My favourite picture was one where I had one brow pulled a bit down and the corner of my mouth screwed up and an air of absolute incredulity – the kind of expression I’m sure I was wearing when Maze told me to put on a dress to meet the Nuran. I couldn’t resist one link titled Interplanetary Love!, and opened it to find a Kolaren trashy infozine with a picture of me smiling up at Arad Nalaz of Kolar’s Squad One, who was looking down at me in a kindly sort of way. That had been just after I’d been grilled by all those Kolaren archaeologists.
"I hope Nalaz doesn’t have a really jealous girlfriend," I said, speaking for the first time since Zee and I had ventured into the wilds of interface fervour. "I’ll have to remember not to smile in public at anything male in future. And, wow, there’s a lot of pictures of me. These were all taken in my last couple of days at Arenrhon, too. Whoever took these could qualify as a full-blown stalker."
There was no fooling Zee, who rubbed the back of my neck gently. "That looks like your pretending not to be upset expression."
I shrugged, though my face went hot. "I’m not saying I like this, because I don’t. But it’s…kind of distant from me. And it’s just pictures and information that everyone on Muina already knew: that I react weirdly but not usefully to the ruins, and that I can use the platforms to get myself in bad situations, was injured and taken back to Tare. A thousand people already knew that. The only real difference with that number changing to a billion is that I can read about their opinion of what I look like. Though – did you see all that stuff about how KOTIS was being too careless with me and that an oversight committee needs to be established to ensure I’m properly handled? What chance is there that actually happen?"
"Hard to say. There’s an oversight committee for the Setari and that’s been beneficial for us over the years. Do you feel KOTIS has been too careless with you?"
I had to think it over. After all, I’ve been hospitalised a half-dozen times since I was rescued.
"It’s like when I first arrived on Muina, and was trying to find something to eat. I looked for fruit that I could see animals were willing to eat, then did taste test, and ate more if it didn’t kill me. One of things I ate made me so sick. Was that too careless? I saw a bird eating some, and it looked and tasted, well, as non-poisonous as anything can look. I look like ordinary stray, so KOTIS treat me like one. Then find out have enhancing talent, so KOTIS test what enhancing talent does. Couldn’t know in advance that three Setari touching me at once give me heart attack. Obviously wouldn’t have arranged that test if had known, any more than I would eat fruit that make me vomit. Same with teleporting about on platforms. If platforms did that for anyone else, no way they would have had me stand on it. Is not to say that I don’t dislike some things. I drew my lab rat on clothes for a reason. Never consulted or told about almost anything, especially at start. Never agreed to follow anyone’s orders; just do so because seemed best option for me. Oversight committee…sounds like more people who get to read my file."
Zee stayed with me for my very low-impact training session with Mara, and then the whole squad came together for dinner. We ate something resembling doubled-over pizza in Maze’s quarters, the first time I’d been in there. I thought initially that he had no decoration in his public space at all, but every so often a bird flies across the room or patters around the floor, and treats the walls like they’re curtains it can hide behind. And there was a picture spot, which flicked through images of a whole bunch of people who looked like Maze, reminding me that the Setari all have families outside KOTIS. A few excess objects, a nice bowl on the table, an odd-looking wire statue. If there was anything which had belonged to his wife, I couldn’t tell.
None of First Squad seems to think all the revelation of the day will have any major consequences. I made sure to not act upset, and I didn’t really need to act. It does seem very distant and not part of my life and at least most of it is positive. The spin KOTIS put out about Earth being Muina’s sister planet seems to have held. But the pictures were another reminder that even ignoring second level monitoring, I don’t have any real privacy and I’m coming under more and more scrutiny. Everything I do, everything I say and see and hear, is recorded. Even this diary, well-protected by its barrier of foreign words, will stop being any kind of secret if the Tarens learn English from me (or other people from Earth).
I did figure out a solution to my worries about the record made of files I access. I just watch my conversation with my family over and over again. Not only does it make me feel better to see Mum, but anyone compiling statistics on my access patterns will be sure to put it down to watches encounter with family not gazes mournfully at Kaoren Ruuel. I always make sure to stop as soon as I move away from my family, then start again from the first time I see them.
This makes me sound really lame. But it does help to be able to look at him, and I would find it pretty unbearable to have my pathetic, one-sided crush exposed for everyone in KOTIS to laugh about, let alone risking it becoming public gossip. I don’t care at all if gossips make up patently false stories about me and every second Kolaren I talk to, but Ruuel matters.
It seems like forever since I had one of the really good dreams about him, but every damn day I wake up knowing he’s not there.
Thursday, May 22
Eleventh Squad
Eleventh Squad today: a team I’d only seen the once at the big parade where they demonstrated me to all the Setari. Didn’t go too badly. Their captain is a girl called Seq Endaran, who contacted me before the testing session and introduced herself before walking down to the test room with me to meet her squad members: Couran – Path Sight, Gate Sight; Genera – Ena manipulation; Wen, Seeth, Dava – combat. They’re a big-hitting squad, lots of big elemental talents. I started out giving Endaran points for good manners and feeling very positive, and she didn’t do anything to change my mind, but she also seemed kind of pleased with herself. I don’t know, maybe it’s just that so many of the big hitting squads love being able to hit even harder. The only person in the squad who really stood out for me was Wen, who just was very calm and cheerful, watching the testing session like it was a good special effects movie.
I’ve tested with so many squads now the faces are beginning to blur together.
Enhancing elemental talents takes a lot more out of me than Speed and Sights. I don’t even seem to get tired after a session which doesn’t involve elementals, but bring on a big-hitting squad and it’s a guaranteed afternoon nap.
Incredible storm outside. Black as pitch, lots of lightning, horizontal rain trying to pound the world to dust. I’m amazed the Tarens survived their early years here.
Friday, May 23
A little light gossip
Tomorrow’s the next episode of The Hidden War (the week here is six days). Mori asked me if I’d like to join them in watching it, but I said I’d pass. Not that I’m not going to watch it, but I plan to keep my breakdowns to myself from now on. We chatted about the big media storm, and how strange it was for some of the squads to have their images out there properly and how some of the drawings that people had made (Tare isn’t above fan art of every variety) had once bothered Mori a great deal, but she’d grown to care about it a lot less.