by Calista Skye
Shala didn't ask what imprint she might be referring to.
“Of course, I apologize for interjec-”
“Do stop apologizing, child! You're far too polite. The other royals will have you for dinner if you plan to go around with no social armor.”
~
The “imprint” the jeweler would need as it turned out was an energetic read that would match Shala to the Teleran ancestors whose signatures were most like her own. Shala half-expected it was also a sort of test the royals would record for their archives to ensure what kind of spirit she was in case the prince did deign to take things further than just one night with her by his side.
It was painless, a slight buzzing from an odd plant that read her energies and announced its findings in its petals with an assortments of colors, textures and patterns. Suni told her the flower would replicate, and several would be woven into her hair the night of Eiowa. The bloom was an identifier, apparently, and wearing it would signal everyone to just “what kind” of halfling she was.
By the looks of things, her warrior blood, slight Kalion seership, and the inner dancer she never let anyone know was in her had come fully to the forefront. A strange mix, if Suni's expression was any indication, but it seemed to please the emissary well enough.
“That 'ought to do it, dear. I'll handle the rest. We'll send for you the morning of Eiowa. Please be ready to go upon the emissary's arrival.”
“Won't it be you?”
“That can't be guaranteed. The prince himself oversees your protection detail the day of the event.”
Shala bristled a little at the word “protection.” She doubted any Telerans would actually attack her, but she couldn't help but feel that the prince wasn't entirely sure of that. There were purists among them, who didn't appreciate the potential mixing of blood, and the fact that she was already quite mixed wouldn't fly well with their sort.
Pretty, identifying flowers in her hair ensuring she possessed a high percentage of warrior blood or no.
She'd been escorted back to her room after that, her second offer of tea politely refused, and before she could gather her wits, she was passed out on her bunk, not having even bothered to disrobe or shower.
Shala slept just like that, with her sheets entangling her legs wildly, well into the deep hours of star set. It wasn't until the intercoms announced some sort of trade arrival that she woke, heavy lidded and still in the sway of half-sleep.
Fighting it off, she peeled herself from the bunk and took a seat by the visi-panels awhile, drinking in the shining, licorice black of the ether they sailed through, like she was taking a gulp from a gigantic, dark ocean. She'd dreamed of taking to the stars for years on Kalion, as much for the escape such a trip afforded as for the beloved purpose of it. Never in a million years would she have dreamed a prince might be interested in her beyond whatever service she could provide him.
Of course, the prince's invitation might only be a thing of diplomacy, so there was certainly no cause to jump the gun and assume he was actually smitten with her. For all she knew, he might prefer the biddy things who squeezed into dresses that might otherwise fit a pre-teen.
Shala was as voluptuous and full-figured as they came, her waist a teensy slope compared to the swelled billow of her hips, and the generously rounded globes of her backside.
Her father and mother had had to beat her suitors off with a stick when they'd come calling before university, but Shala hadn't given herself to any of them, even in secret. And she wasn't a pinch ashamed of that. It was normal for a Kalion woman to wait for marriage to enter into the more sensuous rites of womanhood, and her father had never pressed the human cultural customs of casual intimacy upon her as an option. She half-suspected it was his way of saving himself the need to seriously damage the wrong sort of guy who might be tempted to offend his daughter.
There were all sorts of species touristing Kalion, and if Shala hadn't been a smart girl, she may have well wound up in one of their sensual nets.
She couldn't help but smile thinking of her father. He himself had been a mix of human cultures, his dusken skin and the sharp sliver cut of his eyes making his Asiatic heritage obvious to any who looked at him. She missed him and ma, more than her heart could take sometimes, but there was little to be done about it.
She'd been meant for the stars, and aside from the occasional visit home, in the stars she would remain. It'd become more a welcoming home than her own planet was, even visiting Earth had been a sore disappointment. Since the greening, it'd quickly spun into chaos with feyish creatures of the wood denouncing the barest hint of electronic technology.
Most people who weren't naturally enamored of the ways of the wood protectors were trying to get off of the planet through various galactic dating services, posts with the allied forces, and other trade-related reasons they hoped would allow them access to the star ships that would carry them far from a home they no longer recognized.
Stretching and rising up to order a tea from the butler-unit built into the wall of her closet-like kitchenette, Shala wondered how well she would mesh with Teleran culture, especially at a time of reverence for mythic frights, personification of elements, the spirits of Teleran folklore, and ancestors who enjoyed substantial honor among the culture's people.
Kalion had its own systems of ancestral reverence, but Telera one wasn't Kalion, and she wasn't entirely confident that she wouldn't mess something up at Eiowa. Suni had been an excellent advisor, and Shala soaked every bit of information up like a sponge.
Still, she thought as she gathered up her cup of tea when the nano-butler dinged, it was all a bit much to cram into her head on such short notice.
