The locker room reeked of damp tile, bleach, and stale sweat, the fluorescent light buzzing overhead with a rhythm that never quite settled. A cold draft slid across Eli's bare thighs as he pressed his back to the slick concrete wall, the rough bench biting into his palms. He'd stripped down to his boxers in the corner like they'd asked, folding his jeans and t-shirt into a neat stack that felt absurdly out of place next to the gleaming rubber thing laid out on the bench beside him.

The suit was folded with a precision that made his stomach turn. It lay there like something taxidermied, arms crossed over its chest, legs tucked under. The rubber caught the light in dull waves, dark and liquid-looking, and even from where he stood he could smell it—fresh latex, chemical and sharp, the kind of smell that got in your nose and stayed there.

Marcus stood by the door with his hands clasped loose in front of him, watching. He hadn't moved in what felt like minutes. His charcoal suit fit him the way the rubber would fit Eli, seamless and deliberate, and his gray eyes tracked everything without seeming to blink.

"You're not in a hurry," Marcus said. Not a question.

Eli's jaw tightened. "I'm thinking."

"Thinking's fine. Thinking's good." Marcus tilted his head, a small gesture that made the fluorescent light slide along his slicked-back hair. "But the meter's running. You came here for a number, and the number doesn't change whether you stand there all night or put the suit on."

The number. Two thousand for the night, plus a bonus if the yield was high. Eli had done the math in the bus on the way over, twice, because it didn't seem real the first time. Two thousand covered the bike repairs and the entry fee for the regional qualifier and left enough for the coach's cut. It was the difference between racing next season and watching it from the stands.

He'd told himself it was just a donation. A clinic, sort of. Men sold sperm all the time, didn't they? There were places with cups and magazines and a stack of cash at the front desk. He'd pictured that. He hadn't pictured a rubber suit that looked like it belonged on an autopsy table.

"What's the suit for?" Eli heard himself ask, and hated how thin his voice sounded.

Marcus's mouth did something that wasn't quite a smile. "Contamination control. The product needs to come out of you clean, and you need to stay in a controlled environment while it does. The suit keeps your body temperature stable, keeps you from touching yourself, keeps everything—" he made a small gesture with one gloved hand, "—contained."

Eli's skin prickled. "Contained."

"You'll understand once it's on." Marcus took a step closer, and the floor creaked under his boot. "It's not complicated, Eli. You put on the suit, you put on the mask, you sit in the chair, and you let the night do its work. In the morning, you walk out with enough cash to fix your bike and then some. People do this every week."

Every week. Eli tried to imagine a line of men in rubber suits, faceless and silent, waiting their turn in a chair. The image wouldn't hold together. It kept fracturing into pieces he didn't want to look at.

"How many people?" he asked.

"Enough that we know what we're doing." Marcus's voice stayed level, unhurried. "You're not the first athlete through that door. You won't be the last. Your body type is—" he paused, and the pause felt deliberate, felt like a door opening just a crack, "—in demand."

The words landed in Eli's chest and sat there. His body type. His lean swimmer's shoulders, his cyclist's thighs, the hours of training that had carved him into something he'd always thought of as his own. The way Marcus said it made it sound like inventory.

The draft slid across his bare thighs again, and he realized he was shivering. Or maybe not shivering. Maybe something else.

"The mask," Eli said, his voice coming out steadier than he felt. "What's the gag for?"

Marcus's eyebrows lifted a fraction. "You've done your research."

"I read the fine print."

"Then you read that the gag keeps the jaw relaxed. The body's got a lot of tension in the jaw, and tension works against the collection process. The mask keeps you quiet, keeps you relaxed, keeps the process efficient." He said it like he was explaining a machine, and maybe he was. "You won't be able to talk once it's on. That's the point."

The point. Eli's hands found the edge of the bench behind him, the rough wood biting into his palms again. He could feel his pulse in his throat, a steady drum that seemed too loud in the small room.

"And the chair?"

Marcus's smile finally reached his eyes, and it was worse than when it hadn't. "The chair is where the work happens."

The work. Eli didn't ask what that meant. He was afraid he already knew, or afraid he didn't, and both fears felt like the same thing.

The fluorescent light flickered, once, and in the dark blink Eli saw the room differently. The drain in the center of the floor, a small steel circle that caught the light when it returned. The hook on the far wall, the kind you'd hang a hose from. Details he'd registered and dismissed when he walked in, now rearranging themselves into a picture he didn't want to complete.

"You can leave," Marcus said, and his voice had shifted, gone softer, almost gentle. "You can walk out that door right now, and you'll forget this place ever existed. No one's holding you here."

