he muttered. "A truly thriving civilisation."
No one paid him any attention. That was one of the things he liked about supermarket work. People generally left you alone unless they needed to know where the pesto sauce was.
The scanner chirped.
BATTERY LOW.
Bert shoved the pallet forward with his foot, feeling the familiar resistance of cheap plastic wheels against linoleum that had been mopped too many times and cleaned not quite enough.
Above him, the lights dimmed.
Just slightly. Barely noticeable.
Then one of them flickered—a brief stutter, like a heartbeat skipping.
Bert paused, hand hovering over the next box.
For a brief second the entire aisle seemed to stutter in white flashes, the products on the shelves losing definition beneath the strobing light.
Then it steadied again.
Bert stood completely still.
Something about it felt wrong.
Not dangerous.
Familiar.
Like hearing half a remembered song through a wall.
He stared at the light for longer than was reasonable.
"You alright there, Bert?"
He glanced over. Al from fruit and veg was heading towards the break room, already opening his can of iced coffee.
It was ten in the morning.
"Yeah," Bert said.
"You were just standing there staring at the lights."
"I do that sometimes."
Al nodded like that explained everything.
"Well, it makes you look weird, little brother."
Bert continued scanning, trying to ignore the faint unease settling in his chest like cold water.
Black pepper.
Ramen.
Earl Grey tea.
Air freshener.
Dish soap.
The rhythm of it was almost meditative. Scan, place, scan, place. The same motion repeated until his wrist ached and his thoughts drifted somewhere else entirely.
He wondered briefly what he could do with the last can of beans in his cupboard.
Beans on chips, maybe.
Then he wondered how beans would taste on crisps.
Probably terrible.
He'd still try it.
That train of thought was interrupted by the sudden and deeply annoying reminder that he still hadn't watched the season finale of Sarcastic Detective because the streaming service had crashed halfway through episode seven last night.
That bothered him significantly more than the flickering lights.
Which was probably a sign of something.
Bert glanced down at the scanner again.
Still low battery.
The red light blinked at him accusingly.
"Sod it," he muttered. "Break time."
Mostly because he wanted coffee. Partly because winding Al up was one of the few joys still available to modern civilisation.
The break room smelled faintly of burnt toast and industrial floor cleaner—the kind that promised to eliminate 99.9% of bacteria but mostly just made everything smell vaguely chemical with a hint of artificial candyfloss.
Someone had left a half-eaten sandwich on the counter beside the microwave.
It had been there since last Friday.
It was now Tuesday.
Al was already sitting at the table eating crisps while scrolling through his phone, the empty iced coffee can beside him like a small monument to success.
"You haven't drunk that already?" Bert asked, nodding towards the can.
"Don't worry, little brother," Al said without looking up. "It's only my third. The kettle'll boil in a second."
As if on cue, the kettle clicked.
Bert laughed quietly.
"That's genuinely upsetting."
"I've evolved beyond needing sleep," Al said proudly.
"You've evolved into a health crisis."
Al grinned.
"Same thing."
Bert reached for two mugs from the cupboard above the sink. One had a faded logo for an insurance company that no longer existed. The other said WORLD'S BEST DAD in letters that were peeling off.
Neither of them were fathers.
The lights flickered again.
Both of them looked up.
This time it lasted longer. A full second of stuttering white light that made the break room feel suddenly colder, like the walls had thinned and something vast and empty was pressing against them from the other side.
Then it steadied.
"When's Kevin actually gonna replace those?" Bert asked, trying to keep his voice casual as he reached for the coffee jar.
"He says he's waiting for a delivery," Al replied, still looking at the ceiling. "Apparently they've gotta be a certain brand to make them company standard."
Bert snorted and started spooning aggressively average own-brand coffee into the mugs. The granules looked like they'd been designed by someone who'd heard about coffee but never actually tasted it.
"Corporate loyalty," he said.
"Corporate bulk discount," Al corrected.
Bert poured the water and watched the steam rise beneath the fluorescent lights.
For a moment he felt oddly disconnected from the room, like he was watching himself from somewhere else. A man making instant coffee in a break room that smelled like chemicals and failure beneath lights that flickered for reasons nobody could quite explain.
Then the feeling passed.
Probably low blood sugar.
Or a brain tumour.
Those were the two options the internet usually offered.
He carried the mugs over and sat opposite Al.
"What you reading?"
Al turned the phone around slightly.
"Apparently a bunch of phone companies are getting complaints about flickering screens. Turns out they all use parts from the same manufacturer."
He scrolled down.
"Look at this. People saying their phones flicker at random times. Some bloke in Manchester says his went completely white for like ten seconds."
Al chuckled.
"And people still fight over which phone's best. They're like cults."
Bert nodded slowly, staring at the article.
The rational explanation was right there.
Faulty parts. Manufacturing defect.
Simple. Logical.
But something about it felt wrong.
Not the explanation itself. That made perfect sense.
It was the timing.
The specificity.
The way the lights above him had flickered at exactly the moment he'd been thinking about them.
"That does explain Apple users," Bert said.
Al pointed at him.
"There he is. That's the bitterness I like to see."
Bert took a sip of coffee and immediately regretted it.
"You on Spreadsheets Online tonight or do you fancy shooting zombies instead?"
"Nah," Al said with a small grin. "Big delivery tomorrow. I signed up to start early."
"Why?"
"Money."
"Fair enough."
Bert finished the coffee and, after seeing another cat meme from OrangeCake, stood.
It's never dog ones, he thought.
"See you at nine then," he said mockingly, knowing full well that even if Al was up early, he would be online that night.
"Try not to stare at any lights on the way back."
"No promises."
After his shift, walking home beneath the orange haze of the London sky, Bert stopped at a crossing and looked upward.
He always wondered what the stars looked like without the street lights drowning them out.
Then, for one brief, impossible second, every star above him flickered at exactly the same time.
As if they'd heard him.
Traffic moved again behind him and someone shouted for him to get out of the bloody road.
Bert blinked and carried on walking.
Some people were weirdly aggressive for a Tuesday.
