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An Interlude
Honk stepped out of her favorite bar. The cool wet air fluttered through her jacket and tossed her ponytail around. Neon glow from the signs above her head glittered on the puddles around her boots. Air cars whooshed by above and below the catwalks in the upper side of town.
She pulled a cigarette from her pocket and lit it as she merged in with the handful of people and androids passing by. After a few minutes' walk she turned off to a set of iron stairs landing on yet another catwalk.
The path was covered in graffiti and ran directly under a massive illuminated signboard. The name of some unfamiliar conglomerate flashed on the screen briefly before being replaced by scenes of massive crowds of people cheering for some tiny, colorful, robotic idol.
The screen reflected off the obsidian surface of a titanic monolith a few blocks away. Unilluminated, it blended into the nightscape, reflecting it's surroundings like some sort of shimmering camouflage. Honk didn't know what it was but it always unsettled her. It seemed like no one ever went in or out and no one she'd ever talked to had any idea what it was for. Just that it was called "the Spire".
Music trickled in from another bar a few stories down. Honk finished her cigarette and flicked it off the edge of the catwalk before reaching for another. She hardly thought about the labyrinthine path back to her apartment as the carton in her pocket steadily emptied itself.
She crushed the last butt under her heel as she unlocked her apartment, somewhere tucked away from the noise of the upper side. The flickering glow of her computers' screens dimly lit the livingroom. The place always smelled like chinese food and pizza, even if it was clean by most standards.
Honk ditched her jacket and sat on the couch. A holographic keyboard materialized before her, and she set to work after being out of "the office" for so long. There was much to do.
