Page 28 of Poster Girl

Fuck you,she thinks.

They walk past a man holding a stack of pamphlets; he thrusts one in Sonya’s face as she passes him. It readsThe Dangers of Digital: Why Elicits Are a Slippery Slope That Leads Back to the Insight.Stamped at the bottom are the wordscitizens against digital takeover. Sonya looks back at the man. His thick beard obscures his face, but his eyes lock on hers, taking in the glow of the Insight. He opens his mouth, as if to speak, and she hurries along.

“CAD nutjobs. They’re a feeder organization for the Army, you know,” Alexander says, plucking the pamphlet from her hand. “‘Slippery slope.’ That’s like saying that alcohol leads directly to Blitz.” He pauses. “Blitz is a recreational drug. A stimulant.”

“I know.” Her voice sounds so hard it’s almost tinny. “Plenty of people have died of overdoses in the Aperture.”

Sonya never took Blitz. There was no reason to want an excess of energy in the Aperture. Nothing to occupy your busy hands, your busy brain. Better to dull everything, to mute it, like a T-shirt worn soft by countless washings. But David took it sometimes and stayed awake all night teeming over with ideas. Escape, revenge, home improvement projects, everything.

David also took it to die.

Alexander frowns. “I didn’t know.”

“Why would you?”

David would have been released with the other Children of the Delegation, had he lived. Nikhil had pointed that out to Sonya when the first few younger ones were released, and it kept her up at night for a week, the thought of the little blue pills in David’s palm, so like the little yellow one in hers, a long time ago.

Vines crawl up the side of Knox’s building, a curved, organic shape layered over the building’s strict geometry. Beneath the tangle of leavesis the entrance, two doors framed with grand ironwork. She walks into the building, where security guards stand at either end of the lobby, guarding each elevator bank. A screen greets her, the robotic voice saying, liquid smooth,Welcome to Artemis Tower, please sign in.

Alexander nudges her aside, taking her place at the screen. He types her name, and Emily Knox’s, and hesitates over the line that asks for a reason for his visit:Social Call, Celebration, Business, Other.“Other” is his final selection.

Sonya wonders how, in a world without DesCoin, a person comes to live in a place like this. There’s another form of currency, now simply called “credits,” but she doesn’t know how a person like Knox earns it. Nikhil said she flourished under the Delegation, but without Insights to hack, how does she flourish now? Someone who is useful to two opposing regimes, Sonya thinks, can’t be decent.

Now requesting access from your guest, Emily KNOX,the screen reports.

“She’s not here,” one of the guards says, from the far end of the lobby. Behind him is a fountain, just a heavy tray on the ground with a bubble of spray in the center.

“Do you know where she is?” Alexander says.

“Ordinarily I wouldn’t say,” the man replies. “But givenher...” He gestures to Sonya. “I’m sure she’d love to know what you want, Poster Girl. She’s at the bar across the street, the Midnight Room.”

Sonya shivers at the way he looks at her, eager, like she’s something he wants to unwrap. She’s already passing through the doorway by the time Alexander thanks the man.

“Nice of him,” Alexander says.

“Was it?” Sonya replies.

The Midnight Room occupies the ground floor of the building across the street—with the glass tinted dark blue—and its facade is as dark as its name. Sonya hesitates before opening the door. She thinks of the people who spat at her as she left the Aperture that morning.delegation scumpainted on the wall of her living room.

She could go talk to the Wards, instead.

The interior of the Midnight Room is pure black at first, in contrast to the daylight. Shapes materialize from the dim, dark leaves covering the walls, hanging from the ceiling. Low lamps shine here and there. All along the bar, there are orbs full of artificial insects—small drones, buzzing mechanically against the glass. The plants must be artificial too, convincing fakes. Someone plays light, gentle piano in the corner.

A woman sits at the bar, a black boot braced against the chair next to her. Even sitting, it’s clear she’s tall, her shoulders broad. Her long black hair is tied back, and she holds a glass of dark liquor in one hand, an Elicit in the other.

“You must be Sonya Kantor,” the woman says, her eyes still on the Elicit in her hand. “We’ve never met and you want to come into my apartment? I usually like to go out for a drink first.” She sets the Elicit down and sips from her glass. “Maybe that’s why you’re here now.”

Everyone else in the bar—a small scattering of people buried in the foliage—is silent as she speaks.

“You know the hood’s not really doing much to disguise that thing in here, right?” the woman—Emily Knox, obviously—says.

Sonya tugs the hood down. The Insight is a perfect white circle around her iris, an eclipsed sun. Knox pushes the chair beside her back with the toe of her boot, and gestures to it.

Sonya sits, her knees together. Knox hugs a knee to her chest, balancing her glass on top of it, and stares at Sonya.

“I came to ask for your help,” Sonya says.

Knox laughs.

---