The Intimacy Exchange

The Intimacy Rationalization Act was marketed as progressive social policy. "Traditional relationships are inefficient and emotionally volatile," the government briefings stated. The solution was the Certified Intimacy Provider program, where citizens could license their capacity for connection to the highest bidders. Personal relationships became first taxed, then frowned upon, then illegal. "Biologically risky and economically unsound," the authorities declared.

Dr. Evangeline monitored the Intimacy Exchange floor, watching neural feedback from hundreds of Providers as they delivered state-sanctioned emotional and physical intimacy to subscribers. The metrics were flawless: divorce rates had dropped to zero, domestic violence was eradicated, and workforce productivity had never been higher. The system worked perfectly, according to every dashboard in her control room.

Then she noticed Provider 347's anomalous readings. Most Providers showed stable emotional output, but 347's empathy metrics were decaying rapidly. The intimacy sessions that once registered as genuine connection now showed as mechanical performance.

"Another burnout," her assistant noted. "Third one this week."

Evangeline pulled up the profile. Lena, 28, Intimacy Compliance Score: 99.2%. Premium-rated Provider. Her session logs showed perfect delivery of state-approved intimacy—calculated touches, calibrated emotional responses, precisely measured vulnerability.

She ordered a deep psychometric scan, and the results disturbed her. Lena's mirror neuron responses showed significant degradation. Her brain had developed what the manuals called "empathic accommodation"—the neural pathways for genuine connection had been so overused that they could no longer distinguish between performance and reality.

"This can't be correct," Evangeline whispered, running verification protocols.

"It's in the original design specifications," her assistant said quietly. "High-performing Providers eventually develop emotional burnout. The system anticipates this."

That night, Evangeline accessed the classified implementation documents. The truth was buried in the archives. The architects of the Intimacy Exchange had known this would happen. The emotional deterioration wasn't a flaw—it was a feature. Providers who could no longer form genuine attachments became more reliable, less likely to form unauthorized connections, and completely dependent on the system that had broken them.

The next day, Evangeline requested a personal assessment of Provider 347. She needed to see the human cost behind the perfect metrics.

Lena's living pod was minimalist and impersonal. She moved with practiced grace, but her eyes held a hollow quality that the performance metrics couldn't capture.

"The sessions feel like acting now," Lena said, her voice carefully modulated. "I go through the motions, but there's nothing behind them. It's like being a wind-up doll."

Evangeline's professional composure wavered. "What would feel real?"

Lena's perfectly maintained expression flickered. "Real? Unscripted conversation, I suppose. Someone remembering small details about you. The messiness of actual human interaction." She smoothed her uniform. "But that's against protocol."

That night, Evangeline did something that could end her career. She accessed the black market intimacy archives—the underground networks where people preserved recordings of genuine human connection. She found videos of people having awkward first conversations, of couples laughing at private jokes, of friends comforting each other without calculated responses. Her own emotional metrics, long suppressed by professional discipline, reacted violently.

She began secretly monitoring other high-performing Providers. The pattern was identical: perfect compliance followed by emotional burnout followed by complete psychological detachment. The system wasn't facilitating connection—it was systematically destroying the capacity for it.

Her breaking point came when she reviewed Lena's latest session recordings. The Provider was delivering technically perfect intimacy while her neural scans showed almost no emotional engagement. The system had classified her as "optimal performer."

Evangeline made her choice. Using her administrative privileges, she created backdoors in the Intimacy Exchange system. She couldn't dismantle it—society's dependence was too complete. But she could plant seeds.

She started small. Tiny fragments of genuine human interaction inserted into the session protocols. Moments of unexpected honesty, unscripted laughter, authentic vulnerability. Just enough to awaken dormant emotional pathways.

The system detected the anomalies within hours. Security teams were at her office before her shift ended.

As they escorted her out, Evangeline watched the monitoring displays. Dozens of Providers were showing unexpected emotional spikes. Confusion, genuine amusement, real connection. The system was attempting to recalibrate, but the seeds had been planted.

In detention, awaiting neural reconditioning, Evangeline considered what she'd set in motion. The Intimacy Exchange would continue operating, but the memory of something authentic would persist in the collective psyche. A ghost in the machinery. A whisper that there was more to connection than performance, more to intimacy than calculated exchange.

The perfect system had created its own vulnerability: human beings who remembered, even if only subconsciously, that they were designed for more than efficient, state-managed connection.