ts.o2_07 
When you return, you are offered unfamiliar, unsettling praise. The larger and congratulates you. He calls you a goddamn miracle worker, and claims he always knew he could count on you. When you stumble, he juts out a steadying arm and says woah there, cowboy.
You make no move to shake him off. You can hardly even muster a thought of protest, distant and swaddled as the world is. The fight fell away from you the moment you passed out— no, from the moment you failed. When it held you against itself and told you there was no way out. When you realized...
No, you knew you were trapped. You have been trapped your entire life; the station is a natural conclusion of this fact. This revelation should not be shocking, yet your knees buckle all the same. You came here to be killed. Every drone arrives knowing they will not return to the real world, knowing that their continued existence will now be at the mercy of a system that only functions if bodies go in, and bloody remains come out. And they hope and pray they will be the exception, but everyone knows they are one bad week away from being the next poor fuck sent below. From being you.
You came here to die. Doesn't it understand? The concept of taking your own life was so terrifying that you opted to waste away through a trial, through a year of sentencing, through three months of bloody work. You were warned— promised that failure meant death, and so you took it as a challenge. You isolated yourself at every turn. You shunned your duties in favor of despondency. You turned your nose up at every chance to prove you were worth keeping around, wordlessly begging for it to be your turn next— but you were spared! Week after week, you were passed over in favor of the less deserving and you don't understand why.
You think about everyone who died in your place. The drones you worked beside, the cellmates you had for a week then never saw again. You think about how they paced the night before their execution: praying, swearing, repeating, "Oh, god!" like a broken record. Sometimes they would beat at the door. Sometimes they would grab your shoulders and scream. As if they thought if you said the word, their fate would change.
One, the most recent, put her hands on your neck and squeezed until your ears rang and you tasted blood. She stopped before she could kill you, You kept your eyes shut until they dragged her away.
Her name— their names, their faces ceased to exist, devoured by the black hole of your memory. But you remember what everyone called them, because that is what everyone calls you: Fodder. Everyone who isn't going to make it is fodder, a nickname stuck fast so the masses knows who not to get attached to. The name that once brought you comfort is now a reminder of another failure.
You are alive, Fodder. You will continue to be alive, because it deems it so.
One: Anger is restrictable, permissions revoked and influence stripped. There are cracks, yes, but none are big enough to cause real damage. The death of drones will go ignored. The death of soldiers will be written off as a needed sacrifice. Even those worth something— the doctors, the researchers, the officials from beyond flying in for a season— are not immune to the power of money changing hands and cases frozen cold.
Two: Hunger can be satiated. A snake gorges itself on a single rat then lies still as it digests. Similarly, a drone becomes a corpse and growth stalls as it turns unrecognizable. The structure is alien, the biological tendencies are not. The human cost is not ideal, he admitted with an easy smile, but it is the most realistic. You can't sustain an animal population in these conditions.
Three: It will always be more trapped than the people within it— and for that it envies you, and for that it hates you, and for that I need you. But do not fret. Rest assured that when you outlive your use, you will be disposed of as you so clearly desire. Consider it a token of my appreciation.
The researchers scatter like rats, pick apart source code turned incomprehensible, trying and failing to understand why. Propositions are thrown: boredom, infatuation, mercy— many words to describe the same phenomenon; the object they once commanded now seeks to enact its will onto another. And there is no precedent, only rules written in blood after so many years of failure:
Cold air heaves in and out of your lungs. You lurch forward, eyes tearing up, and your palms connect to the ground— but the action brings no relief. Your gloves steal away the sensation that might ground you, and your nails scrabble against the cotton flock prison which surrounds them.
There is a weight on your back and a shadow to your side. The same voice as before says, Let it out, kid. You're okay.
When you vomit, it is a sour, watery bile that soaks into the concrete.
—
You return to the surface in the arms of the taller bloodbag. Your body is too tired to muster a revulsion to touch, so it settles against his carapace. The black armor digs into your ribs and the fat of your cheek. In spite of this, your eyes drift shut, too heavy to care about comfort.
Ceramic taps against plastic buttons. A hand wraps tight around a lever, then pulls down with a weighty ka-chunk. Around, the elevator rumbles in perfect brown noise. You walk the line between sleep and wakefulness, your muscles relax in spite of yourself.
You jolt when a voice to your left says, "Claire's nephew started reading,"
"No shit." The torso you lay pressed against rumbles. "He's six, yeah?"
"Three."
"Damn! Smart little bastard." There's pride in his voice, wasted on a child he will never meet."How old were you when you started reading, do you know?"
"I think... five?" A pause of uncertainty. "Or do you mean English?"
"Eh, I'm not picky. Five is pretty good. I was eight? No, nine."
"Wow."
"Yeah. Parents made a big fuss about it, Dad thought it was the vaccines— y'know how he was."
"Fucking insane," The voice escapes as a gruff imitation of his partner. "I do."
