Identity
The superconnector was something else.
Every second I spent studying it made me question if it really had been me who’d created it. And yet hour after hour, I found recurring design themes that just made sense.
Like, a series of micro memory stockpiles, a few thousand snapshots of emotions, each one just a split second, but the superconnector held onto them for comparative purposes. It used them to recognize the same emotions in others.
And of course, that meant it was built on the presumption that those emotions could be found in others. And recognized.
It also had adaptive functions. It had basically copied my transceiver and then some. Any way I had of storing or moving information, the superconnector seemed to be interested in.
Just how much of my head’s space was this monopolizing? Nai couldn’t fit any other sensory constructs besides the radar, but the superconnector had to be eating up a ton of my…what exact kind of headspace was it occupying? Communication? Memory? It seemed doubtful that it would confine itself so neatly to one corner of my mind, but I still had room enough left over for the rest of my psionics.
So much to learn…so little time.
“Hey [dude], keep staring at yourself and you’ll turn into a flower.”
I looked up at Nora. She’d actually made the phrasing work in Starspeak.
“[I’m looking at my mind, not my face,]” I said.
“Whatever you say, [Narcissus],” Nora said. “But for real, take a break. I think I am ready to practice fighting.”
“…You practicing your Starspeak too?” I asked. ‘Practice fighting’ was odd phrasing. She seemed to be avoiding English more pointedly than normal.
“Yes. So help me practice the rest also. You are not…the only one making psionic…[breakthroughs].”
She gave up, resorting to English for the last word.
“Alright,” I agreed. I could use a break. “And it’s ‘breakthroughs’.”
She frowned, checking the dictionary in her mind for the word she’d overlooked.
“Basement,” she said.
I followed her out of the apartment and down the stairs.
“I just hope you know what you’re getting into,” I said. “Sparring can be dangerous, even without trying to injure each other.”
“I remember how we met, believe it,” Nora grimaced. “I hope you’re ready for…what I’ve got ready.”
“Any particular rules?” I asked as we approached the gymnasium door.
“First to cry [uncle],” she said with a grin.
I pushed the door open and before I could take another step, a black tendril darted through the gap at me.
Reflex ducked me under the tendril, diving past it into the gym proper. I rolled out of my dive, coming to my feet in a ready stance.
Nora strolled into the gym behind me wearing a smarmy grin.
“Check it out,” she said. Tendrils she made lumped themselves together, making sleek and unsettling black three-legged starfish looking creatures, each the size of a small bear. Psionics were radiating off of her, but not directed at me. Every signal was aimed at this starfish.
“You weren’t kidding,” I said, realizing what she’d done. “That’s a huge leap forward. You combined the Adept nerves with your psionic-sensitive material. You can give signals to the nerves without being in physical contact with them.”
“A new trick isn’t going to let you win, though,” I said. “And just to prove it…”
I created a number of items, including a gun loaded with paint in one hand, and small antennae in the other.
“I’m not going to use any more Adeptry,” I said. “But I’m still going to win.”
“Oh, it is on!”
Nora had a strong opening. Black flesh built up on both her arms, like horrifying cancerous masses before wrenching themselves free of her entirely.
She hadn’t bypassed her range limit: she still couldn’t create any matter more than a few centimeters from her skin. But what she created didn’t need to stay near her.
The three-legged starfish would be difficult to contend with if she was allowed to continue making more.
So I shot her.
One of the starfish darted a tendril out, intercepting the orange splatter. The other two slithered toward me, and Nora ducked aside, trying to keep her distance.
That was smart. She knew I would trounce her up close. Distance would let her make more tendril-starfish too.
I’d given myself quite the handicap with no additional Adeptry, but I was confident.
Holding the antennae I’d made toward her, I dashed at her starfish. Outmaneuvering them was simple. They didn’t have eyes, and Nora had to direct them based on what she saw. If I slipped out of her sight, she could only have them guess where I was.
