Dozens of hands moved in a synchronized rhythm, each pair occupied with assembling pieces of a product whose purpose no longer mattered to us that built it. Fingers darted, twisted, pressed and secured parts with mechanical precision. Their owners spread along a factory line, their eyes looking elsewhere. These used to be jobs requiring full focus, now they have transformed into something entirely different.
A closer look behind the rectangular masks each one of them wore, one could see a worker’s eye, unblinking and wide. Reflecting the flickering light of a screen. Next to the inner corner of the eye, near the tear duct, a thin clear silicone tube with a collection of wires inside ran out. Disappearing behind their cheekbone and around the ear.
The screen showed a scene from a movie: a dramatic chase sequence. The worker’s pupil adjusting slightly as the action intensified. What was on their head was a sleek visual headset, wrapped around the upper half of their face, covering both eyes. From one nostril, another thin wire extended downward, slick with lubricant, trailing into a socket on a small device clipped onto their uniform.
Among them was one pair of hands. Mine. They moved with precision. I tightened screws, clicked plastic into place, the rhythm unbroken. I relaxed in the distant world inside my headset. A sudden laugh escaped my lips. A joke from the stream had landed perfectly! The joy of it echoed in a humming factory, otherwise verbally silent.
I prefer it this way, it’s nice being able to escape.
Rows of my fellow workers, all wired, all engrossed in their virtual distractions, our bodies on autopilot. On the outside of the factory, a bright clean digital billboard glowed. It advertises yXX’s newest job platform with a cheerful slogan: “Work While Watching – Make Time Work for You”. People my age called these drone jobs, while corporate liked to call them: “Automated body careers.”
A buzzer rang, sharp and final. The shift was over.
I slowly removed my headset and blinked against the sudden change in light. With practiced ease, I pinched the tube near the corner of my eye and slid it free. A soft click, a faint sting, the nasal wire followed, slick and warm. I tugged it from my nose and it coiled up. Around me others were doing the same, the ritual of unplugging reappeared across the room.
Over the Intercom came the ding of an announcement.
“Crew we are happy to announce that tomorrow we will be having a mandatory meeting a half an hour before shift starts”
I groaned softly.
“We are one of the lucky locations that is being selected for the new yXX update and we need all employees here to go through the onboarding presentation. Thank you all. Again, arrive thirty minutes before your shift for the presentation” Another ding sounded, signaling the end of the announcement.
At the clock out station, one of my coworkers and long time friend named Natalie came over with bright eyes and an energetic grin that I returned to her.
“That’s great news we just got. I can finally work on sussing out this D&D campaign I’ve been writing.” She grabbed her bag out of her locker.
“How d’you plan on doing that?”
“Haven’t you heard the rumors?” She stared at me for a moment waiting for a response. She shook her head in slight disapproval. “I guess not, huh? Well the update is going to let us do more than just watch streams or movies”
“Oh so you figure it’ll have like a notepad program?”
“That’s part of the rumor! Also a web browser.” Scanning her badge with a beep. “Ahh! One of the first facilities to test it in real time!”
“Hell yeah” I responded, genuinely enthused. “I’ve been wanting to read some comics instead of just streaming. I’ve gone through everything on my to watch backlog. It’s really perfect timing”
“Nice.” she smiled.
I watched her head into her car as we parted ways in the parking lot. We waved goodbye as she left.
———————————————————————————————————————–
The walk home was slow and quiet. Lights buzzed faintly overhead, and the hot breath of summer lingered in the air. I felt the familiar feeling of my legs aching and my shoulders heavy with fatigue. I rubbed my hands absentmindedly, the fingers still twitching slightly as if still assembling something.
My mind might be able to wander during work hours, but boy, my body is tired.
In the quiet comfort of my apartment, I reflected on the strange innovation that had become my reality. These headsets from yXX had changed everything. The old days of robotic automation had failed. Errors causing scrap, expensive maintenance, and just too much downtime.
