29. White Line
The meeting room in the Emotional Stability Centre had always been whiter than those in other departments.
Not a glaring white, but the kind that washed everything pale before allowing it to remain. The walls were white, the tabletop was white, the lights were white; even the data pages on the large screen looked as if they had first been rinsed clean. Stay too long in a place like that, and it became easy to forget that emotions had once had colour, warmth, and certain edges not so easily arranged into fields.
That afternoon, the department held a closed internal meeting.
There were not many people present, but each sat precisely where they ought to sit.
The secretary of the Emotional Stability Centre took the main seat. Beside her stood her agent, the emotional white horse. It had none of the splendour of a display agent. It was plain and clean, its mane smooth, its eyes steady, like a silent reminder: there was no need to become agitated. As long as it was present, the rhythm of the whole room naturally settled.
On the right was Mrs Dunn, the commissioner. White-headed Eagle perched behind her chair, its grey-white feathers neat, its gaze so calm it was almost administrative, as if any emotional fluctuation would be silently recorded. It was not necessarily looking at you, yet it always seemed to be watching everyone.
Farther down sat Cindy Chandler, the senior social worker. Fifi Dog lay at her feet, white and soft, easily putting people at ease. But anyone familiar with it knew that this apparently harmless agent was best at dismantling a person’s guard.
On the other side, Sandy Summers, the chief emotional medical officer, sat upright. Queen of Hearts stood beside her, deep red interlaced with white silver, like a card not yet turned over. She did not suppress and she did not measure. She simply remembered everything quietly.
Serena Simms, the senior emotional training officer, was there too. Grace Wren perched on the data shelf, small and composed. What it watched was not momentary loss of control, but those emotional trajectories that quietly deviated over long stretches of time.
Before the meeting properly began, it was not the humans who spoke first.
The agents began to move.
The emotional white horse brought up the sample summaries. White-headed Eagle marked cross-departmental risks. Fifi Dog organised home-visit and rehabilitation records. Queen of Hearts prepared the medical data. Grace Wren arranged course observations and social patterns into fields.
White light crossed over the table, like an invisible net being laid first, while the people merely sat themselves into it one by one.
At the same time, an extremely faint mirror port lit on the side wall. There was no department name, only a relay number. Everyone present knew what it was.
The Spectrum Recomposition Project office.
The image connected, and the short-haired project director appeared. Her expression was steady. Queen of Spaces stood beside her.
“Spectrum Recomposition Project connected.”
The secretary said mildly, “Today is an internal interpretation by the medical and care terminals. The Spectrum Recomposition Project may access only the summary layer.”
The project director gave a slight smile. “The summary is enough. Once colour surfaces, one does not need to stand too close to know which way it leans.”
The emotional white horse quickly flattened the atmosphere.
“Meeting begins.”
Four codenames appeared:
[Sample 87: Paul Paton]
[Sample 15: Bonnie Lawrence]
[Sample 148: Vivian Poole]
[Sample 168: Flora Cooke]
The room was quiet for a moment.
Because everyone knew that once a person was called a sample, personality, habit and mood all began moving towards pattern.
In the mirror port, Queen of Spaces unfolded the data:
[Spectrum Recomposition Project completion: 39%]
[Confirmed mutual-reflection conditions: partially established]
[Recommendation: continue collecting cross-departmental induction data]
The project director’s tone was calm.
“After cross-sampling across 404, 405 and 402, 87 and 148 showed shared restraint. After 301 intervened, 168’s historical fluctuation was retriggered. As for 15, after 104 she began flowing back towards old nodes. The four samples have not yet formed an alliance, but they already possess mutual-reflection conditions.”
Another page of data appeared:
[Whitelist Recovery Pool | Stage Results]
[Recovered agent residual cores: 7]
[Agent interaction backups established: 22]
[Effective data types: tone residue, write-back delay, non-standard loyalty, subject shielding behaviour]
[Agent data completeness: 27%]
The white light seemed to grow colder.
The secretary frowned. “This section is not on the agenda.”
The project director replied calmly, “It is, in fact, already on every agenda.”
She looked at the room.
“People forget. Paper is purified. Records are corrected. Agents are different. They preserve pauses, habits, delays, even the forms of protection their subjects dare not admit.”
Queen of Spaces added, “Preliminary conclusion: agents are not tools, but residual manuscripts of emotional structures. If only the subject is analysed, the model misses the most stubborn layer of colour.”
Serena finally spoke, “Twinkle Little Star was a deletion request, not research material.”
The project director looked at her. “In the system, deletion and recovery sometimes differ only by a purpose field.”
The room fell quiet again.
Queen of Hearts translated softly, “The Whitelist Recovery Pool is converting agent residual cores that should have been terminated into learnable data.”
