"Step forward and open your hands."
The guard racked the bolt of his assault rifle.
The grueling fourteen hour workday was finally over. The ice citadel was slowly taking shape in the frozen plaza. A wall of crushed cars and compacted snow now blocked the worst of the brutal crosswinds.
Hundreds of starving citizens shuffled into a ragged line. The temperature hovered near negative eighty degrees. Exhaustion hung over the camp like a weight crushing their spines.
"Take your pill and keep moving," the guard ordered a shivering accountant.
The accountant held out his blistered bleeding hands. A second guard dropped a single white vitamin pill into his palm. A third guard handed him an open tin can of cold baked beans.
"Thank you," the accountant whispered.
He shoved the dry pill into
