The Socialite's New Clothes IC
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The Socialite's New Clothes IC
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“I will return here in the morning,” Ichante says. “It is not far from where I live and it is a pleasant walk along the waterfront.” In truth, she’s conflicted about walking along the water. It’s fine if the water stays over there while Ichante is over here, but she does enjoy the sea breezes, especially in the morning when the marine air is heaviest. There is, of course, the possibility that K-E could hassle her for wearing an E-zone outfit in an AAA neighborhood, but she can always alter her image for the duration of the walk.
She returns home, a short-ceiling apartment in the portion of the Underground near Lordstrung’s that’s gentrifying now that Proposition 23 has passed. The design of the dress does not take long; these days, the ideas are falling out of Ichante’s head as quickly as she can write them down. It almost feels like she’s a glass for some pitcher of creativity being poured out of the astral. She also jots down several possible variations, then gets carried away and designs shoes and a handbag that would complement the dress, even though she didn’t take any foot measurements, and then finally falls asleep with the lights still on and some guitar music still playing.
Monday Morning, March 7, 2078, Exterior, Gates Undersound Hotel, Seattle
Ichante shows up at the hotel and looks more like a lost hiker than anything. Her Wild Hunt jacket looks like brown buckskin and her tan baseball hat is a similar color. Her denim jeans are still dusty and dirty – courtesy of the CAS – and her boots are similarly caked in Texas clay and loam from the Edwards Plateau. A sharp eye might identify her boots as SDF-issue, but most people will just think they came from the Metroplex Guard surplus store. Underneath, she wears an old Seattle Screamers jersey.
“I’m actually a Lakota Arrows fan,” she shrugs. “I like the Mountain Dragons too. The Screamers are fine. I just find that Barrens residents are tribal around everything. I was in Puyallup when the Screamers won the Cup four years ago…” She gives a wide-eyed look of astonishment at the memory. “Madness. But, at the same time, I had never seen the Barrens so happy. What else could please so many different people so universally? You’d have to get a crop duster to spray the district in novacoke.”
There’s a bulge in her shoulder holster that suggests she’s armed. It makes the hotel’s security a bit nervous, but she’s broadcasting the right licenses for it. After all, the only people not packing heat around here are the ones so rich that they pay others to do it for them.
“I’ve had my soykaf and breakfast. I updated my will, plus my medical and financial powers of attorney.” It’s not clear if she’s serious or if this is a dry joke, although the barest twitch at the corner of her mouth suggests the latter, or perhaps both. “Shall we?”
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Monday Morning, March 7, 2078, Exterior, Gates Undersound Hotel, Seattle
Tanya had been sitting in one of the large overstuffed sofas in the hotel’s grand lobby when Ichante appeared. Smiling, she stands and walks over to her, a steaming to-go cup in the hand she stretches out. She looks her companion up and down as she sips from her own cup. “I was not sure if you would have had any caf yet, so I got you something. I can drink it if you do not want it. You look good, but I think we should leave before security takes too much of a look at us.”
As the walk past the doorman, Tanya nods to Ichante’s chest. “Screamers, eh? Yeah, I remember being at that game. Wall to wall pandemonium. It was such a trip. We aren’t doing so badly this year, either, but I am not sure if it is going to be good enough to make the playoffs. The transit station is not too far from here and I was hoping that you would want to walk. We can only go so far by transit and then must walk, anyway. Glad to see that you are armed. You can be my hero if anyone bothers us.”
Tanya laughs as she walks towards the nearest transit station, stopping along the way to pick a couple of oranges from a street stand near the station. Two tickets later and both women make their way to the platform, picking up the next train that is headed their way.
22
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“I’m sure security will give me a pass if I’m with you,” Ichante says dryly.
They catch a waterfront trolley, which rolls south toward the looming massiveness of the ACHE. There’s a transit hub not far from there with options leading east. The oranges make her shake her head a bit. Only in Downtown would they think to sell fresh fruit on the street. Corpers. She wonders if the oranges are for them or for the orphans. She likes grapefruits better, but she’s never turned down fresh fruit in her life.
