“That sounds perfect. Okay if I ride in the back till we get there?” The lad punched a pretend sequence into the dash between the buttons.

“No problem. Won’t be very long, I know a place in Betacort,” replied the Captain. Toller poked his way to the hold, mussing his short black hair with a hand. A moment where looking presentable was not required. He took a seat on the floor against the wall, as he felt the smooth action of the ship’s low-altitude scoot. He dug into his pocket and brought out the slip of paper with thirteen words written on it in three lines.

parboiled generous diverticulated immediate
crystalline veracity conjugation aorta sphinx
keratinaceous quorum zenith wander

Maybe someone could make sense of it, but he didn’t want to try. She said he could bring this seal to the management to run it through their system, if he wanted, and they would let him in. He’d have a place to stay, and get to receive the finest schooling the Pan-Galactic Imperium had to offer. Tell them, full ride with dorm. She said her younger brothers would be in school with him, and that Cristobal was very close to his age. She said it all carefully, without commanding him in any way, only that this was possible and that he may go if he liked. Her even, careful tone communicated trust in whatsoever he felt he should do or say, and her penetrating gaze gave him her opinion that this may be something that he, or she, or they, would very much like to happen. Toller worked on memorizing the words in order, in case he lost the slip of paper. Sometimes even pants get left behind.

Wendel spoke over the com, “I’m parking now at Diner Vertris. Serious comfort food, order whatever you want. I know I will!”

The diner had simple booths, and the walls were muraled with vertrisian foliage. They shared an appetizer, took their time over an entree each, and then got dessert. Chuckles between comfortable silences, and gazing through the window onto a sunny afternoon. Halfway through dessert, Toller put down his fork and said, “Hey, I’m going to split and walk around for a while. Be just myself again.”

Wendel slowed her chewing as she read his look, quirking her mouth in a smile. “Going to enjoy terra firma? I can understand that. We had a long and distant voyage.” The Captain pulled out her cash folio and slapped a stack of bills on his side of the table, which the boy pocketed. “It’s enough for a backpack, supplies, and a fare. You know my CD signal.” She also produced one each of four different contact cards. “You can use any of these to get in touch, depending on your area and your order of business. Anytime, whatever I’m doing, I’ll get back to you ASAP.”

Toller chased together one more pile of jungleberry cobbler. “I believe you. Thanks.” Delivering the bite to his mouth, he tapped the table with his hands as he stood, scooting out of the booth. He walked through the door and past the windows, meeting glances with Wendel as he headed away. Smiling, she quietly finished her dessert, and then finished the rest of his.

There was frequent traffic through the back loading bay, since it was still pre-banquet and pre-fashion show. The pair was waved in when they flashed their obviously relevant item; the important checkpoints were internal, so door security acted mainly as helpers and emergency watch.

As the two walked purposefully through the hotel map, Derringer eyed the perceivable form of Yrenn Tiche, pinched her practical outfit, and poked her soft arm. “Wow, that’s convincing,” he muttered to one side. “I could forget that you’re the Princess. But I won’t.”

It would be worth it. Soleil said what she could use, and the krewe said what they could do. It was lock and key, demand meets skill. It helped that they were at the ebullient age where they had new talent and enjoyed flexing it to prove themselves. Drift X handled the contact like it was a regular Vedani aetherscape interface terminal, utilizing one of the text monitors with flattened-output letter-based imagery translation. They planned on bouncing the program module back and forth a couple more times, mostly building in Soleil’s access flap and broadening hardware versatility. She had time now to scope an entry.

The Captain let her borrow her infosheet again. This time, Wendel showed Soleil how to open the programming reroute to use more computer capabilities than the infosheet firmware. One of her recent contracts, a green-haired scientist, had ramified the transport driver’s infosheet upon interest, for the favor of using it. The lightcloth design was so handy, no wonder it was a popular device. Soleil took it with her for more solo time in the gunnery.

Princess Soleil hadn’t used her masque in a long time, and it would be nice to know how well it still worked. She had tied together this anonymous communications access route way back when she was a teenager exploring outside the confines of privilege. The average bedroom window escape in the form of a virtual peephole that only used modified Trailknife freeware, her setup still floating in a forgotten corner of academic history.

An innocent prank of yore was was putting herself onto invite lists. No lists of record, since that could come back to her. Not necessarily because she could go, but maybe she’d want to. Not as many events think to invite the Princess as one might guess, but certainly they’d be glad if she’d like to go.

