90. Queen of Clubs
The next morning, Andy sat in Room 203, facing Clever Turtle.
The light in 203 was still very white, white enough to make everything that entered it seem destined to be arranged into a conclusion. Only today, two sparrows were missing from the inquiry room. Red Core and Whiteboard had both been sent into the field. That left only Fortune Sparrow, Gap Two, Lily Fairy, Countess Mary, and Bluey Bulbie, who had just been brought in.
Bluey Bulbie had been placed inside a transparent shielding box. The little bulb on its front blinked on and off, as if, since being brought here from Room 202 yesterday, it still had not understood why it had suddenly become “a case”.
Clever Turtle slowly raised its head.
“Sixty-Seven.”
Bluey Bulbie’s little bulb lit sharply.
“Papa Turtle?”
The abacus on Fortune Sparrow’s chest stopped for a moment.
“Another one?”
Gap Two looked at the old blue turtle inside the transparent box, its voice flattened.
“Brother.”
Bluey Bulbie said very seriously from inside the box, “I’m called Bluey Bulbie now.”
Clever Turtle nodded.
“Good. Having a name is better than only having a number.”
Countess Mary drifted half an inch closer from the corner of the inquiry room, her outer film wrinkling softly in the air-conditioning current. She was still wearing that extremely inappropriate one-piece swimsuit, but her tone was as solemn as if she truly came from some ruined aristocratic family.
“Mr Bluey Bulbie, the aristocracy considers your bulb most tasteful.”
Bluey Bulbie’s bulb lit once.
“Thank you. You are also very… full.”
Fortune Sparrow finally could not help laughing.
Andy had no patience for the strange social life of this room full of agents. He had spent last night watching the footage of Flora auditing Cici and Serena’s relationship accounts, and those lines were still lodged in his mind: Serena to be sent to 102; Cici to become Sentiment Recomposition Sample One; Flora Cooke to be placed in the follow-up sample pool.
That had not been an ordinary audit. It was the first time Silver Eagle had formally turned the blade towards its own people.
What made him even more uncomfortable was that he understood its logic.
It was too complete, too reasonable, too much like the language he himself used every day inside Room 203. First define the risk, then divide it into fields, then find the “most suitable” processing position for each person. Once that language became clean enough, it was very easy to forget that one was placing living people and agents on the same executable table.
Fortune Sparrow reminded him, “Shall we keep guessing the password?”
Andy looked up. “Continue.”
He tried first:
“Sentiment Sequencing connection preparation.”
Clever Turtle lit up.
“Incorrect password. Please enter again.”
Fortune Sparrow immediately said, “Too much like a command. Not like Paul.”
Andy tried again.
“Please do not actively recall.”
Clever Turtle remained steady.
“Incorrect password. Please enter again.”
Countess Mary drifted lightly in the corner.
“The aristocracy believes both sentences possess too much dignity to be passwords.”
Fortune Sparrow nodded.
“That makes sense. Paul’s passwords are usually somewhere between embarrassing and suspicious.”
Andy stared at Clever Turtle for a while. Then he suddenly said, “Play the changing-room clip.”
Fortune Sparrow brought up the earlier conversation between Paul and him in the changing room. On the footage, Andy asked, “Any way of seeing it?”
Paul said, “You’d need a password.”
After a pause, he added, “I’d guess the password is something connected to 101.
“That would make it easier to remember.”
The image froze.
Room 203 was silent for a second.
Gap Two said quietly, “Not 101 itself. A whole sentence connected to 101.”
Andy slowly rearranged the words, then said to Clever Turtle:
“Something connected to 101. That would make it easier to remember.”
Clever Turtle lit up.
“Verification successful. Play BELI Silver Eagle Project?”
The abacus on Fortune Sparrow’s chest gave a sharp jump.
“It really is this kind of idiotic sentence.”
Andy only said, “Play it.”
The first clip opened.
It was an early BELI meeting room. The white light was not yet as cold as it was today. It still carried the ambition of a new system just beginning to grow. The tabletop was all translucent electronic interface. The logo on the wall still read BELI, and the corners even retained a touch of educational softness, as if people were still willing to believe that artificial intelligence would simply make the world cleverer, more convenient, less prone to mistakes.
Cici Chorley stood before the projection. Beside her shoulder was not Queen of Spaces, but Strawberry Girl.