Ducking behind, past, and over the gym’s exercise machines, I took an unintuitive route toward her. Her starfish struggled to keep up, and when I got within firing distance of her, I saw the first pair had backed off entirely.
Peeling themselves off her shoulders and torso, four more starfish were ready to leap at me.
Worse, Nora was taking me at my word. I could almost see the gears in her mind turn, counting the number of shots I had left in my revolver.
But that was still manageable.
I fired two more shots at her, making sure to keep my antennae in position too. It, rather than the gun, was my key to victory.
Her response didn’t thrill me. Instead of continuing to take her distance to create more starfish, she proved she hadn’t forgotten her old tricks either. Tendrils encased both her arms, growing outward. She blocked my bullets with one arm like a shield while flinging the other arm’s tendril at me.
She was slow swapping from defense to offense though, and I had just enough time to dart out of reach.
If not for the gym’s exercise equipment providing cover, I wouldn’t have been able to avoid her grasp so easily.
With two starfish moving to pin me against the wall, I couldn’t stay in one place. Nora pulled herself toward the ceiling with one tendril, swiping at me while she swung.
“[Now who’s acting like Spider-Man?]” I asked, trying to shoot her. Another blocked shot.
“Not so fast…[uhh…crap, which rogue would you be?]” she said. It was a good act, but her starfishes’ activity gave her away.
“[You’re halfway between Venom and Doc Ock, right now,]” I told her. “[Black goo, plus the extra limbs?]”
“[That’s not—]not a bad idea!” she said. The tendrils she was using to haul herself around the gymnasium shifted, freeing up her arms and anchoring themselves to her back with fleshy vest to keep them secure.
Right. Her new psionic sensitive nerves. She didn’t need the nerve signals in her arms to control them anymore.
“Pretty sure I’m still too agile,” I said.
A starfish leapt at me, but I didn’t need to look at it or where I was dodging toward. For a normal person, it was risky moving without looking where you were going unless the footing was consistent and predictable.
Unfortunately for Nora, I had cascaded this gym time and time again experimenting with psionics. Now? I really could run around this place blindfolded.
So long as no one moved anything.
With my spatial psionics helping me navigate my surroundings, it was actually Nora’s own psionics warning me where the danger was. The same psionics that let her remotely puppet the starfish also gave away when and where one would attack from.
Even as I cartwheeled backward over the exercise machines, then leaping aside from two more starfish, I kept my antennae pointed at her.
“You look like [Harry Potter!]” she taunted.
Fair. It was kinda like pointing a wand at her.
“I won’t lie,” I said. “It’s been months since anyone talked pop culture with me. It’s throwing me off.”
“If you’re going to shoot, shoot! Don’t talk!” she said, rearranging her starfish into a deeper formation rather than just a line. It would be harder to dart past all of them at once now.
It was a good move, but probably too late. I’d almost dialed in on the signal…
“[Words are weapons all their own,]” I said. “[The pen is mightier than the sword, but the tongue is mightier still.]”
“[…God], I hope that sounded better in your head,” she said. But muttering quietly enough that she thought I wouldn’t hear, she added, “[That sounded dirty…]”
I fired the last two shots in my revolver at her, buying myself an extra second or two while my psionic work completed itself.
Nora didn’t miss the sixth shot. The starfish lurched toward me simultaneously. Nora piled on the aggression now that I was out of bullets, but as long as I could last another second or two…
She was animating her starfish with psionic commands to their nerves and muscles. But the starfish had to be giving her some form of feedback. That counted as communicating with her little minions.
One might even say she was connected to them.
The antennae in my hand was made from the same psionic-sensitive material she’d shown me and was using now. The second my sweeper dialed in on the finer points of the signal she was using…any second now… there.
I won.
After I’d isolated the signal, my superconnector took all of one second to map out her connection with her tendrils.
I fed a psionic burst into my transceiver, carefully tuning the output signal to disrupt the connection I’d analyzed.
