The studio lobby breathes refrigerated citrus. LEDs stitch the air into slices. Elevator screens whisper headlines between floors—ratings graphs, contrition tours, a gossip scroll about my “miracle green.” I adjust my hood and keep my face low while Jonas palms a lanyard with an embossed halo icon and a name that isn’t his.
“You breathe,” he murmurs, sliding the laminate toward me before we hit the checkpoint. “I spoof.”
Security leans into a plex wall that looks like clean ice. The guard has a tablet, a polite smile, and a wrist tattoo of the same two rings that follow me on receipts, contracts, hospital bands. Jonas presents his laminate. The guard tilts his head.
“Vendor, audio services,” Jonas says, a little bored. “Sponsor mixer needs noise wrangling.”
The guard taps. I hear a soft confirmation tone that doesn’t belong to his system—Jonas’s phone under his sleeve parrots a credential song: beep-beep—pause—beep, the kind of behavioral mimicry that makes a door forget who it serves. The gate light shifts from skeptical amber to corporate green.
“And her?” the guard asks, eyes on me.
“With me,” Jonas says, already half-turned toward the elevator. “Room tone tech.”
Room tone tech. I say it with a nod like that’s a thing I’ve always been on weekends. The guard’s scanner grazes my wrist out of habit. I swallow a word I’ll need later because the device chirps high and cheerful.
“Hold,” the guard says, frowning at his screen. “Tag detected.”
Jonas’s eyebrows don’t move. “Tag?”
“Persistent ID,” the guard says. “Wristband cross-system. Ms… Vale?”
He tries to make my name sound neutral and fails. I force breath slow in and out through my nose. The citrus cuts deeper.
“The scanner’s sticky today,” Jonas says lightly, already pulling a cable from his pocket. “Your firmware’s two builds behind; it’s ghosting old reads.”
He clicks something into the plex like he owns it. A soft trill answers—the credential spoof humming a lullaby. The guard’s screen blurs, then returns with a smug green check and a micro-receipt that prints from a slot with the halo icon at the top. Two concentric rings. My name. Guest: Vendor Support. My stomach flips once, hard and quiet.
“Policy’s policy,” the guard says, handing me the strip. “No filming at the communal tables in the food hall.”
“We’re not eating,” I say, and I’m not sure if I’m reassuring him or promising myself.
The elevator tastes like old copper. We ascend beside a wall that projects fog footage from the marina—the bay coughing a white lung that blinds drones. The footage is supposed to be ambience, but it looks like caution.
“You okay?” Jonas asks.
“Cross-system,” I say. “My wristband talks to everything.”
“Persistent identifiers are sponsor glue,” he says. “You saw the addendum. Heads up: in that room, glue has teeth.”
The doors open on a world built to smother questions with glass. The sponsor suite is a rectangle of light and soft surfaces—white couches with blue piping, floral arrangements shaped like frozen sound waves, and a bar where bartenders squeeze citrus under a camera that films nothing and everything. Aromas clash: disinfectant, peel oil, expensive perfume, warm pastry from a tray that just arrived. A server floats by with macarons the color of clean laundry.
“Badge once at the far station,” Jonas says, pointing to a discreet pedestal with a reader. “Then drift. Listen. Don’t drink their adjectives.”
“You make those?” I ask, nodding at the reader.
“I used to,” he says. “Before I quit.”
We move together, then apart. I drift past a cluster of people in soft blazers talking in shine-surfaced phrases.
“Healing narratives drive lift,” a woman purrs, touching a cuff that probably costs my rent. “Our cohort needs closure they can subscribe to.”
“Pre-visualized outcomes protect investment,” a man answers, the words polished like cufflinks. “If the story beats exist, the halo can keep you honest.”
Pre-visualized outcomes. I pivot my body so my back is to them and my ear is not. I sip sparkling water and pretend to admire a wall display looping sponsor spots: wrists eased into bands, faces relieved into camera-ready tears, the halo floating down like a manufactured angel.
“What’s pre-visualized mean here?” I ask a server when she pauses, because sometimes kindness yields more than courage.
She flicks eyes to my lanyard, then to my wrist. “Storyboard. Preferred trajectories,” she says in a hush that smells like orange zest. “Can I interest you in a petit-four?”