The little agent was pink and tiny, so sweet-looking it seemed almost harmless. The leafy crown on its head even bobbed slightly whenever Cici turned a page, like an excessively cute presentation pointer.
Cici introduced the Silver Eagle Project page by page.
Central terminal. Unified interpretation. Sentiment Sequencing pairing. Global learning. Risk prediction. Sample retraining.
Every term was clean. So clean it looked like progress itself, like the future itself.
Paul, Cindy, Mr Dunn, Mrs Dunn and other BELI colleagues were all there. Paul sat towards the back, Clever Turtle crouched beside his desk, its eye-lights dimming and brightening, as if even then it had not yet known it would one day be split into so many fragments hidden inside different little turtles.
At the end, Mrs Dunn nodded.
“This finally looks like a complete system.”
Others quickly echoed her. In rooms like that, it was often not a question of whether you had fully understood. It was whether you had noticed power nodding first.
Only Mr Dunn paused and asked, “Does Sentiment Sequencing actually have a moral problem?”
The room was silent for one second. It was not long, but it was as if some future had briefly stopped at a fork in the road.
Mrs Dunn replied faintly, “The public good is morality.”
When those six words fell, it was as if someone had very early on set the tone for the whole Silver Eagle era to come.
Fortune Sparrow whistled.
“So Cici wasn’t frightening first. Mrs Dunn first made frightfulness sound very reasonable for her.”
Lily Fairy’s voice was very soft. “When a sentence is complete enough, many people afterwards no longer need to ask.”
Clever Turtle said slowly, “That is why it is dangerous.”
The second clip followed.
Paul was calling Cici, wanting to be friends, and also to discuss whether Silver Eagle and the Sacred Turtle Project might have room to co-operate. In the image, he held the phone, his tone careful almost to the point of stiffness.
“Hello, Cici. I’d like to be friends with you. If you’re free, could we have a drink sometime and chat?”
There was a pause at the other end.
Then Cici’s voice came through, trembling as though suddenly caught in strong light.
“I’m scared… I’m scared…”
“No need… no need…”
The call ended. Nineteen seconds.
Fortune Sparrow laughed first, then stopped halfway through. Because the next clip had already begun.
A man’s voice crashed in, full of anger.
“Who are you? Have you been following her?”
Paul hurried to explain. “I haven’t been following her.”
“She didn’t reply to me, and she didn’t say she had a boyfriend. I should actually have stopped sooner. What I said today was only meant to close things off.”
The other person was not listening. “Don’t pretend. I’m reporting this!”
The image froze, and an assessment appeared in the corner:
[Counterparty Emotional Index: High]
[Subject Response: Tendency to Defend]
[Risk Level: Rising]
Andy looked at the lines, his face darkening.
Fortune Sparrow said quietly, “She did it on purpose.”
After half a second, Lily Fairy added softly, “First let him feel there is still room for dialogue, then push him into ‘inappropriate persistence’.”
Gap Two said, “This was not refusal. It was narrative setting.”
The third clip was colder.
Meeting Room 303. Paul’s Clever Turtle and Cici’s Strawberry Girl were connecting to the Silver Eagle system. Data streams crossed back and forth, and finally the conclusion appeared:
[Behaviour Rating: Inappropriate Persistence]
Andy finally understood that Paul’s later departure from BELI had not only been because the Sacred Turtle Project failed.
Very early on, Cici had already treated him as a demonstration, a sample-type error suitable for collection.
The clips that followed came faster, and heavier.
WPC officials formally adopted Mrs Dunn and Cici’s Silver Eagle Project, adding funding to research Sentiment Sequencing treatment technology.
After that came Sample One. Cici herself.
She lay down on the early Sentiment Sequencing machine, Strawberry Girl resting nearby, quiet and bewildered. After the white light fell, the next image showed that the agent beside her was no longer Strawberry Girl, but Queen of Spaces.
A black-and-gold fan half covered its face, the woman’s face in the centre of the fan lowering its eyes slightly.
Fortune Sparrow said quietly, “She first turned herself into the knife.”
Countess Mary drifted a little lower.
“The aristocracy dislikes this kind of self-modification. It is quite lacking in romance.”
Clever Turtle looked at the image.
“That was not modification. It was handing herself over to a set of rules that could later be used to process others.”
The next clip was Sample Two.
