Rogue Stars

by C Gockel et al.

  I felt like screaming I need him now but I kept my calm. This reply was better than nothing.

  “You can all go and have a break. There’s food in the living room.”

  While the staff filed out silently, I dropped on the bench. Thayu sat next to me, silent, while I stared at the projection without seeing it.

  “The Delegate is not having a meal?” Eirani stood in the door, carrying a tray with two mugs.

  “Not now, Eirani.”

  “It is time for the midday meal. The Delegate is thin as a reed eel. Not healthy.” She came in, and set the tray down on the first available flat space, which happened to be the edge of the control panel.

  At this, Thayu shot up, “Hey, be careful with the equipment!” She snatched up the tray.

  The two women glared at each other.

  I leaned back.

  Oh. Please. Just. Stop. It.

  A bitter scent wafted through the air.

  My mouth watered. “Is that . . .”

  “Manazhu, yes. The staff went shopping.” Eirani was still glaring at Thayu.

  “Thank you, Eirani. Much appreciated.”

  “Hmph. The staff will have to show the Delegate to appreciate proper food.” Meaning local food no doubt.

  “I would appreciate that, too, Eirani.”

  I took one of the mugs from the tray, and drank, gratefully. The manazhu was a bit weak, but otherwise rich and bitter. It calmed my stomach. “Thank you, Eirani.”

  “There is a midday meal set on the dining table. The Delegate should have a break.”

  She bowed and walked out.

  “She is right, you know,” Thayu said in a low voice.

  “I need to wait for a response from my president.”

  “Can I sit here while you eat?”

  “You don’t . . .” And then realised that if she didn’t know what it was about, that was my fault. No, she might not know Isla, but translators did a fairly decent job. I sighed. “I’m sorry.” I had to put the cup down, my hands were that sore.

  I must have winced because next thing, she picked up my cup and held it to my lips, and I could do nothing but drink like a small child.

  She was staring at my face.

  I asked, “What?”

  “I heard people say that you grew hair on your face. I’ve never seen it.” She touched my cheek, gingerly, where the hair was already too long; I could feel it catch and rasp under her nails, and I wondered when the hell my shaver was going to turn up.

  When she was so close, she looked like Inaru and Nicha all in one. The soft skin under her ear, silvered by the light from the projection, was very sensitive. Nuzzle that area softly and, if she favoured you, a Coldi woman’s eyes became bright, the cheeks, palms and soft skin at the wrists flushed red with desire. Words were too banal to describe what followed, memories of the first time I had witnessed that ultimate intimacy too precious. I had been fifteen, and I could still smell the scent of gym equipment of the sport hall at Taurus Grammar, the feel of the exercise mat under my sweaty hands. She was a year older than me, the smart, witty, politically savvy daughter of some manager high up in the Hedron Mines. She knew about things; I had been a virgin.

  I turned my head away; the memories, and the smell of Thayu’s Coldi skin, were too much.

  She put the cup down. I reached over and pulled my reader to me, shuffling away from her ever so slightly. “I need to sort out my speech.”

  I didn’t know what I was saying, save that I wanted to clear out the confusion.

  “Delegate Ayanu upset you, didn’t she?” She was damn perceptive to boot.

  I averted my eyes. “The situation is serious.”

  “She tends to bluff. I guess you know that.”

  I shrugged. All Coldi bluffed like hell; peacock hair, peacock nature, the conservatives at Nations of Earth would say, but between the Asto ambassador’s rude invasion of my apartment, and the threat posed by Nicha’s father, I had little doubt that the menace was real, no matter how much bluff was involved.

  I had brought up the text of my speech.

  Nice words about being allowed to speak in the assembly.

  Light-hearted paragraphs of the history of Coldi involvement on Earth.

  What a load of rubbish.

  Everything needed to be re-written, and I was running out of time and out of answers.

  I worked hard late into the night explaining the urgency of the situation to Danziger, who still hadn’t gotten back to me. I also sent my agreed column to World Newspoint. While I waited for replies, which didn’t come, I trawled through Amarru’s list of refugee names and after an hour or so, found an entry: Azisha Omi, male, aged four. No other relatives. Oh damn.