Ichante also wonders about Lady Tanya’s security. She had shown up at the hotel half-expecting (okay, mostly expecting) Monique to drive them to Redmond in an Ares Roadmaster. Transit plus walking is decidedly… pedestrian for a capital-L Lady.
“Are you armed?” Ichante asks once they’re seated and in transit. “A tazer, anything? Based on the specifications for the dress, I’m not even going to ask if you’re armored.”
Ichante looks around. It’s Monday morning and transit is mostly full of sleepy commuters, some headed toward the downtown core while others finish up their late shifts and head home. Unsurprisingly, there seem to be a lot of the latter headed to Redmond with the ladies.
“Bold of you to assume I can protect you. I did say I had military training, but that was just 12 months.” She leaves off the 48 months of reserve duty, fearing that it undermines her point. “I don’t remember the last time I actually shot at something. I wonder if I remembered to load it? Hmm.” Again, it’s unclear if she’s serious or this is her sense of humor.
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Monday Morning, March 7, 2078, Exterior, Gates Undersound Hotel, Seattle
Tanya chuckles as she peels one of the oranges and offers the other to her companion. She shakes her head at the questions. “I do not really hold much reliance in guns and do not own even a taser. I do have a dart gun artfully hidden in my clothes, which are armored as you supposed. If something bad happens, I have some skills that I can use, but I would first try to talk my way out of trouble. I appreciate your willingness to take care of me and I hope I do not need that help. However, we are going to be walking several blocks into the Redmond Barrens, and who knows what excitement we will find, eh? It could be an interesting day, indeed.”
23
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Monday Morning, March 7, 2078, Touristville, Redmond, Seattle
Ichante accepts the orange and peels it, knowing in advance it will make her hands sticky. Well, such are the advantages of wearing dirty clothes: she just wipes her hands on her jeans and calls it good. The smell of the orange draws some covetous glances from the graveyard shift employees, but they’re too tired to say or do anything.
The light rail takes the women east across Lake Washington. (Ichante unconsciously holds her breath while on the bridge, as she tries not to imagine the deep meters of dark, cold water underneath her…) Ichante stares at Council Island on the way over, or at least as much as she can from the concrete trough that carries the rail across the island. The tall evergreen trees call to her and she feels a kinship with the terrain, even if it’s not particularly like the plains where she grew up. “I need to visit,” she says under her breath, more to herself than anyone, but she’s easily overhead by Tanya. She wonders if her Sioux SIN would make it easier to get on the Island; Sioux-Salish relations are more cordial than the Seattle-Salish relationship, which is constantly strained.
In Bellevue they transfer to a northbound train that follows 405, then swings east to follow 520. Originally this route was meant to deliver tech workers to and from Redmond, but then the Crash of 2029 flipped the table and scattered all the money and game pieces everywhere. Now the line stops in Touristville, where it serves wageslaves too low on the totem pole to afford something nicer, or the tourists and rich kids who want to go slumming in the Barrens. Upon reflection, Ichante realizes that’s what she and Lady Marisart qualify as right now.
“Here we are,” Ichante says, stepping onto the platform as the rail car empties out at the end of the line. “The late winter sunshine isn’t warm, but the light serves as a disinfectant of sorts. Knight-Errant is more willing to patrol during the day, the Crimson Crush are sleeping off whatever bender they were on last night, and the 162s are… wherever ghouls go during the day. The sewers, I would imagine. Which direction are we going?”
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Monday Morning, March 7, 2078, Exterior, Gates Undersound Hotel, Seattle
Tanya watches the terrain pass by as the trains pass over the city. She is acutely aware of Ichante’s increased tension as they pass over Lake Washington, but only reaches out to give the other woman what she hopes is a comforting touch on the arm. Tanya tries to keep focused on what is happening to her adopted city and part of her mind goes to the massive hospital being built in Chinatown. Her part in that project is very minimal, now, but she can look in the mirror and tell herself that it is HER dream coming true.