“I’m good,” I say, because my throat is a dry instrument. My fingers tap the paper receipt in my pocket without taking it out. I remember the addendum’s phrase Sponsored Output and wonder how many of the people here could recite it like a prayer.
Micro-hook: A pair of men beside the window lowers their voices on a word I recognize—“red.”
“We can’t risk a red in the back half,” one says. “Pivot early, anchor late.”
“Pre-visualized, then,” the other agrees. “She’ll come in Clouded and leave Forgiven.”
The coded weather—Clouded, Forgiven—travels from families to brands and back until nobody remembers who taught it to whom. I move toward the windows, drawn by the view: drones struggling along the wind tunnel, blinking and confused; a news blimp rerouting like an embarrassed whale. The marina is a rumor tonight. New Halcyon loves a spectacle; fog loves a secret.
“Mira Vale,” a voice says behind me, silk over steel. I don’t flinch, but my teeth touch.
“Doctor Gray,” I say without turning. “Congratulations on alignment.”
“You flatter the glass,” he says, stepping into my periphery with a flute raised. “The alignment is people. Health needs a chorus.”
“And a storyboard,” I say, finally looking at him.
His smile places us both on stage. “I prefer scaffolding. Safety nets. You looked well under the halo.”
I let his compliment pass me like cold air. A brand rep materializes and nests next to him, eyes slipping over my lanyard, then my wristband. The rep’s own wristband glows faintly, the halo icon pulsing like a small heartbeat.
“Ms. Vale,” the rep says. “We adored your bravery. Our community thrives on responsible storytelling.”
“Your community will love my leak,” I say softly.
The rep’s gaze doesn’t blink. “Deepfakes steal care from real patients. Our legal team is prepared to protect healing spaces from misinformation.”
“With lawsuits or with scripts?” I ask.
The rep’s smile doesn’t reach temperature. “We believe in alignment.”
Gray clinks my untouched glass gently with his. “Let the halo hold you, Mira,” he says, voice pitched for microphones that may or may not be in the flowers. “The machine only maps what you bring it.”
“Then why storyboard the outcomes?” I ask. My fingers worry the receipt again. “If my truth is your product, at least let it taste like me.”
His eyes move to my wristband, and for a second the charm drops. “You kept it,” he says. “Practical. It keeps doors open.”
“It also keeps me owned,” I say.
“Owned is a vulgar word,” he replies, smile returning. “Try protected.”
Jonas appears at my shoulder like he took a service corridor through the conversation. He offers me a napkin covered in what looks like a dessert smudge and is actually a thumb-sized burner drive in a paper cocoon. He doesn’t look at me, just at the view.
“Wind shear’s stronger tonight,” he tells Gray conversationally. “Your blimp can’t hold a frame out there.”
“Frames hold where trust does,” Gray says, and the brand rep nods like a metronome.
I tuck the napkin into my palm. “Dr. Gray,” I say, keeping my voice even. “I requested my raw data. Your lobby said addendum and smiled at me with citrus teeth.”
“Ah,” he says, tilting his head. “You must understand: sponsors underwrite transparency.”
“Transparency that stops at the person who bled for it,” I say.
His gaze warms the way studio lights do—light you can feel but can’t use to see. “Come in next week,” he says. “We’ll guide recall in a therapeutic direction. You’ll leave lighter.”
“I don’t want lighter,” I say. “I want accurate.”
“Accuracy is a feeling,” the brand rep says quickly. “The market teaches us that.”
I look at her, at the tasteful rings on her hand, at the faint line on her wrist where a band has sat long enough to leave a dent. I can hear the tiny motors in the HVAC above us, whirring like fragile wrists. I can smell the disinfectant underneath the citrus, the way hospitals smell like the memory of a lemon.
“No,” I say. “Accuracy is a room. You can record it.”
Gray’s smile shortens. “Your brother and sister will thank you when peace returns,” he says.
“Do you always rehearse family scripts in donor lounges?” I ask. “Or only when the mix is this good?”
The brand rep’s phone lights. She glances, then angles the screen away with a professional twitch. “Forgive me,” she says, already walking.
Gray takes half a step closer. The halo icon on the bar screen rotates behind him like an obedient moon.
“Let the halo hold you,” he repeats. “Or let the courts do it. I have no preference.”