  When I finally went to bed, I couldn’t sleep. I still had no answers. It was hot, and when I opened the window to let in some air, Evi and Telaris barged in, guns drawn. I cursed at the harsh light they shone in my face, and sent them back into the hall.

  I don’t need coddling, mashara. The danger is on Earth, not here.

  I slept briefly, but my sleep was disturbed by dreams in which Danziger held Inaru hostage in a ring of fire, and where I burned my left hand trying to rescue her. I woke up, that same left hand throbbing with pain. Yellow ooze had seeped from the bandage into the sheets.

  As I sat up, too quickly, my mouth filled with saliva.

  I staggered out of bed, tripped over the fucking flattened-possum rug, stumbled through the connecting door to the bathroom and made the washbasin just in time. Watery puke went everywhere, two, three times, while I stood hunched over gasping in that can’t breathe, can’t stop puking kind of panic.

  Damn.

  I straightened; I stared at my own mirror image, sweaty, red-faced, unshaven and dressed only in my boxer shorts. There were dribbles of vomit on my chest. I hadn’t eaten much yesterday. I’d forgotten to use the infusor last night; I hadn’t needed it.

  Damn, I had no time for this.

  I cleaned up as best as I could, went back to the bedroom, threw on a shirt, never mind the shaving, and went into the communication room.

  Thayu sat at the bench, staring at a projection.

  A street in a city. People in uniform talked to a group of others, several of whom seemed agitated by the way they waved their hands, angry even. A row of buildings rose in the background. Pink stone, white sky. Asto, her home world.

  A Coldi voice blared in the room, “. . . the groups that demand an answer to these allegations. The Atmospheric Institute has assured the Conclave that nothing unusual has happened. They have equally assured the people on the news channels that rain does occur and has been recorded previously.”

  The projection now showed a different street between blocky buildings. In the sky, dark clouds built. Wind whipped sand around corners. Fat drops of water fell on hot pavement. First one, then another. Then it started pouring.

  People ran out of houses, drenched in seconds. Children played barefoot in the rivers of mud.

  Thayu whispered, “Rain.”

  “I’m sure it rains sometimes.”

  Her black eyes fixed mine. “It doesn’t rain in Beratha. In all my life, I’ve never seen it rain in Beratha.”

  Increased rainfall. Elsi Schumacher. Sirkonen’s datastick. I felt for my pocket with the back of my hand, but of course I wasn’t wearing a jacket at all, and I had been wearing the clothes Eirani had given me. I had taken off my jacket the day before yesterday. In the bathroom. And Eirani had walked out with it.

  I ran to the bedroom, but couldn’t see the jacket anywhere. I couldn’t remember having seen it yesterday either. What was wrong with me? I should never have been so careless. Shit, shit, shit.

  I ran downstairs. Eirani had gone out for groceries, or so said the young man in the kitchen. He couldn’t look for my jacket in the laundry, since it went out each morning.

  I groaned, hoping the jacket hadn’t gone, too. I told him I wanted the jacket, and the contents of the pockets, back immediately.r />
  He would ask about it immediately. Oh, and did the Delegate want manazhu?

  I said yes, since it seemed the only thing I could keep down. I slouched back, where Thayu stood at the top of the stairs, tension on her face. “An important matter?”

  I glanced at the ceiling, wishing to hell I knew who listened to us. “Could be.”

  Sirkonen had given it to me as something I might find useful, in a meeting in which nothing else of importance was said.

  Thayu called me. She stood in the door to the communication room, light from the hall silhouetting her athletic build.

  I jolted out of my state of dozing behind the inactive controls. “What is the matter?”

  “You have an appointment with the uniform fitter.”

  For crying out loud. War was about to explode and she worried about a uniform?

  “We must also visit the Trader Ledger today to set up your account.”

  That was true; I had to check if any kind of payment had come in, in case someone sent me a bill for the apartment and staff. And appearance was going to be important at zhamata.

  I pushed myself off the seat and almost fell with sudden dizziness. “Let me make myself presentable.”