Human minds, it turned out, were more reliable.
So, someone had the bright idea: keep the human brain, discard the conscious thought. With the right neural interface, the wires, the syncing, the gentle nudges to the motor cortex.
People could work without actually thinking about it. And while it paid 30% less than traditional automation jobs, it didn’t matter. The demand was overwhelming. People lined up for the chance to be a part of it.
I leaned back staring at the ceiling lost in thought, imagining what the new update would bring. “Soon.” a grin spread across my face
It won’t just be a glorified streaming box anymore. With programs? The possibilities are endless.
——————————————————————————————————————————
I woke up and got ready for the morning. I fixed my short messy hair in the mirror. I was still tired, not from a bad night of sleep. But the tiredness that came with doing menial labor 10 hours a day.
Before heading out, I dropped onto the couch for a moment. I looked at my phone, with its quiet glow I scrolled through the list I had made. Comics I’ve been meaning to read, articles and topics I’d bookmarked for deep dives. History, tech and obscure fiction. I also put a rough note about budgeting a trip to a city I’ve been meaning to visit.
It was the middle of the week, I headed out to meet Natalie at our usual breakfast spot. A cheap place with good endless black coffee. Which more than made up for the old mugs and wobbly tables. It was our ritual, a small resistance against the bland monotony of the week.
I ordered a bagel, and as always, the bottomless house coffee. I filled up my mug at the self-serve dispenser. Natalie was already seated, tapping at her phone with one hand and grabbing a warm mug with the other.
“Yo” She gave a mock salute when she saw me bringing over my food and cup. I smiled back.
We chatted for a while about shows we recently finished. Then Natalie spoke with a slightly serious tone in her voice. “Did you finally figure out if you’re going back to school?” She asked, then took a big bite of toast. We talked about it last week, and I asked her to check up on me about it the next time we met. “Not yet, I wanted a few more months of freedom before I get into it again.”
She laughed, nudging my shoulder “That’s what you said six months ago, man! C’mon, hear me out. If the rumors are true…with that new update at work? You could totally sign up for classes. Study during your shift. Do your homework while you are droning. It’s perfect.”
She frowned a bit “Neither of us want this to be our jobs for the rest of our lives, right?” I groaned, “Yeah, yeah… you’re right.” Bodies can only do this type of work for so long before chronic pain sets in.
The truth stung a little bit more than I expected. I’d wanted to go back to school for a while now, and somehow, that desire had gotten buried beneath streaming queues and half-finished to-do lists. It felt stupid to admit it out loud.
Maybe tomorrow I’d look up enrollment deadlines. Or maybe later today, during work.
————————————————————————————————————————————–
The factory was rumbling with excitement. Normally, the shift would begin with the usual quiet hum of preparation. Everyone walking towards their stations to slip on their distractions. Instead, we gathered in the makeshift “meeting room,” which was really just the on-site gym reconfigured with rows of folding chairs and a cheap projector screen.
Everyone was talking, buzzing with speculation. We’d only seen glimpses of the new yXX update through teaser videos and limited press releases. Nothing solid. Today we finally were getting something official. I sat among my coworkers, the folding chair creaking faintly under me, watching as the yXX rep took the stage in front of us. She was corporate as they come: smooth voiced, efficient, and constantly smiling in that slightly too wide way that let you know she’d given this same presentation 3 times this week.
She clicked her device, walking us through the features. The new desktop interface would be layered over the old one, allowing us to organize our screens like we would at home. Tabbing between media players, readers, and even basic software. Not everything would work though, graphic intensive programs or anything requiring fine motor input would be off the table. But for most of us, it was enough. “Eye tracking will still be the main form of control,” she explained, her laser pointer tracing over a diagram of a pupil with a vector arrow. “But yXX2 features increased precision. You should notice fewer mis-clicks and better responsiveness”
YXX2? This wasn’t just a patch or visual upgrade. This was a new model.
