Endless adverts flash from the corners of my vision. Go on holiday to Dubai, or New Tokyo. Order this mealpack from your replicator tonight. Another Zeal advert flashes and I bring it forward. This one shows a man sleeping calmly, but over his head he’s screaming at his boss and walking out, slamming the door behind him. He wakes up, stretching, smiling at the camera. “I’ve let it all out,” he says, his voice tinny in my auditory implants. “I’m ready to face the day.” A blink and he’s in a suit. The same tagline twines above his head: Find your Zeal for life. What will you dream today? I send it away, a headache blooming in my temples.

My sister and I surprised people in San Francisco by taking to the implants with ease, considering we were about eleven years behind almost everyone else. The doctors and such never realized how many hours we had already spent learning to control our minds, so that implants were only a small side step.

I sigh and lie down in the grass. I try to pretend I’m sixteen again, in Mana’s Hearth, before we ever found that other tablet and learned that everything we thought we knew had been a lie. But it’s no use. That daydream won’t come. How can it? Tila isn’t by my side.

I open my eyes.

I’ve made up my mind, though it was never really in question. Officer Oloyu knew I’d say yes before he even asked me.

*   *   *

I’m to meet my new partner immediately. I don’t even go back to SFPD headquarters to give Oloyu my answer; I ping him through my implants.

I’m back on the MUNI. I swipe my VeriChip at the entrance, the fare deducting from my account, and take the elevator underground. I only wait a minute for the train heading toward downtown, and find a seat in the corner. The train pulls away. I cross my legs as the green glow from the underground algae plants passes by. Everyone looks sickly in this light, and my eyes dart to and fro. I keep rubbing my palms over my knees. Who am I meeting? What have I signed up for?