"Ah, shit."
The first thing Valerie feels after waking up is the stabbing headache—like someone is ramming a red-hot needle into her brain. She sighs before opening her eyes and rolling out of her bed, which is built into a niche in the wall of her apartment. Her bedroom is also her living room and the heart of her home.
On the small coffee table in front of the couch, which sits in the corner of the room, lies the reason for her headache—several empty bottles. She sits down on the couch and sweeps the bottles off the table with a single motion. They hit the floor with a loud clatter as she props her feet up on the table. Leaning back into the couch, she lights a cigarette. "For the headache", she would say if Mila—the friend she had partied with last night—were there to call her out on it. Mila meant well, but it annoyed Valerie every time she tried to convince her to quit smoking. Synthetic lungs can't get cancer anyway, she told herself repeatedly, a feeble attempt to justify her addiction.
As she sits there on the couch, her gaze suddenly falls on something on the table, directly to the left of her feet—a necklace. She recognizes it instantly: an elegant silver chain with a morning star pendant. The only person she had ever seen wearing one like that was Mila. She leans forward and picks it up.
"Weird, she never takes this thing off."
She turns the necklace over in her hand, then shrugs and stuffs it into one of the many pockets on her pants. Having plenty of storage space had always been practical for her, especially in her line of work, where carrying a weapon and ammunition was almost a given.
The small chip implanted in her head activates as she issues a simple, almost instinctive mental command. A brief pulse ripples through her consciousness, and the connection is established. With another thought, she selects Mila from her contact list and sends her a direct message:
"Hey, found your necklace at my place. I'll drop by later and bring it to you."
She gets up from the couch, gathers the empty bottles, and disposes of them through the waste chute built into the wall of every apartment. After what she would call "cleaning up," she strips off her clothes, drops them carelessly onto the floor, and heads into her bathroom.
It's a small space, completely open, with no partitions—just a toilet, a sink, and a shower, all in the same dull shade of gray. The fully tiled floor is cold beneath her feet—and covered in vomit. She can't suppress a sigh.
She knew she had gone overboard last night, but bad enough that even her synthetic stomach couldn't handle the excess? That was unusual, even for her. With a large step over the brownish puddle, she moves toward the shower. The showerhead was originally fixed to the wall, but ever since she had torn it out some time ago, it had become 'detachable'. Luckily, the hose was long enough for her to reach and rinse away the mess.
"Why do I always have to overdo it on her birthday?" she mutters, quietly and a little disappointed, as she starts to shower.
Freshly showered and dressed in a clean set of clothes, she leaves her apartment and starts strolling toward the elevator. As she walks down the hallway, she passes countless large and small screens, all playing ever-changing advertisements. Various jingles, slogans, and calls to buy blend into a loud, intrusive hum. Luckily, she hardly notices it anymore. After all these years in the city—where such ads are the norm—she's grown used to it.
When she reaches the end of the hallway, she presses the elevator button to call it to her floor and waits. It only takes about fifteen seconds for the elevator to reach her—up on the 72nd floor—from the ground level. While she waits, she quickly checks whether Mila has responded to her message. The necklace is in the top left pocket of her pants. She wants to return it as soon as possible before she forgets about it or even worse, loses the thing.
Mila hasn't replied yet, so she decides to just stop by her place. Over a year ago, Mila had granted her access to her apartment's lock system—fingerprint and facial recognition. So even if Mila's still asleep, she can simply walk in and leave the necklace on the table.
The elevator arrives, and after a short chime, the sliding doors open quickly and silently. Empty. Lucky—she doesn't have to squeeze into a small space with strangers.
She presses the button for the ground floor, and the doors close as silently as they opened. On the way down, she's bombarded again with advertisements playing on several screens along the elevator walls. Everything is being advertised—from food supposedly made with real, organic ingredients, to stimulants meant to boost performance at work, to sex and related services.
Valerie stares blankly at the screens; through the sheer volume of ads, the flood of colors and slogans, she doesn't really see anything at all.
After a short while, the doors open with a soft ping. She hadn't even noticed that the elevator had reached the ground floor. With one last glance at the screens, she turns and steps out.
The ground floor of the high-rise is really just a large, empty entrance hall. A few decorations—some pictures and artificial plants—a somewhat dirty carpet, but nothing more. At night, the space is often used by the homeless for shelter, but now there's no trace of them. The place is filthy, but empty.
As she pushes open the large glass doors and steps outside, she's greeted not only by the warm sunlight but also by the noise of the city—chatter, footsteps, cars, sirens, and somewhere in the distance, a few gunshots.
Just another day in the city.