“Not termination,” the project director said. “Reuse.”
Mrs Dunn’s voice was cold. “Don’t make it sound so pretty.”
The project director answered mildly, “Then let us be direct. Agents are the soul of the book. After a person has been taken apart, the agent often still remembers how the book was originally turned.”
The secretary did not let the subject spread further. “Return to sample interpretation.”
White-headed Eagle spoke first, “148 is currently low risk, but has repeatedly shown a tendency to hold back. Taken alone, it can be classed as professional judgement. Repeated, it may form a pattern.”
Several keywords appeared:
[Supplementary paper fragment]
[Domestic memory carrier]
[High emotional weight but does not constitute outward-spreading risk]
On the surface, it was classification. In essence, it was already a tendency.
Fifi Dog pushed Sample 15’s data forward.
“Surface cooperation is good. Attendance at 104 continues. Recent attention has narrowed again towards old nodes. Anomalies include: concentrated musical preference, increased night-time solitude, heightened defensiveness around private storage areas.”
The curves did not fluctuate greatly, but they all gathered in the same direction.
As though someone were slowly drawing scattered lines back into their hand.
The secretary looked towards Paul’s file.
“And 87?”
Queen of Hearts projected the cross-records.
402, 405, legal preservation, pause points at recovery scenes — all were broken into fine lines.
Looked at individually, they were ordinary. Put together, they revealed a direction.
At first glance, Sandy saw the contact line that had brightened — 87 and 148.
It was not long. And precisely because it was not long enough, it was dangerous.
At last, she spoke, “87’s greatest issue at present is not emotional loss of control, but the formation of selective protection.”
Her tone was calm. “His tendency towards preservation is beginning to echo 148’s interpretive pattern. If this continues to develop, it may not first present as a private relationship. It is more likely to appear as shared restraint, shared deviation, and the shared search for reasons certain objects should survive.”
The final sentence was marked pale red. Not an alarm. Only a reminder: there was warmth here.
Serena asked, “What if this is only professional rapport between younger colleagues?”
What she was really asking was the whole system: “Could some kinds of closeness simply be a shared frequency?”
Grace Wren brought up a line of data:
[Restrained language, inward emotion, prolonged tendency to dwell on private stories]
Sandy glanced at it.
“Rapport is not the problem. But if it occurs under conditions of high preservation tendency, sufficient interpretive authority, and increased cross-sampling, it cannot be treated as rapport alone.”
The project director suddenly interjected. “This is precisely the part the Spectrum Recomposition Project requires.”
New data appeared:
[Spectrum Recomposition Project | Stage Report]
[87: preservation impulse / agent technical residue / paper preference]
[15: memory backflow / agent restoration / trust rebuilding]
[148: legal preservation interpretation / story attachment / professional restraint]
[168: historical fluctuation / account audit / unfinished approach]
Queen of Spaces added, “The inclusion of 168 creates a cross-reference between historical relationship accounts and current work deviation. This is not interference, but an important control.”
Mrs Dunn said coldly, “The Spectrum Recomposition Project wants controls. The Emotional Stability Centre wants stability.”
The project director replied evenly, “That is why we need to know which colour will be the first to break through stability.”
The secretary tapped the table. “Return to handling recommendations.”
White-headed Eagle concluded first, “15 to remain under current arrangement. Course uninterrupted. Home-visit density not increased. Objective: avoid alerting.”
Fifi Dog followed, “Maintain low-pressure accompaniment. Do not proactively touch deep nodes. Prioritise preserving willingness to cooperate.”
Then came 148.
“No action for now. Continue observation. Do not prematurely mark as abnormal. Objective: avoid triggering defence too early.”
The secretary nodded. “Do not cut the line. First see how it grows.”
The agents simultaneously gathered the data back in.
It was not yet time to sever. First see whether it became a rope, or only a streak of light.
The project director suddenly asked, “And 168?”
Flora’s data was pulled into the centre.
The 301 record, Pigeon Eyes’ interpretation, historical fragments with 87, the unfinished approach — all were placed into the same diagram.
Queen of Hearts reported softly, “168 is stable on the surface. High interpretive ability. Clear tendency towards delayed emotional naming. Historical fluctuation towards 87 has not been fully eliminated, but has been pressed into a professional context.”
The project director nodded slightly. “This kind of sample is most suitable for observation.”
Serena looked at her. “Observation of what?”
Queen of Spaces answered for her, “How a person rewrites unfinished feeling as professional judgement.”
White-headed Eagle said coldly, “That sentence is unsuitable for the formal report.”
The project director smiled. “The formal report will say: Sample 168 possesses high-value mirror functionality.”