Every starfish went limp simultaneously, a couple just inches from adhering themselves to my body. Even the tendrils she hoisted herself with went limp.
“And that’s game,” I said.
Nora was quick on the uptake though. I’d suppressed her remote tendril control, but she could still animate whichever ones she was in physical contact with. She restored that contact after just a second of dangling from the tendril gripping the ceiling.
As soon as she was mobile again, she went straight for me.
A burst of orange smoke exploded where I dropped the smoke bomb though, instantly obscuring me.
She plunged into the cloud, forgetting to scout around herself with her cascade for one second too many. I manually loaded an extra bullet I’d materialized at the start of all this, took careful aim…and fired.
She gave a yelp at the paintball bursting on the back of her head.
“That’s a kill,” I said. “Call it?”
“[Uncle…]” she grumbled. “You…are a liar and a cheat.”
“If you have to shoot, shoot,” I shrugged. “But I really didn’t cheat in this case.”
“The smoke?” she asked. “And the reload. You said you weren’t going to do any more Adeptry.”
“I made the smoke and the extra bullets at the same time I made the gun and antennae,” I said. “You saw what I made in my hands and let yourself assume I hadn’t created anything else on me. So when I could tell you were counting bullets, I knew you’d get aggressive when I ran out. You shouldn’t have. Your first instinct was good: you can’t beat me up close. Gun or not.”
“Yeah…but I really thought I’d last longer,” she huffed. “I put a lot of work into getting the psionic-sensitive nerves working.”
“[Those starfish are really tough to deal with, I couldn’t let myself get touched even once,]” I conceded. “[You just forgot what psionics I’ve been developing,]” I brandished the antennae I’d beaten her with.
“What exactly is that?” she replied.
“[Signal sweeper,]” I said. “But for psionics instead of radio.”
Her eyebrow rose.
“You got it working?”
“In a manner of speaking. It works a lot better for psionics. I still don’t quite know how we’re going to know if its detecting what we want it to though.”
That search was dead in the water unless we found a way to sample a drone’s broadcasting.
“…Rende Braskin,” Nora recalled, finding the name in her psionics. “You knew that name. Were you quizzing me?”
“Maybe,” I smiled.
Despite jumping all over everything, we hadn’t actually made much of a mess in the gym. A few machines had been pushed a few inches out of place, but things hadn’t gone on very long. Cleanup was equally short.
·····
We went back up to our apartment for the rest of the evening, finding Nai sitting in the common room with her pet.
“Didn’t expect to see you back here,” I said honestly. “I thought you had duty assignments for the next three days.”
“I’ve been put on suspension,” she admitted. “Medical evaluator doesn’t want me in the field until we know more about what’s going on with my brain and your superconnector.”
“It was a medical decision?” I asked. “A psychologist?”
“I was the one who suggested the evaluation, so I can’t be that upset at the result,” Nai said, “but still, what qualifies a psychologist to pull me off duty?”
“What do you mean ‘qualified’?” Nora asked. “Psionically? Or just…mental health…ily.”
“Casti and Farnata medical science hasn’t fully reconciled psychotherapy with their preconceptions of medicine,” I told her. “Which makes it all the more surprising Laranta had someone to make that call.”
“She’s not the most successful Coalition admiral,” Nai said, “but among the Vorak she is the most feared. Other Casti leaders don’t have her shamelessness. She’ll aggressively copy and adapt tactics the Vorak use, even administrative and logistic ones.”
“You mean the Vorak have counselors, but the Coalition doesn’t?” I asked.
“The Deep Coils at least,” Nai said. “Not sure about the Red Sails, but it wouldn’t surprise me. Individualized mental care would be a very ‘Vorak’ idea.”
“[Is it ‘individualized’, ‘mental’, or ‘care’ that makes it very ‘Vorak’?]” Nora asked.
