It had been a busy day, if you counted writing reports as being busy.
Alex did not, at least not in this case. It was an insufferable chore. He knew that the military had thousands of hours of sensor data that told them exactly what they wanted in the reports. He even had the security clearance to view them in secured areas - but he was on the hook for condensing it down into neat, easily digestible documents.
The worst part? Email. There weren’t even that many, just a few outlining exactly what they wanted in his initial reports about the attack by the Eohm and the events leading up to the discovery of the artifact. The ones that hit hard were from the CPP, asking for their stuff back. It just made the whole experience all the more miserable knowing that not only had he finally been cut loose from them, he’d also be without clothes shortly.
Under different circumstances he would have found that funny.
He opted to stay longer than the average eight hour shift, knowing that Carbon would be meeting with the Admiral, and timed it for roughly when he expected her to be done with that. He’d found a bench next to a decorative palm just down the hall from the nondescript entry to the ONI offices, the perforated sheet of metal somehow more comfortable than the office chair he’d been sitting in all day. Didn’t make sense, but at least he didn’t have to worry about further report writing until tomorrow.
It was about 4:30 when she walked out of the offices and, once she located the tired looking human next to a palm tree - he had not even considered if she knew what a palm tree was when he’d told her where to find him - took a seat next to him. “So, how’d it go?”
“She has gone to significant lengths to convince me that Commander Gladwell was acting out of his own volition and outside of the appropriate channels, and to ensure that such behavior will not be allowed in the future. The Admiral even had an agent from Diplomatic Security Services there to discuss the new methods they have put in place to make it more difficult for high ranking military personnel to gain access to the suites without multiple layers of authentication.”
“Commander? Ouch.” While it was only one step down in rank, that was a lot to lose for whatever he thought he was going to be doing that morning. “What's your verdict on all of that?”
“I feel it is an appropriate first step, but it has not yet changed my views. I will not impede their attempts to learn more about us through you, but I will not actively assist them. Certainly not when they retain Gladwell, even with his reduced rank.” She smoothed her jumpsuit, done discussing that for now. “How was your day?”
Alex closed his eyes and groaned. “Can we keep talking about the meeting? Or anything else?”
“It could not have been that bad.” Carbon reached over and patted his leg. “You left so early to, ah... ‘get to it.’ Did you not?”
He gave her side eye, the amount of taunting in her tone not matched at all by her words. “It was about ninety percent writing reports. When we stop talking I can still hear myself typing.”
“And the remainder?” She had dialed it back a bit, at least.
“Email and... well, it was all email, just from different sources. Which is a perfectly good excuse to not continue talking about work, because I need to go shopping.”
“Oh?” Carbon sounded surprisingly interested in that statement. “Why is that?”
“Pilot Program wants its clothes back, and they’re the ones who furnished pretty much everything I have right now.”
“That would become an issue quickly. Is there anywhere to get clothing here? Aside from the gift shop.” She stood, stretching her back.
“You went to the museum? Without me?” He played up sounding hurt about that as he followed her lead, the huge smile on his face betraying his actual feelings. “You gotta tell me what you thought of it!”
“Yes, without you. I was decompressing.” The short alien seemed entirely smug about that, turning towards the elevator bank down the hall. “It seemed to be thorough. There were no chronological gaps in what was presented that did not make sense. Much of Human methods for achieving spaceflight, and the technologies you were putting into space until recently, are fully deranged. As is your propensity for war.”
“Ah yeah, we did a lot of war.” There was no arguing with that.
“Far too much. Your first Waverider drive was worrying.”
“Oh, yeah! They really got lucky with that one.”
“It seems so.” Carbon’s tone indicated that she agreed with the assertion that luck played heavily into it functioning at all. She paused and tapped the button to call an elevator. “The display of the Hōkūleʻa was... endearing and worrisome.”
As far as Alex understood it, everybody knew about the Hōkūleʻa from school. Maybe they didn’t remember it like he did - it was a Corvin K2, after all! The original backbone of human space exploration! - but first contact was mentioned in several history classes he had taken. He tamped down that spike of excitement, not quite the place for it. “How do you mean?”
