Bicycle Confinement — Laboratory [patched]

He didn’t run for the exit. He didn’t call the police. Instead, Elias walked to the mainframe, pulled a fire axe from the wall, and swung it into the largest cable he could find.

He understood then. The bicycles weren’t for exercise. They were for extraction. Pedal by pedal, the machine was translating the prisoners’ physical motion into digital data—their memories, their personalities, their very awareness—and uploading it to the central mainframe. And when a subject reached 100%? bicycle confinement laboratory

Then alarms blared, and the basement doors began to seal. He didn’t run for the exit

The lights flickered. The bicycles stuttered. On Screen 12, the woman blinked—and for the first time, she smiled. He understood then

Elias moved down the row. Each screen showed a different person—different ages, different builds, all pedaling. All asleep. All with neural upload percentages ranging from 3% to 91%.

He looked at the torched lock on the door. Someone had been here before him. Someone had wanted this found.