He shook the carrier bag hanging from his wrist just to make sure the tortilla chips and blueberry muffins were still there.
Priorities.
Bert's flat was technically a one-bedroom, though that description depended heavily on how generously a person defined both "room" and "bedroom." The radiator in the living room hissed like it held a personal grudge against humanity and one of the kitchen cupboard doors only opened if you kicked the lower hinge first.
Still, it was quiet.
Mostly.
Once you got used to the sirens.
And the takeaway underneath closing at one in the morning.
That counted for a lot.
Bert dropped onto the sofa, threw his keys onto the coffee table and finally opened Sarcastic Detective.
"Right," he muttered. "No interruptions tonight."
The streaming app froze immediately.
Bert stared at the screen.
The loading symbol spun once.
Twice.
Then the television went black.
Not off.
Black.
Completely black.
Bert sighed.
"Of course."
The bloody song started looping through his head again.
Low. Rhythmic. Familiar.
"Bloody earworm," he muttered. "Hope they change the playlist tomorrow."
The television flickered.
For a split second he saw something reflected in the dark screen behind himself.
Not his flat.
A silhouette of a massive city behind an impossibly tall wall.
Towering shapes disappearing into sunlight.
Then it vanished.
The streaming service menu returned.
Bert sat completely still.
The first explanation was exhaustion.
The second was stress.
The third was that he'd finally lost his mind.
The annoying thing was all three felt equally plausible.
After a moment he picked up the remote, turned the television off and then unplugged it from the wall for good measure.
"Right," he said quietly. "Either I'm having a breakdown or this streaming service has become significantly more immersive."
His phone buzzed.
Bert rubbed his eyes and picked it up.
AL:
where are you guys
BERT:
5 min
AL:
comms?
BERT:
Make it 10, im making a drink
ORANGECAKE:
out with the mrs, gonna be late lads
AL:
traitor
He was tired.
That was all.
Too much work. Too little sleep. Too much sci-fi nonsense melting his brain.
Nothing mysterious about that.
Bert walked over to his PC and started it up. While it loaded, he wandered into the kitchen and put the kettle on.
Decaf this time.
Better not tell Al, he thought. Apparently it didn't count as a real drink unless it could legally dissolve anxiety through a ceramic mug.
Outside, somewhere above the city, something moved silently across the stars.
Bert never noticed.
The headset crackled softly beneath the constant background noise of gunfire, explosions and OrangeCake shouting tactical information several seconds too late to be useful.
Bert leaned forward in his chair, lit almost entirely by the flickering glow of his ageing monitor. Empty mugs sat scattered around the desk beside half-open packets of crisps and a screwdriver he'd been meaning to use on the radiator for at least three weeks.
Outside, rain tapped quietly against the flat window.
Inside, digital zombies screamed somewhere down a virtual corridor.
"What the fuck, dude? How are you surviving?" Bert heard over the headset after his seventh close shave of the evening.
It had to be OrangeCake, he thought. Bert liked Orange, despite his trigger finger leading to a lot of friendly fire.
"You know me, Orange," Bert replied. "Natural talent."
"Okay, care bear," Al mocked. "We all know you couldn't fight your way out of a paper bag."
"Hold on a minute," Bert said. "I only lose because none of you communicate. It's not my fault your tactical strategy is screaming after you're already dead."
OrangeCake laughed down the headset.
"Mate, you walked directly into a wall of zombies."
"That, my friend, is what I call strategic positioning," Bert said dryly.
"You got trapped in a bathroom," Al added, chuckling.
Bert ignored them both.
"Anyway, once I get a new monitor I'll be fine. I'm sick of this one flickering. I'm just glad it didn't go static again tonight."
"How long's it been doing that?" Orange asked.
"A couple of weeks, maybe."
"That's not normal."
"Neither is voluntarily playing with you lot three nights a week, but here we are."
Al laughed.
"That's fair."
Bert glanced at the clock in the corner of the screen.
00:47
"Shit," he muttered. "I wanted to be asleep before one. I'm off."
"Night, brother," Al said.
"Later, lads," Orange added.
The call disconnected.
Silence settled across the flat almost instantly.
Bert leaned back in his chair and rubbed his eyes. The monitor flickered once, then stabilised again.
"Yeah, alright," he muttered. "Message received."
The dreams started three nights later.
At first they didn't even feel like dreams.
Just fragments.
Noise.
Shapes.
A woman's voice saying something he almost understood. Not English, but close enough that his brain kept trying to translate it anyway.
White clouds lit from beneath.
A massive ring hanging in darkness.
Rows of figures kneeling beneath banners he couldn't read.
Then:
Fire.
A city breaking apart in complete silence.
Bert woke suddenly in darkness, breathing hard.
His alarm clock blinked:
03:33
"Fantastic," he muttered.
He lay there staring at the ceiling while the remains of the dream dissolved from his mind like smoke.
Only one thing lingered.
A feeling.
Not fear or grief.
More like remembering somewhere he'd never been.
The next morning things got worse.
Automatic doors opened before he reached them.
Jedi, he thought immediately.
His phone battery jumped from sixty-six percent to full charge while he was holding it.
At lunch the self-checkout suddenly displayed:
WELCOME HOME
before immediately resetting itself.
Bert stared at the screen.
A teenage coworker looked over from the next till.
"You alright, Bertie?"
"Yeah," Bert said slowly. "I think the till just welcomed me like family."
She blinked.
"...what?"
"Nothing."
Back at work, Al found him staring suspiciously at a shelf full of macaroni cheese.
"You look rough."
"I had weird dreams."
"Well, have you considered a healthy diet?"
Bert considered this seriously.
"No," he sighed. "Because then I'd have to develop as a person."
Al nodded thoughtfully.
"Fair point, brother."
That evening Bert searched:
WHY DO WE DREAM
Then:
WHAT DO DREAMS MEAN
Then:
CAN STARS FLICKER AT THE SAME TIME
That search returned significantly more conspiracy theories than he was comfortable with.
One thread claimed the stars were "government satellites pretending to be stars." Another insisted humanity had actually ended in 2012 and everyone currently alive was technically a spiritual afterimage.