“It is-” She stopped talking as the elevator arrived, doors opening to reveal an empty lift. “As I said, it is endearing to see that first meeting between our races portrayed with joy. And it is something I wish we had approached with even half as much enthusiasm.”
They stepped in and Alex tapped the glyph to take them down to the main deck where all of the day to day commerce was. “I’m not surprised, based on... Well, everything. It’s been an uphill climb for us a few times and you’re more used to humans than most Tsla’o, right?”
“Correct.” She’d shown him some early memories of actually meeting Humans before. Most Tsla’o had probably never even seen a picture of a Human, then the disaster on Schon brought thousands of them to Empire space. “Our treaties were mostly outlining borders and formalizing how aid could be rendered in certain situations. The Confederation and our Empire never truly had a need for each other, and this was made clear in how we portrayed our only allies among the stars. And we suffer for it in the face of humanity’s kindness.”
“That’s changing though, right? Between having the Archimedes on site and all the other aid we’ve sent, and what we found with the Kshlav’o there has to be a shift going on.” The elevator stopped and dinged, the doors opening onto the main promenade. The crowds would arrive when the normal day shifts started to end, and the more tourism-focused places began shutting down for the day. For now, it was only sparsely populated.
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
“It is... slowly.” She shook her head, not satisfied with how fast that was happening. “Where are we going, anyway? There is actually a place to buy clothing here?”
“There’s an Uncommon down at the far end. It’s... Fine. They’re everywhere, but on stations they sell clothing intended for workers as well as the usual fashion stuff.” The name of the store could not be more ironic. He’d been to an Uncommon back in the Berkley arcology, The Valles Marineris arcology on Mars, and an actual ground floor one in London. All the same once you look away from the entrance. Now he was about to be in one on McFadden station. “It’s nice that they leave you alone unless you ask for help, but If I’m being honest I kind of don’t like shopping there.”
“What’s wrong with it?” She looked over at him, eyebrows and antenna raised in curiosity.
“Nothing, really. It’s just... Not my style.” He shrugged as they passed by the gaudy neon and steel front of The Mothership, an absurd little-green-man themed restaurant complete with ‘crashed’ UFO and saguaro cacti for that desert feel. “Lots of fancy clothes, I prefer to keep it simple.”
Carbon peeked in through the glass front doors and waved at the hostess standing behind the podium, who waved back with a wide smile. “Will they have ‘fancy’ human clothes here? I admit my curiosity to what that is, and what you’d look like wearing it.”
“Do- do you know her?” he asked, catching the end of that wave. “And no, I’m not getting anything fancy. Probably. At least no ties.”
“Not well, but I did have lunch there with my friend Emily. If you are an alien you get free dessert - it was disclosed on the menu and they honored that.” Carbon said this like it was the most normal thing in the world. “I would like to see the fancy clothes.”
He got the distinct impression that he would be getting something at least a little bit nice, despite being disinclined to do so. “Guess you were decompressing today.”
“Aside from a brief crisis of faith in my own people, I would say that I have.” She straightened up a little bit, a hint of pride creeping into her voice. “I sought out new experiences with an open heart, and I believe I have come out better for it.”
“I don’t- That’s not necessarily what I mean when I say decompress. But as long as it leaves you feeling better, good.” He had meant doing nothing, lazing around, maybe watching TV or listening to music. Reading. There was a pool on the station, but he suspected hanging out there was somewhat out of the question for Tsla’o given the ankle thing. He’d happily accept Carbon getting it done however worked for her, though.
“It has. While I still feel the weight of future endeavors, of the horrors my people are experiencing, it does not feel oppressive now.” She petered off as she was speaking, noting the tall black and white Uncommon sign at the end of the promenade, across from a bar, hemmed in on the other side by a gift shop that was starting to close up. “I know these things will come to my full attention again, likely soon. My mind feels clearer, I do not question if I will be able to make a sound choice.”
“Gotta say, that’s a lot more than I was expecting for a day off.” Maybe he should try tagging along next time. That sort of clarity sure sounded nice.