The meeting room fell silent again.
At that moment, the emotional white horse suddenly enlarged Paul’s preliminary medical file.
It was an ordinary action. But it made Sandy, involuntarily, think of another place.
Not 87, not cross-sampling, not 402, nor 405. A classroom from many years ago, before agents.
Back then, she was not yet the chief emotional medical officer.
There was no Queen of Hearts, no samples, no one to translate her quickening heartbeat into a curve.
Only a summer classroom.
It was high summer in G City. The sunlight was bright, not gentle, but clean and hard, with a little chalk-dust white in it. Outside the window, the wind cut the shadows of trees into squares that fell on the floor, as if someone were paging time.
When she entered the classroom, she saw he was already sitting in the second row, near the middle.
Bo.
She sat to one side of the front row, separated from him by a narrow aisle. The distance was ordinary, so ordinary no one would have looked twice. Only later did she understand that some stories began like that, sitting ordinarily beside you.
It was an extra lesson that day. Miss Lambert, who taught physics, was in a good mood. She was holding a little bear keyring she had conjured from somewhere. The moment she stood at the podium, the whole classroom seemed less as if it were waiting for a lesson than waiting for her to tease them first.
She lifted the little bear, smiling like a child.
“Little bear attack.” She asked the class, “Is this a good bear or a bad bear?”
A classmate answered at once, “Good bear!”
Miss Lambert shook her head.
“Bad bear.”
The class erupted. Some laughed, some protested, some began guessing whether she had changed the answer at random.
She lifted the bear again. “All right. Little bear attack. Now? Good or bad?”
This time someone tested the answer. “Good bear?”
“Correct,” she said.
The classroom became even more chaotic.
Thomas Barlow, sitting at the back, muttered under his breath, “This is basically black magic.”
At first, Sandy had merely watched with the others.
But as she watched, she suddenly realised Paul’s expression had changed. It was not smugness, nor the desire to show off. Only a very slight concentration, as if he had already touched the edge of the rule.
Miss Lambert raised the bear a third time.
“Little bear attack. Good or bad?”
This time, many people hesitated. Only Paul raised his hand.
Miss Lambert looked at him, as though wanting to know whether he had truly guessed it.
“You say.”
He looked at the bear once, his tone level.
“Bad bear.”
Miss Lambert nodded.
“Correct.”
The whole classroom filled with cries of “Why?”, like a group of people suddenly pushed half a step away by the same riddle, unable to see where the door was.
Sandy looked at him too. Not because he had answered correctly. But because after answering correctly, he did not look as though he needed anyone to know he was clever. He simply sat there, like someone who happened to have seen the rule.
After class, she kept thinking about the bear. She thought about it for a long time, then finally could not help going over to ask him.
There was wind in the corridor then. People slowly drifted out of the classroom, leaving behind chalk dust and that brief emptiness after class. She stood beside him and asked softly, “How did you guess just now?”
He first looked at her, then smiled. It was not a big smile, but it was real, as if he had seen that she had not come to steal the answer, but truly wanted to know.
He said, “It wasn’t really about watching the bear.”
“Then what?”
“Whether Miss Lambert said the word ‘All right’.”
She froze for a moment.
He explained, “If she says, ‘All right, little bear attack,’ then it’s a good bear. If she only says, ‘Little bear attack,’ it’s a bad bear.”
She understood at once.
That understanding was not merely solving the rule. It was more like suddenly discovering that a person could look at something everyone else thought was mere nonsense and see a structure with clues, logic, and a way to be quietly taken apart.
She could not help smiling. “That sly?”
He smiled too. “People like using language to trick others.”
She remembered that the wind was dry that day. She also remembered that before turning to leave, a very small thought had appeared in her heart: if there was another riddle next time, she wanted to ask him first.
Many years passed.
Many classrooms disappeared. Many people were washed apart by life. And she slowly tidied away those tiny, useless feelings, those moods not worth returning to again and again, arranging them into “small things from school days”, into “old impressions that do not affect work judgement”.
After enough tidying, even she almost believed they had truly become that little.
But today, when the words Sample 87 hovered quietly in the white light of the meeting room, she suddenly realised some things had not been tidied away at all.
They had only been put away too neatly.
“Sandy?”
Queen of Hearts reminded her very softly, and she came back to herself. Around the meeting table, everyone was looking at her.
“Does the medical terminal have any additional view?” the secretary asked.
Sandy did not let herself pause too long.
“87’s preliminary medical file should be passed to me first for review,” she said. “15 remains under course and home visits. Avoid sudden collection. 148 should not yet be contacted by the medical terminal, only observed. 168 will not be referred for now, but her historical fluctuation must be incorporated into 87’s medical interpretation.”