She paced with practiced rhythm, anticipating questions before anyone had a chance to ask them. Then, she directed our attention to the printed packet each of us had
been handed on the way in. A slim folder of glossy paper with onboarding checklists and feedback forms. The front cover had the yXX logo: A stylized keyhole with circuit board elements that branched out downward, all encompassed in a circle. I flipped through my packet as she continued to speak.
● What types of applications do you regularly use at home?
● What types of tools or features would you like to see in yXX2?
● Do you experience eye fatigue more easily or visual blurring at the end of your typical shift?
● Have you noticed symptoms of vision sickness since the beginning of headset usage?
● Is there a noticeable delay between your eye movement and the system cursor?
The questions were framed casually, but I could tell they were taking this rollout seriously. This was a new infrastructure, a new way to live your life on the clock.
“A reminder to everyone, the NDA’s that are a part of your contract still apply to this version.”
Eventually, the presentation wrapped up to scattered applause. One by one, we lined up to receive small black box clips. Our new sync units for the upgraded firmware. They were sleek, matte, and a bit bigger than the size of a match box. They looked harmless, almost elegant. Like before, we were instructed to attach them to the reinforced loops on our uniforms.
I ran my fingers over the clip’s surface. This little box was the bridge to something I hadn’t experienced yet. The excitement I felt dropped into a kind of anxiety as my fingers traced the ridges and buttons along the edge.
——————————————————————————————————-
We went to our stations one by one, my new headset waiting for me. I slid the slick cord into my nose and it wriggled deep inside, a sensation I’d long since grown used to. Then came the headset itself, it looked the same mostly. Just a different color. I placed it over my eyes and activated the new sync unit clipped to my collar. The headset hummed softly as it scanned my retinas and adjusted the silicone tube, guiding it between my sclera and the inner fold of my eye.
As it settled in, gripping onto parts of my brain, my hands pressed the start button on the conveyor. They moved without thought, beginning their shift. My eyes were introduced to the new OS.
YXX2 was sleek and user friendly. Icons floated on the screen with the yXX company key logo on the background. Using what I remembered from the presentation, I moved through the apps. Now simply by moving my eyes to look at what I wanted to navigate to, and then a sharp thought of tapping on it. A huge improvement from the old system, no more blinking in patterns to select anything.
I wandered through the menus and found the internet browser and the app hub. There were only about thirty apps available at this launch but I browsed through them casually.
Ah, they have a version of maps.
I liked the idea of gradually taking a walk in another city during company time. A bunch of the apps were things that you’d find on any mobile device outside of work. Simple games like flippy bard, match 3’s, sand color sorting, and sudoku. Y’know, in case you wanted to get your mother in law a job here.
Looking through the apps I found one listed as a file name, Halcyon.app. There was no preview image for it. No icon. No description. Just the name, rendered in default system font , and a small file size. The moment I opened it the entire headset white-screened and my hands froze mid motion.
There was a deep pulse through me, and then the sync unit on my chest whirred. A soft reset triggered, and the mechanical movements of my fingers began again.
I guess that app isn’t finished yet.
The rest of the shift flew by as I explored the menus.
————————————————————————————————————————–
Later, at the time clock, Natalie caught up to me. Her usual energy dulled just a little, maybe from excitement fatigue. “Did you end up going on the university website?” Natalie asked as we scanned out.
“I did… but I forgot my username and password so…” I trailed off quickly. “How about you? Did you work on your campaign?”
“No,” She admitted, grinning sheepishly. “I got totally distracted by all of the apps.”
“Ha! You didn’t do your thing either.” I nudged her. “To be honest, I was distracted for like… the first 8 hours.”
She laughed. “My brain forgot I had goals.”
We walked together through the parking lot, our footsteps echoing on the cracked asphalt. The sky had that smudged-orange look it always got near the end of shift, like it was as tired as we were. Natalie stretched her arms behind her head and let out a groan. “I swear, these updates make everything more fun, but somehow I still feel like I got hit by a truck.”
