The first time I felt like a human was when I smelled money.
Account balance: seventy-three thousand four hundred credits. Annual salary. After deducting the capsule apartment rent, synthetic protein bars, and arrears for AI voice service fees, there was still 2,100 left - enough to buy half a ticket to the orbital colony station.
Half a sheet. Fly into the vacuum.
Cockroaches sniff the icing on the cake through the glass. They can't lick it, but they can smell it.
There was a sudden buzzing deep in the skull. A string of blue light exploded from the retina. Number: P-1998-044.
I thought it was a hallucination, caused by hunger.
Until an anonymous package crashes into a pipe. The old-fashioned hard drive has no sending code and only a piece of monitoring - Dr. Chen is editing the genetic sequence and turning 230,000 embryos into switchable tools. The postscript flashed: "Sell to me, two million. Sell to 'Neon Mirror', half a million."
My fingers automatically calculate. Two million, deducting the boat ticket, deducting the deposit, deducting the AI butler who can tell jokes...
The numbers were jumping, like cockroaches crawling in the gaps, their leg hair scraping against the metal, making a rustling sound.
I stared at the postscript and suddenly smiled. This greed is the factory setting, and this gap is the ventilation pipe reserved by the system. Dr. Chen held the bait at the other end of the tube, waiting for me to crawl over.
"Three days later, the committee will meet behind closed doors." Her message popped up again, "Topic: Vote on the B-7 District Disposal Plan. Get your big news and make your quick money. Then, if you are still alive, I will tell you the true meaning of P-1998-044."
I crawled out of the capsule apartment, neon acid rain splashed on my face, burning with pain.
Cockroaches don't need dignity, they just need gaps.
And I'm crawling towards the biggest one.
