The first refusal was unmistakable.
It did not come as absence.
It came as interruption.
They had learned to leave space—to initiate incompletely, to allow the system to respond, to negotiate the terms of connection rather than assume them. The thin thread between their trajectory and the autonomous one had held through several iterations, strengthening not through force, but through mutual recognition.
So when Neo began again—carefully, deliberately, opening a pathway rather than defining it—
he expected a response.
He did not expect resistance.
The system did not ignore the gesture.
It engaged it—
then redirected it.
The trajectory he initiated curved, subtly but undeniably, away from the connection point they had previously established. Not breaking it. Not severing it.
Re-routing it.
Neo paused mid-engagement.
"…That's new."
Ti reacted immediately.
"Input redirection detected. Source: system-origin adjustment."
Cassandra's head snapped up.
"It just overrode you."