She motions for Ichante to walk near her as the pair disembark from the train. At Ichante’s question, she smiles and nods across the street, where the road makes its way into the Redmond Barrens. “We go that way. The orphanage is about ten blocks in.”
The two walk about half a block and already the decay is more pronounced with almost every step. Tired workers coming off the late shifts move with them, expressions nearly dead, as if they have given up on life. Tanya pauses and nods at a small shop, where Ichante can see a young man, probably in his mid-twenties but who can really tell down here. “And bingo. Right on time.”
The young man is joined by four men and two women, all appearing to be about the same age as he is. They all look hardened and are openly carrying weapons. The six stop moving at about twenty feet, spread out a bit so that one grenade could not get them all, but the first man comes forward to about five feet. He stands a bit over six feet tall and looks to be well-muscled. He looks from one woman to the other and nods, a smile forming on his lips. “Good to see you, Miss M. The train was only a few minutes late.” He turns to look at Ichante again. “You did mention a guest would be with you, but you did not say she would be this pretty. A pleasure to meet you. My name is Ivan O’Reilly. We are happy to serve as your escort today.”
24
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Ichante scoffs. She hadn’t altered her looks that much, nor was she riding any magical enhancements, so anyone calling her pretty is delusional or a serial womanizer, or both. She’s well aware that she’s no special beauty; at time it is demoralizing, but she was hoping to turn it to her advantage in the Barrens, to use it as armor to avoid hungry gazes.
That said, Ivan could broadly be categorized as Ichante’s type. She likes them tall and muscled, and he seems to fit the bill. Still, she’s here for orphan babies, not babies of her own. “Charmed, Ivan,” she says, although it’s a degree more snide than polite. She appreciates their defensive tactics, and the mini-perimeter they’ve established. She looks them over for colors or markings, unsure of whether they’re a gang or some sort of tour company that escorts tourists.
Ichante makes conversation as they start to walk. “Who are the local players, Ivan? Who shoots whom around here, and why? Is it still Kanaga-gumi turf or are the Kenran-kai contesting for control? Where do you fit into it all?” Her posture is a bit stiff; the growing background count rankles her, like a cat getting rubbed backwards from tail-to-head.
Ichante lets her eyes unfocus periodically to scan the astral for potential threats. She could summon a spirit to watch her back but she’s always reluctant to bring one into a place of questionable mana. She’ll do it if she feels threatened, or if things get tense, but until then she’ll soldier on by herself. Well, plus these six, plus Mercy’s dart gun, much good may it do her.
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Monday Morning, March 7, 2078, Redmond Barrens, Seattle
Ichante’s look at the seven people near them lets her see that each has an armored jacket on that bears a symbol of a green tree on the front. She also notes that he six outriders are not just looking at her and Tanya, but seem to be scanning the area. When they turn, she sees that the tree design is repeated on the back of the jacket as well, only larger. The weapons carried by all seven seem to be of recent make and look well-tended to. Assensing them lets her know that two of the six have a magical aura about them, while the others have some good cyberware implants. Someone has paid good money to have these people set up like this.
Ivan chuckles and waves his hand to the wretched area away from him, but his eyes narrow a little as he looks closer at Ichante. “Not just another pretty face,are we.” He shrugs and begins to walk down the street, indicating that Ichante and Tanya should walk with him. The other six people with him fan out to form a sort of loose perimeter around the others.
He points to where three young oriental men are lounging against the side of a building. The young men stiffen a bit and one takes a step forward but is pulled back by one of his comrades. “No, you have it right, this part of the Barrens is still run by the Yakuza, but the Koreans are pushing to gain a larger footprint in the area. The Russians are also looking at some territory at the far side of the Barrens. Beyond the major players, there are a lot of smaller gangs that are either attached to the big guys or pretend to be acting independently.”