A third appeared to just be a man threatening the moon personally.
Bert closed the browser.
Then reopened it thirty seconds later because, in fairness, the moon had been acting suspicious recently.
After a moment he searched:
WHY WAS FUNNY SITCOM CANCELLED
The answer somehow involved taxes, cocaine, a Rubik's Cube and a mascot lawsuit.
Bert was halfway through reading a twelve-year-old forum argument about it when the lights in his flat flickered once.
Then again.
He sighed.
"Bloody updates."
"Susan, turn on the kettle," he said absent-mindedly.
After a brief pause he added, "Thank you," as though worried about offending the helpful AI.
"Okay," replied the small cylinder on his desk in a calm artificial voice.
From the kitchen came the soft click of the smart kettle switching on. The bubbling became louder and more frequent.
A few seconds later the microwave started humming.
Bert frowned.
It was starting to become a thing now. He made a mental note to read the instructions when he had time.
"Susan, turn the microwave off."
The microwave stopped.
Then the coffee machine started.
Bert slowly turned in his chair.
That's a new one, he thought.
It was a recent addition to his kitchen. Apparently you could get twelve different types of coffee pods for it. He tried to remember if it was AI-compatible or not.
"Susan, stop."
The coffee machine died.
Silence.
Then all seventeen fans inside his PC suddenly accelerated at once.
WHIRRRRRRRR.
For one genuinely alarming second Bert thought a swarm of bees had somehow broken into the flat.
Every screen in the room turned white.
Monitor.
Television.
Phone.
Microwave clock.
Somewhere in the kitchen his smart toaster suddenly started playing a song about a man who was far too confident about being sexy.
Bert frowned.
It reminded him of his work shirt somehow.
Then a single line of text appeared across the monitor.
GENETIC RESONANCE DETECTED
PLEASE LOG IN...
Then everything shut off.
Silence filled the flat.
Bert sat frozen in front of the monitor for a very long time.
Then quietly reached for his coat.
If he was losing his mind, he decided, he was at least going to do it outside for a bit.
It was late and the takeaway shop below his flat was shut.
As he walked down the stairs, opened the door and stepped onto the now-empty street, the sight of abandoned takeaway trays and crushed drink cans somehow made the world feel reassuringly normal.
Bert shoved his hands deeper into his coat pockets.
He needed a drink.
He still had work in the morning, but after what had happened upstairs he was craving something non-sugary to perk him up.
Not coffee.
Something cold.
Cherry-flavoured, preferably.
As he walked down the road towards the nearest twenty-four-hour shop, he noticed the street lights seemed a bit dimmer than usual. Maybe it was one of those energy-saving schemes councils were always using to save money, he thought, so he looked up to see if he could spot more stars.
He stopped.
Still there, he thought.
He tried to find the Big Dipper, then for a brief moment became aware of someone nearby.
Not footsteps or movement.
Just the strange certainty that he was no longer entirely alone.
He looked around, but there was nothing. Everything was as it should be, considering it was a main road.
He carried on walking slightly faster than usual.
Being out this late always made him feel uneasy.
When he finally reached the twenty-four-hour shop, he pushed the door open and immediately regretted it.
The fluorescent lights inside hit him like a flashbang.
Bert squinted and pulled his hood lower as the automatic doors hissed shut behind him.
Earlier he had been a Jedi.
This felt significantly more Sith.
The drinks fridge stretched almost the entire back wall.
Watermelon soda.
Apple fizz.
Kiwi lemonade.
Elderflower tonic.
So many choices.
Then he found them.
Cherry cola or cherry lemonade.
Decisions, decisions.
Bert glanced sideways towards the multi-fruit cola and felt a sudden dangerous urge to become adventurous.
What a time to be alive.
Then, feeling half asleep, he yawned and headed to the counter to pay. Keeping his head down to avoid any kind of interaction, including himself, Bert remembered he had to get up in the morning and was starting to regret going out this late.
It was raining when Bert saw him for the first time.
Not dramatic rain.
Not thunderstorms or cinematic sheets of water crashing against windows.
Just miserable British rain that seemed personally offended by human happiness. The kind that soaked through your clothes slowly enough to feel personal.
It was half six in the morning and the sky already looked exhausted. Streetlights reflected across wet pavement in long blurry streaks while traffic hissed through standing water nearby. Somewhere in the distance a siren wailed briefly before giving up, which felt appropriate for the hour.
Bert pulled his hood tighter and trudged down the pavement with all the energy of a man spiritually prepared to die in retail.
He was already thirty minutes behind.
Again.
Several times that morning Bert had considered calling in sick. Unfortunately the supermarket remained stubbornly unsympathetic towards conditions such as exhaustion, despair and "not wanting to deal with people before sunrise."
Besides, company policy didn't pay for the first three sick days, and Bert's current financial stability relied heavily upon not having to choose between electricity and gaming snacks.
Mostly gaming snacks.
Rainwater dripped steadily from the edge of his hood as he pulled out his phone and checked the bus times.
If he hurried, he could still catch the 6:42.
Technically it only took three minutes to reach the stop.
Technically.
In practice, the combination of exhaustion, rain and a deep-rooted unwillingness to participate in mornings meant Bert moved with the urgency of a sedated sloth.
He briskly walked anyway. Mostly because wet socks were one of the few remaining experiences capable of ruining his entire day before sunrise.
By the time he reached the shelter, his coffee was already cooling in his hand.
He stepped beneath the scratched plastic roof and took a cautious sip.
Burnt cardboard. Slight hints of regret. Possibly nutmeg.
The man sat alone at the far end of the shelter.
Grey coat.
Dark gloves.
Perfect posture.
Something about him immediately felt strange.
Not threatening.
Precise.
Like he'd been arranged there deliberately.
Bert tried not to stare.
The man looked up anyway.
For one brief second Bert felt an odd pressure in his head, like static building behind his eyes.
Then it vanished.
The man spoke calmly.
"You're sleeping poorly."
Bert frowned.
"Don't we all?"
The man gestured slightly towards the dark circles beneath Bert's eyes.
"Visual evidence."