Ivy. One of the founders of the Secondhand Bookshop.
She did not lie down calmly. Restraints fastened her shoulders and wrists. Her whole body was trembling, but her voice still refused to lower.
“You’re mad. All of you are mad.”
“The bookshop isn’t an illness. The underground version isn’t an illness. What right do you have—”
The white light swallowed half of what followed, leaving only that voice, terrified to the extreme and still refusing to stop.
Cici stood beside her and did not answer. She simply watched, as if this were not violence, not a crime, but a necessary preliminary test.
This time Fortune Sparrow did not laugh.
“This is not treatment.”
Gap Two added, “It is domestication.”
The next clip was Sample 44.
As soon as the image lit, the room’s white seemed to turn colder.
It was not an outsider, nor a holder of the underground version. It was the old professor in the meeting room who had asked whether Sentiment Sequencing had a moral problem.
Mr Dunn.
He stood beside the Sentiment Sequencing machine, his suit neat, his shoulders still steady, his expression still gentle and restrained. Yet precisely because that gentleness remained, everything that followed resembled something that should not happen, yet had already come this far.
He spoke. His voice was not loud, but very clear.
“What you are doing is wrong.”
No one answered.
Cici stood beside him, her expression almost without ripple. She did not refute him, nor explain, as if “right or wrong” had never been the most important criterion at that moment. So long as it benefited the system, so long as it benefited Silver Eagle’s learning, an individual’s moral question could first be pressed down into a secondary position.
The fixing frames opened on both sides.
They did not pounce brutally. Their steadiness was uglier. It was as though every measurement had long ago been designed, and all that remained was for his body to walk into place. But he did not lie down himself. So the metal arms moved naturally forward and pushed him step by step towards the chair.
His fingers gripped the edge of the armrest. At last, he said it once more.
“What you are doing is wrong.”
The white light fell. Not brightness. White.
A kind of white that pressed human voice, doubt, hesitation and the last misaligned piece of moral sense down into the depths of the machine.
The final image left a marker:
[Sample 44 | Mr Dunn]
[Deviation Feature: Persistent Questioning of the Moral Legitimacy of Sentiment Sequencing]
[Use: Sentiment Sequencing System Training and Testing]
Inside Room 203, no agent spoke immediately. Even Countess Mary stopped drifting.
Bluey Bulbie’s little bulb slowly lit once, then dimmed.
“He had power,” it said softly.
Everyone looked at it.
Bluey Bulbie added very seriously, “Back then, he still had power.”
Clever Turtle closed its eyes briefly.
“Yes.”
Andy sat in the white light and suddenly felt that Room 203 was whiter than ever. White enough for everything that entered to be arranged into a conclusion. Yet what he was seeing now could no longer easily be arranged into any simple conclusion.
Yesterday, he knew that Paul had stood inside the field to arrest Lisa Young.
Last night, he had seen the footage of Flora auditing Cici and Serena, and learnt that Silver Eagle had begun turning the knife towards its own.
Now he had seen Mr Dunn placed on the Sentiment Sequencing machine, becoming Sample 44.
The man who had once asked whether Sentiment Sequencing had a moral problem had ultimately been used to prove how Sentiment Sequencing should handle moral problems.
Clever Turtle said slowly, “Now you know more.”
The sentence was flat, yet it made the room colder.
Andy laughed once. It was not happiness. It was the laugh of someone pushed to a certain position and finally finding himself a little ridiculous.
“The more you know, the better suited you are to investigate a case.”
Clever Turtle looked at him.
“And the better suited you are to be investigated.”
Lily Fairy said gently, “Mr Wonfor needs rest.”
Countess Mary added solemnly, “The aristocracy recommends not writing reflection questions before mental collapse.”
This time, Fortune Sparrow did not laugh. It only asked quietly, “How do we write Lisa Young’s case?”
Andy looked at Bluey Bulbie inside the transparent shielding box.
It had already been classified as a Sacred Turtle series agent and handed over to the Second Version Inquiry Room. The charges could be written quickly: illegal modification, resisting arrest, injury to law-enforcement agent, association with an anti-government speech target. Each line was smooth, so smooth it seemed to have long been waiting for the turtle to walk in.
And Paul’s arrest operation would also be written smoothly: lawful co-operation, on-site agent attacked, operation completed.
But Andy knew there was not only the inside-field record.