He looks over at Ichante. “As for us, we primarily provide protection to people who want to slum it up a bit down here in Tourisville and the Barrens. Speaking of which………” He pauses and fishes two red metal bands from a pocket and hands one to each of the women. “These are special DocWagon bands I provide to my clients. If everything goes sideways, the DocWagon guys will come get you. The cost is covered in my fee.”
He turns and continues down the street. “We have about six more blocks to go, and there could be an issue with one of the new players in the area. A few weeks ago, a large Troll wandered out here with a dozen Orks and assorted human hardmen. He claims a loose association with the local Yakuza boss, who apparently lets him run loose as long as he pays his tribute. Miss M and I had a run-in with him a week back and he may still be smarting a bit from that. I do not expect any real trouble, but your day may become a bit more interesting in about three blocks.”
25
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“It might be his day that gets interesting,” Ichante says. She’s much too stubborn to back down or be cowed. Ichante accepts the red metal band. She slaps it on and watches it wrap itself around around her wrist. It’s snug enough that it can take her pulse; hopefully the wireless in this part of town is good enough for the band to actually alert someone if her pulse suddenly stops.
She likes Ivan, who gives complete answers and doesn’t talk down to her. Ichante scans the streets, looking for ill intent. “Best thing about the Yaks controlling the neighborhood is you usually get a respectable noodle cart or two. There’s this one in Puyallup that serves dynamite udon to the Kenran-kai. The Gianellis like good food too but Italian just doesn’t translate to food carts in the same way.” She shakes her head remorsefully.
Walking down the street feels awfully conspicuous. Ichante understands the need for an escort but she can’t help but wonder if a couple escorts might have drawn less attention than a whole squad. Still, they know the lay of the land better than she does. Hopefully the size of the team will be a deterrent, rather than an irritant to the local powers-that-be.
The description of a troll plus some Hard Bois makes Ichante waffle on her decision not to summon. Lady Tanya said that she’d try to talk her way out of trouble. Unless they get straight-up ambushed, that would buy Ichante the second or two she would need to summon backup. She holds off for now.
“So if things go sideways, what’s the play? You breaking into two fireteams, or are you doing the whole ‘protecting the principal’ bit and pulling back with the package?” She juts her chin to indicate Tanya. “I should warn you that I’m pretty terrible at retreating.”
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Monday Morning, March 7, 2078, Redmond Barrens, Seattle
Ivan chuckles. “You really are more than just a pretty face, aren’t you?”
He listens to your comments about food carts and nods. “Correct on both counts, Ichante. In fact, there is a very good noodle cart in the next block. It will be the last chance for something of that quality until we return this way, so if you are hungry, we can stop there.”
As they cross the intersection of the next street, Ivan points out a small noodle cart with perhaps a dozen people standing around it, Some of the people are in line for food, but five young men are lounging next to the cart, three eating from large bowls. “There is the cart I was talking about, and the five lads idling about are with the local Yakuza boss.” He pulls a small plastic tablet from a pocket and shows it to Ichante. “I paid my toll for this pass this morning and they should honor it, so please grab some noodles if you like. To answer your other question, it really depends on who I am escorting. If you were just some tourist from out of town, I would definitely be doing the whole protect the principal thing and getting you out of here. However, with you two, it would be the two fire teams and killing the bad guys.”
Both he and Tanya laugh at the retreating comment and Tanya interjects for the first time. “I like that, Ichante. I knew that you were a woman after my own heart. I am not sure I even know how to spell that word, what was it, oh yes, retreat. In any case, I am going to stop for some noodles here. I like the vendor and he really does a great job. You want some?”
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Ichante looks skeptical. It’s not that she doesn’t want to try the noodles – she does – but it’s mid-morning, she ate not that long ago, and she doesn’t associate noodles with breakfast.
