The air scrubbers in Sector 4 were failing, and for the first time, the Orbit smelled like the people inside it: stale, sweaty, and terrified. For decades, the high-altitude residents had lived in a sensory vacuum, shielded by the humming machinery that stripped away the scent of mortality. But today, the metallic tang of recycled copper had been replaced by the heavy, humid scent of overcrowding and rising CO2 levels. It was the smell of a closed system reaching its breaking point.
Evelyn stood in the center of the Genetic Research Lab, her silhouette cast in a flickering cerulean glow. The laboratory was a cathedral of glass and chrome, but even here, the pristine surfaces were beginning to dull with a fine layer of grit that the filtration systems could no longer catch. She was staring at a holographic projection that haunted her more than any "glitch" or phantom heartbeat. It was a chart of the Orbit's population longevity, a jagged mountain range of data that had been trending downward for fifty years. Now, the lines weren't just dipping; they were plummeting into a vertical abyss.
"It's not just the oxygen, is it?"
The voice made her jump. Leo was leaning over her shoulder, his face illuminated by the data stream. He had bypassed the lab's triple-layer security encryption. A feat that would have earned him a one-way trip to the bioconverters; to help her pull the raw, unedited data that Director Vane kept hidden from the public eye.
"No," Evelyn said, her fingers flying across the haptic interface, deconstructing the charts into their base components. "The oxygen is a symptom. A mechanical failure. What I'm looking at is a biological collapse. Look at the replication markers, Leo. It's the telomeres. We've lived in recycled light, shielded from the sun's radiation but also stripped of the Earth's natural magnetism and microbial diversity for too long. Our DNA is literally fraying at the edges. Every time a cell divides in this environment, it loses a piece of itself. We are becoming copies of copies, and the ink is running dry."
She manipulated the hologram, zooming in on a microscopic level. The chromosomal caps were shriveled, looking like burnt fuses.
"We've reached the Bottleneck," she continued, her voice trembling with a mixture of professional horror and personal dread. "It's a genetic dead end. If we don't get fresh genetic material; untainted, resilient strains that have actually survived the harshness of a natural environment, the next generation will be born with immune systems so fragile they won't even be able to handle the sterile air of the Core. We'll succumb to our own internal bacteria. We'll literally rot from the inside out while standing in a pressurized paradise."
Leo wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead. The temperature in Sector 4 had risen three degrees since the start of the shift. "Is that why Vane is so obsessed with the 'Lush Zones'? He told the council it was about finding arable land."
"He lied," Evelyn breathed. She tapped a hidden directory at the base of the data pillar, entering a secondary encryption key she had surreptitiously copied from Vane's terminal during their last meeting.
The hologram flickered, turning a deep, bloody crimson. A restricted file marked Project Chimera bloomed in the air between them. Evelyn felt the air leave her lungs. It wasn't a plan for relocation or a colonial charter. It was a blueprint for a massive, systematic extraction. The werewolves, the "infestation" Vane spoke of with such public disgust, weren't being studied for relocation. They were being targeted for their "Primal Strains."
The data was cold and clinical. It detailed the way the lycanthropic virus bonded with human DNA, creating a hyper-resilient helix capable of rapid cellular regeneration. Vane's scientists had concluded that the only way to "patch" the holes in the human genome was to graft these primal markers into the Orbiter population.
"It's a harvest," Evelyn whispered, her eyes scanning the tactical maps attached to the file. "He's calling it a rescue mission to the public, a grand return to our ancestral home to save us from a mechanical failure. But these orders... Leo, look at this. They call for 'Total Biological Liquidation' of the host subjects once the Alpha is secured and the genetic templates are digitized. He isn't going back to Earth to live with the world. He's going back to drain it. He's going to bleed the packs dry to save a few thousand people in a glass box."
"And he's using you to find the vein," Leo added grimly, his voice echoing the hollow feeling in Evelyn's chest. "You're the only one who can track them. You're the bloodhound he's sending into the woods to find the kill."
Evelyn watched the casualty projections for the Earth-side inhabitants. The numbers were staggering, entire ecosystems wiped out just to secure a few vials of serum. The irony was suffocating. The people of the Orbit, who prided themselves on "Purity through Technology," were now so desperate that they were willing to become the very "monsters" they claimed to loathe, just to keep their failing hearts beating.
The silence of the lab was shattered by a sharp, rhythmic chime that vibrated through the floor tiles. The overhead speakers crackled with a burst of static before the cold, modulated voice of the Central AI took over.
"All Citizens of Sectors 1 through 7. Report immediately to the Great Hall. Director Vane will now address the Genetic Crisis and announce the commencement of the Eradication Initiative. Attendance is mandatory. Non-compliance will result in immediate credit docking."
Leo looked at the door, then back at Evelyn. "He's making his move. If you go on this mission, Evie, you'll be the one holding the scalpel."
Evelyn closed the file with a sharp swipe of her hand, the blue light of the terminal reflecting in her eyes like a dying star. She felt the silver mark on her shoulder throb. Not with the heat of the bond, but with the cold weight of a guilty conscience. She looked at the hologram of the fraying DNA, then at the darkened window that looked out over the bruised, waiting Earth.
The Orbit was a dying beast, a parasite that had run out of host. It was about to bite the world below with everything it had left, not out of malice, but out of the primal, ugly necessity of survival.
"I'm not holding the scalpel for him, Leo," Evelyn said, her voice dropping to a low, dangerous frequency. "I'm going to find the Alpha. But I'm not bringing him a harvest. I'm bringing him a revolution."
She turned from the terminal, her mind already racing through the medical supplies she would need to smuggle. She had to be the perfect doctor, the perfect soldier, and the perfect liar. The weight of the world was no longer just a metaphor; it was the atmosphere she was about to plunge into.
Evelyn walked toward the door, leaving the flickering charts behind. The scent of stale air followed her, a constant reminder that the clock was ticking. The Orbit was gasping its last, and the descent was no longer a choice, it was an inevitability.