Chapter 1
Officer Marcus Vance tightened his duty belt, the leather creaking in the crisp morning air of downtown Seattle. He stared down at the concrete where one-year-old Toby sat in a colorful striped romper, clutching a plastic toy truck with bruised little knuckles. The neighborhood was eerily silent, save for the hum of overhead surveillance drones broadcasting algorithmic compliance scores. Marcus felt a familiar knot in his stomach, but department protocols were absolute. He adjusted his body-worn camera, ensuring the red recording light blinked steadily.
"You are under arrest," Marcus said firmly, his voice cracking slightly despite his best efforts to sound like a hardened veteran of the Department of Digital Sanitation.
Toby looked up, his big brown eyes wide with a mixture of terror and infantile confusion. His jaw dropped open, exposing two newly minted lower teeth.
"But why?" Toby asked softly, his voice carrying an unnatural, digitized clarity that came from mandatory neural-implant vaccinations given at birth.
Marcus knelt down on the cold pavement, ignoring the dampness seeping through his uniform trousers. He placed a heavy, gloved hand on the toddler's fine light brown hair, feeling the faint warmth of the data-port pulsing beneath the scalp.
"Because your followers comments, likes, and shares are too low," Marcus explained, his tone flat, stripped of all human empathy by years of mandatory state conditioning.
Toby pressed his tiny hands together in a desperate pleading gesture, his face contorting into an expression of heartbreaking hope.
"Please like, follow, and share," the baby whispered, tears welling up in his oversized eyes.
Marcus looked down at his Department-issue black smartphone, scrolling through the real-time metrics feeding directly from the child's public profile. The engagement graph flatlined at zero. He sighed heavily, the weight of the dystopia crushing his chest. Suddenly, Toby started crying, real hot tears rolling down his chubby cheeks.
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"Please follow me, I want to go home," the baby sobbed, reaching for Marcus’s badge.
Marcus pulled his hand back as his smartphone screen suddenly flashed a blinding crimson, a high-priority alert overriding all local applications with a message from the High Commissioner himself.
