The crowd roared and cheered when we emerged. Taarel responded with a brief smile and nod in the general direction of the masses, but then kept us moving the short distance to the platform and through the door to the private section. She kept her attention on the Kalrani, making sure they weren’t too overwhelmed and didn’t lag, while Orla and Sefen bracketed me. It seemed a much longer walk than it had on the way in.
Everyone except Orla and Sefen was exhausted. I managed not to fall asleep on the train back, but as soon as I reached my hotel room I dropped and slept for four hours – as I expect all the Ena manipulation talents did, except Taarel, who paid the price of being captain and had to talk to people first. Fortunately, it’s not just us along: with a half-dozen KOTIS support staff we’ve plenty of people to keep things running through the frequent napping. There’s an evening meal scheduled half an hour from now, and then medical exams, bleh.
I was vaguely hoping that maybe I could go shopping while we were here – buying things over the interface just doesn’t compare – but I don’t see how it’ll be possible.
Thursday, April 24
Zzz
Today was a repeat of yesterday, except that the crowds were expecting us back. We went several hours earlier in an attempt to avoid the worst and tomorrow we’re going during a later shift to give the Ena manipulation talents more rest. They’re even considering skipping a day if necessary. I do wonder why they didn’t try and disguise everyone, rather than cause such a circus, but I guess the interface makes that kind of difficult, and certainly the location of the gate and the fact that Tare doesn’t have a night when most everyone goes home means that not wearing our uniforms wouldn’t have hidden very much at all after the first day.
I spent a large part of today feeling very self-conscious. Yesterday gave a huge number of people a chance to look at the stray who unlocked Muina. And air their opinions about her. They couldn’t get too close, and don’t seem to have spotted that my eyes are different colours, but there was a lot of talk about me being so suyul, and it was amazing how uncomfortable that made me.
A suyul is a droopy, pale pink flower, and by calling me that they were saying I acted shy. Just as on Earth there’s a stereotype of people who are red-headed being temperamental, on Tare people who are white-skinned are stereotyped as shy and bashful and a bit wimpy. It didn’t help that after the first appalled glance yesterday I kept my eyes down and blushed madly. It was just too many people, too loud, and too overwhelming.
I couldn’t make myself not read all these comments about me. And it left me weirdly conscious not of how I looked, but of how everyone else does. Practically everyone I know here looks Asian. Of the people I’m close to, only Lohn and Zan look primarily Caucasian, with maybe a hint of mix around their eyes. It wasn’t something I’d given more than an occasional thought to until all these comments about my skin colour.
I’ve spent way too much of today trying to work out if I’m racist, or just annoyed because I am a bit shy and not good at fighting.
Friday, April 25
Something to Say
At the end of today’s shift I walked into my hotel room wanting only a shower and then to curl up for a thousand hours, and there was a man waiting for me.
That startled the hell out of me, more because I was tired and wasn’t expecting it than anything he did, which was smile and start talking. I froze for a moment, then stepped backward out of my room, for once remembering to set off my alert. Only after I did that did his words filter through to me: he was introducing himself and saying he wanted to interview me, to give me an opportunity to speak outside the control of KOTIS. And seconds later Sefen and Taarel were there, suit weapons out and looking extremely dangerous. Orla arrived a few moments after that, then one of our greensuit escort, and then a half dozen more people: a hotel security woman and more of our escort and most of the Kalrani.
I ended up feeling sorry for the reporter guy. The Setari didn’t attack him, being more intent on making sure they were between me and him. Combat Sight obviously didn’t classify him as a threat. He put his hands out palm up to show he wasn’t planning anything, but the greensuit wrestled him to the ground anyway, and put a knee in his back. Then hotel security and one of the pinksuits helpfully piled into the room and I think he was stood on a bit.
Taarel began to usher me away, but I said: "Wait," to her and stood my ground until there was a lull in the noise, then said: "Am not under duress. But thanks for the offer." I’m not entirely sure he heard me.
Taarel gathered all of the Kalrani up as she went, some of them looking painfully tired, and stowed us in a big lounge. She disappeared for a few minutes, leaving Sefen and Orla still alertly on guard in case any more attack reporters showed up, then came back and said we were going to be moved to another floor. She gave the Kalrani a thorough survey – they were being all wide-eyed and battle-ready, which was more than disconcerting from the younger ones – then corralled me off to a couch to one side and asked me if he’d touched me, if I was hurt. Since we’d gone off-mission I didn’t have a log Taarel could access with her security level.
"He just want to talk, I think," I said, helpfully sending her the segment of my non-mission log which showed me walking in and back out of my room. "Sorry about alert. I was surprised and didn’t realise he was just reporter."
"The alert was exactly the right reaction," Taarel said, eyes abstract as she reviewed my log. "Reporter or not: to get into your room he has to have by-passed security in ways that are by no definition legal."
"Moving so that rooms can be scanned?"
"And also because our location isn’t supposed to be known. They will make it appear that we have relocated to another building entirely, but it will only be to a different floor."
The adrenaline surge wore off very rapidly, and I fell asleep on the couch, waking up hours later in a different room. I don’t like being shifted about while I’m asleep. Or people touching my bag. I don’t know if the reporter pawed through my stuff, but nothing was missing, and my diary and phone seemed fine. I presume it had all been scanned as well. Fortunately there were no delays or extra security before eating, because I was absolutely starving. And the day’s drama even prompted a couple of the Kalrani to talk to me, started off by one of the oldest two, a girl my age named Pen Alaz, asking: "Why did you thank him?"
Alaz isn’t exactly friendly and cheery, but she doesn’t give off a malicious vibe either. She’s a bit like Jenny from my maths class – super-smart, but not quite socialised, with a tendency to ask abrupt questions without any thought to whether they’re rude or not, but just because it’s occurred to her to want to know.
I swallowed my mouthful (really weird brown sticky bread that tasted like congealed vegemite). "Because he was offering to help me if I needed it. Mostly wanted good story, I expect, but I appreciated the gesture."