The doors slid open for them, the brightly lit interior just like all the other stores. White tile floors, everything displayed on pale wood tables or gleaming steel racks. The ceiling was lit wall to wall, save for the regular dotting of fire suppression systems and other safety features required on modern stations. It made his eyes ache. He still grabbed a steel mesh basket from the stack of the by the door.
“It was a good day.” She followed him in, squinting for a moment as her eyes adjusted to it. Carbon looked over the displays, scrutinizing the mannequins and the various branding and images of happy people doing happy stuff in the store’s current lineup of clothes, all the while perusing the multitude of options laid out aside the store’s main aisle. “All of this is intended for female Humans - ah, Women?”
“Up here, yeah. Men’s is in the back corner.”
“Curious. There is far more variety than I had expected.” She stopped in front of a display of dresses, head tilted as she took in the details, studiously ignoring all that exposed leg.
Alex hadn’t stopped when she did, and had to retrace a bit to reunite with her. It wasn’t a big store, but losing your alien in any store was probably not the best. “Want one?”
“Perhaps.” She looked up at him with a little smirk that he hadn’t seen in a few weeks. “Another time. We are here for your clothing, so we should focus on that.”
“Alright. It’s back this way.” He continued down the wide aisle, a single black line of tiles marking the primary route through the store. True to his word, and every one of their stores he’d been in so far, the comically small men's section was tucked away in a back corner. He stopped at a table full of pants, a small display noting they met all the requirements for engineering crews - rated with arc, cut, and blast protection as well as being fire resistant. Not to mention pockets for days. More than he needed, but exactly what he was used to. He crammed two of each color into the basket, then a few pairs of shorts with none of those ratings from the next table.
Carbon was studying the mannequins again. Inspecting one in its generic model pose, then looking to Alex with her ears perked slightly, mentally dressing him in the clothes on display. “Why is there so much less clothing for men? Your species has a very even gender distribution, does it not?”
“We do, and-” He paused and piled some plain t-shirts into the basket. Why is that? Uncommon was particularly bad about it, but he’d noticed that anywhere he’d bought clothes. “I don’t actually know why. Fashion, I guess?”
“The array of colors and materials are reduced as well. Is there a social taboo I am unaware of when it comes to Human fashion?” She joined him again, picking up a dark red shirt and slipping it into his basket, once more looking like she was getting away with something as she wandered deeper into the section.
Was there? That seemed like a good question. “Not that I’m aware of. It’s just kinda always been like that?”
“The difference is just... it is shocking. Our clothing does not feature such variety, so to see this divide based on gender is very unexpected.” She stopped and picked up one of the few vibrantly colored objects in this corner of the store, unrolling it to look at the pattern. “Are there subgenders that would mix elements of both?”
Fuck, she was looking at ties.
“Hey I need help picking out a belt.” Alex filed the question about subgenders away for another time as he gently set the tie back on the stack it came from and ushered her towards the back wall. It was back there, next to wallets and laces and shoe shine kits. They’d always been back there. “The CCP issue pants have tabs to adjust the waist, but these don’t have that feature.”
Carbon rolled her eyes at his behavior but went along with it, soon facing an array of leather goods. “Oh, they come in black and two shades of brown.”
The sheer amount of sass coming off her was as relieving to Alex as it was annoying. She must have been feeling better, and he would be willing to put up with quite a lot of it because of that. “Probably... black? There’s some color combinations that are supposed to go together but I don’t remember what. I’ve got a couple of belts back on earth so it’s only until I get to the rest of my stuff.”
“Alex?” The question came from behind them, and Alex recognized the deep baritone immediately. How could he not?
He turned and there was his trainer from the last phase of the Pilot program, Ed Brzezinski. Tall fellow, impossible to miss if they hadn’t been staring at the wall. Alex hadn’t been avoiding him, per se, and yes he was feeling a bit guilty about that. Had getting poached by the ONI made it worse? Vastly.
“Oh! Ed, it is good to see you again.” Carbon said cheerfully before Alex could say anything in response.
Alex pressed his eyebrows together as he processed that. He distinctly recalled Ed leaving the station before the Kshlav’o arrived to take care of a death in his family, and they had departed before he returned. Carbon had never met Ed... Not outside of Alex’s memories, anyway.