“It’s cause your mind is still in bed,” I said, rubbing the back of my neck. “Only your body shows up to work now.”
“Yeah well,” she shot me a look, “that part of me doesn’t get paid, so it stays home.” We both laughed at that…too hard, maybe. The kind of laugh that leaks out when everything else in your life feels like it’s on autopilot.
We reached her car, and instead of me heading down the block, I leaned against her rear door for a moment.
She didn’t unlock it.
“You good?” she asked. I hesitated, then shrugged. “I don’t know. I keep thinking about what you said. About school. About not letting this be our life forever.”
Her face softened. “It’s not just about school. It’s about momentum, you know? If you wait too long, you start believing it’s already too late.”
I didn’t respond right away.
“Sorry,” she added quickly. “That came out more dramatic than I meant.”
“No, it’s okay,” I said. “You’re right. It’s just… I think I’m afraid if I start, maybe I’ll realize how long I’ve been standing still.”
Natalie looked at me for a second, like she was trying to decide whether to hug me or hit me with more reality. Instead, she reached into her bag and handed me a crumpled napkin.
Scrawled in marker was a note:
“Enroll, dummy.”
Underneath was a smiley face with devil horns.
I grinned. “What, is this some kind of hex?”
“It’s a reminder,” she said. “Stick it on your fridge. Or your forehead.” The car beeped as she unlocked it. “Tomorrow. You don’t even have to enroll. Just check the deadlines. One step.” She got in, rolled the window down. “Also, if you don’t do it, I’m making Flippy Bard your start up program until you snap.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“Try me.”
She gave a half wave and drove off.
I stood there with the napkin in my hand a little longer than I meant to, watching her tail lights disappear. Then I started walking down the sidewalk, smiling like an idiot.
PART 2
The next day at work I handed in my feedback form to the same woman who gave us the presentation yesterday. My response was mostly positive, at least on paper. Under the additional comments I had made a note about the app that glitched out and white screened.
When I mentioned it out loud to her the rep was unfazed.
“We have already implemented some bug fixes overnight, due to some employees turning in their questionnaires at the end of shift yesterday. The problem might have already been resolved.” She gave the same plastic grin from yesterday. “We hope there are no further issues.”
“Uh. thanks” I nodded, turning away with a frown pulling at my mouth. Natalie was looking at me from the locker area. As I walked towards her I could see her expression was a bit duller than normal.
“Mornin’” Her voice lacked her usual vigor.
“Hey, same to you.” I smiled trying to inject some warmth into the moment. “Good news, I looked up enrollment last night. I even scheduled an appointment to talk to an advisor next week.”
With a slight smile, she exhaled in tired relief. “That’s great.”
“You doing okay?” It wasn’t really a question. It was clear she wasn’t.
She opened her mouth, hesitating.
“Well…I-“
The buzzer cut her off. We both flinched, instinctively glancing at the clock.
“Shit,” I muttered. “We’re not at our stations.”
Natalie gave a quick nod. “Later,” she said.
“Yeah.”
We peeled off toward our respective areas with the silent understanding that whatever she was going to say. Whatever was really going on, would be addressed at next break.
Until then I tried to keep busy with word puzzle games, and music. But my brain wouldn’t work the way I wanted to.
————————————————————————————————–
When I walked into the break room, I spotted her already sitting at a table, sipping a drink from the vending machine. She looked… better. Not perfect, but clearer than this morning.
“You look more alive,” I said, grabbing a seat across from her. “That morning fog wore off?”
“Yeah,” she said, with a shrug. “Honestly, I felt like garbage this morning. But once I hooked into the headset… I don’t know. I must’ve nodded off. Slept until right before the bell for break went off.”
“You what?” I raised an eyebrow. “You fell asleep?”
She nodded, totally casual.
“How? Your eyes have to stay open for the sync unit to work properly. That’s, like, the whole thing.”
“I don’t know,” she said, lowering her voice slightly. “But on 2, apparently… you can.”
That left me blinking for a second.
