He had sold his sister’s body for corpse-starch and sworn never to be that kind of bastard again. Now, he was damning strangers for the price of a meal-token.

Against every other hive-rat decision in his life, paper was nothing. Jeric stared, fingertips tracing across the thick red ink. Twenty credits a piece, just for putting up some signs. Throne knew he wouldn’t get another opportunity like this. A week of rations at least, maybe more for a single sheet.
Susvik was thinner every day, and without Marium, it was hard to feed her, feed them both. Children needed food, he knew that, more food than him.  He stared at the stack by his feet, in the alley, they were trash, just another pile of sold dreams. He glanced up where the hab units opened up into the street. 

He could see the neon lights, hear voices shouting. None of them would think twice before gutting him for a meal. Why did he have to be the only fool trying to be good? 

God-Emperor damned him, he had promised. He had kept himself clean for two years, kissed up to the overseers until he felt sick. He was due for a raise, two more credits per shift, maybe enough for an extra ration a month. Was he really going to ruin it for some inbred zealot?

The poster fluttered in his hand, picked up by the foul air of District 820-32. Unwashed bodies and decay constants he couldn’t escape. He sighed. How much trouble could he really get in? 

Sure, something was up with Lerange. The thin man was a shiver addict, but he had looked healthy lately, plump on a frame that had only ever known starvation. 

His voice had been strong, not the broken rasp of a ruined throat but the full timbre of an overseer or an enforcer. That shouldn’t have been possible; nobody could afford an operation like that. 

At the end of shift, he had whispered about an easy job, earning a few extra credits. Jeric hadn’t hesitated. 

He looked at the symbols, swirling, bucking lines that made something pulse behind his eyes. He glanced away again and put the paper back on the pile. The man had been clear: just put them up. 

Let them see, let them know. He bit his lip. They’d be torn down in a day, maybe less. He could toss them and lie, who would ever know?

He pictured the man again, thin and tall, faceless under a dark hood, voice like smog on a day with no visibility. 

No, he thought. He couldn’t lie. If he lied, he breathed out tasting ash. Neither kid would survive without him. 

He shivered as he curled in on himself. He didn’t want to do this, didn’t want to risk his own life for his sisters’ kids. Didn’t want to wake with a third eye on his palm and the knowledge he had let warp-rot in without a fight. 

He could walk away. This wasn’t the water-guild’s tithe; no one had put a gun to his head. He glanced at his fingers, skin peeling where leather had bitten in. No one would bleed for this, no one would even care. 

He was still a good man. 

He let his fingers compress in a circle so small the light could barely get through. That was how small their wrists were now, Susvik and Hie. He had watched Hie stumble only a day ago, lifting a dateslate load as he rushed off for another courier route. Felt clumps of hair from Susvik’s skull as he brushed it out in his hands. 

Six and eight. Too small to work, too small to live. Would they forgive him if they knew? Pious little things, too young to know the preachers were full of grox-shit. 

He reached out and picked up the papers. It was nothing, barely any work, and who would read them anyway? Everyone was too busy to notice some print on the wall. He stood up. The slips felt too light in his hands; they were pristine, real white, the kind he had only ever seen in a priest’s book. Ink so dark it felt like oil sunk into frost. 

He tucked them under his arm and walked. Nothing would come of it. Some up-hiver fool thought words mattered. He would post them, get the credits, no one would bleed for this. Words meant less than chem-fumes down here. 

He needed to believe that. 

He just needed to see his goblins smile without blood weeping from their gums. See Hei with enough muscle to knife the next drunk with wandering hands. He might even be able to buy Susvik balm for her cracked lips. That would be enough. 

He moved with the end-cycle crowds, pasting the sheets in lift shafts and vent grates, trying to push down the urge to claw them off the wall every time one stuck. By the time he got home, half the stack was gone. That should have been good. Enough for a mid-hab unit. Enough, maybe, to bribe the overseer for a better shift. His blood felt like tar through his veins. 

He slipped inside, his shoulders falling as he started to unlace his work boots. The little hab felt like a shadow collapsing in. 

‘Uncle Jeric? You’re home!’ Hei’s voice, bright and light with hunger. Jeric’s face softened, just this one job. 

He drew in a breath, but no words came, as if rust had sealed his throat. 

Knock. Knock. Knock. His blood chilled; the dust in the air burned like corpse-stack smoke. The door shook as the fist pounded against it again. 

‘This is Interrogator Henrick. Open your hab.’ The paper fluttered to the ground. He stared at it as if the words offered more than condemnation. 

Just paper, he told himself. Ink wasn’t a sin. He was a good man. 

He had to be.