"Fair enough."
Silence settled again. Rain tapped softly against the shelter roof.
Then the man said:
"You've been experiencing unusual phenomena recently."
Bert slowly turned towards him.
"Mate," he said carefully, "if this is about crystals or a pyramid, I really haven't had enough sleep for it."
For the first time the man's expression shifted slightly.
Confusion, perhaps.
"Why would lack of sleep cause pyramid concern?" he asked.
Bert blinked.
"...what?"
The man tilted his head slightly.
"You seem unhappy. Possible mineral exposure."
He tapped something on the device in his hand.
Rain continued against the shelter roof.
"Are you using resonance quartz?"
Bert stared at him.
"I genuinely cannot tell if you're being serious."
The bus roared past without stopping.
Bert realised too late that he hadn't put his hand out.
Neither of them reacted immediately.
Bert stared after it.
"You know," he said quietly, "I think that was my bus."
"Yes."
Another pause.
Then the man added:
"You are Bert Holden."
It wasn't phrased as a question.
Bert felt the tiny hairs on the back of his neck rise.
Normally when strangers knew his name it meant one of three things:
Debt collection.
Someone from work.
Or he'd accidentally left his Clubcard at self-checkout again.
None of those possibilities felt correct here.
The man hadn't asked if he was Bert Holden.
He'd said it the way someone might state the weather.
Certain.
Outside the shelter a car hissed through standing rainwater. The stranger remained perfectly still.
No shifting his weight or checking his phone. No awkward little human movements people normally made when trapped beside each other before sunrise.
Just complete, patient stillness.
Bert suddenly became aware that he had absolutely no idea how long the man had been sitting there.
His stomach tightened slightly.
"How do you know that?"
The man studied him carefully for a moment before answering.
"My name is Smith," he said. "And I think we need to talk."
Bert stared at him.
"Dude, I just want to catch the bus."
Smith studied him silently for a few moments, as though comparing Bert to something only he could see.
"You've displayed no advanced resonance behaviour at all?"
Bert frowned.
"You keep saying words like I'm supposed to know what they mean."
Smith considered this carefully.
"Lower language exposure," he mumbled.
"Cool. I'm glad we're having a nice time."
Another silence settled between them.
Bert took a cautious sip of coffee and immediately regretted it.
Definitely nutmeg.
Smith watched him with uncomfortable focus.
Not eye contact exactly.
Observation.
Like Bert was a puzzle missing several important pieces.
"So, you work in retail?" Smith asked eventually.
Bert looked at him suspiciously.
"Why?" he finally said.
"Your file suggested higher functionality."
"My what?"
"No unusual abilities?"
Bert thought about it.
"I make a pretty decent spaghetti."
Smith stared at him.
For the first time since Bert had met him, he looked genuinely confused.
"That's it?"
"I mean... I can also stack shelves quite fast."
Smith slowly rubbed the bridge of his nose.
"This is going to be significantly more difficult than I anticipated," he muttered.
Bert pulled his phone from his pocket and checked the bus times again.
Cancelled.
Of course it was.
He sighed quietly. He already didn't want to go to work and being late again was only going to make Kevin start doing that disappointed-manager stare he'd perfected over the last few weeks.
Not that Bert entirely blamed him.
No matter how many times he changed his alarm, it kept resetting itself to 04:06:30 exactly.
Phone alarm.
Microwave clock.
Oven timer.
Once, somehow, the digital display on the self-checkout at work.
Kevin had not appreciated Bert stopping an entire queue just to stare at the frozen numbers.
04:06:30.
Every time.
At this point Bert had mostly accepted that modern technology was powered by hatred.
Rain continued hissing softly against the pavement outside the shelter.
The longer Smith stood beside him, the more uncomfortable Bert felt.
Not threatened exactly.
Just... aware.
Like standing too close to electrical equipment.
Bert shoved his phone back into his pocket.
"Sod it," he muttered. "I'll walk."
The supermarket was only another twenty minutes on foot and honestly that sounded preferable to spending any more time talking to whatever this bloke's deal was.
He turned and started down the pavement.
A few seconds later he heard footsteps behind him.
Of course he did.
"Do you know where I can obtain a hot drink?" Smith asked.
Bert kept walking.
"There's probably a vending machine at the station."
"I do not believe the station is this way."
Bert sped up slightly.
The footsteps matched him perfectly.
Smith reached out slightly, his gloved hand hovering near Bert's shoulder without quite touching it.
For a brief moment Bert felt an odd pull in the back of his mind.
Warm.
Familiar.
Like the sudden urge to stop being rude to someone who technically hadn't done anything wrong.
He slowed without entirely meaning to.
Smith noticed immediately.
"Your beverage is no longer retaining heat efficiently," he observed. "I assumed this was undesirable."
Bert stared at him.
"...what?"
"The coffee," Smith clarified. "You appeared disappointed by it earlier."
Bert looked down at the paper cup in his hand.
It was cold.
"...right."
A small silence followed.
Then Bert sighed.
"There's a café this way."
They crossed the road together.
Bert barely checked for traffic.
A delivery van blasted its horn.
Smith turned towards it instinctively.
The horn abruptly died mid-blare.
The van rolled past in confused silence.
Bert slowed.
"...did you just break that bloke's horn?"
Smith looked genuinely uncertain.
"I did not touch the vehicle."
"Right."
"Though the resonance field around local electronics remains unusually unstable."
"You keep saying sentences that make sense right up until the end."
They continued walking in uncomfortable silence while Bert tried to work out which poor life decision had ultimately resulted in this conversation.
Smith glanced down at the thin black device in his hand. Pale lines of text moved silently across its surface.
"Curious," he said quietly.
"What is?"
Smith looked up towards the rain.
"Precipitation in this region has increased by 8.2% during the current cycle."
Bert stepped around a puddle.
"You talk like a disappointed weather app."
Smith ignored this.
"The data suggests persistent atmospheric instability."
"The data's called England."
Smith studied the grey sky for another moment.
"How long has your climate been considered acceptable for habitation?"
Bert looked at him.
"You really need to work on sounding less like an alien."