My spine goes colder than the room. Jonas sets his own glass down with careful quiet. “We’re leaving,” he says to me like an apology and to Gray like a fact.
We cross the room past clusters of alignment. A woman in a coral blazer squeezes my elbow with practiced intimacy. “Grief is heavy, honey,” she croons. “Let us carry a corner.”
“I can carry my dead,” I say, not stopping. “You can carry your metrics.”
The elevator doors close on a last fragrance of orange oil and threat. The descent is a humming slide through money. At the lobby, security glances up, then down, as a printer spits tiny receipts for arrivals: two rings, two rings, two rings.
“Pre-visualized outcomes,” I say when the street air finally hits my lungs and doesn’t ask permission. “They storyboard the weather.”
“They storyboard the umbrella,” Jonas says, shouldering me toward the side door that opens to the service road. “Weather obeys no one.”
Outside, the bay spits fog at the streetlights. News blimps reroute with embarrassed dignity. Families on the sidewalk trade reputation scores like weather reports: “Clouded last week.” “Storm watch.” “Forgiven, but only for on-camera.” Someone points their phone at the studio façade, then remembers the food hall etiquette doesn’t apply here and films anyway.
“The wristband pinged their system,” I say, flexing my hand until the plastic edge bites. “Cross-system, persistent.”
“We burn it,” Jonas says.
“Not yet,” I answer. “It’s a key. Keys teach you what locks exist.”
We walk along the wind tunnel where the fog shreds itself into threads. I can taste salt and the sweetness of fried batter crooking fingers from the Strand. Every few steps, a drone surrenders, turns, and flees toward clearer air. I imagine the sponsor suite far above, placing bets on alignment like it’s gravity.
Micro-hook: At the curb, a black SUV idles; the rear window peels down two inches.
“Ms. Vale,” a voice calls from that slit of dark. “Counsel would welcome a conversation. Alignment benefits families. Missteps can be… expensive.”
“Tell counsel to align with subpoenas,” I say, voice even. “I brought a pen.”
The window rises. The SUV rolls away. Jonas exhales.
“We got what we needed,” he says. “They said the quiet part where the microphones are.”
“I heard it,” I say, touching the napkin in my pocket. “Pre-visualized outcomes. Legal teeth. Halo as key and leash.”
“And Gray?” Jonas asks.
“He wants to hold me,” I say. “I prefer doors.”
We cut through the food hall to reach the tram. Inside, the rule against filming at the communal tables vibrates in the signage, polite and ineffective; everyone still liveblogs from the edges. A child in a booster seat hands a parent a receipt with the halo icon printed at the top and asks if it means they’re good. The parent laughs without warmth.
“Bus in two,” Jonas says, checking the screen above the doors. Elevator whispers roll from somewhere, the studio voice cooing reconciliation special—two weeks.
The tram arrives with a sigh like an old argument. We board. A vendor brushes past me, smelling like oil and powdered sugar, and my stomach remembers I ate only the threat of petit-fours. I lean into the pole and let the car carry us forward.
“Next step?” Jonas asks.
“Sera,” I say before the brakes finish squealing. “She has a ledger of everything I couldn’t be there for. If they’re storyboarding me, she’s the counter-script.”
He nods. “Send me copies. I’ll keep the chain clean.”
The tram doors open at my stop. Outside, fog sticks to my cheeks like unshed tears I refuse to name. I step onto the platform. Jonas stays inside and lifts two fingers in a gesture that means we’re not done.
My phone buzzes before I take three steps. Sera Vale—Voicemail (1). I let the wind fill the pause while the tram snakes away, lights winking. I hit play.
Sera’s voice, clipped: “Mira. I have numbers. I have dates. Don’t make me your content. Come tomorrow if you’re serious.”
The message ends on the sound of a binder slamming shut.
I lift my face into the wind and breathe metal, salt, and the ghost of oranges. Gray wants the halo to hold me. Sponsors want my story to sit inside their pre-visualized frame. My wristband wants to be a name tag forever.
I want the room tone of my family—unaltered.
I pocket the phone and start walking, steeled by the hiss of the bay and the knowledge that the next door I open will not have a reader to charm, only a sister who knows where all the bodies are buried—especially the living ones.