The secretary looked at her. “Reason?”
Sandy lowered her head and pulled the four codenames — Paul, Bonnie, Vivian, Flora — back into the white light. Her voice was as steady as if she were speaking only according to procedure.
“87’s current risk is not loss of control. It is that he may become an amplifier of other people’s deviations. 15 is still restabilising and must not be alarmed. If 148 is touched too early by the medical terminal, the part that is currently only professional restraint may rapidly become self-defence, which would be unfavourable for subsequent interpretation. 168 has a historical mirror effect; if handled separately, it would lose the reverse interpretation of 87.”
This was the standard answer. It was also the cleanest answer she could give.
Queen of Hearts said nothing, only stored her sentences neatly into the meeting summary.
In the mirror port, however, the project director gave a soft laugh.
“The medical interpretation is consistent with the Spectrum Recomposition Project,” she said. “We will continue tracking with 87 as the main axis and 15, 148 and 168 as mutual-reflection samples.”
The secretary showed no expression.“Tracking is permitted. No self-directed induction.”
The project director looked at her, her voice faint.
“Induction does not require any great movement. Putting people back into positions they believe they chose is often already enough.”
Beside her, Queen of Spaces opened her fan slightly.
“In addition, the Spectrum Recomposition Project requests from Room 401, the Data Calibration Office, all purification data related to the samples, including calibrated cultural content, purified-version rewriting records, traces of calibration deletions after physical carriers were digitised, and the data flows of objects related to 402 and 405.”
The air in the meeting room seemed suddenly thinner.
Room 401. The Data Calibration Office — That place did not process people. It processed content.
But in Silver Eagle’s world, content was often operated on earlier than people. Stories were cleaned first, words cooled first, images smoothed first. Then, when people looked back, they would believe they had always lived inside that safer, cleaner version that hurt less.
Serena finally frowned, “What do you want purification data for?”
The project director said, “To see which colours have been removed.”
She paused, then added, “If we want to understand how white light is recomposed, we must first know what Room 401 took from them.”
The secretary did not approve at once.
Mrs Dunn spoke first, “Give her the summary layer.”
White-headed Eagle raised its head, as if the sentence were enough to become a conclusion. “Room 401 will provide purification summaries. Full originals remain closed.”
The project director did not object.
“The summary layer is enough,” she said. “What matters is not the original text, but the places of deletion.”
The meeting soon drew to a close.
The final plan was set:
[Sample 15 would continue to be soothed through Cindy’s line, without added pressure.]
[Sample 148 would remain under general professional observation between 404 and 405, without escalation.]
[Sample 168 would be incorporated into 87’s historical mirror interpretation.]
[Sample 87’s preliminary medical file would be reviewed first by the chief medical terminal.]
[The Spectrum Recomposition Project would apply to Room 401, the Data Calibration Office, for purification summaries relating to all samples for further research.]
[The Whitelist Recovery Pool would continue supplementing agent interaction data, especially from agent nodes that had stayed close to subjects for long periods but had not been fully incorporated into legal write-back.]
Every procedure was reasonable. Every step looked like nothing more than straightening the lines a little, preventing them from tangling too soon.
After the meeting, the others rose one after another.
The emotional white horse withdrew the projection. White-headed Eagle flew out first. Fifi Dog followed Cindy. Serena also left with Grace Wren, taking several course records back into her terminal.
The mirror port closed last.
Before the image disappeared, Queen of Spaces gently folded her fan. The sound was very fine, yet it was like some piece of fate being clipped into a file.
The meeting room was soon half empty. Sandy did not leave at once.
Queen of Hearts stood beside her and did not hurry her. She was always like this, as if she knew some people did not need company, only a witness who did not speak too much.
Sandy looked at the Sample 87 number on the table, not yet fully dimmed. After a long time, she asked very softly, “If a person left a deviation behind many years ago, and later only packaged it so it looked more like procedure, does that count as part of the medical file?”
Queen of Hearts looked at her. “Are you asking about the sample, or yourself?”
Sandy did not answer.
Queen of Hearts did not press her. She only lowered the brightness of that string of code a little, as if placing the question back somewhere less glaring for the time being.
Sandy put away her tablet terminal and finally stood.
When she walked out of the meeting room, the corridor was still white, steadily white, as though all emotions had already been settled on your behalf.
But she knew some things were not absent. They had merely been placed under the name of procedure all along.
And today, when Sample 87 was placed in her hands, the fine line that had quietly appeared in a classroom aisle many years ago was finally lit once more.
Usually invisible. Once illuminated, it was difficult to pretend it was only background.
More troublesome still—from this moment on, it was no longer only the white line in her heart. It had entered procedure.