“Cause any more kak like that, girl, an I’ll crisp you too.” The bartender said
as she sat down on the bar stool next to me.
“Oh please. Like how many dial-ins you got left for the night?” Kendra
snapped, but girl was looking almost as strung out as Ten was now.
“Yeah, well don’t make me waste ‘em all on you.”
“Just get me a Sprite, okay?”
Behind her, Jazz and Rob were holdin’ Tendeka up. He made as if to move
for the bar, but Jazz pulled him back, wouldn’t let him. Not least cos of the
look the bartender shot them. Boy was too fried to stir anyway, but said, loud
enough for all to hear, “Sell out.”
“Get the fuck out, kid.” Dismissive the bartender was. Knew there was no
fight left.
“Fucking corporate whore!”
“C’mon, Ten. Let’s go.” Jazz was escortin’ him out.
Kendra ignored him. Girl had her Sprite now and downed it in one. Asked
for another.
Already you could see it kickin in.
“Can I see?” I asked, mock sly-shy.
Kendra shot me a look which I couldn’t figure and then finally slid up her
sleeve reluctant like, revealing the glow tattooed on her wrist.
The bartender clicked his tongue as he set down the drink. “Sponsor baby,
huh?”
Sprite logo was emblazoned there, not on her skin, but under it, shining
through, with the slogan, “just be it”.
No rinkadink light show was this. Nanotech she’d signed up for changed the
bio-structure of her cells, made ‘em phosphorescent in all the right places.
Nothing you couldn’t get done at the local light-tat salon, but corporate
sponsorship came with all the extras. Even on lethe, I wasn’t ‘blivious to the
ad campaigns on the underway. But Kendra was the first I knew to get
Branded like.