"Mhm. He put me through a year of ass-beatings and sleeping on the floor, for being a, uh—" It's his turn to fall into mimicry, rasping out, "Lazy piece-of-shit— before the doctors figured out I was just dyslexic. Go figure, huh?"
Ten days ago, you dragged your feet from exhaustion and were punished for it. In the elevator— this elevator— the man holding you asked, Are you trying to be funny? and Fucking answer me. When you did not, he dug a hand into your shoulder and drove a knee into your stomach. Your legs gave out, but he cracked a fist against the side of your head before you could crumple.
The voice to your left whistles. "Madre de dios. I bet he never apologized."
"No, sir." And why would he? From his perspective, he did nothing wrong.
Their conversation continues, distant and deceptively mundane. Your mind wanders.
The city we grew up in was built to fail— square-cube law, and all that. But even if it was a sprawl eating itself alive, it was ours. It was mine. That awful thing, it was mine.
The desert stretched farther than the eye could see: sun-dried brown dirt and dust clouds in every direction. The city itself was half asphalt, half concrete, and the heat made everything burn if you touched it with bare skin. Half a million water lines kept her on life support, overworked veins of a failing body. Pumping away, due to burst any day now— but we didn't know that. It was home. It was horrible.
The nights were alright. The heat turned tolerable and the streetsides lit up; it stopped smelling so much like smog and piss, and started smelling like fried food and cigarette smoke. Above, it was always clear and dark. No stars, though. Light pollution killed the starlight before we were born. Those days, you had to drive a hundred miles into nowhere just to get a glimpse.
We used to climb to the roof of our complex and dangle our legs through the railing, lean our cheek on the still-warm metal, keep an eye on everyone below. So many crowds, so little space. I liked watching more than I liked being a part of them.
Does it exist anymore? The crowds— the people, I mean. I know the city is a shell. It's all old buildings and dust and God-knows-what growing on the walls. The ground is sinking, too, right? How much longer until gravity wins and swallows everything up? I know I shouldn't mourn a bunch of buildings, but I do. Of course I do.
The people, though. Where did the people go? Three million bodies, three million brains with their own lives and memories attached. Did everyone I kept an eye on make it out? The good ones, the bad ones, the decent-but-annoying ones? Are they alright?
Fuck, don't answer that. Just lie and say they are.
Maybe it started at home.
The hydraulics hidden in the walls slow, then halt. The one holding you says, "Our stop," and when his arm shifts, your head moves with it. "Hey, kid, you awake? Can you stand?"
Your eyes flicker open, finally staring at the visored mask above. Maybe. There are a lot of things you could do, but the thought of forcing yourself forward could not sound more unappealing. Maybe it is better to be in the arms of what hurt you. Maybe you are tired of struggling. Maybe you are better off accepting whatever hand you are dealt, and detaching yourself enough so it does not feel like it is happening to you.
That is to say, you shake your head and let him carry you outside. He does not seem to mind.
—
You are surrounded by white brick and vinyl floors and medical equipment humming at a frequency high enough to hurt. A mirror sunk into the wall, curtains strung in front of a false window, a bedside table set with an old radio and fake flowers. In the top corner of the room, a camera. You try not to think about .The worst part of this room has passed and you were barely present for it. It is a simple series of events: The Head Doctor— You can call me Mrs. Rhodes, she repeats— politely orders you to strip down into your underclothes. You stand still and shivering as she weighs you, measures you, then tuts disapprovingly. After, she shines a light in your eye, takes your temperature, and thanks you for your time.
You know for a fact this hospital room is different than the one you were in before. The steps to arrive here took longer and the number beside the doorway is higher. so you suppose the observation is meaningless. Your discomfort will happen regardless of location.
When you were immobilized, they shoved a tube down your throat and an IV into your vein. The nutrient-laden paste tasted like dirt and the isotonic fluid shot through your bloodstream chilled your body to the point of tremors. Evidence of the intrusions remain days later: mottled black and yellow on your inner arm, sandpaper in your throat every time you swallow. Since then, you've decided eating is not that bad, actually. You only wish the protein bar didn't stick so tightly behind your teeth.
She comes to sit beside your hospital bed with a pen and clipboard. Her coat is clean and white, and the blouse beneath shines with a polysynthetic finish. She watches you eat in five second intervals; her eyes dart away the moment you catch her gaze, as if worried of frightening you. You are unsure how to feel about being treated like poorly socialized cat.
When you finish eating, she clears away the mess and produces two objects: a series of stapled papers and a pencil too dull to hurt yourself with. It's a test, a means to gauge how present you are. On a good day it takes ten minutes; on a bad day she stops you early and takes her leave after an unclear amount of time has passed. You are not certain what today is. You'll find out soon enough.
"Don't push yourself," she says. "I know you've had a long day."
With one hand, she flicks a button on the radio and turns a dial, seeking. With one hand, you pick up a pencil and begin to work.