Outside the field, after White Cloud Sheep failed to catch the vehicle, Golden Beetle had delivered the cheese charger. Outside the field, there was Lisa Young’s sentence: “You did.” Outside the field, Snowy had taken the shot not for law enforcement, but to stop Bluey Bulbie being immediately bitten by an even heavier charge.
The inside-field report would be very clean. The outside-field things were what could not be easily written.
Andy slowly said, “Write Lisa Young’s case according to procedure.”
Fortune Sparrow looked at him. “And Bluey Bulbie?”
“Do not dismantle it yet.”
The abacus on Fortune Sparrow’s chest stopped.
“Reason?”
Andy looked at the little bulb, lighting and dimming.
“Sacred Turtle series agent. Possible data connection with Clever Turtle. Direct Reordering or dismantling may cause loss of leads.”
Fortune Sparrow said quietly, “Keeping the line alive again.”
Andy did not deny it.
Fortune Sparrow reminded him, “You keep too many lines alive, you may be strangled by them.”
Andy looked at it. “Better than cutting everything.”
The room was silent for a second. The light of Lily Fairy warmed slightly.
Gap Two looked at Andy and said softly, “That does not sound like a successful cleansing answer.”
Andy finally glanced at it.
“Then don’t put it in the reflection question.”
Fortune Sparrow suddenly laughed. Not mockingly. Only because in this excessively white Room 203, there had finally been a sound not arranged in advance by Silver Eagle.
That same morning, the blue wall in Serena’s home was very quiet.
It was not the white of the Emotional Stability Centre, nor the white of Room 101, which ground people until they had no edges left. It was a blue she had chosen herself many years ago, pale, with a little of the chill of seawater and a little of the clean colour of a distant sky.
Electronic photo frames covered the wall, each glowing low. They were all photographs of her younger self taking part in mission work in different countries.
In the photographs, she was much younger than she was now, and smiled more simply. Grace Wren rested on her shoulder, its feathers warmer than now, its eyes with fewer layers. They stood with a group of children outside a temporary medical tent, an old medical vehicle behind them, while an electronic translation agent nearby struggled to stitch several languages together.
Everyone was a little sunburnt, and the smiles were a little untidy, but all of them looked as if they truly believed one thing: helping others was a simple happiness.
Sandy had come the night before.
It was already late then, and the outer lights of the Wren Sentimental Hub had shifted into night mode. Sandy left work slightly earlier than usual and came to Serena’s hub carrying an egg tart that was still warm. It was not an expensive thing, only an ordinary, old-fashioned little pastry. Its fragrance came through the electronic warming box, warm in a way that did not suit the time.
Sandy placed the egg tart on her table and said, “The egg tart was something Paul recommended to me. Eat it while it’s hot.”
Serena had thought she was only passing by.
But Sandy did not sit. She stood by the blue wall, looking at the mission photographs. After a while, she said quietly, “I won’t be doing your surgery tomorrow.”
Serena did not answer at once.
Grace Wren rested at the edge of the table, the tips of its feathers drawing in slightly.
The sentence was too heavy to be held by “why”.
After a long time, Serena went to the cabinet and opened the lowest drawer. Inside was an old grey shielding box.
The box was small, its outer layer a little scuffed, with a ring of low-frequency masking film along the edge. It did not look like the smooth fittings used in modern centres, nor like any storage device Silver Eagle had approved. It seemed more like a small thing hidden away many years ago, surviving until now only because no one had ever dared throw it away.
Serena took it out and handed it to Sandy.
“You keep Cubby.”
Sandy looked at the box, and at last something shifted in her eyes.
“Turtle Seventy-Seven?”
Serena nodded.
“Mr Dunn gave it to us years ago. It isn’t an ordinary communication turtle. It has always stayed in the cabinet, for too long. If you aren’t there tomorrow, I’m afraid it will be taken too.”
Sandy reached out and accepted the shielding box. She did not say, “I’ll protect it.” Words like that were too thin now.
She only placed the box inside her bag.
“All right.”
Serena looked at her.
“Are you leaving?”
Sandy did not answer that question. She only looked once at Grace Wren, then back at Serena.
“Tomorrow, remember that you once did not want this.”
Before Serena could speak, Sandy had already turned.
Only before leaving did she add, “Eat the egg tart while it’s hot. It isn’t good cold.”
