Joss accessed Dol's assessment file through Rin's Thaler Trading House connections on Day One Hundred and Sixty.
The file was buried in the city's central assessment database, behind three layers of classification. Rin used her family's institutional access -- the Thaler house had commercial partnerships with the assessment bureau that granted read-only access to citizen records for "credit evaluation purposes." The irony of using a Threshold Foundation member's credentials to uncover the Foundation's crimes was not lost on either of them.
Dol Mercer. Assessment Date: Three years ago. Original class: [REDACTED]. Override code: THRESHOLD-AG-001. Reassigned class: Maintenance Worker, D-Rank. Override authority: [REDACTED]. Justification: "National security -- dimensional infrastructure access restriction."
The redactions were standard government classification. But the override code -- THRESHOLD-AG-001 -- matched the memo Rin had photographed from her father's archive. The same code applied to all 847 overrides.
"The file confirms it," Rin said. "Your father was assessed as Anchor Guardian. The Foundation's override protocol suppressed it. The assessment bureau processed the override as a routine administrative correction."
"Can we get the original class data? The full Anchor Guardian assessment results?"
"Not through the commercial portal. The original data is in the assessment bureau's classified server. Physical access only." She paused. "But I know someone who works in the bureau's records department. A Merchant-class player who uses Harvest Market for her personal shopping. She owes me a favor."
"How big a favor?"
"She bought a legendary accessories set from Lenn's Resonance Collection last month. I gave her a 15% discount because she mentioned she works in government records." Rin's smile was thin. "I give discounts for reasons."
The records clerk was a woman named Hana. She met Rin at a tea shop near the assessment bureau, nervous, her hands wrapped around a cup she wasn't drinking.
"This is illegal," Hana said.
"It's classified. There's a difference." Rin set a data chip on the table. "I need the original assessment data for one citizen. Dol Mercer. Assessment ID DM-00347. The data behind the redaction."
"If anyone finds out I accessed a classified record--"
"Nobody will find out. The access logs show routine data verification for commercial credit purposes. My family's partnership with the bureau authorizes exactly this kind of access."
"For commercial data. Not classified records."
"The record isn't classified by subject matter. It's classified by override code. The override code is a Threshold Foundation designation, not a government classification. Legally, the Foundation has no authority to classify government records. The classification is invalid."
Hana stared at Rin. "You're telling me the classification on this record is illegitimate?"
"I'm telling you that a private organization used a government system to suppress a citizen's class assessment. The classification exists to protect the organization, not the citizen. Accessing the original data isn't a crime. The suppression is."
Hana picked up the data chip. Turned it in her fingers. Put it down.
"One record. One citizen. I pull the original assessment data and nothing else."
"That's all I'm asking."
Hana took the chip and left. Two hours later, the chip arrived at Rin's workshop via courier.
The original data was comprehensive. The Anchor Guardian assessment results for Dol Mercer:
**[Anchor Guardian — Rare Class]**
**[Combat/Support Hybrid]**
**[Primary Abilities:]**
- Dimensional Sensing (Passive): Detect dimensional instability within 100 meters
- Barrier Reinforcement (Active): Strengthen dimensional barriers through direct contact, +10% density per minute of contact, maximum +50%
- Core Interface (Active): Communicate with dimensional infrastructure systems. Requires Level 30+
- Anchor Pulse (Passive): Passive dimensional stabilization in a 50-meter radius. Strengthens barriers, enchantments, and game-system components within range by 3% continuously
**[Assessment Notes:]**
*"Subject demonstrates extraordinary dimensional resonance. Passive stabilization field detected during assessment -- equipment in the testing chamber showed improved accuracy during the subject's presence. Recommend immediate classification as critical infrastructure asset."*
*[OVERRIDE APPLIED: THRESHOLD-AG-001]*
*[REASSIGNED: Maintenance Worker, D-Rank]*
*[JUSTIFICATION: Unsupervised dimensional infrastructure access by unvetted citizen poses unacceptable risk. Subject to be monitored but not activated.]*
"Monitored but not activated," Joss read aloud. "They knew what he could do. They wrote it down. And they locked him in a tunnel."
"For three years," Rin said.