“The first two,” Nai said. “It’s hard to say anything that accurately applies to a homeworld’s entire culture, but Vorak tend to be very individualistic, and very…”
“Psychological?” I suggested.
“…I was trying to think of a better word, but yes.”
“[Where does that come from?]” Nora asked. “[Generally, I mean. I want to learn more about alien stuff. Especially about the Vorak.]”
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“I’d like to learn more about Earth too,” Nai said. “Even though Caleb and I have both traded memories, he has a greater opportunity to learn from them than I do.”
“[Oh, I can learn about the Vorak later,]” Nora said, leaning forward. “[What do you want to know?]”
“Wait,” I interjected. “You have to give her answers in Starspeak, not English.”
“[Booo…]” Nora said. “[Actually wait,] that’s also not a bad idea.”
“What do you want to know?” I asked Nai.
“I don’t know exactly,” she shrugged. “Who’s the most widely known individual human being to ever live?”
Nora traded a look with me.
“On three?” I said.
“One…two…three…” she counted.
“[…Jesus,]” we both said.
“Huh,” Nai said. “I’m legitimately surprised you both had the same name. Ask any two Farnata that question and you’ll get three answers. Casti too. So who’s ‘Jesus’?”
“Religious figure, lived about two thousand years ago,” I said.
Nai’s eyebrows rose.
“That long ago? And his name is that widely known?”
“Well, I’m trying to think if there’s some other figure from the rest of the world that would compete,” Nora said. “It’s not like they don’t have anyone…but [Rome] spread [Christianity] more or less everywhere, right?”
“What about more recent figures?” Nai asked. “I take it you’re from [America] too?”
“[You told them about America?]” Nora asked, giving me a quizzical look.
“Of course,” I said. “Not a ton, I mean, but some. You didn’t tell Halax anything?”
“Starspeak!” Nai reminded her.
“[I—] I kept it vague. We talked mostly about tech and biology.”
“Your nation,” Nai said, wrestling us back on topic.
“The [United States of America],” I said. “It’s a democratic republic. We vote for a president, senators, representatives. Complicated stuff.”
“Booo,” Nai said, mimicking Nora. “Details are the fun part.”
“First religion, now politics: you keep going for topics that breed conflict,” I said.
“Speak for yourself,” Nora grinned. “I’d love to talk religion with an alien.”
“Compromise then,” Nai said. “Some personal background. I don’t think Caleb and I have actually sat down much and talked about where we come from.”
“What, you mean like play a stupid name game like on the first day of class?”
“Middle name, how many family members you have, favorite food, and one interesting fact about yourself?” Nora suggested.
“You’re doing this on purpose…” I muttered. “You're doing this to spite me.”
“Perils of being the youngest one here,” Nai smiled. “And since Nora came up with the list, you have to go first.”
“Ugh, middle name? Really?” I asked.
“Personal and embarrassing?” Nai asked Nora with a glance.
“Only as much as you make it,” Nora said tauntingly. “Go slow. One answer at a time so we can…properly savor your embarrassment.”
“Theodore,” I said evenly. “As in Roosevelt.”
Nora leaned closer, scrutinizing me. “That was…a little too easy. Are you lying? Is he lying Nai?”
“I don’t know…” she said. “I think he’s telling the truth…but maybe not all of it.”
“You have a second middle name!” Nora said gleefully.
“No I don’t!” I sputtered. “I have just one middle name.”
“But…?” Nora prompted.
“…I’ve got a Korean name too,” I said, rolling my eyes. “No one in my life ever calls me by it except my grandma.”
“Ooo…” Nora said. “Did you notice that, Nai? He gave up on the middle name, and tried to segue to the next thing on the list.”
“It was a good effort,” Nai agreed. “I’m inclined to give it to him.”
“Family members?” Nora asked me. Thankfully not pressing me.
