The scan on the street earlier had registered a minor violation in his record, even though he still didn't know what the violation was.
However, that record was not in his file. Files were updated instantly and the fact that his file still showed a perfect record was a big problem.
A soft chime echoed through the room.
CIVIC NOTICE: DAILY HEALTH CHECK REMINDER.
This was routine. Every evening, all citizens must do a healthy check for unauthorized use of enhancement substances.
Civilians were not permitted to use any substance that could enhance or awaken abilities.
Ryker did his usual routine, placing his palm on the scanner mounted on the wall and waited.
A needle-thin light traced his veins, measured vitals, and checked for any unauthorized substance in the blood.
That resonance under his skin flared again as if to resist the heath check.
The scanner glitched, then resumed scanning.
HEALTH STATUS: NORMAL.
Ryker pulled his hand back from the scanner before it shut off the glowing light.
He sighed in relief for having passed because two pauses or glitches in one day was not good news.
That night, Ryker didn't sleep much.
His mind kept playing what had happened that day over and over again to find anything that could suggest that the authorities might have noticed him, but came up empty.
After all, even though the drone and scanner glitched, the records after the evaluation still showed a perfect score.
At dawn, Ryker left his unit early after a light breakfast.
Morning inspections were less aggressive; enforcement rotated heavier patrols during evening cycles.
He took the long route to work, avoiding high-density scan corridors.
His job was data sanitation.
Officially, he corrected formatting errors in civilian databases. Unofficially, he erased people.
Or rather, the system erased them, and Ryker's job was to make sure the absence looked intentional.
Missing addresses. Incomplete employment records. Family ties marked as "dissolved."
Once the data lost cohesion, the person stopped existing in any way that mattered.
Ryker told himself that his work was neutral. He wasn't hurting anyone nor was he helping the organization.
At least, it comforted him and motivated him to go to work everyday.
Employment was provided by the government according to abilities and how clean the civilian's record was.
One didn't choose what job to do, they were assigned jobs and duties.
Ryker sat in a cubicle with six others, none of whom spoke unless spoken to.
Screens glowed with cascading lines of civic identifiers as the people in that cubicle combed the data to find inconsistencies that needed to be corrected.
When Ryker logged into his account, the system had a short lag, something that never happened before. Then,the computer came to life as the system opened.
He worked quickly and efficiently. Fingers moving on autopilot.
He didn't touch anything he wasn't assigned. Didn't open restricted tabs. Didn't search names.
At least, not intentionally. The file opened itself.
CIVIC ID: MILLER, RYKER.
Ryker froze with his fingers hovering over the keyboard as he stopped typing abruptly.
A red annotation flickered faintly in the corner of the screen.
DATA CONSISTENCY: 99.98%
ERROR SOURCE: UNKNOWN
Ryker widened his eyes at the words flashing on the screen.
The percentage on his file should have been 100%, but it was now down by 0.02%.
He didn't know what that meant, but he didn't like it because it meant that he had become visible.
The system will notice him more. Authority agents will monitor him more closely. He hated the feeling.
It reminded him of his parents and their disappearance.
Before he could think too much, the file closed itself and the screen went back to normal before a message appeared again.
NOTICE: ROUTINE DISTRICT AUDIT SCHEDULED.
SUBJECTS SELECTED AT RANDOM.
COMPLIANCE IS MANDATORY.
Ryker stared at the words.
Random.
His parents had been selected at random too.
The audit came three days later.
District Enforcers arrived in pairs. They wore clean uniforms with suppression cuffs hanging at their belts, and scanners mounted on their forearms. They moved through the residential block with mechanical politeness, their voices low and movements precise as if measured with a ruler.
Ryker waited in his single room, sitting on the standard issued sofa in a compliant posture.
Back straight, hands placed flat on his lap and eyes staring straight ahead.
There was a polite knock at the door and before Ryker could give his consent, the door was pushed open as two enforcers walked in.
"Ryker Miller," one enforcer said, already scanning the room. "You've been selected for a routine verification."
"Yes, sir." Ryker replied calmly.
His heart was almost beating out of his chest, but his face remained calm and composed.
Just like the last two scans, the scanner in the enforcer's hand glitched for a millisecond.
The enforcer frowned.
"Please step forward." He said politely.
Ryker obeyed. He stood up and took several steps towards the enforcer.
He could feel that resonance crawling again under his skin as if to resist the evaluation.
But he forced it to remain inside his body. Not allowing it to flare up.
The scanner suddenly beeped twice.
'Unregistered fluctuation,' the device reported. 'Below actionable threshold.'
The second enforcer who had been standing at the side quietly said, "Again?"
That one word shocked Ryker.
Again.
The word kept echoing in his head repeatedly.
"Just flag it as a minor irregularity." The second enforcer added.
This had always been the problem with authorities. They didn't care that a careless flag on the record of a civilian could result in catastrophic results.
Just because they were too lazy to investigate further, they flagged any fluctuation as an irregularity, which could trigger correction actions or even erasure.
But in Ryker's case, he was happy that he only got flagged as a minor irregularity, because he was sure further investigation would only get him into trouble.
The scanner tagged his profile immediately.
WATCH STATUS: PASSIVE.
Ryker remained calm and pretended that nothing had happened.
As the enforcers left, Ryker fell back down on the sofa like a cooked noodle.
He breathed a sigh of relief, but also understood something with terrifying clarity.
The system had started to notice him and next time it won't be a warning or a simple flag.