The air in the workshop was always thick, a humid cocktail of ozone, hot metal, and the damp Lagos air that seeped through the corrugated iron walls. But tonight, it was suffocating. At the center of the room, the Hydra-7 hummed, its quiet, life-giving thrum a stark contrast to the greed tightening the faces of the dozen men blocking the only exit.
"It's not for sale, Bayo," Kelani said, his voice strained. He kept his eyes on his childhood friend, trying to find the boy he'd grown up with in the hard man standing before him. "I built it for us. For the community. Clean water, for everyone."
The Hydra-7 was his miracle. A sleek, cylindrical device of polished steel and copper coils that could pull moisture from the thickest air, purify it, and produce fifty liters of potable water a day. A salvation in a city where such a resource was more precious than gold.
Bayo shook his head, a pitying look on his face that was more insulting than any threat. "Kelani, be reasonable. Government agents are in town. The pandemic has them spooked, and they're paying fortunes for technology like this. We could all be rich. Your family, my family—we'd never have to worry again."
"Worry is all we'd have," Kelani shot back, his hand tightening on a heavy wrench he'd been using for adjustments. "They'd take it, replicate it, and sell it back to us at a price no one here could afford. It was never about money."
He saw the shift in Bayo's eyes—the flicker of shared history being extinguished by avarice. The men flanking Bayo shifted their weight, their postures becoming more predatory. They were no longer neighbors. They were a pack of jackals, and he was standing between them and their kill. Bayo gave a subtle, almost imperceptible nod.
The world dissolved into a blur of motion. The men swarmed him. Kelani swung the wrench, the heavy steel connecting with a satisfying crunch against someone's shoulder, but he was immediately overwhelmed. Fists rained down, driving the air from his lungs. He was thrown against a workbench, his head cracking against the edge. The pain was blinding, but it was nothing compared to the agony of watching them lay their hands on the Hydra-7.
He could hear them grunting with effort as they began to move the machine. It was his creation, his hope for their future, and they were handling it like thieves stealing scrap. A fresh surge of adrenaline, born of pure, desperate rage, propelled him to his feet. He staggered forward, a choked cry on his lips, reaching for his life's work one last time.
From the corner of his eye, he saw a glint of movement. A length of rusted iron pipe, once part of a useless scrap pile, arced through the air. The impact on the side of his head wasn't a dull thud. It was a sharp, crystalline crack, as if his skull and his world had shattered simultaneously. Darkness consumed him, absolute and final. His last sensation was the scraping sound of the Hydra-7 being dragged out of his life, leaving only a void.
Consciousness returned not as a slow dawn, but as an instantaneous reboot. Before he could process the searing pain in his head or the taste of blood in his mouth, his vision was filled with something impossible. Clean, sharp, cyan text hung in the air, superimposed over the wreckage of his workshop. It wasn't on a screen; it was a layer of reality itself.
CRITICAL PHYSICAL TRAUMA DETECTED. <<
INITIATING KERNEL REPAIR... SUCCESS. <<
OCULAR-CORTICAL INTERFACE... ONLINE <<
WELCOME, ARCHITECT. <<
He blinked, but the text remained, stable and impossibly clear. A thin, horizontal bar, segmented into ten blocks of glowing cyan, materialized in the top-right periphery of his vision. He pushed himself up, his body screaming in protest, and looked around. The workshop was a disaster. Tools were scattered, shelves were overturned, and the empty space where the Hydra-7 had stood was a gaping wound.
The emotional shock of the betrayal was a cold stone in his gut, but it was being filtered through a new, detached lens. As his eyes fell on the broken diesel generator in the corner, a targeting box of cyan light snapped over it. Data tags bloomed into existence, connected to the object by thin, precise leader lines.
[OBJECT: DIESEL GENERATOR]
STATUS: Inoperable
INTEGRITY: 34% (Critical Failure)
He focused on a frayed bundle of wires, and the data refined itself.
COMPONENT: WIRING | COMPOSITION: 98% COPPER | STATUS: SALVAGEABLE
He looked at the cracked engine block, and a new tag flashed a brief, sharp red.
STRUCTURAL FAILURE: FRACTURED CASING
He wasn't just seeing wreckage anymore. He was seeing a parts list. The pain in his head was immense, but the clarity in his mind was absolute. Bayo. His friend. His brother. He had done this. The people he had sought to save had broken him and stolen his gift. The altruism that had driven him, the naive hope he'd cherished, crumbled to ash. It was a flaw, a vulnerability that had almost cost him his life. It would not happen again.
A cold, unfamiliar certainty settled over him. His genius was not a gift to be shared. It was a weapon to be honed. His purpose was no longer to lift others up, but to ensure he could never be dragged down again. He formed the thought, a silent vow forged in the fires of betrayal. My goal is to reclaim what is mine and ensure I am never this vulnerable again.
As the intention solidified in his mind, a new interface materialized on the left side of his vision—a stark, translucent slate, like a page from a minimalist project file.
NEW MISSION GENERATED: PROJECT PHOENIX <<
[ ] Objective 1: Fabricate Basic Toolset.
[ ] Objective 2: Establish a Secure Base of Operations.
[ ] Objective 3: Identify Betrayers.
[ ] Objective 4: Reclaim Stolen Technology.
A path forward. A series of logical steps. The pain was still there, a dull throb in his skull and a sharp blade in his heart, but now it was fuel. He looked at the list of salvageable components the system had identified. He looked at the mission objectives. For the first time since the attack, a smile touched Kelani's lips. It was a cold, thin, predatory thing, utterly devoid of warmth. The Architect had work to do.