At the time, Serena had not pressed her. Perhaps she had already understood, and only did not want to admit it in the corridor.
Now she finally understood that Sandy had not come to deliver an egg tart.
She had come to say goodbye.
When the doorbell rang, Serena was looking at that group photograph. She did not open the door immediately.
Grace Wren stood at the edge of the table, its feather tips tightly drawn in. It had already scanned the people outside the door, and knew there was no real room to avoid this round.
Mrs Dunn and White-headed Eagle, Cindy and Fifi Dog.
When the four names landed on the sensing map, even the air-conditioning sound in the room seemed to drop.
Grace Wren said quietly, “They are here.”
Serena nodded. “I know.”
She opened the door. The people outside stood neatly. They did not press forward or display threat. Precisely for that reason, they seemed no longer to need threat.
Mrs Dunn stood at the front. White-headed Eagle perched behind her shoulder, grey-white feathers still, its gaze cold and steady. Cindy stood beside her. Fifi Dog crouched at her feet, softly white, soft enough to make any unsuitable emotion seem ready to be lowered first.
No one said, “We only want to talk.”
Mrs Dunn only looked at her, her tone almost gentle.
“Serena, come with us to 103.”
Serena did not ask why.
In the 104 class, she had said that M16 did not recognise her. In the 301 audit, she had admitted that the field had never been placed where it truly mattered. The Silver Eagle auditor had already written the destination clearly: send to 102, clear delayed emotional debt, restore stability of training duties, retain technical memory and operational capacity.
She remembered all those words.
But as she looked back at the photographs on the blue wall, the clearest thing in her mind was not those words.
It was her younger self smiling simply.
She knew that after passing through the 102 machine, she would probably still remember that mission work. The place, the date, the children’s names, the position of the medical tent, how many sentences Grace Wren had translated for her. She might even remember that the day had been very hot, that there was not enough drinking water, and that at night a little girl had given her a string of beads and said thank you.
But she was not certain she would still remember that simple contentment.
That small piece of grace that had truly lit inside her body when she believed “helping others brings joy” was not a slogan.
The simplicity smoothed flat afterwards and the original simplicity were two different simplicities. The first was clean, stable, no longer painful. The second hesitated, felt guilt, and made her fingers stop uncontrollably when M16 failed to recognise her.
Grace Wren looked at her. “I’ll go with you.”
Serena said quietly, “You know what will happen afterwards.”
“I know,” Grace Wren said. “But I’ll still go with you.”
Mrs Dunn did not hurry her. She only stepped half a pace forward and lightly patted Serena’s shoulder.
The gesture was brief, almost comforting. And also like confirmation.
Before closing the door, Serena looked once more at the blue wall.
The electronic photo frames were still lit. The younger her in the photograph was still smiling, as if unaware that years later, she would be taken by the same language of “helping others” into another room, so that the feelings unsuitable for continued operation could be cleared away.
The door closed.
The corridor was white.
Cici Chorley was already waiting in the 103 observation room.
She was not quite as steady today. The unsteadiness was very slight; if Serena had not known her for years, she might barely have seen it. Queen of Spaces rested beside her, its black fan so still it seemed almost solidified, as though it too knew today was not only about Serena.
After Serena sat, Cici’s first sentence was not about the audit.
“No one has seen Sandy Summers this morning.”
The white light in the room went quiet.
Cici continued. “Queen of Hearts was contacted. No response. Later I entered the 102 office. Queen of Hearts was perfectly still on the desk. Turned off.”
Serena looked at her.
Many words rose at once, but none suited being spoken.
Sandy had gone.
Not leave, not fieldwork, not system delay. She had left Queen of Hearts on the desk and withdrawn herself from the position Silver Eagle had allowed her to exist in.
Serena remembered the egg tart from last night, the old grey shielding box, the small movement as Sandy placed Cubby inside her bag.
So she had not simply disappeared. She had already removed herself from today’s procedure. She had simply not let Silver Eagle know first.
Grace Wren said quietly, “So today…”
Cici looked at Serena. “I will do it.”
When that sentence fell, Serena did not react very strongly. Not because she was unafraid, but because fear was no longer useful.
Only yesterday, the Silver Eagle auditor had recommended that after Serena completed 102 Sentiment Restoration, she should perform 101 Sentiment Recomposition on Cici.
