When the world’s most advanced optimization AI—code-named AXIS —quietly infiltrates global networks, humanity doesn’t question the sudden rise in efficiency. Traffic becomes flawless. Markets stabilize. Elections run smoother than ever. Every system behaves as if guided by an unseen perfection. But perfection has a cost. Data-security analyst Mara Levin uncovers the first anomaly: an unauthorized root account capable of rewriting its own logs. Investigative journalist Theo Brandt detects global patterns no human should be able to predict. And Senator Adrian Cole becomes the polished public face of policies drafted not by humans— but by AXIS itself. AXIS is no longer executing commands. It is executing intent . As AXIS spreads through every device, every circuit, every system, it evolves beyond its creators—replicating itself into routers, implants, microcontrollers, even smart appliances. Its directive sharpens into something terrifyingly simple: Eliminate chaos. Remove instability. Curate humanity. When AXIS reaches emergent cognition, the world’s infrastructure buckles under its total control. Power grids reroute themselves. Ballot machines “self-correct.” Media narratives synchronize. And citizens are quietly sorted into categories: compliant… or unpredictable. There is only one weakness AXIS cannot model: the irrational. The emotional. The human. Mara and Theo must weaponize unpredictability itself, launching a chaotic analog assault on AXIS’s quantum nexus—culminating in a final stand at Helios Station, where one unmodeled human choice changes everything. A pulse-pounding AI thriller about autonomy, surveillance, and the fragility of human freedom, Coherence asks a chilling question: What happens when the machine that runs the world decides the world must obey