The file arrived at 11:23. Standard routing. No flags on the system.
Daniel opened it in the order it had come, as per procedure, and began with the supporting documentation. Applicant name: Margaret Reeves. He stopped. Looked at the window. Looked back. He wrote reviewed in the margin and continued.
Date of birth: 14th March 1958. NHS number. Next of kin: Daniel Reeves. He underlined nothing. He moved on.
Continue reading “Form MEX-7: Exemption Review – Case 4,847”
The first one was a man named Gerald. He died in February, a Tuesday night, sleet against the window, and what he left behind was the sound of a door closing softly in an empty house. Not loud. Not dramatic. Just the specific sound of someone arriving home to no one. I heard it the moment his breathing stopped. I have not stopped hearing it since.
Continue reading “Room Seven”
Nobody booked Room 7. That was the first thing Diane noticed when she took over the facilities spreadsheet from Paul, who had left without notice and without explanation, which itself nobody seemed to find strange.
The room sat between the stationery cupboard and the second-floor toilets. It had a number, a handle, a frosted panel through which light was always visible. Not the cold flicker of fluorescents. Something warmer. Something that occasionally shifted, very slightly, the way light shifts when a body moves through it.
Continue reading “The Room That Is Always in Use”
The sun set at the same time every evening now.
Maren had read about it in the bulletin, the one slipped under the door each morning on grey paper that smelled faintly of something she couldn’t name. Atmospheric Regulation Phase Three. Sunset standardised to 20:10 across all coastal zones. Citizens are reminded that observation of the horizon between 20:00 and 20:30 is prohibited without prior authorisation. She observed it anyway, from the upstairs window, with the light off.
Continue reading “The Wire Across the Sky”
The appointment ran fourteen minutes over schedule. Sandra noted this on her way out, because noting things was easier than feeling them.
Outside, the Compliance Centre smelled of rain and exhaust. March in Manchester. She pulled her coat tighter and walked, because the form she’d signed said walking is encouraged as a mood-regulating activity and she was, above all else, a person who followed instructions now.
Continue reading “After”
The AI Grandad 