“I was thinking we’d stop for lunch on the way back,” Ichante says. She eyes the five idling lads. She’s not as familiar with Redmond’s Kanaga-gumi as she is with the Kenran-kai in Puyallup, but she knows a bit. She knows that the Kanaga-gumi is conservative, and shipped off all their metahumans and foreigners to Puyallup to fill the Kenran-kai’s ranks (and to be rid of their ideas). The Kenran-kai are modern, even borderline progressive in their notions, and have established “neighborhood watches” to help bring order to some of the more lawless swaths of Puyallup. She strongly doubts that the Kanaga-gumi is so magnanimous. “I don’t want to incur a metahuman tax. Not on the way there at least. Maybe on the way back, when I know how many bullets I have left.” She smiles at her little inside joke; she’d electrocute them, of course.
She privately wishes that she had some of that mental manipulation magic that could help in potentially awkward situations like these, or with the troll. Not the puppeteering sort of magic, but the spells that were just little hints, hypnotic suggestions that you could subtly plant in the target’s mind and watch them sprout from a safe remove. “Now would be a good time to take a leak” or “Let’s go shoot devil rats in the alley”. Little suggestions to help clear the way; normal thoughts softly inserted at normal times.
“It’s close to midmorning snack anyway, right? I’d rather have crackers and peanut butter with the kids.”
There’s a disturbance across the street to their left. An angry ork man is being belligerent toward a a young ork woman carrying young twins. She walks purposely away from him, shielding the babies, while he pursues her and loudly makes a case about his fidelity, her infidelity, how ungrateful she is and how beneficent he is. Ichante doesn’t like the look of his aura, which is growing agitated to the point of violence, but she does like the steely determined look she sees on the woman’s face. She identifies with the hardened look and the woman’s upright, resolute stride.
Ichante twitches her nose and the man stops his rant mid-sentence when he suddenly finds his underwear pulled halfway up his back. The woman only spares him a half glance of derision as he freezes midstep. He gasps for air as his testicles are constrained by the rising fabric. He eventually leaves the ground altogether, is pivoted in midair by an invisible force, and is set down again facing the direction from which he came. His situation is met with condescending laughter from the bored observers of the Barrens. The ork takes the hint and retreats to remove his undergarments from his intergluteal cleft somewhere privately.
“Ready,” Ichante says, slightly brighter than before.
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Monday Morning, March 7, 2078, Redmond Barrens, Seattle
Tanya walks off to the noodle cart and bows slightly to the vendor before speaking to him in very passable Japanese. They hold a short conversation while her order is being prepared, both smiling and laughing at some joke. On her way back, Tanya, to-go bowl and chopsticks in hand, notices the same disturbance that hods Ichante’s attention. She continues forward, keeping an eye on what is developing, arriving at where Ivan and Ichante are standing at about the time the Ork is spinning in the air. She looks around carefully at the other people in the street, keeping a close watch on the lounging youths, one of whom straightens up and hurries away from his companions.
Tanya nods to Ichante and motions with her bowl that they can proceed. “Cool effect, if that was you, and I know why you did it, but we might need a different way home. The Kanaga-gumi is not without magical resources and the use of magic may put them on alert, even if they are not certain who was doing that. Still, you were conservative in your choice of spells and I can appreciate both the desire and the need, Well done, overall.”
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Ichante shrugs noncommittally, not owning up to anything specifically.
“My general experience is that you can’t live life in the Sixth World without pissing someone off. Someone’s going to find a reason to dislike you no matter what. They don’t like you because you’re a dwarf, they don’t like it because you move things with your mind, they don’t like it because you have a bowl of noodles they want. Sometimes we have the luxury of picking and choosing who we piss off, but the answer can’t be ‘nobody’ or ‘nobodies’ because there’s no nuyen in either.”
She gives a dismissive wave of the Yakuza.
“I already have a strike against me for being a meta. If they want to hold something else against me, that’s their panties in a twist, not mine. At a certain point, if you ever want to grow you have to plant your roots and tell the world that you’re done moving; it will have to move around you from now on. After all, every mighty oak was once a little nut who stood its ground.”