9
Shala was in good spirits the following day, and she woke finding much of the overwhelm had passed out of her while her subconscious worked on the new information she'd been given. She was feeling confident when she considered the coming event, and eyes sweeping the corridors of the commons, she couldn't help but greet the Telerans she encountered with more cheer than usual. Oddly enough, they seemed to return it, like she'd already been vetted and included into their fold during closed-door talks privy only to them. It helped to take any of the lingering edge off of her focus, though she had a faint dredge of doom tugging at her gut throughout the day's duties. Something she couldn't quite put her finger on but also couldn't have ignored if she tried.
All seemed well, though, despite the muted alarm in her solar plexus. No staff hails or alarms had struck the air, the scanner didn't detect anything untoward on any of the decks. Not even one fight broke out amongst the warrior classes on the commoner's deck.
It had the makings of an unusually smooth day on Telera one, and perhaps that was all there was to her mild, pang of internal alarm. After all, when one is accustomed to chaos, a calm day is bound to be treated with suspicion.
When Shala finally sat down at her station, she did it with a forced ease borne of her repeatedly telling herself all was well. Within an hour or two she began to believe it, to accept the calm of the day and focus her attentions more wholeheartedly on her work.
This could all play out perfectly. Sometimes good things happened to good people. How could she expect to receive anything that set her soul at ease if she wasn't willing to even believe it was possible?
Cheerfully, she told herself she could do better than that. She could let potential problems rest until they revealed themselves for what they were.
For all she knew, they were just phantoms leeching any energy they were offered, and with the memotic contained, a diplomatic solution offered up on a silver platter, and a possible commendation if she played her part it in all effectively, Shala was beginning to believe that she was just at the edge of the dark tunnel she'd been walking since birth.
Right there at the edge of a less than joyous beginning, waiting to be delivered into a starlit middle, and nebulaic happy ending.
“Officer Kane, can you deliver the afternoon's data reports to Lex
before you sign off?”
“Yes, Sir,” she told the captain with a cheer that wasn't at all forced.
"I appreciate that. Glad to hear you in good spirits.”
“Glad to be in them, Sir.”
“Well, things do look like they might wind up taking a higher track than they did at first, don't they?”
“That, they do, Sir.”
“Alright. Take a load off tonight. We're checking the engine systems tomorrow and installing a temporary security measure until all of the allied ships are retrofitted to account for memotic breeches. We'll need you on your A-game.”
“I will be, Sir.”
“I have no doubt.”
Practically humming along the processing of the day's reports, Shala drank in the good vibes raining down on her from the universe. With any luck, they'd get through most of this transport in peace. And if they were really lucky, the Tavalar enforcer wouldn't seek to rain vengeance on the Telerans until well after they were transported planetside on their shiny, newish orb.
Well out of easy reach.
~
“Good work, Officer Kane. Maybe you should take the rest of the day and gather, 'aye? Tomorrow's got a pretty tall order waiting for you.”
The captain gave her a fatherly smile, and Shala couldn't help but warm reactively to it.
“Thanks. I think that would help me focus all the more.”
“It will. Swing by the archives and do a little reading on Eiowa, too. I know the emissary told you the essentials, but additional information never hurts.”
“Good idea, Captain.”
Well, he was awfully helpful today...
She'd half-expected him to treat her with suspicion for the invite she'd received, but he was acting like he couldn't be prouder. It struck her as a little odd. Fraternization was explicitly against the rules, and this event was right there on the line of things. An unthinking step in the wrong direction could mess it all up for everyone.
Surely, he'd considered that?
Ah, well. She'd take the gift and do some of that reading he'd recommended. It was a smart approach, and she fully intended to wind up on the wiser side of the fence than on the wrong
side of it. Maybe the captain just had faith in her. She'd been a good officer for her stint under his charge thus far; there really wasn't any reason to doubt her, was there?
Everyone's ass was on line. The captain was probably considering the weight of that enough incentive for her to anchor herself into her Ps and Qs without need for a nudge from him. Pushing forward to her room to change into her common clothes, she lifted her head and resolved herself. She appreciated the notion that he was confident in her and he obviously was. He was considering her for a commendation, after all. Maybe it had only been her sense of manufactured guilt talking. Except, she'd only daydreamed of the prince, never acted on anything she felt.
Sweeping into the archives, Shala lowered her scanserv's alerts to avoid disrupting the scholarly types roaming the hall of books and slowly made her way down the stretching corridors.
That gut nudge was still troubling her, but she managed to brush it aside long enough to select a few books on loan to the city ship from the Telerans. It was best she read them now. They'd be taken back for the new Teleran libraries once they were planetside. Feeling eyes on her as she tucked the small pile of books under her arm, Shala paused before turning to take in the aisle around her, creasing a brow when she found only the endless rows of books pristinely perched and dusted on the folding shelves.
