[b]7:32 am - District 16, Rent-a-Room
[/b]

Petra was risen from her slumber by a siren.

It was just another day. She opened her eyes to the cracked ceiling of her decrepit apartment, shrugging her sour sheets onto the dusty floor. Groggily, she sat up on the creaky boxpring, mentally reminding herself to do laundry before she began to smell like a demon's armpit.

The young woman swung her feet over the side of the bed, and began her morning ritual. After a cold shower in a mildewed bathroom and a quick meal of nutritional cardboard, she pulled on a pair of mismatched socks and was out the door.

As she ambled down the street, she wondered where the tide would take her today. One of the benefits of living in poverty was the amount of money it saved. Work was not a necessity, leaving almost too much time to engage in her passions.

An old man sat on the side of the street, rattling a can with annoying enthusiasm. Petra shoved a crumpled hundred in his container, putting an immediate end to his one man orchestra. He stared at the bill in disbelief. She didn't care. He was probably going to spend it on drugs, or alcohol, or prostitutes...

[i]But it made him happy. For that short moment, it made him happy.[/i]

Turning the corner, she slipped discretely into a grimy bar. Inside, acrid smoke permeated the air, and the occasional shouts of hustlers in the back pierced the otherwise stoic silence. She sat at the bar, placing a metallic card on the table.

"Who'll it be today? We've got our fair share of early knockouts." the bartender asked, rubbing a spotted cloth n the inside of a cracked glass. Petra pointed at a slouched lump a few seats down, passed out drunk on the wooden counter. The bartender nodded.

"Aye, that's Felix. He comes in here every day, but I've never seen him so wasted, or this early. He says his wife left him."

Petra stared at the unconcious man dispassionately.

"Will it be the whole tab, as usual?" Petra nodded.

As the bartender hurried away to swipe her card, she walked over to the drunk, and shook him gently. He mumbled incoherently. She shook him harder.

"Wassit?" Felix raised his head, bloodshot eyes searching for the disturbance.

"I'm taking you home." Petra's voice was hollow, robotic. The bartender returned with her card, pressing it into the woman's open palm.

"Yer in good hands now, Felix. Whatever this woman says to you people, I never see your faces in this sorry shithole again. She's an angel, that one. 'll get your life straightened up fast. Hell, I'd be afraid she's driving me out of business if she didn't pay you fools' dues." The bartender gave a hearty laugh as Petra guided the confused Felix out the door.

They walked in silence, drunk and helper, down the busy streets and unswept alleys. With no help from his alcohol addled brain, Felix eventually found his apartment. His shaking hands, steadied by Petra's own, shoved the key into the lock, and he stumbled into the dark room. The woman followed after.