I JOLT AWAKE to the familiar sound of my front door being pounded against its hinges. Dried saliva crusting the corner of my mouth. Messy hair curtaining half my vision. Ears kicking into gear. The butt of Sarah’s gun- I recognize the weight to it- hammers against the metal three more times before she says something incoherent through the door’s insulation.
I stumble off the couch and fumble around the floor for wherever my JOY fell during the night. Swiping blindly through the screens while I paw the bleariness from my eyes, accidentally triggering the rest of the morning cycle. Artificial sunlight forces my eyes shut again. A hellstorm of synthesized birds start tweeting on repetitive loops. Forest trees rustle quietly. Springtime mountain ambiance, flowers blowing in a breeze, the cry of a distant seagull. A spine-tingling shiver follows when I find the menu to access my JOY’s neural link, stabbing my brain with enhanced gunslinging reflexes. If I wanted, I could use the sphere to summon any weapon imaginable straight into my hands. But I’ve already got a physical one on the table next to me, and that one doesn’t disappear when I turn off the JOY.
Finally I get the door camera on. Sarah Morninghawk, tight leather and fur hood, rakish blonde hair, Sixer in hand, stares at me from the other side.
“Thought you’d be up and going already, kid. It’s high noon.”
Grumbling, I throw my JOY into the bed nook and key the door a quarter of the way open, sticking my head through the gap. “I didn’t get home till two.”
She chuckles and tries to pat my mussed-up hair. I dodge easily. “You think that’s an excuse? Those university mooks that you love to mock are training by five in the morning. And that’s after spending the whole night partying.”
Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.
“Good thing I don’t go to school, then.”
“Sheesh. Someone woke up on the rebellious side of her bed.”
Nudging the door open with her boot, Sarah ducks her head and strides right into my apartment, eyes wandering from the thrown-open closet to the half-dried clothes hanging from the couch, the one rumpled sheet on the bed, the takeout boxes lining the windowsill, stains and towels piled near the shower, makeup and pills around the sink, empty bottles and eyeliner on the table, a used-up hoodie for a doormat. I let her by without contest. She’s tall as a man and nearly as well built. I can’t even reach the top shelf of my own closet.
“God, I forgot how much of a slob you are,” she murmurs, blinking slower now that she’s started to adjust to the fake sunlight. Her ears prick up at the ambiance of birds and trees. “You’ve mastered the single girl apartment well.”
I grab the cleanest thing in the closet- a cutout bodysuit made from slick, acidproof black- and follow it up with baggy white combat pants cinched down by two crossed belts. Duraplast pads built into the knees. Magnetic plates strap my JOY to one hip and 6-Teba to the other. A one-shouldered poncho completes the look, draping like a cape down my left side to cover the gun. “Learned from the best,” I grumble.
“Kid, I own a firing range. And I didn’t sleep there last night.”
“Why didn’t you just message?”
“Because I came here to bribe you.” Sarah leans against the shuttered window and hooks a raised eyebrow in my direction. “Walk and talk. You, me, breakfast. I got a special place in mind.”
My stomach growls loudly in reply. She’s already crooking her fingers for me to follow. I key off the ambiance as I leave. The apartment sinks to its usual dim silence, neon stripes cutting the floor through shuttered blinds.