Her mind was obviously working overtime. After this, she'd do well to get some sleep. Heading down the aisle with the books in tow, she found a seat by the visi-panels, taking a moment to appreciate the simulated view of Teleran mountaintops from an ornately, paneled window.
The craftsmanship the faux window frame it emulated was of the finest quality and really set the Teleran people apart from a good deal of other, allied cultures. If they weren't so brusque to outsiders, and well, seemingly each other, she'd have visited their planet long before they'd been forced to evacuate.
A yawn escaping her, Shala cracked open the first book and relaxed into a pillowed reading seat. It was a tome that covered the reasoning behind various seasonal events, and she was fully sucked into its depths by the time she reached the fifth page.
Her head popping up at the feel of heat on her neck, Shala frowned and turned to glance around her, wanting very much to settle the matter of whether or not she was being watched once and for all. But she was met again with rows of books kept in impeccable condition, their spines staring out at her as pridefully as a book spine could.
Rubbing her eyes, she turned back to the book at hand and continued her reading, fascinating over the wealth of information in its depths. Not much shook her attention from it – she was in information-vacuum mode, hoovering the data with the greed of a newborn learning its world – but as scholarly types swept past, she lifted her head from time to time to watch the blur of them passing by.
It was comforting here. She hadn't been to an archive in some time. Shala was at her best when she was learning something. She'd figured that out about herself early on when university helped her to overcome a number of rudely aggressive alien girls who thought they might have a bit of fun attempting to humiliate her before they were taught what she was made of intellectually, just as rudely.
It was well past star set when Shala finally pried her eyes from the third book, making a mental note to finish it at her earliest opportunity. She felt good about the reads she'd consumed. All that was left were footnotes in a specialized historical tome. They'd be important, but Shala had the actual content to feed on for now. And she was all the more secure for having spent the time she did in the archive.
Her gut still tugged her though, and when thoughts of the memotic's containment crossed her mind, she decided to head back to the main deck and poke her head in, maybe give them a heads up to keep an extra scan trained on the formless girl.
Her gut feelings had never warned of false dangers before, and as much it would be great if they did now, she was better off leaving some sort of word that might help avert potential disaster.
She couldn't be sure what sort of disaster and truly might only be sensing the fallout to come when the enforcer learned that his daughter had been disembodied (which everyone was already imagining, dreading, and bracing themselves for). She'd feel better if she let her crew know something didn't feel right. She did have a bit of seership in her blood, and it did come out sometimes to warn of potential danger.
Returning the books to their shelves she made her way up deck, not bothering to change before she headed there. Everyone knew who she was, and she had no plans to stay for long. When she reached the second level, her gut was squeezing with alarm, and she sped her steps until she was standing before the guard station, frowning to find Temmen taking post there.
“Uh, hey, Temmen.”
The Alaran's golden eyes snapped up then instantly relaxed into a kind of boredom. He averted them and turned his attention back down to his scanserv, flicking through whatever digitized comic he'd recently downloaded, like she was barely even there. Not giving so much as a salutation in return.
“Is the captain in?”
“Do you think he'll see you in commoner's clothes?”
“Really, Temmen. It's important.”
“Can't be that important.”
Fuck, he was annoying. Incredibly self-satisfied. Someone was going to ream him a new one one of these days.
“Look, I've got a bad feeling that's stuck to me all day. Just tell him someone should keep another pair of eyes on the memotic scans... Make sure she stays put.”
Boredly looking up, the useless Alaran locked eyes with her.
“You're worrying yourself for nothing.”
“I'm... Dammit, Temmen. I've got a strong feeling about this.”
“According to the captain, you're not scheduled tonight, so...”
&
nbsp; “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Have an extra look at the scans when you're scheduled.”
Unbelievable, this guy.
“Listen-”
“I don't-”
“I'm not scheduled tomorrow!”
Shala's hands clenched to fists.
“Enjoy your day off, Shala.”
This was going absolutely nowhere.
Fuming, Shala glared at him.
“Just give him the message will you?!”
She stormed off before he could respond, raging through the bay door when it wooshed open to her and closed behind her just as fast. Assholes like Temmen got people killed all the time. He had no true place on a city ship facing dangers of acquisitioner attacks. She hoped to stars that such as attack wasn't what was troubling her gut, but there wasn't much to be done about it now.
Cursing under her breath, she made her way back up to her quarters. She could just send word in the morning through someone who was “scheduled.” Hopefully, she'd manage to get some sleep before then. She did, indeed, have a long day ahead of her.
10
Discouraged, but fighting her way through it, Shala made her way back to her corridor, determined to get some sleep without being nagged by this damn feeling all night. Maybe, she was reading into things on a subconscious level.
That could be it right?
Things seemed to be going well, and that nagging gut thing was probably her psyche's way of trying to insert doom into the equation. Probably because she didn't believe deep down that this thing could play out well, without the diplomatic nightmare, and investigatory lash out most of them were dreading.
