The sun had long disappeared, and the moon is nigh. My mask covered half my face, and the rest of me was draped in black, chained pocket in the shirt to hold documents and maps. Clothes that neither clung nor hung loose, just enough to melt into the shadows. Each step echoed differently than in the day, heavier somehow, like the silence itself was listening.

  The market I grew up with was nothing but a skeleton now, stalls locked, streets emptied, laughter gone. Only the wind moved between the gaps. The drones, ever-watchful in daylight, now lay dormant in their docks, dark shapes against rooftops. A false sense of safety lingered in the air, but I didn't trust it.

  I kept walking, steady, until the government boundaries loomed ahead. The very place I had no business approaching. Tonight, I did.

  At the edge of the boundaries, beside the parking lot, I pressed my hands against the cold wall. The surface was rough, the concrete chipped in places, and high above it ran a line of fencing crowned with jagged tips. I began to climb. The wall scraped against my palms, but I kept moving until I reached the fence. The steel bit into my arms as I pulled myself over. The stings cut deep, but my mind was elsewhere, fixed on the other side.

  My shoes weren't so lucky. The sharp ends pierced through the soles, pressing dangerously close, but I managed to push through. I swung over slowly, careful, and slipped down the other side. The ground met me with a dull thud.

  I crouched low, listening. No footsteps. No voices. The guards were nowhere near. Slackers, like always. I scanned the shadows once more. Across the lot, the drones sat in their docks inside the government building, red eyes dark, charging ports glowing faintly. For a few precious hours, the sky was blind. Silence answered back, and I began to move.

  I recognized the layout from the map Steve had given me and from my own reconnaissance earlier. The front building was the machinery section. Loud, alive, and crawling with security on the inside. Getting caught there was certain death. I needed to steer clear.

  Keeping low, I traced the shadows along the lot, every step deliberate, every sound questioned. The night was quiet, but quiet was a double-edged blade. It made me harder to spot, but it made my mistakes louder.

  From the corner of my eye, I caught the guards at their station. Their rifles leaned against the wall, untouched, while their eyes were glued to a flickering TV. No patrols. No wandering boots. Just laughter and cigarette smoke curling into the night. Slackers, worse than I thought.

  It made the way forward easier. I slipped past the open spaces, moving from shadow to shadow until I reached the section marked on the map. The "Redacted" section. A thick black smear had swallowed almost everything about it, leaving only an outline. I clenched my jaw and cursed Steve under my breath. Handing me a half-blind guide was as good as sending me to my grave.

  Still, I pressed on.

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  I circled to the side of the building, keeping low. A narrow toilet window caught my eye, just the kind I'd been practicing on for months. My fingers worked steady and silent, loosening the latch without so much as a click. The window gave way, and I slipped inside.

  The faint scent of disinfectant clung to the air. The place was spotless, but that wasn't what mattered. I perched on the commode, careful to keep my feet off the ground where they might be seen through the gap beneath the door. I waited. Counted breaths. The silence stretched thin, only broken by the distant hum of machines.

  No footsteps. No voices. Nobody here. Only then did I move.

  Stepping out of the toilet, the first thing I noticed was the sound. Every step echoed with a heavy reverberation, the kind that could betray me with the smallest mistake. I crouched low, moving slow, my breath tight in my chest.

  Faint voices drifted through the corridor. Casual talk, guards or workers maybe, their words muffled by distance. I froze, letting the sound wash past until it grew dim.

  On the wall ahead, a directory glowed under dim light. I scanned the signs, each word etched in bold letters. And there, sitting right on top of the list:

  Information Zone.

  So that was what the redacted section really was. Steve had led me on, left me cursing under my breath, but it worked out for the good.

  The sign pointed the way: Criticals — Second Floor.

  My pulse quickened. If the "Information Zone" was already buried under redactions, then the Criticals had to be the heart of it. The part they didn't want anyone near.

  I hugged the wall, following the shadows along the hallway. The voices behind me grew faint as I reached a stairwell. Its metal railing was cold to the touch, dust clinging to the edges. I slipped onto the first step, each movement careful, measured.

  The staircase betrayed me. Every press of my foot sent a muted creak spiraling upward. I paused, waited, listened. Nothing stirred. The slackers downstairs still hadn't moved from their stations.

  One floor up. Just one.

  I climbed, keeping low until the landing opened into a dim corridor. A faint hum echoed through the silence, machinery hidden somewhere behind the walls. Ahead, a sign confirmed it in block letters:

  Criticals →

  The hallway stretched into a gloom so deep the far end was swallowed by shadow. It was massive, a cavern of polished tile and humming server racks lined side by side with towering shelves of documents. Paper and machine, ink and electricity, guarded in equal measure. Together they dwarfed the scribbled box on Steve's map.

  Conduits and pipes ran along the high ceiling like metallic veins, pulsing with a low, mechanical breath. This wasn't just a room; it was an artery. The heart of the lie.

  The map was a child's drawing compared to this. Steve hadn't just given me a half-blind guide; he'd sent me into the belly of a beast he didn't understand.

  Every instinct screamed at me to turn back. My throat tightened, lungs drinking in the sterile air that seemed too heavy, too knowing. This wasn't infiltration anymore, it was trespass into something I was never meant to see.

  I took a sharp, quiet breath, grip tightened. And then, with the weight of silence pressing down like stone, I stepped inside.