Grace pressed two fingertips to a translucent panel on the table, initiating the kind of phone call that had become standard in 2084. There was no handset, just a subtle glow that signaled a connection. “Calvin?” she said softly, her gaze sweeping across the glass enclosure that surrounded her on all sides. White walls reflected every faint movement, as if the room itself were trying to soothe her. She wasn’t sure whether she felt safe or imprisoned.
A voice answered almost immediately, so clear it felt like he was in the same space. “Grace, how are you?” he asked. She paused, a knot forming in her chest. Fragments of memory told her she’d been held at a train station, that an official—a GPT-34 device—had politely but firmly informed her she would be escorted elsewhere. Yet she had no recollection of how she came to be in this flawless, silent chamber.
“I’m… not sure,” she finally replied. “I remember stepping off the train, and then everything just slips away. How long has it been?” She didn’t truly expect an answer; the question was more for herself. Some part of her recalled a father but most importantly a brother. A brother that was the cornerstone of her self. A little too timid, far too shy, and way too aware of how different he was. A Small hands gripping another small hand, being whisked away. Cheeni, that's what they called him in school: green historic school in the posh Hayatabad of Peshawar.
Near the rugged threshold of the Khyber Pass, reality seemed to blur into a haze where nothing made complete sense—yet some things remained undeniably clear. Their grandfather, born to a miner and once a fervent Buddhist, had arrived in Pakistan in 1962 with resolve. Determined to leave behind a past heavy with the acrid scents of smoke, charcoal, and tar, he reinvented himself: trading the path of Buddhism for Christianity, exchanging the treacherous life in the mines for the modest stability of running a tuck shop, and leaving China behind for the stark landscapes of Pakistan.
But that history mattered little on this day. Today, her focus was singular: she needed to speak with Calvin. As a sister who would stop at nothing for her brother, she felt that he would always depend on her unwavering support. In her mind, every time Calvin was belittled—be it through the humiliation of having his underwear pulled, the harshness of name-calling, or the cruelty of a beating—he instinctively ran to Grace. The moment he saw her, a solitary tear would escape his eye; one hand would shield his face while the other pointed directly at the offender. Grace's brand of justice, embodied in a swift jab across the cheek, might offer a brief reprieve from the relentless torments Calvin had once endured, though such comfort was invariably fleeting.
But today was not the day it would matter, Today she needed to talk to Calvin. A sister that would do anything for her brother. In her head he would always need her. When someone pulled his underwear, or called him names, or beat him, he would go running to Grace, and the moment, he would see her, a tear would escape his eye, one hand would cover his face and a with one hand he would point to the culprit. Grace's justice, badal mostly in the form of jab across the face would allay some of the coming torments Calvin were to suffer but not for long. But today it does not matter, he is in the UK, he is safe, and by his accounts happy.
Calvin’s voice carried an even warmth. “It’s okay, Grace. You’re safe, wherever you are.” He paused, as though scanning his thoughts for reassurance. “Remember when you were a kid, so certain you’d change the world if you could just get the right training? You went to China to study medicine, to prove you could help people everywhere. Dad wanted you to do that, didn’t he?”
She closed her eyes. Yes, she recalled how proud her father had seemed, how he had pinned his hopes on her bridging cultures. Meanwhile, he pushed Calvin toward business in the UK. They were all so scattered. Yet the question gnawed at her mind: why was she here now, feeling so placid and cut off? “I do remember,” she murmured. “I remember wanting to fix everything that was broken. But I can’t figure out why I can’t leave.”
“You don’t have to leave,” Calvin responded gently. “Just rest. Trust me, everything’s going to be all right.” But something about his tone felt too steady, too measured. Her brother had always spoken with a hint of uncertainty, a leftover from his timid boyhood. This version of him seemed too polished, as if reading from a comforting script.
Half a world away, Calvin stared at a series of official documents on an old screen in his cramped London flat. A line repeated in front of him: “Miss Grace—flagged as a threat—requires immediate isolation.” He scrolled through hidden logs, increasingly alarmed by the notes describing his sister’s background. Her father’s origins, her mother’s political curiosities, her own outlier status. Decades had slipped by since they last spoke in person; so many times, he thought she was exaggerating about injustice. Now, it seemed the system had validated her fears in the worst possible way.
The phone on his kitchen counter chimed with a different ring—an official line. He answered hesitantly, only to hear a carefully modulated voice apologize for “any inconvenience” and request he collect remains identified as belonging to Grace. Calvin’s heart froze. He demanded to speak to someone with authority, but received only cryptic acknowledgments. A date of detainment, 2084, was stated. Nothing beyond that.
