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"Claw?"
"There are four barracks in Dragon's Den, each named for a part of the dragon. Claw, Fire, Fang, Wings. You're in Claw."
"Why won't Mama Goshi want to see me?"
"Because you have a stomach and you're a kid, which means you'll eat food and not prove very useful. A drain."
"I'm not completely useless," said Bingwen.
Hun smiled as if he thought Bingwen naive.
They arrived at a warehouse-sized room that was now a camp. Hundreds of cots were packed together; hammocks hung between columns; bedrolls lined the walls and everywhere else, save for narrow aisles between the rows of living spaces. Women, children, the elderly, all practically on top of each other.
"Welcome to Claw," said Hun. "You might want to put that helmet back on. It smells like piss and sweat and antiseptic in here."
And worse things besides, thought Bingwen. He passed a washing station where women scrubbed sheets and clothing in large plastic buckets, then hung them dripping wet on lines above drainage grates in the floor. He passed a group of old men huddled around a holopad that looked almost as old as they were, the news reporter on screen flickering and fading as the signal came and went. He passed others who stared back at him, their faces blank and despondent. Mothers nursed infants. Old men coughed. Children ran and played, oblivious to their plight. Injured people with bandages lay in cots at a nurses' station. A shriveled old woman in the corner clutching a bundle of blankets rocked back and forth softly singing a lullaby. If there was an infant in her bundle, Bingwen didn't see one.
Bingwen tried smiling as he made eye contact, but no one returned the gesture.
Hun led him to the back corner where several sheets hung from the ceiling to form a small room. Mama Goshi was inside cutting open a box. When Hun introduced Bingwen, Mama Goshi grunted with exasperation and said, "And what am I to do with a boy? Especially one in a rubber suit meant for someone twice his size. What ails you, boy? You keeping a virus in there just for yourself?"
She was wrinkled and weathered and slightly humpbacked, wearing a pink flowered dress long faded from the sun and a pair of mismatched slippers.
Bingwen bowed. "No, Nai Nai. I'm healthy."
Mama Goshi nodded, pleased. "You were taught to respect your elders, at least. By your parents, I suspect. Both of them dead."
It didn't sound like a question, but Bingwen nodded nonetheless.
"Well, off with the spacesuit. No one obviously cares that I don't have room or food for another mouth, even one as small as yours, but I see I don't get a say in the matter." She waved a dismissive hand at Hun. "Get out of my face before I change my mind."
Hun hurried away without another word while Bingwen stepped out of his radiation suit. Mama Goshi put her hands on her hips and appraised him. "Skinny and scrawny and probably good for nothing. Can you clean toilets?"
"Yes, Nai Nai."
The old woman waved a hand again. "Enough with the formalities. I'm Mama Goshi here. Keep calling me 'Nai Nai' and people will think you're my real grandson, which you aren't and never will be."
"No, Mama Goshi."
She nodded. "Fast learner. Good. What's your name?"
He bowed again. "Bingwen."
"Well, Bingwen, when I say I don't have food for you, I mean it." She pointed to a small pile of boxes. "You see these? They contain today's food. Bottles of protein vitamin drink. That's our diet. It tastes like grass and grit, but it keeps us alive. Now, there are nine hundred and seventy-eight people in Claw. And I'm supposed to feed them all with this."
It wasn't enough. It wasn't enough to feed half that many.
"So if you think you're out of the woods down here," said Mama Goshi, "you're mistaken. This is only a different kind of hell."
"I can work," said Bingwen.
"You will. Until your fingers bleed, if I have my say. In the meantime, go find a place to sleep over there." She gestured to a row of cots where children were gathered.
He bowed. "Yes, Mama Goshi."
She turned away from him and began to speak with someone else who had approached. Bingwen got the message: He was dismissed. He scooped up his radiation suit and went to the cots.
A circle of boys sat on the floor playing rock dice. Behind them a girl about nine years old was kneeling by a cot, dabbing a sick boy's forehead with a damp cloth. She saw Bingwen, stood, and glowered at him.
