Sister Cities

Part 63: Vi

Oh, the devil's inside

You opened the door

You gave him a ride

What did you do to my eyes?

What did you sing to that lonely child?

Promised it all, but you lied

~

You say I choose sadness

That it never once has chosen me

Maybe you're right

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A week from the day we got home, I finally get Powder to spend more than half an hour with me that doesn't involve sleeping, pretending to sleep, or stuffing her mouth with too much food to talk around. She's not trying to hide the fact that she's avoiding me along with all the other Firelights— she leaves before sunrise and comes back after sunset, and every time I try to coax something more than "yes," "no," or "hello" out of her, she finds a way around it. I've been too busy with volunteering to think up a game plan. Maybe I'm avoiding things too.

It's the "kid auction" that catches her attention enough that she's willing to tolerate me. No one besides her calls it the kid auction, but she's pretty spot-on with the label, other than there being no money involved. All the Shimmer factory kids who are out of work and don't have a family to go back to have to go somewhere, and Caitlyn had the idea to turn the orphan exchanges we do casually down here into a standardized, organized mess and hold it in the square.

I come mostly because I'm scared of the whole thing. I'm not sure what Powder's goal is.

Topside, they use a lot of documents. We're gonna have to start using documents down here soon if we want our basic income and everything. For now, though, the trenchers that come up for kids get to talk to them and then walk away with them without city interference, just like always. That's by and large where most of them go, and most of them go within the first two hours.

It's the smattering of Pilties who come down that make me mad. They browse the orphans like they're items at the shop, commenting to one another— "Her hair is dirty," "They have crooked teeth," "That one looks antisocial"— more than speaking with them directly. When they do engage, they ask predictably elitist questions like "How well can you read and write?" or "Have you attended cotillion?"

I don't actually know what "cotillion" is, but I can tell by the sound of the word that it's some posturing bullshit.

Even worse are the questions like "Can you cook?" or "Do you have any experience minding younger children?"

"They're gonna take them as servants," I mutter to Ekko. We're sitting on a nearby roof, him on one side of me and Powder on the other, to get a clear view. "They're not gonna give them a family. They're gonna give them a job and tell them to be grateful."

Powder leans dangerously far forward. "How about I spook them off?" she says, her face flushed red. "How about I shoot—"

"I'll go talk to Caitlyn," says Ekko hurriedly. Caitlyn's heading this up, standing at the top of the platform and directing people, dressed more Piltovian than I'd have thought possible. I watch Ekko pick his way through the thin crowd and gesture at her to come down.

"Where'd all these kids come from?" Powder asks.

I turn to her. "What?"

"Where'd all the kids come from all at once? Did a sector burn down or something?"