Excerpt - Hidden Planet, chapter 2

(don't miss chapter one!)

They landed directly in front of the sandcrete-and-glass offices serving the Greater Assembly of Arkhide. Someone took Katla’s pack, while she was whisked away to wash, primp, and prep for camera.


She’d seen other people put through this process but never experienced it herself. So many distracted people pushing and prodding, shower too hot, hair gel too smelly—and too thick, having to work mightily to tame the frizz of her hair after a week of no product. The best tailor in Macadare City—a synth named Seela—sewed a new tuck into someone else’s formal tunic as Katla wore it, with Sofia casting a critical eye on the whole ensemble. Sofia, of course, looked perfect: beautiful rows of twists coursing down the back of her closely tailored tunic in brilliant blue.


"We’re trying to get decent shoes for you. Last resort you can wear mine.” She tsked. “You didn’t bring any formal sandals?”


Katla had wrecked them at the last political gala. She’d had to twist out of the way of some diplomat whose thoughts—and gaze—were elsewhere. She’d fallen into one of the ponds with the colorful fish, who apparently thought sandal straps were super tasty. By the time she’d pulled herself out, one sandal was on by just a strap, the other hopeless. “Didn’t see you there,” the diplomat said. “Your presence is … minuscule,” he said wonderingly. Her presence on the net, he meant. Her corporeal form was average feminine human. Soggy human.


Katla shook her head, which shook her hip, which earned her a tiny poke from Seela’s needle. “What do you want me to do?”


“Play for time. Don’t agree to anything. Whatever they want, say you can’t do it without consulting the assembly, and it will take a while to gather them all together.”


“They’re right here.”


“The Cooperative doesn’t need to know that. If you can, try to find out what they already know about us. The news clip was vague.” Their monitor bot, which regularly caught and forwarded much of the Cooperative’s broadcasting, had flagged one short segment on the interesting discovery of a human-made object far out in edge space.

“Can I see the clip?”


“On your comm.”


Katla woke up her wristcom and pulled up the clip. One of the Co-op’s usual newscasters, so this was an official announcement. Blurry image of their solar system, with an arrow pointing to a tiny blob that was the space platform. A chilling closing line: “We look forward to welcoming our new friends into the Cooperative soon.”


“Doesn’t look like they know much at all,” she said.


“That they’re saying for public consumption,” Sofia said. The primpers turned Katla to face her mom, who looked her over, frowning. Then she hugged her, careful to avoid the makeup. “Perfect. My brave girl.”


Katla let the lavender and love calm her a little. Not much—she was more dazed than nervous. She waited for Sofia to pull away first. Her mom had stopped with the hugging when Katla was a surly teen, and she’d hadn’t managed to find a way to tell Sofia she missed it.


* * *


Katla was ready, shoeless but with a lectern in front of her that bore the seal of the Greater Assembly of Arkhide: two silvery hands clasping at the wrists with a sun over water in the background. An army of lights surrounding two camera lenses beamed at her, washing out the dark drape of fabric behind her. A drone camera hovered just inside her peripheral vision. A screen that would show the Cooperative official was set up directly behind the camera, helping to guide Katla’s line of sight into the lenses.


Outside the light, in the large communications center, it was nearly silent. Dozens of people were in here with her: comm techs, assemblypeople, the synth with the annoying facepowder puff. It felt to her as if they all were holding their breath.


The moment to connect came.


And went.


Someone brought a chair for Katla, outside of camera range. The ring of lights clicked off, their buzzing ceased. Sofia crowded her from the back, and the present Speaker of the Assembly, a synthetic human from the South named Aimee Five, crowded her from the front.


“Do you know what you are doing?” Aimee Five said, her voice lilting as well as cutting. She had modified it to sing in a trilling operatic style. It really suited her, with her fine lithe shape and taste in ornamentation, Katla thought, all other thoughts fleeing under the onslaught.


“Yes, madame speaker,” she said. She pointed at her earpiece. “I hear you fine, and I will pause to be sure I understand before I speak.” In fact, she would hear both Sofia and the Speaker, as well as the cameraperson, and they would all hear one another. Katla really, really hoped everyone would keep the line clear. They might forget that she wasn’t used to a lot of simultaneous cross-talk.


Sandals came, but the lectern remained. A good hour or so later, the communications tech lifted her head.


"Signal’s coming in.”


Katla stood, shaking out her tunic. No wrinkles, good. She submitted to another patdown of her hair, and more face powder. She stepped up to the lectern, gripping its sides outside of camera range. She nodded.

***


Read Hidden Planet, available in ebook and paperback

also included in Tales of Arkhide, available in paperback and ebook