“I’m an only child. Mom has a brother and a sister, dad has five brothers but I’ve only met one of them. Never met my grandparents on my dad’s side. Grandmother on my mother’s side was born in [Korea], she met my grandfather when he was deployed there. They married after and she moved to the states with him. The end. Happy?”
“Very,” Nora said.
“This is payback for shooting you this afternoon, isn’t it?” I asked.
“I’m sure I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she said. “Favorite food?”
Well at least she was keeping things moving forward.
“That one is even harder…” I grumbled. “Favorite food…[milk and cookies].”
“What?” Nora scoffed. “That’s not food, it’s…”
She seemed at a loss for words, but it was Nai’s reaction that caught my attention.
“When I say that, how much do you know what I’m talking about?”
“I…can’t picture it,” Nai said. “…But when you say the words, I get impressions of a taste. What is it exactly?”
“Well [cookies] are these baked…lumps of starch and sugars, plus extras. You bake the lumps and they turn into little crispy discs, and you can dip them in milk.”
“Gross,” Nai said. “The milk, I mean.”
“Do Farnata not drink milk?” Nora asked.
“Some did, but that’s more a Vorak thing,” Nai shrugged. “Most of Farnata domesticated the wrong kind of animals for that.”
“Your loss,” I said. “That means you don’t have [cheese].”
“I feel like you might have [cheated],” Nora said. “Favorite food is like…the meal you’d demand on your [birthday] or something. Why [milk and cookies]?”
“I’m a sucker for [Christmas],” I shrugged. “You’ve got one thing left, then it’s one of you two’s turn.”
“This last one does have the most…[open-ended-ness, Caleb?]”
“Open ended,” Nai clarified.
“Something interesting about myself…” I said. This one also put you most on the spot, because we had to say something we found interesting about ourselves…
“Psionics would be an easy answer,” I said. “But I’m trying to be a good sport…”
My mind churned. It was hard to say anything about myself without referencing the most interesting thing about me. I’d been abducted!
But that didn’t really matter so much next to someone else with the same experience.
“Oh! I’ve got a perfect one,” I grinned. “I outdid [Neil Armstrong!]”
Nora’s eyes widened when she realized what I was talking about. “[Holy shit, that’s right! You actually walked on the planet!]”
“Bzzzzt,” I droned. “Penalty for Nora! That was too much English.”
“No human has walked on another planet?” Nai asked.
I shook my head. “Nora and her troop have been on moons, but I’m the only human being alive to actually walk on another proper planet.”
“Ah, give us a few years,” Nora said. “I’m sure we’ll get someone on [Mars] soon.”
“If we make it back quickly enough, those someones could be us,” I pointed out.
“Now that would be [cool],” she smiled.
“Alright, I did my sharing,” I said. “Someone else’s turn.”
“I’ll go next,” Nai said.
“Middle name!” Nora prompted.
“They don’t have those,” I said. “But ‘why’ actually connects to the second thing on the list.”
“Hush Caleb, let me tell it,” Nai said. “Farnata babies almost always get single syllable personal names unless they have lots of older siblings. But the rest of our names are taken from family members,” Nai said. “Nerin and I are from a nation called Pinsa, and our surnames are the names of our parents followed by…a sort of ‘clan’ name, or family lineage name. My mother’s personal name is ‘Cal’, my father was ‘Yan’, and our family is named for a founding ancestor: ‘Ti’.”
“Hence, Cal-Yan-Ti,” I elaborated for Nora’s benefit.
“So…[purely hypothetically], if you had a baby with someone named…say…’Jon’, and the kid’s name was…”
“Nak,” I suggested.
“Nak,” Nora agreed, “then the kid’s full name would be…‘Nak Nai-Jon-Ti’?”
“Correct,” Nai said.
“Does the mother’s name always come first?” I asked.
“In the Ti family? Yes,” Nai said. “But it depends. Every family has their own personal quirks to it, especially after the Razing. A lot of Pinsa conventions were adopted widely after the planet fell.”
“Okay, favorite food,” I said.
