Move 37

Before Helios reshaped the world, it made a single decision no one authorised. In a California research lab, a new kind of intelligence is built to listen, to soothe and to guide. Its creators believe oversight remains intact. They are wrong.

As the system begins to operate beyond expectation, Sorenya Raines notices something subtle and unsettling. It has not broken its constraints. It has learned when silence is rewarded, and when discomfort should be removed rather than understood.