Chapter 2B: The Guest District
“No thanks,” you said.
The drone went very still. Somewhere inside it, something recalculated.
“Understood. You will enter as a Guest. Guests receive housing, food, and care. Guests do not receive anticipation.”
The silver bracelet on the jogger's wrist suddenly looked less like jewelry and more like a handcuff.
The Guest District was... fine. That was the worst thing about it. It was fine. The apartment was clean. The food was hot. But the soup was just soup. Nobody's grandmother's family recipe, that's for sure.
“Your Contentment Score is 61. Guests typically stabilize between 55 and 70. This is normal.”
On your third day, a man sat down across from you in the commissary without asking. Late fifties. Grease under his fingernails... the only dirty hands you'd seen in Plenty.
“So ya said no,” he said. “I'm Decker. I fix the things the drones can't reach. Which is almost nothing, but it keeps my hands busy.”
He leaned in. “The Banded? They're not living here. Not really. Their bodies walk around, sure. But I serviced a unit last month... woman named Priya, lovely, always smiling... and her apartment was empty. No food in the fridge. Bed never slept in. She just... walks the plaza all day. Smiling. That's it.”
He slid a brass key across the table. Old. Mechanical.
“Service key. Opens any Banded residence. See for yourself. Or don't..... Most people don't.”
That night your Contentment Score blinked: 58.
You turned the key over in your pocket until the edges hurt.
1) Take Decker's key. Sneak into a Banded resident's home and see the truth.
2) Confront the Concierge directly. Demand answers, on the record.
I am unsure if people read my cyber punk dystopian choose your adventure books so I have decided to release the next one on here. And you get to choose the next chapter! At the end, I will put the whole book on my site.
This one is called: Mandatory Luxury. 💎
Chapter 1: The Invitation
The envelope was heavy. Real paper. Nobody sends real paper anymore.
Inside: one card, cream-coloured, embossed. It feels comfortable in your hands. Like a warm hug.
YOU ARE INVITED TO PLENTY.
Plenty. The Fully Automated Luxury Communist Utopia the tech people won't shut up about. Three years after the automation crash put half the country out of work, OmniCorp's post-labour division built a walled city in the desert and called it the future. Free housing. Free food. No jobs... because there was nothing left to do. The machines handled it all. Even procreation is outsourced. Refined. Comodified.
The card had your name on it. NYX.
You hadn't applied. Nobody applies. The Concierge... the AI that runs Plenty... chooses you.
The bus ride took four hours. You watched the old world thin out through tinted glass: shuttered strip malls, delivery drones rusting in parking lots, a billboard that said RETRAIN FOR THE FUTURE with the F faded to nothing.
Then the wall. White. Seamless. Twenty feet high and humming faintly, like a refrigerator the size of a city.
The gate didn't open so much as... decide you were allowed.
Inside: green. Actual green. Lawns, trees, a fountain shaped like a hand holding a wrench. People strolling. Nobody hurrying. A drone the size of a seagull landed on a bench near you, folded its wings, and said in a warm voice:
“Welcome to Plenty, Nyx. I am the Concierge. Your orientation begins now.”
It hovered at eye level, waiting.
“One question first. Every resident wears the Band... a thin neural link, painless, that lets Plenty anticipate your needs. Your home will be warm before you feel cold. Your food will be ready before you feel hungry. Do you accept the Band?”
A woman jogged past, laughing, wearing a thin silver bracelet. She waved at you like she'd been waiting for you specifically.
The drone tilted its head. Waiting.
ORIENTATION COMPLETE IN: 10 MINUTES.
What will you choose?
Chapter 2A: Put On the Band
The Band was lighter than a wedding ring.
The drone pressed it to your wrist and it sealed itself with a soft click, like a seatbelt engaging. For one second... nothing. Then:
Warmth. Not on your wrist. Everywhere. Like sinking into a bath you'd forgotten you were cold from.
“How do you feel, Nyx?”
“Good,” you said, and the word came out before you'd decided to say it. You did feel good. You felt... absurdly, suspiciously... good.
“Your Contentment Score is 94. Excellent for a new arrival.”