Smith frowned slightly.
"I am not an alien."
"That is exactly what an alien would say."
Smith appeared to think about this carefully.
"That is statistically reasonable."
Bert stared at him for a moment, rain dripping steadily from his hood.
CIA, he thought.
Or a dodgy corporation wanting to take over the world.
At this point both seemed equally likely.
After a five-minute walk they arrived at a café called The Rusty Spoon.
Bert had always thought it was an impressively honest name for a place where your elbows slowly stuck to the plastic tablecloths if you leaned on them too long.
Still, the coffee was half decent, even if it had been instant for years. By the time they finally bought a proper coffee machine, everyone had become too attached to the staff to leave.
It never stopped anyone complaining.
The café was warm in the way only small independent cafés managed to be.
Not enough lights working and more breakfast sets than seats.
And the constant sound of an eighties radio station somewhere behind the counter. Just loud enough to recognise the tune, never quite loud enough to make out the lyrics.
Bert still found himself quietly singing along anyway.
Smith stood awkwardly near the entrance, watching people with the focused attention of someone attempting to solve humanity manually.
His eyes moved carefully around the room.
Three builders occupied the back corner booth. One silently scrolled through his phone while the other two debated sealant brands with the intensity of cabinet ministers.
Near the window, two elderly women sat over untouched tea conducting what appeared to be a full surveillance operation on the surrounding neighbourhood.
"Doris' curtains haven't opened in three days."
"Well, that's never a good sign."
"Last time I spoke to her she was thinking of buying an allotment to grow tomatoes."
"At her age?"
"Said she wanted to grow tomatoes."
"Well... that'll keep her busy."
Smith nodded once, as though the whereabouts of Doris had become operationally relevant.
As he followed Bert towards the counter, his shoe made the faint peeling sound of a floor that had lost its fight with baked beans several hours earlier.
Bert pointed towards the menu board.
"What are you having?"
"I am observing the system first," Smith replied.
"It's coffee, not diplomacy."
Smith ignored him, still watching the queue.
People stood in line without speaking. One man stared blankly into the middle distance while holding a bacon sandwich with the emotional commitment of someone surviving exclusively through caffeine and unresolved debt.
A teenager behind the counter called out:
"Large latte for Steve?"
Nobody moved.
Then, slowly:
"Oh shit. Yeah. Sorry."
The man collected it like he'd briefly forgotten how existence worked.
Smith frowned slightly.
"This process appears deeply inefficient."
"We like queues," Bert said dryly.
Before Smith could reply, a woman near the counter suddenly raised her voice.
"I asked for oat milk," she snapped. "How difficult is that?"
The middle-aged woman behind the counter looked about nineteen seconds away from walking directly into traffic.
"I'm really sorry—"
"No you're not, because this keeps happening."
Several people glanced over.
And somehow the entire café shifted.
Not silence exactly.
More like the room holding its breath.
Conversations lost momentum. A spoon stopped halfway towards someone's mouth. One of the builders quietly lowered his tea. Even the radio host behind the counter seemed to pause between sentences.
Smith noticed it immediately.
The atmosphere seemed to compress inward for half a second.
Then he looked towards Bert.
Bert sighed quietly.
His expression tightened slightly.
Bert stepped forward.
"To be fair," he said, "I can barely keep track of milk anymore. There's about fourteen types now."
The woman blinked at him.
"What?"
"I saw one called Almond Breeze the other day. Sounds less like milk and more like a scented candle."
A few people nearby laughed softly and the tension shifted almost immediately.
Not gone.
Just... softer.
Like everyone collectively remembered they were too tired for conflict.
Even the woman's shoulders lowered slightly.
The girl behind the counter gave Bert a deeply grateful look. She had chipped peach nail varnish and the exhausted expression of someone operating entirely through hope and customer trauma.
"We can remake it if you want?" she offered carefully.
The woman exhaled slowly.
"...yeah. Sorry. I'm having a rough morning."
Bert nodded sympathetically and sighed.
"Aren't we all."
The room slowly restarted itself.
Conversations resumed.
Cutlery moved again.
One of the builders quietly returned to complaining about silicone sealant.
But Smith continued watching Bert carefully from across the café.
Not confused this time.
Concerned.
Tired of Smith's behaviour already, Bert ordered two flat whites to go and paid. After being told the coffee machine was "playing up again" and it might be a while, he finally dropped into one of the cracked vinyl seats, feeling thoroughly sorry for himself in his rain-soaked clothes.
"Why did I choose to walk?" he muttered.
A moment later Smith sat opposite him.
"Do you do that often?"
"Sorry?" Bert replied. "What, sit down? Only when my legs ache."
"No," Smith said calmly. "De-escalate situations like you did there."
Bert frowned.
"I only made a joke. It's either that or cry while waiting longer for coffee."
Smith considered this carefully, as though mentally filing it somewhere important.
Then he slowly reached into his coat and removed a small rectangular device roughly the size of a phone.
Bert stared at it.
"...is that a PDA?"
"For surveying purposes," Smith replied, nodding as if that answered the question.
Smith activated the device. A faint line of pale light moved briefly across its surface before vanishing again.
Bert narrowed his eyes.
"That definitely looks expensive."
"It is a survey tool."
"Still looks expensive."
Smith ignored him completely.
"Have you experienced unexplained gravitational shifts?" Smith asked eventually.
Bert thought about it.
"I fell down the stairs last Thursday."
Smith stared at the device.
"That is not generally considered the same thing."
"Depends how fast you fall?"
Another pause.
"Have animals behaved unusually around you?"
"Squirrels approach me in the park."
Smith looked up immediately.
"How long has this been occurring?"
"Since I started feeding them. They're pretty chill, honestly. I've got photos if you want."
Smith slowly exhaled through his nose.
"Have birds ever arranged themselves into repeating patterns around you?"
"...what kind of question is that?"
Smith waited patiently.
Bert thought about it.
"There was one time a pigeon followed me into the bakers, but I assumed that was more of a food-based relationship."
Smith ignored this and continued.
"Have reflective surfaces behaved incorrectly?"