“You’re serious?”
She smiled faintly. “Well, I didn’t get written up. So either it worked, or a supervisor didn’t notice. Either way, I’m not complaining.”
I leaned back in my chair, a bit worried about how dismissive she was.
“Well… you do look better.” I said slowly, “Guess if you’re lying, the production logs will snitch on you.”
She laughed, but the sound was quieter than usual.
“I don’t remember anything about sleeping being possible in the paperwork.” I added.
She gave a shrug. “Maybe it’s not a feature. Maybe it’s just something the system allows now.”
I didn’t press the point, but her explanation didn’t sit right.
“So, what wiped you out?” I asked. “Did you stay up too late?”
“No, it wasn’t that,” she said. “I kept waking up in the middle of the night. One of those nights where you’re dreaming so hard you jolt yourself awake.”
“…Nightmares?”
She frowned a little. “Not exactly. Just… intense.”
The buzzer rang again, louder than before. Or maybe, I was just more on edge.
We stood up, heading towards the door. “You gonna be okay?” I asked as we tossed our wrappers.
“Hopefully.” She said with a nervous smile.
——————————————————————————————————————-
Returning to work, I noticed something surprising. Halcyon had an icon now. It was faint, almost translucent. A pale symbol that looked like a mini upsilon and an H next to it.
I stared at it.
It looks like it was fixed.
Maybe now I could actually see what it was supposed to do. I hovered my gaze on it, hesitating… I opened it.
The screen blinked once.
Then again.
Then again, faster and faster.
Like a strobe light revving up, or a heartbeat skipping out of sync. My unit was whirring. Lines of text skidded across the display. Unreadable, Half formed instructions or code, disappearing too fast to make anything out.
And then everything went white.
I felt the pulse again.
I was back. Standing at the same workstation. Components in my hands. Same steady movements of my fingers. Annoyance flickered through me. Not just at the app, but at myself for trying it.
Had I…?
No. No, I didn’t fall asleep. I was just zoning out. I didn’t feel unconscious. Not really. Just…floaty. Disoriented. My playlist had skipped forward by two songs. I glanced at the product counter. It was ahead by a few dozen units.
I clenched my jaw and shook it off.
Okay. Lesson learned.
No more opening it.
The end of shift alarm rang out. Reflexively, everyone began unplugging in unison. A sea of hands rose to the headsets, sliding their wires free. I removed mine slower than usual. My eyes adjusting. Breathing shallow like I was coming out of anesthesia.
I scanned the shop floor for Nat, a bit more sensitive to the light around me. I had started developing a migraine. I didn’t want to wait, I pulled a pair of sunglasses out of my locker and headed out.
The walk home was slow and the heat pressed down on me like a second body. What normally was a 10 minute walk, turned into 20. I drifted past the usual land marks, slowly my shoulders became heavier and my feet dragged across the pavement. The moment I got inside I dropped my keys down, removed my shoes and sweaty socks, and stumbled straight into bed.
——————————————————————————————————————————
When I woke, the light in the room had shifted, and my head throbbed. A dull, nagging ache that pulsed behind my eyes. I popped a painkiller and chased it with a cold glass of water.
“Ugh” I muttered aloud, pressing my palm to my forehead. “This sucks.”
I called in sick and stretched out on the couch with a damp washcloth draped across my brow. It felt like a hangover.
A notification ping broke the stillness. I reached for my tablet and saw a message from Nat.
“You bailed on work? Weak.”
I smirked, even though my head still felt like it was full of static. My vision shimmered faintly. I blinked, but it didn’t go away.
“Yeah. Called in sick. Head’s killing me. Thought I was gonna pass out on the walk home last night.”
Another ping.
“RIP. You good? You’re not the only one who called out today.”
That made my stomach twist a little.
“O? What did they say?”
“Something about the refresh rate or light calibration. One of the floor leads said he was gonna file a report if more people drop.”
I hesitated, then typed:
“U ok tho? No headache?”