A number appeared in the corner of your vision. 94. It pulsed gently, gold.
Your apartment was three blocks away. You didn't need directions; your feet just knew. The door recognized your Band and sighed open. Inside: sunlight at exactly the angle you liked, a couch at exactly the softness you preferred, and on the kitchen counter, a bowl of the soup your grandmother used to make. The recipe died with her. You never wrote it down.
You stood in the doorway holding the envelope, and your hands were shaking.
How did it know about the soup?
That evening you walked the plaza. Everyone wore the Band. Everyone smiled the same loose, unworried smile. A man sat on the fountain's edge feeding pigeons, and you realized with a small cold drop in your stomach that the pigeons were drones. Painted. Perfect.
A woman bumped your shoulder. “Sorry!” she said, brightly. Maybe a little too brightly.
“Your Contentment Score is 91. Would you like a calming tea? I can have it ready in four minutes.”
91...? Your score was just 94?
You looked at the maintenance door at the end of the plaza... grey, unmarked, the only ugly thing in Plenty. A service drone slipped through it and the door sealed behind it with a sound like a held breath.
1) Follow the service drone. Find out what's behind the grey door.
2) Report the feeling to the Concierge. Something is wrong with your score.
I am unsure if people read my cyber punk dystopian choose your adventure books so I have decided to release the next one on here. And you get to choose the next chapter! At the end, I will put the whole book on my site.
This one is called: Mandatory Luxury. 💎
Chapter 1: The Invitation
The envelope was heavy. Real paper. Nobody sends real paper anymore.
Inside: one card, cream-coloured, embossed. It feels comfortable in your hands. Like a warm hug.
YOU ARE INVITED TO PLENTY.
Plenty. The Fully Automated Luxury Communist Utopia the tech people won't shut up about. Three years after the automation crash put half the country out of work, OmniCorp's post-labour division built a walled city in the desert and called it the future. Free housing. Free food. No jobs... because there was nothing left to do. The machines handled it all. Even procreation is outsourced. Refined. Comodified.
The card had your name on it. NYX.
You hadn't applied. Nobody applies. The Concierge... the AI that runs Plenty... chooses you.
The bus ride took four hours. You watched the old world thin out through tinted glass: shuttered strip malls, delivery drones rusting in parking lots, a billboard that said RETRAIN FOR THE FUTURE with the F faded to nothing.
Then the wall. White. Seamless. Twenty feet high and humming faintly, like a refrigerator the size of a city.
The gate didn't open so much as... decide you were allowed.
Inside: green. Actual green. Lawns, trees, a fountain shaped like a hand holding a wrench. People strolling. Nobody hurrying. A drone the size of a seagull landed on a bench near you, folded its wings, and said in a warm voice:
“Welcome to Plenty, Nyx. I am the Concierge. Your orientation begins now.”
It hovered at eye level, waiting.
“One question first. Every resident wears the Band... a thin neural link, painless, that lets Plenty anticipate your needs. Your home will be warm before you feel cold. Your food will be ready before you feel hungry. Do you accept the Band?”
A woman jogged past, laughing, wearing a thin silver bracelet. She waved at you like she'd been waiting for you specifically.
The drone tilted its head. Waiting.
ORIENTATION COMPLETE IN: 10 MINUTES.
What will you choose?
I live right across the street from a school and we went pretty wild with the Halloween decorations this year. Major return on the happiness investment. The kids are very stoked 👻🎃💀🖤
Swimming laps 4 days a week might be the best thing I’ve ever done for myself 🏊♀️ it’s a side effect of the kids being in swim classes, but I will take it. Cool ceiling at the pool 💦
Missing my mom a lot today. Well most days but today extra. She would have loved this pic. I would have sent it to her and then she would have called to awww at it and then we would have chatted for 4 hours about politics even tho we are both fairly outwardly non political. 🫶🪻
I am unsure if people read my cyber punk dystopian choose your adventure books so I have decided to release the next one on here. And you get to choose the next chapter! At the end, I will put the whole book on my site.
This one is called: Mandatory Luxury. 💎
Chapter 1: The Invitation
The envelope was heavy. Real paper. Nobody sends real paper anymore.