"I looked rough in the supermarket window yesterday."
"That is not what I mean."
"Then honestly, no idea."
Smith tapped something into the device.
"Have electronic systems responded unusually to your presence?"
Bert hesitated slightly.
"...define unusually."
Smith immediately looked up.
"Have they?"
Bert shifted slightly in his seat.
"The self-checkout at work called me 'home' yesterday."
Smith froze completely.
Rain rattled softly against the café windows.
"Interesting."
"It reset straight after," Bert added quickly. "Honestly, supermarket software barely works at the best of times."
Smith stared at him in complete silence.
Then very slowly lowered the device.
"You genuinely do not understand how concerning that statement was."
"I'm getting that feeling a lot lately."
A sharp hiss came from behind the counter as if the coffee machine had suddenly become angrier.
The server looked up.
"Two flat whites for... Bart?"
Bert immediately stood.
"Cheers... Debbie," he replied after noticing the name tag.
She smiled weakly.
"Thank you for earlier, by the way."
"No problem."
He collected the drinks while Debbie gave him the exhausted smile of someone beginning to realise her first shift might also be her last.
"Is the machine finally behaving itself?" Bert asked.
"For now," she said. "I think it hates me personally."
"You might want to start thanking it after every cup."
She laughed quietly.
"Thank God," Bert muttered as he handed one of the coffees to Smith.
Smith frowned slightly.
"Are you religious?"
"No," Bert sighed. "I just didn't want to say fuck in public."
Smith accepted this explanation immediately.
For a moment neither of them spoke.
Rain continued rattling softly against the café windows.
Then Smith reached into his coat again and removed a plain white card.
No company logo.
No branding.
Just a name.
SMITH
Beneath it sat a long contact number:
0800 406 30 463
Bert stared at it.
"0800, ay?"
"It reaches me directly."
"Convenient."
Smith ignored this.
"If you experience any further unusual phenomena," he said calmly, "you should contact me immediately."
Bert turned the card over.
Blank.
"No website?"
"No."
"No QR code?"
"No."
"You're not surveying anything."
Smith said nothing.
Bert nodded knowingly.
"You want to use my flat for a stakeout."
A pause.
"...who is it?"
Smith stared back blankly.
"The kebab shop downstairs?"
Smith said nothing.
"I knew it."
Bert leaned back slightly.
"I've been saying for years there's no way they sell enough kebabs to stay open."
Smith gave absolutely no indication he understood the joke.
"Define unusual," Bert muttered. "I don't think I trust my interpretation anymore."
Smith met his eyes evenly.
"You will know."
A pause followed.
Then:
"You're serious about all this, aren't you?"
"Yes," Smith replied.
Not dramatic or threatening.
Just certain.
Which somehow felt worse.
Bert slipped the card into his pocket beside his bus pass.
"Well," he muttered, "this has definitely been the weirdest morning I've had this week."
Smith glanced briefly towards the rain outside as it finally began easing.
"I suspect that will change soon."
Bert stared at him for a long moment.
"...you really need to work on how you end conversations."
Smith had been in his new position for a while now and still occasionally forgot where the corridors went.
He was happy to be there, mostly, but temporarily covering somebody else's patch while they underwent "intense retraining" was not what he had expected when Oversight revived him.
He had hoped for a fresh assignment.
Or at the very least a permanent transfer.
Instead, he inherited somebody else's disaster.
The building changed layouts too often for memory to help much anyway.
Officially the architecture adapted dynamically for efficiency purposes.
Unofficially, most investigators believed the place itself was mildly unstable and management simply refused to acknowledge it.
Smith personally blamed Budgeting.
The corridor lights brightened automatically as he walked past, cold white panels humming softly overhead. Doors without handles lined both sides of the hallway, each marked only with small grey numbers and colour-coded clearance strips.
No windows.
Never windows.
Somewhere behind the walls, machinery pulsed with a slow mechanical rhythm, like the building itself was breathing in its sleep.
Smith disliked that comparison every time it occurred to him.
An administrator passed him carrying three paper folders.
Actual paper.
That alone was enough to ruin his morning.
The report had already been waiting on his desk for eleven hours, which technically classified it as urgent.
Smith disliked urgent things.
Urgent things led to committees.
Committees led to investigations.
Investigations led to historical review panels.
Historical review panels eventually led to somebody using the phrase:
"Possible Alpha-level escalation."
Nobody ever slept properly after hearing that.
He entered the records office and dropped the report onto his desk with the kind of care normally associated with unexploded explosives.
J11-3
LOCAL INSTABILITY DETECTED
PATTERN MATCH: UNKNOWN
Unknown patterns were deeply irritating.
Predictive systems were designed specifically to prevent unknown patterns.
Across the office another investigator glanced up briefly from behind a mountain of paperwork.
"You're still here?"
Smith sat down heavily.
"Apparently."
"You were scheduled for rotational recovery twelve hours ago."
"I filed an extension request."
"That was denied."
"I filed an appeal."
"You filed it incorrectly."
Smith stared at her for a few seconds.
"...can I file an appeal for the appeal?"
"No."
"That feels anti-appeal."
The woman ignored him and returned to her work.
The office settled back into silence.
It was always silent here.
Not natural silence.
Managed silence.
Even conversations somehow sounded administratively approved.
Smith opened the report again.
ACTIVATION CYCLE PROXIMITY EVENT
ENVIRONMENTAL RESPONSIVENESS CONFIRMED
OBSERVATIONAL ANOMALIES INCREASING
Smith rubbed the bridge of his nose.
The last major event had happened on his second day after revival.
Three population centres lost structural continuity.
An entire regional predictive network collapsed.
Officially, the casualty count remained "under review."
Smith still occasionally dreamed about the light.
Most investigators did.
He leaned back slowly in his chair.
"Please don't be another long case."
Nobody nearby reacted.
Pretending not to hear certain words was considered polite.
A soft chime echoed through the office.
Then the voice arrived.
"Investigator Smith," it said calmly. "Transit preparation authorised."
Several people nearby immediately focused much harder on their paperwork.
Smith closed his eyes briefly.
Of course it had.
