The Unfollow List

The damp air in the Neon Alley tasted of copper and cheap ozone. Rain trickled down the pitted brickwork, pooling in the grooves of Arthur Caldwell’s haptic tablet. He wiped the glass with his sleeve, his fingers moving across the modified interface with steady, practiced rhythm. Above him, the hum of the town central servers vibrated through the alley floor, a constant reminder that every step, breath, and heartbeat was monitored.

Beside him, an anxious middle-aged man shifted his weight from foot to foot. The man’s wrist-mounted display was glowing amber, displaying a dangerously low score of 12.4. One more automatic fine for loitering, and he would drop into single digits, triggering a mandatory security review.

Arthur kept his head down, dark curls falling over his eyes. "Hold still," he murmured, his voice clipped and quiet. "If you jump about, the optic scanner on that overhead lamp will flag your heart rate."

"Just fix it, mate," the man whispered, casting a desperate glance toward the street corner. "The patrol drone is due in two minutes."

Arthur tapped a custom line of code into his tablet, forging a localized signal mask. It would trick the local receiver into thinking the man was three streets over, tucked safely inside an official public library. It was small-time ghost-coding, barely enough to buy a warm meal, but it kept the scanners at bay. The amber light on the man’s wrist smoothed into a gentle green standard. The client exhaled, slapped a few physical tokens into Arthur’s hand, and scuttled away without another word.

Arthur pocketed the coins and pulled his oversized hood lower. Trust was an expensive commodity in Oakhaven, and he preferred to keep his account empty.

A sudden, sharp scream shattered the wet silence of the night. It came from the direction of Verificator Square, high-pitched and choked off mid-breath. Arthur froze, his thumb hovering over his tablet’s power switch. His instincts screamed at him to fade into the shadows, to duck into the drainage channels of the Offline District and mind his own business. In this town, curiosity was the fastest way to drop your score.

Yet the sound lingered, a raw human noise in a city built on curated perfection. Before his common sense could stop him, Arthur broke into a low, crouching run, heading toward the bright glow of the main thoroughfare.

He slowed at the edge of the square, pressing his back against the cold steel frame of an advertising pillar. Verificator Square was immaculate, a shining monument to the town’s high-status citizens. Polished marble tiles reflected the dazzling light of giant, rotating holographic billboards that projected perfect faces, endless advertisements, and live feed updates of local ranking tables.

Slumped against the base of a glowing advertisement for luxury neural upgrades was a figure in an iridescent silver coat. Arthur recognized her immediately. Everyone in Oakhaven knew Chloe Vance. She was the golden girl, the top-ranked teenager whose perfect score and flawless social feed were broadcast across every school display in the district.

Now, she sat completely still, her head tilted at an awkward angle against the holographic glass.

Arthur moved closer, his dark trainers noiseless on the marble floor. "Chloe?" he called out softly, keeping his eyes on the open plaza.

There was no answer. He reached her side and knelt on the slick tile. Up close, her face was completely smooth, devoid of any visible mark or sign of struggle. There was no blood, no bruises, no torn clothing. But when his glance shifted to her left arm, his chest tightened.

Her wrist-mounted status display was pulsing a vivid, blinding crimson. The digits reads 0.00. Beneath the numbers, the word ERASED flashed in cold, brutal block text.

In Oakhaven, a score did not simply drop to zero on its own. The algorithm recalculated points through gradual deductions for minor infractions or rewards for public praise. A sudden zeroing was a mathematical impossibility unless someone had deliberately forced it through the central framework. It was a complete digital execution.

Arthur extended two fingers toward her neck, seeking a pulse. Her skin was cool. There was no movement beneath the surface. Her breath had stopped at the exact moment her digital footprint had been scrubbed clean.

A piercing blue light cut through the drizzle above. The heavy thrusters of a high-velocity security drone whined overhead as the craft descended into the square, its spotlights cutting through the gloom. The central scanning lens pivoted, locking its glowing red aperture directly onto Arthur’s upturned face.

A synthetic voice boomed from the drone’s speakers, amplified across the empty plaza: "Critical safety incident detected. Suspect identified. Arthur Caldwell. Score status: Unverified. Initiating public safety alert."

Arthur stepped back, lifting a hand to shield his eyes from the blinding glare, but it was already too late. High above him, the massive holographic billboards flickered. Chloe’s radiant face vanished, replaced instantly by Arthur’s own mugshot, pulled directly from his civic registry file. Beneath his picture, bold red text illuminated the night: PRIME SUSPECT: CAPITAL CITIZEN OFFENCE.

His tablet began to vibrate frantically in his pocket. He pulled it out to see his personal status interface spiralling out of control. The town's central network was broadcasting his profile to every citizen's personal device within a five-mile radius. Notification alerts chimed in the distance as residents received the panic notice. Every second, hundreds of automatic "unfollow" votes poured in from horrified citizens viewing the broadcast from their flat windows.

His score dropped from a precarious 15.2 to 8.0, then 3.1, cascading down into negative numbers. The system was actively directing the public to hunt him down for a score bonus.

Heavy boots thudded against the marble plaza at the northern entrance. A unit of Peacekeepers marched into view, their heavy armours gleaming under the streetlights. They carried long electrified batons that hummed with high-voltage energy, blue sparks bouncing off the damp pavement.

"Target sighted!" the lead officer barked, pointing a baton straight at Arthur. "Do not move!"

Arthur did not wait for a second warning. He turned on his heel and sprinted across the wet tiles, his heart hammering violently against his ribs. He crossed the edge of the square, vaulted over a heavy metal rubbish skip, and scrambled into the dark entrance of a narrow side street.

Behind him, the drone’s spotlight swept the alley walls, throwing sharp, elongated shadows ahead of him. The hum of the Peacekeepers’ batons grew louder, accompanied by the heavy metallic clatter of their pursuing boots. Arthur gripped his tablet tightly in one hand, forcing his legs to pump faster as he plunged deeper into the labyrinthine backstreets of the lower city.

He was no longer just a ghost-coder hiding in the shadows. The system had made its choice, and the entire town was about to join the hunt.