At the entrance to the dining room there was a retina scanner, when the children arrived the system detected if they had completed their work and entered the few coins into their virtual account, when they approached to ask for food they would go through a scanner again that would discount the cost.
The room was a large empty warehouse, without tables, the children ate on the floor with their hands, at the back there was only a food dispenser, it was the children themselves who had to put their bowl, their hands or their clothes to receive the ration of the disgusting gray porridge with which they had been fed since they were little.
But something caught the attention of Balloon Head, the older the children were the more malnourished they seemed.
"Why are they thinner than children our age?"
Mouse noticed the queue for food, most of the older children only asked for half a ration. That was the big trap of that system, the cost of the ration was the same as the salary that the children received, if they wanted to save something to be able to buy some skill that would allow them to survive when they reached the age in which they would not fit in the tunnels, the children were forced to go hungry. Success required sacrifices or so was the motto that could be read above the food dispenser.
That entire dining room with hungry, filthy, and desperate children was controlled by three class G adults, although emaciated, thin, they had survived to adulthood, but their lack of skills or strength had prevented them from having any other better paid job, they barely earned a little more than the children in the dining room themselves.
The children approached the dispenser, they had nothing to receive the food, so they used Rabbit's gray shirt that was the cleanest to receive the two rations of food. The three of them sat on the floor and began to eat the purée with their hands. It was disgusting and tasted awful, but the children had never tasted anything else in their lives so they had nothing to compare it to.
One of the guards, an old G-class woman, emaciated and lame, no longer fit for any physical work, approached the children.
"She hasn't paid, she can't eat."
The old woman was about to take Rabbit by the hand to take her away when Mouse intervened.
"Can't I give her my food?"
"And why would you do that? In the long run, she will die if she doesn't work, and she will drag you down with her. There are no friends in this world, boy, it's better to get it into your head if you don't want to die young."
"I'll decide that, not you. For now, if I eat her, she'll eat my food..."
The mouse's gaze, despite her small and weak body, was imperious. The children weren't really breaking any rules, so the old woman couldn't kick them out. In truth, she was more surprised than anything else. She hadn't gotten old by being compassionate with her class.
The boys continued eating. When they finished, they went to the tunnels. They wouldn't be allowed to mingle with the people at the station until the time came when they couldn't fit in the tunnels.
That night they slept hugging each other in the widening of a damp and stinking tunnel. All they had was each other and their friendship. It took Rabbit almost a week to get his job done, and even then he wasn't always able to finish it.
At least some days they could eat their full rations, but the joy was short-lived. One day Balloon Head went into the wrong tunnel, went down the wrong drain and suffered a fall of several meters, a common accident among the G-class garbage collectors. Although Rabbit and Mouse managed to get him out of there, he had broken both legs, it was impossible for him to walk for a long time, much less do his job.
The two friends tried hard to bring him a little food every day for a month, but Balloon Head's legs healed badly, very badly, he walked again, but a five-year-old boy with a serious limp who couldn't use the strength to get into many of the tunnels assigned to him was a serious problem.
Mouse returned one day to his meeting point, Balloon Head was there, he had tried to do his job, but he was not able to pull himself up to reach the upper tunnel where he had to squeeze through.
"Did it go wrong?"
"I haven't been able to get up, Mouse, I don't want to fight anymore, it's no use, I'm no good at all. I'm just a burden..."
"Don't say that Balloon Head, we have the three of us, we'll get through it."
"You should leave us, survive, you can Mouse, Rabbit and I will only bring you problems..."
"Never, never say that, you're all I have, I'll never leave you behind..."
At that moment Rabbit arrived, she was the weakest of the three, even in mentality, the boys did not want to continue with that sad conversation in front of her. But Balloon Head's look had changed.
The three children were getting hungrier every day and were getting weaker, Rabbit was not always able to fulfill her task, and Balloon Head was even worse. Many days they had to make do with Mouse's food ration, one ration for three children, that did not even cover the minimum to survive. They continued like this, weakening.
Until one day Balloon Head did not return from work, Mouse looked for him everywhere, but he did not appear anywhere. It was one of his former colleagues at the farm who told them that they had found Balloon Head's body, apparently he had fallen more than fifteen meters from a lateral collector to the main artery.
For Rabbit, it was always a regrettable accident like the previous one that his friend had had, but when Mouse checked the place he had no doubt, the trap door of the collector had to have been opened, there were only two options: someone had thrown him from there or the boy himself had jumped headfirst to save them suffering.
For weeks the idea that someone had killed his friend haunted Mouse, but in the end he completely ruled it out. Balloon Head had nothing to steal, he had no conflicts with anyone, and he was not useful for anything or anyone, nothing was gained by killing him, the only thing that could be done was that this good guy had ended his life to make the future easier for Mouse and Rabbit.
After a few months, Mouse found a perfect shelter for the two of them to sleep, it was an old vent from the old air distribution system that had been sealed on the other side long ago. It was narrow, but they could fit both of them side by side, and it was clean compared to the other places and there were no bugs. As the weeks went by, they even managed to get two pieces of pipe that could serve as bowls for their food. They would no longer have to hold the food in their hands and eat like animals, now they could pick up the gray mush with their hands in peace.
They missed Balloon Head, but they were class G children, few survived the tunnels, if they had at least been class F they would have been able to grow up on the farm until they were seven years old, and had been assigned to the larger, safer collectors, their chances of survival would have been greater, although that would not have guaranteed that Balloon Head would have survived, but they would have had more opportunities.
One night, Mouse was sleeping next to Rabbit, but Rabbit had gotten wet in a drain, she was cold and shivering, her fever was rising, although mouse could do nothing but hold her and give her the little body heat that her thin body gave off.
In the morning, Rabbit's cough became evident, Mouse's concern increased, the guards were not worried if the children were mutilated, had wounds or broken and poorly healed bones, the only thing they could not allow was that they were sick, if a virus spread among the poopers the station could be left without its cleaning system, and that would be a serious problem.
They decided not to go to the dining room, they would manage with Mouse's food ration, however Rabbit's health did not improve, she coughed, had a fever and was delirious, not even continuous rest without doing her job worked.
Luckily, Mouse hadn't caught anything, whatever was wrong with Rabbit, he hadn't caught it. However, one day he went to the mess hall, several inspectors from the space station, F-class adults too old to do any other job, were there in their uniforms. The old guard nodded at him as soon as he entered.
Mouse tried to retrace his steps, but an old, ugly guy was waiting for him at the door with his inhibitor baton in his hand.
"Are you the boy they call Mouse?"
"So what if I am? I haven't done anything wrong..."
"That remains to be seen. Where are you hiding your friend? Where are you hiding Rabbit?"
Mouse didn't say anything and after receiving a hard beating he was taken unconscious to a medical center, the scanner revealed that he was in as good health as could be expected from a G-class pooper. From what he could find out from the inspectors who questioned him, some other child had reported them in exchange for an extra ration, that's how cruel life was for those of his kind.
By the time Mouse regained his freedom and returned to his hideout, Rabbit was no longer there, he had taken her, the boy waited for weeks until he lost hope of seeing her again. Thus, Mouse was left alone in life at the end.
It took weeks to heal the wounds from the beating he had received, he only survived by his willpower that clung to life desperately, he would not die so easily, he would not do it for Balloon Head, he would not do it for Rabbit. He will survive.