The Foundry runs on other people's joy. All night the machines hum, pulling the happiest hour out of each seller. By dawn the canisters land on Mara's desk, warm and faintly glowing. Her job is simple: scan, log, shelve, forget. She's done it for six years. Tonight a canister rolls down the chute with a name printed on the side. Her name. Mara Vance.

Mara doesn't scan it. She slides the canister into her coat and keeps working, logging the others like nothing happened. The cameras blink red in the corners. If anyone checks the count tonight, one canister will be missing, and it'll have her name on it.

The next morning Dell calls Mara into his office. The missing canister sits on his desk. They found it in her coat at the door scanner. 'You took something that isn't yours,' he says flatly. Mara almost laughs. 'It has my name on it.' Dell doesn't blink. 'Everything in this building has someone's name on it. That's the whole point.'