Eli looked at the door. It was a plain metal door, the kind you'd find in any industrial building, and there was nothing stopping him from reaching for the handle. His legs would carry him. He was a cyclist; his legs had carried him up mountains, through wind, through the long grinding miles when his lungs burned and his quads screamed and the only thing that kept him going was the thought of the finish line.

But the finish line wasn't here. The finish line was a season he couldn't afford, a bike with a cracked frame that would fail him on the first descent, a coach who'd already floated the idea of him taking a year off to "find his footing." The finish line was rent due in nine days and a bank account that had gone from thin to empty to something worse.

He'd done the math. He'd done it twice. The math didn't change.

"I'll do it," Eli said, and the words came out before he could stop them, before he could take them back and put them somewhere they couldn't hurt him.

Marcus nodded, slow and satisfied, like he'd known all along. "Good." He crossed to the bench and picked up the suit, holding it by the shoulders the way you'd hold a jacket. "Arms up."

Eli's arms didn't want to move. They hung at his sides, heavy and wrong, and for a long moment he just stood there, staring at the rubber thing in Marcus's hands. The suit had no visible fasteners from the front, just a smooth expanse of dark rubber that looked like it would fit close as skin.

"It goes on over your head," Marcus said, reading his hesitation. "The zipper's in the back. It's not complicated."

Not complicated. Eli raised his arms, and Marcus stepped in close, and the rubber came down over his head like a second skin, cool and clinging, sliding over his shoulders and chest with a soft hiss of air. The suit was tight—tighter than anything he'd ever worn, tighter than his racing skinsuit, tighter than the wetsuit he'd trained in during the off-season. It sealed around his torso, around his hips, around his thighs, and the sensation was so strange, so total, that he forgot to breathe for a second.

Marcus's gloved fingers found the zipper at the base of his spine and pulled it up, slow and deliberate, the metal teeth clicking together one by one. The sound was obscenely loud in the small room, and Eli felt each click in his chest, in his throat, in the place behind his ribs where his heartbeat had taken up residence.

The suit settled against him like a second skin, and he could feel everything through it—the rough concrete under his bare feet, the cold air moving across his rubber-clad legs, the faint heat of his own body bouncing back at him. It was like being wrapped in something alive.

"Good," Marcus murmured, and his hands lingered at Eli's shoulders for a moment longer than they needed to, pressing the rubber flat against his skin. "The fit's excellent. You've got the frame for it."

Eli's skin prickled under the rubber. The suit left nothing to the imagination—every line of his body was visible, every muscle, every curve. He could see himself reflected in the dark surface of the metal locker across the room, a lean rubber-clad figure that didn't quite look like him.

Marcus stepped back and picked up the mask. It was made of the same dark rubber, with a round opening for the face and a built-in gag that jutted out from the mouth area—a thick rubber bulb on a short shaft, the kind of thing that would fill his mouth completely and leave no room for anything else.

Eli's throat tightened.

"This is the last part," Marcus said, holding it out to him. "After this, there's no backing out. You understand that, right? Once the mask is on, you're committed."

Committed. Eli looked at the mask, then at the door, then back at the mask. The rubber bulb gleamed under the fluorescent light, and he could smell the latex from here, sharp and chemical and new.

"How much?" he asked, and his voice cracked on the words. "The bonus. If the yield is high."

Marcus's eyes glinted. "Another thousand. Maybe more, if the night goes the way I think it will."

Another thousand. Three thousand total. Eli's hands moved before his brain caught up with them, reaching out and taking the mask from Marcus's grip. The rubber was warm from the other man's hands, and it flexed slightly under his fingers, yielding and then springing back.

He held it for a long moment, feeling the weight of it. The built-in gag was heavier than it looked, solid and substantial. He thought about the bus ride over, the way he'd rehearsed what he'd say, the way he'd convinced himself this was just another transaction, just a clinic visit with a better payout.

This wasn't a clinic visit.

The fluorescent light buzzed overhead, flickering once, and in that blink Eli saw himself in the locker's dark surface—a lean figure in a rubber suit, holding a mask to his chest, standing at the edge of something he couldn't name.

He lifted the mask to his face.

The latex pressed against his lips, cool and smooth, and the rubber bulb of the gag just touched his mouth, not quite in, not yet. He could feel his breath fogging against the inside of the mask, warm and damp, and the smell of fresh latex filled his nostrils, chemical and sharp and everywhere.

One heartbeat of silence. The room held its breath with him.

And then Marcus took a single step closer, the floor creaking under his boot, and Eli knew the night was starting now, not later.