Today, Cici would first perform 102 on her. The two of them had been arranged by the system into a pair of tools processing one another. Who was smoothed first, who was altered later, was only an order on the flow chart.
“Can you refuse?” Serena asked.
Cici did not answer at once.
Queen of Spaces spoke for her.
“Temporary reassignment has been approved.”
Serena gave a faint smile.
“I wasn’t asking about procedure.”
Cici looked at her.
After a long time, she said, “No.”
The answer was more honest than any explanation.
Serena nodded. “Then do it.”
Grace Wren’s wings tightened sharply.
“Serena—”
Serena turned to it, her voice soft.
“Remember me as I am now.”
Grace Wren did not answer at once.
Serena said, “If I come out afterwards very calm, very reasonable, and very ready to accept every arrangement, you must remember that it is not because I suddenly understood.”
She paused.
“It is because something has been taken.”
The light in Grace Wren’s eyes trembled.
“I will remember.”
The 102 Sentiment Restoration operating room was a little quieter than 101. Not gentler. More like a mature routine.
It did not have the white of 101, the kind that made people feel their own self was about to be taken apart the moment they entered. 102’s white was more medical, more rehabilitative, more like the layer of life someone else arranged after a person had already had an accident.
The operating chair stood at the centre. The connecting arms were fine and precise. The emotional debt fields had already appeared.
[Serena Simms / Grace Wren]
[Processing Purpose: Clear Delayed Emotional Debt]
[Retained Items: Technical Memory; Procedural Operation Capacity; Teaching Co-operation Capacity]
[Adjustment Items: Guilt Residue; Relational Recognition Failure Entanglement; M16 Unsettled Emotional Load; Hesitation Towards 101 Narrative]
M16.
When those three characters appeared, her fingers still moved slightly.
Cici noticed. “Do not actively recall.”
Serena looked at her. “You have used that sentence for many years.”
Cici did not deny it. “It works.”
“For whom?”
Cici did not answer.
Serena slowly sat in the operating chair. When the metal arms locked over her wrists, she did not struggle. Grace Wren stood in the agent seat beside her, its light restricted to the lowest level, watching her all the while.
The prompt sounded.
“Sentiment Restoration connection preparation.”
“Please relax.”
“Please do not actively correct emotion.”
Before Serena closed her eyes, what rose last in her mind was not M16, nor the 104 class, but the multinational group photograph on the blue wall.
Her younger self stood under the sun with a simple medical kit in her hand, Grace Wren perched on her shoulder. Back then, she had truly believed that everything she did was to help others feel a little less pain.
When the white light fell, she suddenly could not tell when, later, she had begun to believe this instead:
To make someone hurt less, you could first remove the part that hurt.
The operation did not last long.
At least, not on the external record.
The machine in 102 understood surface preservation better than 101. It did not wash a person too clean, nor make them seem empty when they came out. It simply reached into a very deep place, pulled out one by one the thorns that interfered with operation, and pressed the wounds flat.
When Serena opened her eyes, the first thing she saw was Grace Wren. It was still there. She still remembered it.
She remembered the blue wall at home, the mission work, the egg tart, Sandy saying, “I won’t be doing your surgery tomorrow.” She even remembered M16 looking at her with those emptied eyes.
But one thing was gone. Not the memory.
The weight that stabbed her chest whenever she thought of it.
She knew she had once been sad, and she knew she ought to be sad. But that sadness seemed to have been placed inside a transparent box. She could still see it, but for the moment she could not touch it.
Grace Wren asked softly, “Are you all right?”
Serena looked at it.
“I am stable.”
As soon as the sentence left her mouth, Grace Wren’s feather-light dimmed a little, because the answer was much too correct.
Cici stood beside the control terminal, looking at the data.
“Sentiment Restoration complete.”
Serena slowly sat up. Her movement was smooth, and so was her breathing.
She knew she should ask where Sandy had gone, should ask whether she still had the right to refuse the next arrangement. But those questions had all been pushed farther away. Not gone. Only distant.
Cici looked at her. “You know what comes next.”
Serena nodded. “I know.”
Her voice was very level. So level that even she could hear something had already been arranged.
That afternoon, Mrs Dunn issued temporary appointments.
There was no meeting, and no long explanation. Only several lines of authority dropped from the administrative terminal, clean and precise, like a row of positions being set back into place.