She didn’t reply for a few minutes. Then:
“Felt off earlier. Better now. You up to rally later for some post-shift pancakes?”
I stared at the screen. My fingers were sluggish, like they didn’t quite belong to me.
My vision faltered, the screen looking like it was underwater.
“Maybe…”
The tablet slipped out of my hand in the bed. I didn’t catch it.
And then I drifted off again.
My dreams were vivid and stressful. I was alone on a grey beach, forced to count each grain of sand. When I lost track, something descended . My punishment was disassembly, my body taken apart, each piece sealed into rough metal. I fell endlessly, waiting to hit the ground.
I jolted awake with my heart racing in fear. The pain in my head, however, had passed. I felt so helpless in that moment.
With a long exhale to steady my emotions, I sat up and checked the time. 5:00pm. Nat will be getting out in an hour.
———————————————————————————————————————–
By the time I got to the diner, the sun had dipped behind the buildings. I entered the diner and Natalie was already seated in a booth near the back as usual, a mug of coffee slowly steaming on the table.
She looked up as I slid into the seat across from her. “Hey, corpse,” she said with a crooked smile. “You made it.”
“Barely.” I took a long drink from the ice water “I think I melted into the sidewalk twice on the way here.”
“Ugh, I feel that. Thank god they need to have the shop cool because of the headset hardware.” We both paused in relief, imagining what a hellhole it would be.
“Have you heard anything else? About the headset issues?”
Natalie shifted in her seat, looking into her mug like it had answers. “Not really. Just… that a few people complained of headaches. One person said their eyes wouldn’t track right for a while. The rep shrugged it off mostly. Said it was calibration fatigue.”
“Calibration fatigue.” I rolled the words around like something bitter.
She shrugged. “To be honest.. It sounds like something they made up quickly in a meeting to quell us. It’s up to corporate how long they want production to be affected.”
There was a pause. We both stared out the window for a few seconds. The street beyond was quiet and hazy.
I lowered my voice. “I opened one of the apps. One that wasn’t listed properly.”
She looked up immediately. “What?”
“It didn’t even have a name, really. Just a file name: Halcyon.app. No info, no icon, well… until yesterday. I made a mistake.” Admitting it out loud. “Everything was flashing and it white screened. My hands froze. It rebooted, but after that… at the end of shift…”
I paused for a moment “I’ve opened it twice now and it doesn’t work. The representative seemed dismissive about it. I’m confident it gave me a migraine.”
Natalie didn’t speak right away. She tapped her fingernail against the ceramic mug in a slow rhythm.
“Yeah, I saw that one too.” She said softly.
I blinked. “You open it?”
She shook her head. “No. I hovered over it for a bit. Thought it was just a bugged out listing.”
I nodded slowly. “Ever since yesterday, I feel terrible. I don’t know. I wanna blame work, but the dreams were intense too.”
That got her attention. “Dreams?”
“Just weird,” I said. “Hard to explain. But I woke up and couldn’t shake the feeling.”
She hesitated, and laughed a little. “Maybe it’s contagious.” She looked back down. “Well you know I’ve been feeling it too. Like, just a little out of sync. I almost tripped on nothing walking to my car.”
A realization came over me,
”Be honest with me… did you open it?”
Her voice was quieter. “Not really…I might have when I fell asleep. I woke up to a white screen in the headset.”
We both sat with that for a moment. Natalie broke the silence. “Maybe we’re just fried. New software, long hours, heat wave. That’s enough to scramble anyone.”
“Yeah…” I said, though it didn’t feel like enough.
She pulled her legs up into the booth, wrapping her arms around them. “Still… maybe don’t click anything weird for a while. And if you get another dream like that? Tell me. Deal?”
“Deal.” I managed a smile.
We sat like that for a while longer, sipping coffee as the diner lights buzzed above us and the shadows outside deepened. Neither of us said it out loud, but we both knew something had shifted.
We just weren’t sure how much it would affect us, yet.
Drones 
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