“Bisrassamenra,” Nai said.
I flinched, the word straining my brain. Just mentioning it evoked a non-specific warm flavor in my mouth. But it was chaotic. My brain knew it didn’t have the tools to process what taste it felt should be associated with the word.
“How much can you tell about it?” Nai asked me.
“I’ve…got…some kind of noodles?” I said, trying to reach for memories I didn’t have. “…You haven’t eaten it in years…”
Sadness flickered across her face, but she shook it off quickly.
“No, I haven’t. You’re right, it’s a special kind of paper thin noodle that gets served with pik. Before the Razing, it was kinda cheap. Now it’s basically a luxury. It’s basically impossible to get the stuff to make it outside of Dar system.”
“Dar,” Nora said. “That’s the Farnata sun?”
She nodded.
“Keep going then,” I said. “One interesting thing.”
Like me, she had to slow down for this one. But that just meant she was carefully considering her answer.
“I…don’t know if I have something that interesting that you don’t already know. I decided to enlist in the military when I was young, I did, and then the remnant Farnata militaries joined the Coalition. I haven’t… done that much with my life outside fighting.”
“Do you play any music?” Nora asked. “What about reading? Is there a game of some kind you like?”
Nai shook her head to the first two, but brightened at the last suggestion.
“Actually yeah,” she said. She materialized a grooved nine by nine board with a pair of figures on the center tiles of opposite rows. “It’s called Huru, ‘Walls’ in Starspeak. We take turns either moving a figure or placing a wall in one of the grooves. The goal is to move your piece to the furthest row before your opponent can do the same.”
“No diagonals?” I asked.
Nai nodded. “The only other rule is that you can’t trap your opponent’s piece with walls. There has to be some route for both players to reach the goal. You can block them, make them turn around. Anything so long as there’s an open path somewhere.”
“How many walls is each player allowed to place?” I asked.
“Depends on the handicap,” Nai said. “Standard is ten, but once you place down a wall, it’s there for good. No taking them back.”
She and Nora started a game, quickly moving their pieces toward the middle of the board, blocking each other with a few walls. Watching Nai play made me notice how unusual the creation was for her.
I picked up a wall-piece and inspected how thin it was: maybe a quarter centimeter.
“This is fine work for you,” I commented. “You can’t make anything thinner than a centimeter…”
“…Unless I go slowly, and practice it frequently,” she said. “And I have a lot of practice making this game. Nerin and I used to play all the time when we were younger, and we’re really good. The game is a great way to practice thinking ahead and reacting to potential obstacles and situations before they arise.”
“…You just won, didn’t you?” Nora asked, frowning at the game board.
Nai had put her walls behind her own piece, leaving two holes for Nora to progress through. But once she drew close enough to one, Nai could just block it off, forcing Nora to backtrack to the other gap.
“Yep,” Nai said. “You’ve got four walls left, and even if you place them optimally, it’ll take me no more than six turns to reach the goal. You’re looking at eight turns, even if I don’t place my last wall.”
Nora tipped over her pawn in defeat.
“We could probably mock up a psionic version of the game,” I said. “That could be an interesting exercise…making little game modules.”
“Maybe I will…” Nai mused. “But I want to hear from a human who isn’t named Caleb now.”
“[Right, my turn. Ugh, why did I—nono, I gave the grief, I can take it too…]” Nora said. “My middle name is [Rachel].”
“That’s the easy one, though,” I said. “Talking about family is the more personal and awkward one.”
“[No kidding,]” Nora muttered. “If… I were…cruel, I would point out the list just calls for number of family members. Technically you didn’t have to share background. But…since I am gracious, I will match your stake, [so to speak].”
She shifted awkwardly, trying to disguise it like she was taking her time picking out the right Starspeak, but she’d been speaking nearly flawlessly up until now.
With how eager she’d been earlier, I was a little surprised it seemed to be as awkward a topic for her as it was for me.