  I stumbled to my room. My clothing had arrived there yesterday, and Eirani had put my clothes on the shelves in the walk-in alcove that functioned as a wardrobe. I went in there, found a clean shirt and the infusor band. Got the box of capsules. My hand hovered over the little vials. The top compartment were the ones to increase my body temperature. I was meant to keep taking them for a few more days until my adaptation balanced and my body could deal with the heat without medication. The bottom compartment contained the capsules that lowered my body temperature, and I was meant to have finished them in Rotterdam. As it was, there were two left, and I clicked both of them into the infusor. Maybe they’d kill my raging fever. Damn, damn it.

  Also, no one seemed to have turned up my electric shaver, so I took the razor into the bathroom and applied Eirani’s stinging soap to my face.

  I felt a bit better when I re-joined Thayu, but still shivery and altogether not clear of mind.

  “You’re not looking healthy,” she said.

  “Just tired.” I rubbed my stinging cheeks, which felt like glowing beacons. I’d have to ask Eirani what had happened to my shaver.

  “It’s not good to be working all the time.” Thayu’s face showed concern. “You must go out.”

  Out. Enjoyable strolls in the tropical air.

  “How can I? I’ve heard almost nothing from Nations of Earth. Nothing from the president or Nicha.”

  “Nicha will be fine.” She slid the front door open, letting in a cool breeze and the scent of humidity from the waterfall.

  I stopped and stared at her, more irritated perhaps than I should have been. “How do you know that? Do you know him? Do you know what he’s facing?”

  She just inclined her head.

  I didn’t know why Delegate Akhtari had appointed Thayu to this position, with her knowledge of spying and communication. Was I starting to see bogeymen around every corner?

  Think, Delegate, be reasonable. The trouble was, I had some difficulty doing that right now. It was hard enough walking. I focused on the guard’s back. Down the gallery, down the stairs.

  The fitter’s workshop was on the ground floor of the hall. Hundreds of uniforms, all with at least some blue, lay sorted on shelves. Tunics, robes, sashes, scarves, trousers. Never had I seen so much blue in one place.

  While the fitter took my measurements with a piece of white tape, I glanced around the shop. “What do you advise?” Damn, I wanted to go back and crawl in bed.

  The man mumbled with the tape between his lips, “The display rack over there. We have plenty of sizes for the Delegate to try on. If the fit is not correct—” He took the tape out of his mouth; he blushed. “You know, because we’ve never had anyone of the Delegate’s race here before, then we will make changes.”

  Never had anyone of the Delegate’s race before? What did that make Seymour Kershaw? An orangutan?

  Come to think of it, I had never seen pictures of Kershaw in local dress. In even his latest photos, his hair had been short. Kershaw had never had a zhayma.

  I had met Seymour Kershaw only once, at a party organised on Taurus for the swearing-in of the new governor-elect. Earning a bit of pocket money behind the bar, I had taken note of how much he drank, and how much louder his laughter became as the night progressed. A favourite with the ladies, a charismatic man.

  Is that Seymour Kershaw? I remembered my Damarcian stepmother Erith exclaiming when I, my father and Erith walked home after the party.

  My father had said yes, and then Erith had shaken her head and mumbled something about gamra not being happy with him.

  Half-distracted, I pulled a simple sleeveless tunic from the rack. The fabric was thin like gauze and when I draped it over my arm, my skin shone through. Was this acceptable?

  Thayu stood at the entrance to the shop, legs apart, hands on hips. She wore a temperature retaining suit, and her silver-clad arms protruded from under her tunic. The fabric showed a slight bulge at her thigh, and a metallic glint.

  Monitoring equipment? A gun? Nicha never carried a weapon.

  Telaris leaned against the doorpost; Evi had come into the shop, but his eyes were focused on the plaza outside.

  None of them was going to be much help in choosing. I should have brought Eirani, for all the hostility that would have evoked from Thayu.

  “That would be an appropriate choice,” the fitter said behind me, and his voice startled me.

  I held the tunic up, and couldn’t see myself in something so . . . revealing.

