Amber's new face is a hit with the public. She almost gets more publicity for her first surgery than for taking over the zydrate support department of Geneco. Journalists fight for the opportunity to interview her, and dozens of magazines publish human interest articles about the former Carmela Largo's ascent into adulthood. In the loving eye of the public, she is the very face of Geneco's commitment to creating a more perfect world.
But behind locked doors and tinted windows, in shadowed alleys, in her own mind, Amber is beginning a sinister transformation. Because after a few weeks, she realizes that her nose isn't so perfect after all. Noses with a slight bulbous tip are much more attractive. She tells her father this, and because she doesn't ask for much, he lets her get it fixed.
Not long afterwards, she notices that her eyes look awful, and she would look much better with less droopy eyelids. Rotti agrees to that one too, but tells her to slow down. There is no such thing as perfection, he says.
But Amber knows that there is, and if she tries hard enough, she can become perfect.
She does an efficient job of managing her department. There isn't much that she has to do, directly. Occasionally an assistant approaches to ask her to make a decision about this or that. She still holds art shows. All of the proceeds go to charities, mostly Zydrate Support Groups, and everyone calls her a new age saint. Most of the actual art is done by other, under acclaimed artists, hired for large sums of under the table cash and sworn to silence. Amber doesn't have time to create art, anymore.
She tells Rotti that she needs to get her ears fixed. The stick out too far, and they're too big. Rotti shakes his head. "You don't need new ears, the ones you have are beautiful."
"No, they're not!" Amber says, and stomps like a child throwing a tantrum.
"I don't have time to listen to you whine, Amber. Please leave me to my work."
She pesters him for awhile longer, but when it becomes obvious that he won't cave into her demands, she leaves his office in a huff. She finds a gentern in the hallway and shoves her, even though Amber knows it isn't her fault.
"I need to get my ears fixed. See?" Amber says, tossing her hair over her shoulder to expose the offensive earlobes. "Can you fix this?"
The gentern shakes her head, no. "I'm only licensed to assist in surgery," she says.
"Fucking useless."
Somehow, she manages to locate Pavi. "Who does your surgeries? Who do you get to put your faces on?" Amber barks at him as soon as she walks into the room.
"Why do-a you wish to know?" he asks.
"Rotti won't let me get surgery to reshape my ears, even though they're hideous. I can't wear my hair up until I get them worked on... so I need some genterns or surGENs who'll do it."
"You must be-a very pissed, if you're not-a calling him 'daddy'," Pavi says. "I'll tell-a you what you should do. Find-a... this girl. She and some friends of-a hers will hook you up." He scribbles something in a book, rips the paper out, and hands it to her.
On the paper is the name Emma Jensen. Below it is a rather impressive sketch of a naked female form. It takes Amber a few seconds to realize that the figure is wearing a visor.
"Is this the gentern I'm supposed to find?" Amber asks, pointing to the drawing.
"No, that is a different gentern. The Pavi sketches them. It make-a them feel pretty," Pavi replies, flipping through the sketchbook for her to see.
"I didn't know that you draw."
"There is much-a you don't know about the Pavi," he says with a smile. Amber thanks him for the name, and excuses herself to get nature's handiwork repaired.
"This is as much as we can safely give you, Miss Sweet," the gentern tells her. She apologizes, but Amber knows that she doesn't mean it. She's holding back.
"But it still hurts!"
"A little pressure is normal," the gentern says, and Amber smacks her across the face.
"Don't you think I've had enough surgeries to know what it's supposed to feel like, you stupid shit?" Amber sits up in the chair where she would be getting her breasts enlarged, except the zydrate isn't working. Except the idiots who work for her aren't giving her enough. The slapped gentern is clutching her cheek and staring at Amber with enormous eyes, while another bandages up the scalpel wound on Amber's chest.
This is all a long, long time after Amber's stint as a painter. Ages have passed since she had her first nose surgery. In fact, she can't remember the last time she had an "authorized" surgery.
When the bandage is secure, Amber goes to find the Graverobber. She hasn't seen him in years, but she's willing to bet that he stills works the same alleyway next to the same old church. He's just that kind of guy.
As she leaves, she hears the genterns whispering behind her. Remember when she was younger? She used to be such a sweet girl, one of them says. I know! says the other. I wonder what happened to her? Amber wants to kill them both. She could hit them again, or have them fired, but the sad truth is that you can't abuse someone into liking you.
Later that day, Amber has her first hit of street grade Z. Unlike other drugs, street grade zydrate is actually more pure than the official stuff. When you get zydrate from Geneco, you're really getting a watered down version of the drug. It's been refined so many times that it's lost most of it's potency. The Graverobber tells her all this as he prepares the injection.
"But when you get Z from me," he says, tapping the vial with his finger before snapping it into the gun, "It's about as pure as it gets. Practically just a dead guy's brain, really."
Amber pulls up her skirt to give him access to the skin on her inner-thigh. "Oh, lovely."
The Graverobber laughs and squeezes the trigger. A jolt of liquid heat roils up Amber's spine, and she nearly collapses. She grabs the Graverobber's jacket for balance and wobbles against him. "Ah... that's the stuff. Here," she says, and shoves a stack of bills into his hand.
"Go buy yourself something pretty," she says, giggling.
"Why would I do that, when I have something pretty right here," he says, and runs his fingers through Amber's hair.
She frowns and pushes him away. "Don't be a goddamn creep. I'm gonna go get some big knockers now, but I'll see you again sometime."
"What if I like your knockers the way they are?
"You'll like them better when my surGENs are done with them," she says. "If you're a good boy while I'm gone, maybe I'll share."