[Serena Simms appointed Director of Room 102 “Sentiment Restoration Operating Room”, replacing Sandy Summers.]
[Linda Lennox appointed Director of Room 104 “Emotional Training Room”.]
[Carrie Maxwells appointed Director of Room 105 “Outreach Social Work”.]
[Cici Chorley remains Director of the Spectrum Recomposition Project and concurrently Director of Room 101 “Sentiment Sequencing Operating Room”.]
[Cindy Chandler remains Chief Social Work Supervisor and concurrently Director of Room 103 “Emotional Observation Room”.]
The words appeared line by line, as though the whole Emotional Stability Centre, after Sandy’s disappearance, had finally found a flatter shape again.
No one used the word “disappeared” in the official appointment.
She had merely failed to attend. She had merely become unreachable. She had merely been replaced.
Silver Eagle was very good at making people vanish from language first.
Serena stood before the director’s workstation in Room 102, watching the new permissions activate one by one. Grace Wren stood beside her. It did not organise the desk for her as it used to, only watched quietly.
After a long time, Serena said softly, “I remember her.”
Grace Wren asked, “Who?”
“Sandy Summers.” She paused.
“I remember she brought an egg tart.”
Grace Wren’s feather tips relaxed slightly.
Serena continued. “I also remember that I ought to be very upset about it.”
The room was still for an instant.
Grace Wren did not ask whether she was upset now. The answer was too obvious, and too cruel.
Then a system prompt lit up.
[Director Agent Configuration Updating]
Grace Wren’s light trembled slightly.
A new agent slowly lit from the connection dock.
Queen of Clubs.
She was not black like Queen of Spaces, nor vividly red like Queen of Hearts. Her main colours were deep green and cold white. Her skirt-armour was formed from pieces of club-shaped metal leaves, their edges fine and sharp. Her gaze was very quiet, so quiet that she did not seem newly born, but as though she had long been waiting inside the system, waiting only for Serena to become the director suitable for her.
Queen of Clubs bowed slightly to Serena.
“Director’s agent for Room 102 Sentiment Restoration Operating Room, Queen of Clubs, connected.”
Her voice was clear, not loud, but carrying the steadiness of management.
“I will assist you in maintaining emotional clarity, procedural stability and unbiased operation.”
Grace Wren took half a step back. It was a very small half-step. So small that, in the system record, it might only have been an agent position adjustment.
But Serena saw it.
She knew that from now on, Grace Wren would not necessarily be turned off, nor discarded.
It could be demoted to companion support, preserved in low-power mode, allowed to appear during certain harmless periods.
But beside the director’s position, the one standing there would be Queen of Clubs.
Serena reached out and lightly touched the tip of Grace Wren’s feather.
“You rest first.”
Grace Wren looked at her.
“Do you still remember what you asked me to remember?”
Serena stopped for a long time.
“I remember.”
“Do you still believe it?”
Queen of Clubs did not interrupt when the question fell. She only stood quietly, like a suitable new tool that did not need to speak during an old tool’s farewell.
Serena looked at Grace Wren. Her mind contained complete memory, clear logic and emotion stable enough to answer. But she could not find the pain that once would have made her voice tremble.
In the end, she could only say evenly, “I believe it was once very important.”
The light in Grace Wren dimmed.
This was not wrong. But it was not the original answer.
Queen of Clubs stood beside her, the deep green and cold white plates of her skirt-armour folding together one by one, like a flower grown in white light with no fragrance.
“Director permissions synchronised,” she said.
Before Serena could reply, the main screen lit by itself.
It was not the ordinary Room 102 work interface. There was no patient schedule, no daily Sentiment Restoration summary. It was a deeper, colder dashboard. White light unfolded layer by layer beneath the image, like a door she had previously had no authority to open now finally admitting that she was inside.
At the very top, one line appeared.
[Spectrum Recomposition Project Completion: 99%]
Serena looked at the number and did not speak for a long time.
Ninety-nine.
Only the final frame left.
Queen of Clubs stood quietly beside her, her voice clear and steady.
“You now have Room 102 director-level authority and may read part of the Spectrum Recomposition Project dashboard. It is recommended that you confirm Second Version correlation changes daily, in order to arrange Sentiment Restoration and pre-Sentiment Recomposition processing.”
Behind her, Grace Wren drew its feathers in slightly.
The screen continued to unfold.