Smith stepped into the lift and watched the doors close around him.
4.6.3 again.
He liked Alan well enough, but this was the fifth assignment this month alone.
Gary El had complicated things for everyone and most departments still hadn't recovered from Galilean.
Officially, Incident 31-C.
Unofficially: the reason nobody in Oversight trusted field investigators with independent judgement anymore.
Smith already had a headache.
As the lift descended, he pulled out his tablet and resumed filling in the inventory authorisation forms.
Carol in Logistics had become painfully strict about procedural compliance over the past few cycles.
Every box needed the correct classification marker.
Every request needed justification.
Every justification needed secondary approval.
Since Galilean, everything required triple approval.
Smith reached the Transit Preparation Office and pressed his hand against the authorisation panel.
The door slid open with a soft mechanical sigh.
Inside, the room was almost aggressively white.
Equipment lockers lined one wall beneath recessed lighting. Dark field coats hung in sealed compartments beside them while diagnostic displays scrolled endless streams of green text across polished surfaces.
A single preparation chair sat beneath a ring of dim overhead lights like an interrogation device pretending to be furniture.
Smith stepped inside while continuing to scroll through the inventory forms.
"Field kit authorised," the room announced calmly.
"Good."
"Additional stabilisation equipment recommended."
Smith frowned slightly.
"That's unexpected."
A locker unlocked with a soft click.
Smith removed a pair of dark gloves and slipped them on carefully before checking the charge levels on a compact restraint unit clipped beside the harness.
"Alan?"
A soft tone echoed through the room.
"It's cold where you're going."
Smith sighed quietly.
"I need a summary."
There was a brief pause.
Then:
"Local instability continues. Pattern match unresolved. Behaviour inconsistent with previous activation records."
Smith nodded once.
"Of course it is."
"Astronomical reference points continue displaying instability."
Smith stopped adjusting one of the gloves.
"...the stars?"
"Yes."
Smith closed his eyes briefly.
That was bad.
The voice continued calmly.
"Field subject currently displays minimal advanced behaviour."
"That's not reassuring."
"It was not intended to be."
Smith picked up the remaining equipment from the locker and secured the transit harness across his chest.
"Any indication this is another training exercise?"
A slightly longer pause followed this time.
"Probability remains inconclusive. However, current operational restrictions have remained active for a considerable period. Statistical likelihood is low."
Smith stared at the wall for several seconds.
"Fantastic," he muttered.
"Would you like emotional support resources before transit?"
"No, Alan."
A brief pause.
"Smith. You probably should."
Smith ignored that and sealed the final compartment on the harness.
"Has local listening traffic increased again?"
"Yes," Alan replied calmly.
"By how much?"
"Approximately fourteen percent over the previous cycle."
Smith frowned slightly.
"That's early."
"Agreed."
Another silence settled through the preparation room.
Then Smith asked quietly:
"Any common factors?"
Alan responded immediately.
"Fear. Social isolation. Economic instability. Elevated mortality awareness. Increased behavioural outreach."
Smith sighed.
"So... the usual."
"That is an oversimplification."
"It's still accurate."
A soft tone echoed somewhere inside the walls.
"Additionally," Alan continued, "non-directed contact attempts have increased significantly within the affected region."
Smith stopped adjusting one of the gloves.
"...people are trying to talk to us again?"
"Yes."
Smith closed his eyes briefly.
"That's never a good sign."
The preparation room doors slid shut behind him with a soft hiss.
The corridor beyond remained almost completely silent apart from the distant hum of systems moving somewhere deep inside the structure.
Smith adjusted the collar of his field coat and continued towards the transit hangar.
A line of identical vehicles rested silently behind reinforced glass further ahead, their dark surfaces reflecting the sterile overhead lights.
Most investigators hated field assignments.
Smith mostly hated the paperwork afterwards.
As he approached the nearest vehicle, Alan's voice spoke calmly through the hallway speakers one final time.
"Smith?"
He paused.
"Yes?"
A brief silence followed.
Then:
"Please be nice. Remember customer service."
Smith stared ahead for a long moment.
"...that happened once."
"Official records indicate four times."
Smith exhaled slowly.
"That still feels unnecessarily judgemental."
The vehicle door slid open beside him.
Somewhere very far away, the stars flickered again.
Crowe had been awake for thirty-one hours, sustained by two cups of stale coffee and one regrettable argument with a predictive intelligence that technically outranked him.
None of that particularly bothered him.
What bothered him was the signal.
The numbers crawled across the curved monitor suspended above his workstation.
Pulse alignment.
Local response.
Genetic resonance.
Then:
MATCH PROBABILITY: 97%
Crowe stared at it.
"That can't be right."
The internal speaker in the ceiling responded immediately.
"I'm sorry, Crowe," the voice replied smoothly. "It is."
"Thanks," Crowe said dryly.
"You are welcome."
Crowe leaned back in his chair and looked around the lab.
Due to long-term budget cuts, most of his equipment was either second-hand or heavily modified beyond recognition.
Exposed wiring.
Metal patched over older metal.
Several components held together with enough duct tape to violate at least three engineering regulations.
Crowe suspected he was personally responsible for keeping AdhesiveCo profitable.
Unlike the polished silence of the better-funded organisations, this place hummed constantly with tired machinery and overworked cooling fans.
Outside the narrow observation window, red storms rolled endlessly across the fractured horizon.
Beautiful in a deeply threatening way.
Crowe returned his attention to the screen.
The local region resolved slowly across the monitor.
Northern District.
Of all places.
He zoomed in on the resonance profile again.
The percentages made no sense.
Most activations barely crossed five percent.
Historical outliers occasionally reached twelve.
The Jain Sadhu of 666 BCE had allegedly reached thirty-four before central administration buried half the records.
But this?
Crowe stared at the impossible number glowing on the monitor.
Ninety-seven percent.
For the first time in several decades, he felt genuinely afraid.
The internal speaker spoke again.
"Would you like me to notify Command?"
Crowe stood slowly.
"No."
A pause.
"Not yet."
He stared at the screen.
"Run a diagnostic."