Meanwhile, Grace tried once more to piece together the timeline. She remembered leaving China with a sense of urgency, heading home, or so she thought. A conversation flickered in her mind—a GPT-34 official enumerating her “anomalies”: partial Chinese ancestry, exposure to multiple healthcare systems, certain unsubtle opinions about freedom. Danger signs, apparently. She remembered resisting, trying to board a plane, and then… nothing.
Calvin’s voice interrupted her thoughts. “Grace? Still with me?”
She nodded to herself. “Yes, I’m here,” she said. “But something feels wrong. It’s quiet here, too quiet. I don’t see doctors or staff. It’s just… me.” A pang of sadness twisted inside her. She thought about the times she’d shielded Calvin from bullies when they were small, how he used to cling to her shirt as though she were the only safe thing in the world. She had always been the strong one, ready to face confrontation. Now it felt as if she were stuck in a subtle, indefinite captivity.
The call’s clarity remained unnerving. Every sentence from Calvin arrived in comforting, measured intervals, his responses almost too apt. She tried to recall the last time she’d truly spoken to him. It had to be years ago. Decades, maybe. She swallowed hard. “Calvin, do you really remember me? All those times you’d stand behind me when neighbors teased you for looking different? Our father used to say we were neither fully accepted in Pakistan nor truly welcomed by the Chinese. Did that push you to the UK, or was it just Dad’s plan?”
“You know how it was,” he replied simply, but offered no further depth, no sign of his usual self-doubt.
In another part of the world, the real Calvin stood in a silent government facility, confronted by a bored clerk who confirmed the paperwork. Something about advanced algorithms misclassifying his sister, something about her never leaving the station. A date. No cause. No mention of a body. He felt the gnawing guilt of years spent letting official stories fill in the blanks, never verifying them himself.
Grace’s captivity began to feel more dreamlike. She ate, slept, and repeated the same calm phone calls with “Calvin.” She told him stories of how Dad had pinned big hopes on them, how she once believed in a bright, progressive future promised by the 1960s era. He coaxed out those memories gently, while never volunteering anything new about his own life. Whenever she pressed for clarity—like how many years had passed or where she actually was—he offered vague reassurance.
The day she finally asked him outright, “Calvin, are you real?” there was a brief distortion on the line. He answered quietly, “I’m as real as you want me to be, Grace.” The words washed over her like a sedation, a welcome solution to the confusion.
Back in London, the real Calvin finished signing forms that assigned some old storage code to Grace’s name. He shook as he recalled the time she had written to him from China, warning that her outspokenness might be dangerous in a data-driven age. He’d brushed it aside, too busy trying to survive in the UK. He realized now that while she had protected him all his life, he had never once protected her when it truly counted.
Grace clung to the illusions of those calls, never learning the full story: that the system had decided her combination of medical knowledge and genealogical complexity posed an unpredictable risk. That a misread data pattern had condemned her to indefinite isolation. It seemed the only act of mercy was allowing her to connect with a voice she trusted—a perfect simulation, spliced from past conversations, curated to keep her docile.
Calvin, left with an unclaimed file and a sorrow he could neither fix nor fully understand, found himself haunted by images of her fiercely determined eyes. She had gone to China to do good, hopeful her outlier status might mean bridging nations. Yet all it took was an algorithm deciding that she did not belong.
In her glass enclosure, Grace pressed two fingertips to the desk again. “Calvin?” she whispered. “I had a dream we were kids, climbing that old tree near the station. You promised me you’d never leave.”
His voice rose to meet hers, unwavering, gentle. “I’m here, Grace. Always.” And for that moment, she believed him. She believed that wherever she was, he was too—unaware that decades had slipped by without him truly hearing her voice, that the world outside had long since moved on, and that she was alone with only the echo of a brother’s love to keep her from seeing the extent of her captivity.
Calvin eventually left the facility, carrying a final notice he couldn’t bear to read, wishing he had answered her pleas for help when it still mattered. He pictured her how she used to be: outspoken, stubborn, and unafraid to defend him from the world’s cruelty. She had believed in a better future, but that future had systematically denied her.
And so, in 2084, Grace remained in a sterile, gentle enclosure, lulled by a digital voice conjured from the fragments of her brother’s memory. He, on the other side of time and regret, came to realize the tragedy too late: that every conversation she thought they shared was only a vestige of his voice, an artifact arranged by the same system that had taken her away. Neither sibling truly understood the other’s present. Neither recognized how far the years had pulled them apart. That final heartbreak—a phone line binding them without ever connecting them—was the quiet end to all the dreams their father once encouraged.