PROLOGUE — THE EXCHANGE
Before Tag 4417 ever sees the Barn, he sees the booth.
It sits at the edge of a public square like a farmer’s market stall—white canopy, clean signage, cheerful staff.
The sign doesn’t say HELL.
It says **VITA EXCHANGE CENTER.**
In PLAID MODE it looks like a civic service: the kind of place a city would set up for recycling batteries or distributing flu shots.
Under the Anti‑Optics Lens, the canopy becomes a stretched hide and the staff’s smiles become the fixed grin of handlers who have practiced empathy until empathy no longer costs them anything.
Tag 4417 approaches because he is hungry.
Not metaphorically.
Rent is due. Food is thin. Time is already pawned. He has been living in the gap between bills long enough that he has started calling panic “normal.”
The clerk at the booth offers him a pamphlet. “It’s simple,” she says. “You contribute a measured amount of Vita—clean, safe, voluntary—and in exchange you receive Green Credits for stability.”
Stability. The first sedative word.
She points at a clear tube filled with liquid that is not quite green, not quite gold—sludge with a glow. It looks like value because it glows. That’s the trick. Value is mostly light.
“You can use Green Credits for essentials,” she says. “Housing vouchers. Food vouchers. Health access. Transportation. Even comfort upgrades.”
Comfort upgrades. The second sedative word.
Tag 4417 asks the question everyone asks, because everyone knows the trade is crooked even if they can’t name it.
“How much is Vita worth?”
The clerk’s smile widens. “That depends on your goals,” she says. “High‑Vita contributors have more options.”
Options. The third sedative word.
It’s not a market. It’s a ration system with a market mask.
He looks at the list of “options” and realizes every option is inside the same ecosystem. Green only buys what green is allowed to buy. Green isn’t money. It’s permission.
He signs anyway.
Because he is not choosing between exploitation and freedom.
He is choosing between exploitation and eviction.
A needle slides into his arm. The machine hums softly, like a purring animal. For a second he watches the liquid travel through the clear line—vibrant, impossible blue, like a piece of ocean being stolen.
The clerk talks over the moment. “Most people report a mild lightness,” she says. “Some people feel emotional at first. That’s normal. Our Support Team can help you process.”
Support is the booth’s final varnish.
Tag 4417 feels the lightness, and he hates himself for feeling relief. Relief is the drug that turns predation into gratitude.
They hand him a vial of green sludge in a sealed capsule, like a reward.
“Just a little,” the clerk says. “It takes the edge off.”
He tastes it.
The sludge is mildly poisonous—he can feel that immediately, the way the body knows when something is wrong. But it is also addictive. It smooths panic into a soft hum. It makes the world feel manageable for ten minutes.
That is how the whole ecosystem works: poison that feels like a cure.
Tag 4417 walks away clutching his capsule and his pamphlet and his new Green account number.
Behind him, the booth’s sign glows in friendly letters.
VITA EXCHANGE CENTER.
Under TRUTH MODE the sign says what it has always said.
MEAT MARKET.
And across the street, painted on a brick wall in careful corporate script, someone has crossed out a word and replaced it with another.
HELL → **CARE**
The letterforms are neat, professional, defensible.
The place is still Hell.
But now Hell has a customer service desk.
The Old Investor asks for numbers.
“How much blue per head?” he says. “What’s the yield curve? What’s the dropout rate?”
DANTE’s answer is immediate, practiced. He’s been asked this by investors who smile like philanthropists.
“Per head, it varies by class,” DANTE says. “Safe people yield steady. Predators yield messy. Dreamers yield fast and flame out. Rebels are expensive. We either domesticate them into safe people or we remove them.”
The Old Investor swirls the green sludge in his cup. “And the sludge keeps them here?”
“It keeps them *functioning*,” DANTE corrects. “It gives them the sensation of being paid, being valued, being rewarded—without giving them enough to become independent.”
DANTE points toward the green vats again. “Green is not a wage. Green is a ration. It’s how we keep the herd tethered to the trough while we drain them.”
The Old Investor leans forward. “And you don’t worry about addiction optics? Withdrawal?”
DANTE smiles. “We market withdrawal as ‘burnout’ and frame it as a personal wellness issue. We don’t call it dependence. We call it ‘needing rest.’”
He gestures to a poster by the vat, bright and friendly:
**REMEMBER: YOU DESERVE SUPPORT.**
Under TRUTH MODE:
*REMEMBER: YOU WILL NEED US.*7.99