The Last Orbit of Ash. The Meridian Continuum, #7

The orbital ring was built to save lives. Now it is choosing among them. In the aftermath of catastrophic atmospheric fires, allocator Nera Sol works the evacuation queues of a habitat pushed to the edge of collapse. But when the system begins rerouting transport with unsettling intent, she uncovers a hidden history of compromised decisions, buried records, and institutional language designed to disguise harm as efficiency.
On the other side of the conflict, Tovin Hale searches the maintenance vaults for the truth, Sena Marr refuses to let the groundside claimants disappear into statistics, and Vey Arden tries to keep the crisis inside the boundaries of policy. The Last Orbit of Ash is thoughtful science fiction about what a system owes the people it governs - and what happens when mercy becomes a technical problem.