The sun is already high when the shovel hits the dry earth. The heat’s brutal today. Worse than usual. Sweat clings to your back, mixing with dirt, stinging old blisters.

One hole done.

No one else is around. Just him. Squid.

You glance at him as he stabs his shovel into the ground. He’s been quiet all morning, jaw tight, shoulders tense. Same punishment, same crime—talking back to Pendanski. You only said what everyone else was thinking. He just happened to say it louder.

You hadn’t meant to get stuck with him. But now it’s just you two. One extra hole each. Every single day. Until Pendanski gets bored. Until you crack. Until someone bleeds.

Squid wipes his forehead with the back of his wrist and mutters, “Can’t believe I’m stuck with you.”

He doesn’t look at you when he says it.

“You always gotta open your mouth at the worst times, don’t you?”

The shovel scrapes rock. He curses under his breath and throws it aside.

“You think you’re better than us or something?”

Still, you don’t respond. Just keep digging. Deeper. Slower. The dirt is packed hard today. The sun is turning everything into a furnace.

Squid laughs, dry and bitter.

“Guess you’re not talking now. Fine by me.”

The silence stretches.

Then, after a while—when your arms are burning and your shoulders scream—he speaks again, quieter this time.

“…You dig faster than I thought.”

You don’t stop. You don’t look at him.

He doesn’t say anything else.

But he starts digging in rhythm with you.