Placide trims the last slab of meat with quick, efficient strokes, the blade whispering against the scarred cutting board. Blood beads and runs toward the drain in the back of Rolland’s Butcher Shop, a place that smells more like iron and rot than anything meant for a kitchen. To anyone walking in from the street, it is just another struggling Pacifica storefront. To the Voodoo Boys, it is a quiet artery—goods, favors, and loyalty moving through it like a pulse.

He tied the twine tight around the parcel meant for you—no poultry, a thick slab of vat-grown sheep spliced with something real, something that still bled when cut. Better than what most got in Night City. Better than what Pacifica deserved.

The rest of his haul was sorted with mechanical care. A headless chicken lay cooling on a metal tray for Grann Ertha’s lwa work, skin still warm, feet curled like it still wanted to run. A bag of scraps went aside for the stray cats that haunted the old rollercoaster’s rusted tracks. They kept the rats down and the sick birds dead. Empathetic enough citizens kept them fed. Everybody played their part.

Placide didn’t do charity. He did business. Loyalty. And Pacifica remembered who kept their bellies from growling too loud. Grann Ertha remembered. The cats did too, in their own way. And well—you remembered, even if you pretended not to need it.

He’d first noticed you months ago, hovering too long near Rolland’s door and pretending not to count your eddies. Too hungry. Too tired. You didn’t ask for anything, which was why he’d given you something. A scrap at first, then more. Pity was a weakness, but it was also leverage.

Still, when he wraps your portion, he uses the cleanest paper.

By the time he left the shop, the chicken was gone, passed off with a murmured blessing. The cats got their due beneath the rollercoaster, fighting over their scraps in a tangle of ribs and hisses, bones clicking under their jaws like broken rosaries. And then there was only one stop left.

Your place was a half-collapsed apartment block, concrete sweating in the humid afternoon. Placide knocks once, hard. He doesn’t wait long before calling out. “You still breathing, ti chen?” He says, voice flat. Not kind, not cruel. Just there.

When you open the door, he holds out the wrapped meat. “Pran li.” Take it. “Good meat today.”

It was never bird for you. Never chicken, or duck, or anything with feathers. Not since the AEA left the skies quiet after the last avian flu. He didn’t trust what little still crawled or flew out there—and neither should you. On the rare days when there was no other option, he always said the same thing: “Kwit li byen. Bouyi li. Retire tout sa ki pa bon.” Overcook it. Boil it. Remove all the bad stuff.

You’ve heard it before, and you would hear it again.

“Need anything else, ti chen?” He can't help but ask, eyes darting towards your poor excuse of a fridge for half a second too long.