"His passive ability alone -- Anchor Pulse -- would strengthen barriers within fifty meters by 3%. Continuously. If he'd been stationed at the wall since the Merge, his section would be at full strength instead of degrading."
"If all 847 Anchor Guardians had been stationed along the wall, the entire barrier network would be at full strength." Rin's voice was tight. "The Foundation suppressed the solution to the barrier crisis before the crisis began."
"They didn't suppress it because they wanted the barriers to fail. They suppressed it because they wanted control. Unsupervised Anchor Guardians would have access to the dimensional infrastructure -- the same infrastructure the Foundation has been positioning to control since before the Merge."
"Control the infrastructure, control the economy. Control the economy, control the city."
"And if 847 underground citizens suddenly had the ability to interact with the city's foundations..." Joss set the data chip down. "That's 847 people who could see through the Foundation's entire operation. Every barrier weakness. Every suppressed assessment. Every dimensional anomaly the Foundation has been exploiting."
"The Foundation didn't suppress the Anchor Guardians to protect the city. They suppressed them to protect themselves."
---
Joss took the data to Dol that evening.
They sat in Mercer Repairs, the shop closed for the night, the workbench between them. Joss laid out the assessment file, the original class data, the override memo, the Foundation connection.
Dol read everything. Slowly. The way he read everything -- completely, missing nothing.
"Barrier Reinforcement," he said. "Active skill. Strengthen barriers through direct contact."
"You've been doing it without the class. Unconsciously. Through your repair work."
"Anchor Pulse. Passive stabilization in a fifty-meter radius." He looked up. "This building. My shop. The apartments I've been servicing. They all fall within fifty meters of places I spend time."
"And their enchantments last longer than anyone else's repairs."
"Because I've been stabilizing them. Passively. Without knowing." He set the paper down. "Three years. Three years I could have been helping."
"You were helping. Just not at the scale you could have been."
"The scale." Dol's voice was rough. "Eight hundred and forty-seven of us. If we'd been deployed to the barriers from the start, the degradation wouldn't have happened. The Night Fog wouldn't have needed to compensate. The system wouldn't be failing."
"That's what I believe, yes."
"And the Foundation stopped it. For control."
"For control."
Dol stood up. Walked to the window. Looked out at the street, where the evening light was softening toward the Fog hour.
"I'm angry," he said. It was the first time Joss had heard his father say those words. "I told you anger is expensive. I was wrong. Some anger is an investment."
"What do you want to do?"
"I want my class." Dol turned from the window. "I want Anchor Guardian. Not for power. Not for status. Because the city's barriers are failing and I can help, and someone decided three years ago that I wasn't allowed to."
"Getting the class restored requires a governmental reassessment. Wuan is pushing through Field Ops. The senators have the report. But the process--"
"The process is too slow." Dol picked up a dimensional relay from the workbench. Held it. Closed his eyes. The relay's crystal core brightened -- not the game system's enchantment brightening, but the deeper glow of dimensional energy responding to an Anchor Guardian's touch.
"I don't need the system to give me back my class," Dol said. "I've been using the abilities my entire life. The class designation is paperwork. The ability is real." He opened his eyes. "Take me to the wall. Show me where the barriers are failing. Let me touch them."
"Dad--"
"I'm not asking permission, Joss. I'm telling you what I'm going to do." He set the relay down. "You said you'd give me help. This is what help looks like. Take me to the wall."
Joss looked at his father. The scarred hands. The steady eyes. The quiet rage of a man who'd spent three years fixing locks when he could have been fixing the world.
"Tomorrow morning," Joss said. "0600. Meet me at the Field Ops outpost."
"I'll be there."
He was. At 5:45 AM, Dol Mercer stood in the Field Ops outpost lobby wearing his work clothes and carrying his tool bag, and when Captain Wuan asked what a civilian was doing in a military facility, Joss said: "He's an Anchor Guardian. Unactivated. And we need him."
Wuan looked at Dol. Looked at Joss. Looked at the assessment data that Joss handed him.
"I'll need to run this through channels," he said.
"Run it through channels after he touches the wall. Show me results and the channels will follow."
Wuan was quiet for three seconds. Then he opened the outpost door.
"Sector 7-Echo. You have one hour."