Soleil opened a series of individual windows and fell into the step-by-step rhythm of gaining anonymity, and creating a new identity that fit the system she was entering. Boot/log/open/encrypt/access/select/search/encrypt/route/access/closewindows/erasetrail. Masque. After that, Yrenn Tiches was now a listed volunteer for the Women’s Leadership Symposium, in case she needed to officialize, and she would appear as the alias, Yrenn. Princess Soleil tasted the irony of hardly using her dragon’s boon of perceptual disguise until she was back home. She felt done. That was it. She folded the infosheet and waved it in the air as she went forward to talk to the others.

Derringer, Wendel, and Toller were chatting up front, facing the eerie view of a darkened orbit cluster. Captain Wendel accepted her infosheet from the Princess. Soleil leaned up casually as if just to join their conversation, though they’d gone quiet in expectation. To the private investigator, she said, “You’ll be happy. We’re going back to Alisandre.”

“Mm.” Derringer took this in with the slightest of nods. “Okay.” He didn’t expect to be dunking the puck straight in the bucket, but he could keep the prizewinner in good condition with his eye out for deal closure. If he tried to control her, he’d lose her. There’s no strongarming this one, not if he wants to keep his good name when she reaches power.

“Alright,” said Wendel as she readied. Toller secured himself in the copilot’s chair. “Let’s fire up this woodstove.” They knew she was referring to the potbellied unit installed by the Vedani, which glowed a little when Drift X was engaging in jump. “Nice and toasty.”

Current date of the Pan-Galactic Synchrony, that’s what she needed next. She set Wendel’s infosheet out on the equipment where she could read and navigate, taking good care of the loaned device. Glimpsing at the Synchrony date, Soleil reckoned it into a few different planetary timeframes to see if any familiar events were coming up.

Yes – right about now, the Women in Leadership Symposium should be underway just outside of Alisandre Capital. Margeaux would undoubtedly be helping to run that in some capacity, as long as it’s happening. This would be her cousin’s seventh running year of involvement, back since they started taking advanced courses. Innovative problem solvers with armloads of trade secrets? Princess Soleil would take that, along with the sight of one of her most familiar faces.

She went looking for news of the event. It was on in just a few days. But the WLS had been co-opted as a Relief Assistance annex group, so it was now both a drive and an organizational meeting. The fundraising was being redirected, and though some of the original program items remained, including the fashion show, there were lots of action items related to the populace in lockdown-affected urban areas. Things like supply distribution and information dispersal.

The Princess made a quick detour through mainpage headlines. There was a lot about the recent Red Nexus Dragon attack on the fleets. Tabloids were surging with confessionals which, now that she’d met them herself, read as obviously Kao-Sidhe related. Many connected to the battle, or to a rediscovered long-lost heirloom. Essay magazines were discussing new theory completions about the meaning of the Vedani window picture shows. Soleil could spot a lot in those that she could corroborate from her own educational voyage and liminal download, though the shift in perspective was sometimes dizzying.

There could be something that Margeaux Rienne could do for her, other than a welcome moment of recognition unlikely to be betrayed. So long as Soleil could make it work in time, it could really help. She’d have to see if she could contact some of the handsignal crew. Drift X could probably manage that connection. It would have to be worth getting her bestie involved in dangerous schemes.

Soleil was feeling up to speed on the elements of her current trajectory coming from this side of the Imperium-wide conflagration that she knew was taking place. The boil of activity was observable in the sequence of events – the way they followed each other, and grew off the previous into the next. The accrual of experiences was producing a wholeness of perspective that wasn’t coming into being upon her whims for her personal edification. Now, after all that, the initiative was hers and she was in home territory, with means, assistance, and protection.

The most effective thing she could do was amplify her gains to the benefit of her peoples. The connections she had forged, the crucial information – she had conceptual cabinets of items that could stem the flow of disaster. They needed to land in the right places, at the right times – which she could ascertain upon learning the greater series of current events beyond her purview, now that she was no longer immersed in a separate struggle for understanding.

Considering everything she’d learned, all of this was unlikely to effect the better course if she simply brought it to authority. That was especially so considering the role of the current Imperial authority – her father – in the creation of the problems in conflict. That could amount to very little.

She sent out thought feelers for the touchpoints in her network that might be trustworthy without prompting or assurance, direct unaided contacts that could serve as platforms or jumping-off points; appropriate beginning stations. Visualizing the flattened-enfolded Greater Dymaxion star map, the Princess illuminated it with her hotspots and directionalities.