The top of Pillar 0x8A is covered, almost edge to edge, with a shining city, broadly beloved by its inhabitants and by those lucky visitors that arrive daily by airplane or long-distance cable.

In that city, there are many apartment towers, gleaming glass and steel and bright greenery spilling from vertical gardens or flourishing on rooftops, soaring up towards the heavens like their foundation rendered in miniature. 

In one of those apartment towers, there is a clean and well-appointed apartment with very good soundproofing — not at the top, but certainly not at the bottom either. It has a beautiful view of the southwest quarter, and automatic sunshading, and fantastic internet.

In the bedroom of that apartment, there is a young and brilliant systems administrator, who is technically on her day off.