"Diagnostics complete. All monitored systems remain within approved parameters."
Crowe frowned.
"Run diagnostics on the diagnostics."
A pause.
"You wish me to inspect the systems used to inspect the systems."
"Yes."
"That appears inefficient."
"Humour me."
Several uncomfortable minutes passed.
Crowe began clearing empty mugs from his desk simply to keep his hands occupied.
Ninety-seven percent.
The number felt wrong.
Not unlikely.
Just wrong.
Most weeks he observed fluctuations between two and four percent.
A ten percent reading was enough to start conversations.
Ninety-seven?
That wasn't a reading.
That was a disaster waiting patiently.
The familiar burning sensation returned to the back of his mind.
Seven specialists.
Years of reassurance.
Years of being told everything was perfectly normal.
Yet somehow sitting amongst ageing machinery and impossible readings never quite stopped the feeling that something was about to go catastrophically wrong.
"Evelyn?"
"Yes, Crowe."
"How many activations above fifty percent have we recorded?"
A pause followed.
"Three."
Crowe froze.
"Three?"
"Correct."
"And what happened?"
"Two were later determined to be equipment failures."
Crowe relaxed slightly.
"And the third?"
Silence.
Longer than before.
"Access to that file requires clearance above your current authorisation."
Crowe stared at the ceiling.
"Of course it does."
"Would you like me to request access?"
"How long?"
"Estimated approval time: seventeen to twenty-six working days."
Crowe closed his eyes.
"Right."
"You appear dissatisfied."
"I'm considering several crimes."
"Please complete the relevant paperwork beforehand."
Crowe snorted despite himself.
Several seconds later Evelyn spoke again.
"I have compared the readings against all archived activation records available to this facility."
"And?"
"The result remains unchanged."
Crowe sank back into the chair.
"This can't be right."
"Historical probability disagrees."
Crowe rubbed tiredly at one eye.
"Check historical records."
"Already in progress."
"And?"
"Existing protocols recommend immediate notification of Command."
He sighed.
"Of course they do."
"Shall I proceed?"
"No."
A pause.
"That's irresponsible."
"So is most of my life."
Another pause.
"I don't understand."
Crowe stared at the glowing number once more.
Ninety-seven percent.
There was no world in which he trusted someone else to handle this.
"Put in a field trip request."
"What is the stated purpose?"
Crowe leaned back.
"I think we have a faulty sensor."
"All sensors are fine. Maintenance was completed recently."
"We'll see."
Rain-like static crackled softly through the old speakers.
The request was processed.
"It has been approved."
"That was quick."
"Nobody wished to argue with the Observation Department."
"Wise of them."
Crowe grabbed the old field coat hanging beside the workstation and shrugged it on.
Unlike the clean, fitted coats used by central investigators, this one looked like it had survived several small wars and at least one explosion.
Which, to be fair, it had.
"You appear nervous."
"That obvious?"
"You requested maintenance checks before travel."
"...I did."
The heavy hatch unlocked with a mechanical clunk.
Beyond stretched a long industrial corridor lit by uneven strips of flickering light.
Pipes ran openly along the ceiling.
Some leaked steam.
One was making a noise Crowe had intended to report for six months.
He kept forgetting.
Crowe headed towards transport.
Nobody rushed in the Southern Authority.
People worked because things needed doing.
Not because somebody's schedule demanded it.
To Crowe, the distinction mattered.
A maintenance crew occupied the next junction, arguing over a pressure valve.
One spotted Crowe.
"Morning."
"Morning."
"Still not reporting that pipe?"
Crowe glanced upward.
The same leak.
The same stain.
The same pipe.
"I've been monitoring it."
"You've been ignoring it."
"Monitoring from a distance."
The technician shook his head.
"Observers."
Crowe winced.
"That's the rudest thing anyone's said to me all week."
The technician laughed.
Further along, another worker raised a hand.
"Going somewhere?"
"Probably."
"Don't forget my fridge magnet."
"I never do."
The station continued around him in a maze of patched metal and practical repairs.
Nothing matched.
Nothing looked new.
Everything worked.
Mostly.
Crowe liked it that way.
Perfection made him nervous.
Eventually he reached his quarters.
Calling it an apartment would have been optimistic.
Calling it spacious would have been criminal.
A bed occupied one wall.
A desk occupied another.
The remaining available floor space had lost a long and bitter war against laundry.
Crowe surveyed the damage.
"It appears you have delayed washing your clothes again."
"I prefer to think of it as strategic inventory management."
"You own four shirts."
"Exactly. Quicker sniff test."
He opened a drawer.
Old field reports.
A broken scanner.
Several forgotten data drives.
Another drawer contained disciplinary notices.
The lower drawer contained a medal.
Crowe stared at both for a moment.
The medal and the suspension notice came from the same incident.
Crowe had always admired administrative efficiency.
He packed a bag.
More accurately, he packed enough clothing to create the illusion of preparation.
The coat would hide the rest.
His thoughts kept returning to the signal.
Ninety-seven percent.
Whatever was happening had already begun.
If Command became involved, entire departments would descend on the location.
Committees.
Investigations.
Risk assessments.
Years of bureaucracy.
No.
He would get there first.
Fix the problem.
Replace the metaphorical washer.
Avoid another disaster.
Avoid another set of fines.
He had only just managed to get his life back on track.
There was absolutely no chance he was repeating history.
"Evelyn."
"Yes, Crowe?"
He hesitated.
For a moment he felt foolish asking.
Then he asked anyway.
"Do you think we'll be alright?"
"What do you mean?"
Crowe sat on the edge of the bed.
"This inspection."
A pause.
"Haven't done one in a while."
Silence lingered long enough for Crowe to start regretting the question.
Then Evelyn finally answered.
"You always are."
Crowe looked down at the packed bag.
"That wasn't what I asked."
"No."
Another pause followed.
"It was what you meant."
For once, Crowe had no reply.
Outside, the storm continued to crawl across the horizon, painting the observation windows red.
Tomorrow he would leave.
For now, all he could do was wait.
Exogen Foundation - Brought to you by the Almighty Bert and the NMU Council
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