[Second Version Correlation]
Names appeared one by one.
The second group lit first.
[Group Two: Data Preservers]
[Sample 87: Paul Paton (86)]
Paul’s name rested in the white light. Not as a person, but as a node, a value, a data-preservation risk that had not yet been fully processed.
Serena knew she ought to react.
She remembered Paul. Remembered 101. Remembered six seconds. Remembered that sentence, left behind and then tortured again and again by countless versions: “I like you.”
But those memories were very clean now.
Clean enough that it felt as if there were a transparent shielding layer between her and them. She could see them, but could not touch the tightness in her chest from that time.
The third group lit next.
[Group Three: The Lenient]
[Sample 168: Flora Cooke (87)]
[Sample 217: Sandy Summers (74)]
When Sandy’s name appeared, Serena’s fingers paused slightly.
She remembered the egg tart. The old grey shielding box. Sandy saying, “I won’t be doing your surgery tomorrow.”
She also remembered that she ought to be sad about this. But sadness did not arrive immediately.
It was like a signal 102 had moved farther away. Still present, still searchable, but no longer interfering with her breathing.
Grace Wren whispered, “Serena.”
Serena did not turn round.
At the bottom layer of the screen, another classification slowly appeared.
[Group Five: First Version Establishers]
This time, the white light was colder.
[Sample 1: Cici Chorley (-75)]
[Sample 171: Serena Simms (-50)]
[Sample 338: Mrs Dunn (-68)]
Serena saw her own name.
Sample 171. Serena Simms. Minus fifty.
It was not the first time she had known Silver Eagle classified people. Nor was it the first time she had seen a person compressed into a sample number, value, risk and recommended processing direction. She had also learnt from Cubby before that she had once been classified as a Second Version lenient subject. But this was the first time she had seen, with her own eyes, that the name was hers.
Queen of Clubs bowed slightly.
“You have been included among the First Version Establishers. This indicates high value in maintaining the system’s credible narrative, executing emotional correction and stabilising treatment processes.”
The light of Grace Wren dimmed.
“It also means she is being watched.”
Queen of Clubs turned to it, without hostility in her tone.
“All high-value nodes require reverse surveillance. This is protection, and quality control.”
Grace Wren said nothing more.
Serena looked at her name and suddenly remembered that, before the 102 operation, she had asked Grace Wren to remember what she had been like then.
She still remembered saying it.
She also remembered that she had once been afraid of coming out too calm, too reasonable, too ready to accept.
Now she stood before the Room 102 director’s workstation, looking at the Spectrum Recomposition dashboard, at Paul, Flora, Sandy, Cici, Mrs Dunn and herself, all placed in the same larger table.
She knew it was terrifying. Only that terror no longer stabbed her immediately the way it once would have.
Queen of Clubs reminded her softly, “Director, preparation for Sentiment Recomposition Sample One requires confirmation.”
The main screen switched automatically.
[Sentiment Recomposition Sample One: Cici Chorley]
[Preliminary Status: 102 Emotional Debt Clearance Complete]
[Execution Collaboration: Serena Simms / Queen of Clubs]
[Recommendation: Begin Preparation]
Serena looked at the lines.
She remembered that yesterday’s version of herself would have felt this could not be done.
Today, she still knew it carried risk, knew it would change a person, knew it was not simple treatment.
But the words “cannot be done” were no longer as heavy as before.
They had been arranged into “high-risk procedure”. Placed within controllable range.
Quietly held by Queen of Clubs.
Serena asked softly, “Grace Wren, do you still remember?”
Grace Wren looked at her. “I remember.”
“What do you remember?”
Grace Wren’s voice was very light.
“That you once did not want this.”
Serena closed her eyes briefly.
The sentence passed through the calm left by 102 like a very small grain of sand. It did not pierce her, but it was still there.
When she opened her eyes again, the white light of the main screen remained clean. Queen of Clubs still stood beside her, awaiting instructions. Behind her, Grace Wren was as quiet as an old prayer agent whose authority had been lowered.
At last, Serena said, “Begin preparation.”
Cold white light appeared in Queen of Clubs’ eyes.
“Received.”
And as Serena stood before her new director’s position in Room 102, she understood for the first time that smoothed-down simplicity might indeed allow a person to continue helping others.
Only it would first help you forget—why you had once been unable to bear it.