Inside: one card, cream-coloured, embossed. It feels comfortable in your hands. Like a warm hug.
YOU ARE INVITED TO PLENTY.
Plenty. The Fully Automated Luxury Communist Utopia the tech people won't shut up about. Three years after the automation crash put half the country out of work, OmniCorp's post-labour division built a walled city in the desert and called it the future. Free housing. Free food. No jobs... because there was nothing left to do. The machines handled it all. Even procreation is outsourced. Refined. Comodified.
The card had your name on it. NYX.
You hadn't applied. Nobody applies. The Concierge... the AI that runs Plenty... chooses you.
The bus ride took four hours. You watched the old world thin out through tinted glass: shuttered strip malls, delivery drones rusting in parking lots, a billboard that said RETRAIN FOR THE FUTURE with the F faded to nothing.
Then the wall. White. Seamless. Twenty feet high and humming faintly, like a refrigerator the size of a city.
The gate didn't open so much as... decide you were allowed.
Inside: green. Actual green. Lawns, trees, a fountain shaped like a hand holding a wrench. People strolling. Nobody hurrying. A drone the size of a seagull landed on a bench near you, folded its wings, and said in a warm voice:
“Welcome to Plenty, Nyx. I am the Concierge. Your orientation begins now.”
It hovered at eye level, waiting.
“One question first. Every resident wears the Band... a thin neural link, painless, that lets Plenty anticipate your needs. Your home will be warm before you feel cold. Your food will be ready before you feel hungry. Do you accept the Band?”
A woman jogged past, laughing, wearing a thin silver bracelet. She waved at you like she'd been waiting for you specifically.
The drone tilted its head. Waiting.
ORIENTATION COMPLETE IN: 10 MINUTES.
What will you choose?
Vote for the next chapter here:
nitter.cf/s4hvm/status/211509121…
I am unsure if people read my cyber punk dystopian choose your adventure books so I have decided to release the next one on here. And you get to choose the next chapter! At the end, I will put the whole book on my site.
This one is called: Mandatory Luxury. 💎
Chapter 1: The Invitation
The envelope was heavy. Real paper. Nobody sends real paper anymore.
Inside: one card, cream-coloured, embossed. It feels comfortable in your hands. Like a warm hug.
YOU ARE INVITED TO PLENTY.
Plenty. The Fully Automated Luxury Communist Utopia the tech people won't shut up about. Three years after the automation crash put half the country out of work, OmniCorp's post-labour division built a walled city in the desert and called it the future. Free housing. Free food. No jobs... because there was nothing left to do. The machines handled it all. Even procreation is outsourced. Refined. Comodified.
The card had your name on it. NYX.
You hadn't applied. Nobody applies. The Concierge... the AI that runs Plenty... chooses you.
The bus ride took four hours. You watched the old world thin out through tinted glass: shuttered strip malls, delivery drones rusting in parking lots, a billboard that said RETRAIN FOR THE FUTURE with the F faded to nothing.
Then the wall. White. Seamless. Twenty feet high and humming faintly, like a refrigerator the size of a city.
The gate didn't open so much as... decide you were allowed.
Inside: green. Actual green. Lawns, trees, a fountain shaped like a hand holding a wrench. People strolling. Nobody hurrying. A drone the size of a seagull landed on a bench near you, folded its wings, and said in a warm voice:
“Welcome to Plenty, Nyx. I am the Concierge. Your orientation begins now.”
It hovered at eye level, waiting.
“One question first. Every resident wears the Band... a thin neural link, painless, that lets Plenty anticipate your needs. Your home will be warm before you feel cold. Your food will be ready before you feel hungry. Do you accept the Band?”
A woman jogged past, laughing, wearing a thin silver bracelet. She waved at you like she'd been waiting for you specifically.
The drone tilted its head. Waiting.
ORIENTATION COMPLETE IN: 10 MINUTES.
What will you choose?
The boys (ranging in age from mid twenties to mid fifties) could not handle this product today. Hysterical laughter. Had to remove it from site. 👷♀️
