The residential lower levels of Planet Seventy smelled of rust, stagnant water, and sour ozone.
Lin Mo, Su Wan, and Old Granite walked through the narrow, dripping corridors of Tenement Hive Nine.
The ceilings were barely six feet high. On both sides of the damp iron catwalks, thousands of rusted sheet-metal doors were stacked four tiers high, looking like an endless wall of filing cabinets.
Armed rent-bailiffs in spiked armor prowled the gangways, their electric stun-batons humming menacingly as they checked electronic padlocks.
Old Granite stopped before Unit 402 and tapped on the thin tin door.
A frail, elderly weaver named Sister Lan opened the hatch. The entire room measured barely six feet long by four feet wide. There was no window. A narrow foam mattress sat on a cold steel shelf, beside a small chemical hot plate and a rusted oxygen regulator.
On the wall, a digital meter ticked backward every second, measuring the remaining oxygen tokens in the cubicle.
“Sister Lan,” Su Wan asked gently, looking at the cramped cubicle. “How much rent do they charge for this?”