  “Does the shop have something with longer sleeves?” I was no athlete and there was no need to advertise that fact.

  “Yes, there are various other designs.” The man proceeded to pull out four other tunics, some with sleeves, some not. None came with matching trousers, so I would have to buy those separately. Not blue—only senior delegates wore full blue dress.

  Bewildered, I glanced at Thayu, but her attention was elsewhere: on a man who walked past her into the shop.

  He was at least a head taller than me, carried his height without stooping or looking reedy. His uniform was all blue: a shimmering tunic and trousers in a slightly darker shade. A thin cloak, like an academic gown, hung from his shoulders. His chest and collar bore gold-coloured ornaments.

  Not an ordinary delegate, this one.

  He bowed, first to the uniform fitter, and then to me. His eyes were brown like beach sand, lighter than hazel and not vivid enough to be yellow.

  “I’m here to pick up my order,” he told the fitter in accentless Coldi.

  Yet he definitely wasn’t Coldi. Too thin, and too tall, his eyes deep-set, not flat and single-folded, like the Coldi, Asian-like eyes. His hair was night-black without the peacock gloss, hanging loose over his shoulders.

  “Just a moment. Excuse me.” The fitter scrambled to the other side of the shop, fumbled in a cupboard and pushed a wrapped parcel across the counter.

  The man took it, gave a curt thanks and headed back to the entrance. When he was almost out the door, he hesitated, again turning his gaze on me.

  “Delegate.” He nodded at the tunic in my hand. “Delegate, if I may be so impudent, I believe that the short sleeves are out. If merchant Hadri wants to get rid of his stock, he can do so without preying on unsuspecting new delegates. Wearing short sleeves will make a person look out-of-touch. The hem of the tunic needs to be below the thigh and the elbow-length sleeves are very trendy at the moment.”

  The fitter made some spluttering noises.

  I inclined my head. “Thank you. In all truth, I am new and I do not know much about the latest trends.” Nothing, in fact.

  An expression came on his lips that could be a smile, or maybe not, since I was lost as to what type of person this was. “We all know who you are, and merchant Hadri knows
this, too. But you must forgive me. I better introduce myself. Marin Federza.” He held out his hand in an Earth-style greeting.

  “Cory Wilson.” I held up my hands, clumsily. “I’m afraid I’m indisposed. You know our customs?” Most gamra cultures did not shake hands.

  “My grandfather taught me.” He paused and then continued in Isla, “It seems that was a useful skill.” Accentless.

  One thing I had learned early in interactions with gamra people: never assume that no one understood me, whatever language I spoke. Most delegates were fluent in at least one other language besides their own, if not two or three, but to hear Isla spoken this well surprised me, hell, more than surprised me. Not many non-Coldi came to Earth. Certainly no one I knew who hadn’t grown up on Earth spoke any Earth language this well. Those languages were of no import in the scheme of things at gamra.

  “Forgive my rudeness, but you represent. . . ?” Also in Isla.

  Thayu scrambled to attach the translator to her ear.

  “The Trader Guild.”

  Ah. Reason clicked into place. Traders travelled a lot and knew many different languages. Now the unusual dress code also made sense. Traders had their own uniforms. The Trader Guild was a government without a country, but older than gamra itself.

  I inclined my head and went back to Coldi. “Forgive me, Trader Delegate. I didn’t realise.”

  “We don’t tend to be loud. We just get the work done.”

  “You have regular contact with Earth?”

  “I’ve been there, a few times. Interesting place.” His face showed no emotion.

  I laughed away my unease. A few times did not justify his total command of Isla, and I didn’t know what else to ask, without being rude for no reason.

  Marin Federza nodded at the tunic still draped over my arm. “I better let you choose your uniform. I will see you again when zhamata meets. I believe your speech will be popular. A lot of delegates are talking about it.”

  “I bet they are.” Damn that Asto delegate and her pressure.

  “I am looking forward to it.” He stepped closer to me, enclosing me in a scent of musk-like perfume. “Delegate, I want to say that we support you in this matter that has upset Nations of Earth. If you air your entity’s concerns, we will support your vote, if it comes to that.”