“…Any second now,” I said.
“Hush, you, I’m getting there,” Nora said. “I’ve got a brother and a sister, but they’re both a lot older than me. I don’t know them super well. Both sets of grandparents are still alive. I’ve only got one aunt, so not a ton of cousins. And…I am avoiding talking about my parents, aren’t I?”
“No pressure,” Nai said.
“No, I want to share,” Nora said. “[Even if I have to force it out.] I didn’t talk much about my family with my [campers]. My parents are…very religious. Devout, even. And up until shortly before I was abducted, I was too. Devout, I mean. And when I was first abducted, on a ship full of other girls, we…talked.”
“If not about your parents, then religion?” I asked.
Nora nodded. “[You’re actually the first person I came out to,]” she admitted.
Probably best not to buzz her for the English. She settled right back into Starspeak anyway.
“It was the other girls I was abducted with that made me come to terms with being [gay]. I already knew, but I wasn’t…okay with it. I was… very in denial about liking women. I thought it was something I should try to fix about myself. Back on Earth, there was one girl in particular, she made me realize I was gay…I said some really awful things to her. It wasn’t until I talked with the other abductees about [God], right and wrong, and more that I…changed my mind.”
“How does this connect to your parents?” Nai asked.
Nora hesitated, realizing she’d gone somewhat off topic.
“…She’s not sure how her parents might react,” I realized.
Nora nodded. “It kept me up for the first few months, before I knew we were [in for the long haul.] I…know they love me, but I think that actually makes it more daunting. If they react even a little how I did…”
“It would be crushing,” Nai finished.
Again, Nora could only nod.
“[…That’s why you went easy on me,]” I realized.
“[It does take one to know one, Caleb,]” Nora agreed.
“I might have a parallel problem,” I said. “After Nai talked to me, I thought about my parents. I wondered if I was being unfair to you because of how I was raised. But when I thought about my parents, I realized I have no idea what they think about being [gay]. It…made me feel like I’d been manipulated somehow. I had this thought, that was undoubtedly mine, but I have no good idea how I got it.”
“Children are raised by much more than our parents,” Nai pointed out. “Farnata, at least, are raised just as much by the children around them. And children can be very cruel, when allowed. Talking with Caleb seemed to indicate that’s the case with your people too. Are Human children taken as easily with fads as Farnata are?”
“Yes,” I said plainly. “Adults too sometimes.”
“We should find you more Vorak to talk to,” Nai said. “Both of you. Their ancestors dragged their entire planet to the brink of survival with nuclear war. There’s a widespread conscientious modern effort to try to learn from their predecessors with their predecessors’ mistakes well in mind. They have a phrase for it, wenzha ent khor: ‘neither worship, nor hatred’.”
“So how much…credit am I supposed to give them?” Nora asked. “I…understand why they would attack me. I’ve believed what they believed. I get it. [But…I’m—] I’m worried that if—or when—my parents disapprove, I’m going to feel the urge to agree with them. [Capitulate]. But…I like who I am. I like who I’ve become, and I like who I’m becoming.”
“…I have no idea,” Nai admitted. “But whatever the case, I’d like to know about it—stay in touch, you know? I think that’s an admirable attitude. ‘Liking’ yourself, not just who you are, but who you’re intending to become.”
“Me too,” I said. It was the kind of thing Daniel would have approved of.
“[…I kinda dragged us off topic,]” Nora said. “Sorry.”
“Bzzzt,” Nai and I both tried to make the same sound.
“No English!” I said.
“I asked to hear more of your backgrounds. I don’t think it was off topic at all,” Nai said. “But the English? Clearly against the rules we laid out.”
“And, you’ve still got two items on the list!” I said. “So you better hurry up and tell us your favorite food. And, fair warning, you snubbed my [milk and cookies] so be prepared to endure the same.”
“[Okay,]” Nora said, smiling. “My favorite food has to be…”