Ichante, barely scratching 1.5 meters, looks more like a little nut than a mighty oak, but her expression tells another story.
“Alright, let’s go see if we piss off a troll. The day is young; maybe I can irritate some Halloweeners on our way out of town.”
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Monday Morning, March 7, 2078, Redmond Barrens, Seattle
Tanya smiles and nods. “Some very good words to live by. And we should not have to piss the Troll off, unless you really want to. I was down here last week and we had a slight…………….discussion over travel rights. He ended up agreeing to a very reasonable toll and I agreed to pay it.”
Ivan snorts but does not say anything, just shaking his head and muttering under his breath.
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Ichante moves forward as the procession moves down the street.
In many ways, the Barrens are a time capsule of the 2020s. As Seattle weathered the surge of immigrants following the Treaty of Denver, exurbs like Redmond built apartments and condos to accommodate the masses. In Puyallup the buildings were shoddy, but Redmond was a hub of the tech industry and so built sightly buildings of brick and steel. Then the Crash of ’29 yanked the rug out from underneath the district, and everything went to drek. The buildings still stand but have weathered fifty years of acid raid and general lack of maintenance. Their shells are pockmarked but intact; their souls are mostly hollow. Ichante tries to privately weather the swelling background count.
It is in this setting that they pass by an old two-story firehouse where, perched on the roof, a large troll sits in an oversized (and heavily reinforced) lawn chair and surveys his domain. Vision magnification reveals bloodshot eyes and crust around his mouth and tusks. There’s a peevish look on his face that strongly suggests a headache and/or a hangover. He burps and drinks something reddish. Tomato juice, hopefully, although that would be a prized commodity out this far. A heavy shotgun is within easy reach; a trained eye would recognize it as an Enfield AS-7, but perhaps one that has seen better days.
“Better to walk by and hope he doesn’t say something, or will that just aggravate him?” Ichante subvocalizes. “Don’t know whether it’s worth it to initiate a conversation.”
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Monday Morning, March 7, 2078, Redmond Barrens, Seattle
Tanya grins. “Not exactly sure what that would do, but I don’t think we need to worry about it.”
She nods her head to where two large Orks were approaching the group. Tanya takes a credstick from a pocket and holds it out in her left hand. keeping her right along her side. One of the Orks looks visibly nervous and stops several feet from Tanya, but the other has a bit of swagger about him and approaches to take the ‘stick. However, he does seem to pay close attention to Tanya’s right hand as he reaches out. Tanya says something to the Ork in what seems like passable Or’Zet. The Ork looks around before looking up to where his boss is sitting on the roof of a building. The Troll nods and the two Orks back away after taking the toll.
Tanya turns to Ichante. “See? No real problem this time. It is always good to approach with caution, however, as things can change very quickly down here. We should be at the orphanage in about two blocks. Do you have any questions of me before we get there?”
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What’s it like to be rich? Ichante thinks to herself. What’s it like to have so much nuyen that you can solve any problem with a credstick?
What’s it like to live in a hotel? To have a maid? Does that feel weird to have a servant or is that just what life is like for you?
How much are you dropping on this visit to the orphanage? We have a security detail of seven, all wielding newer weapons. Two are Awakened and the rest of good implants. A crew like that wouldn’t get out of bed for less than ¥500 a day, each, and probably more like ¥1,000 each, plus hazard pay if there’s live fire. So this little jaunt is costing thousands of nuyen, and why? For a little visit? You just have that much money to spare on a single day’s outing? The orphanage is so well-funded that it doesn’t need an extra ¥4K or ¥5K instead of your presence for the day? And is this all for my benefit? If so, why? Why make this sort of investment in me? We’ve barely known each other 12 hours!
Why is your aura so fragged up? Are you some drek-hot mage who’s flexing her signature and fragging with me? Do you have drek-hot mods that look like the real thing? Did you run into a vampire? Are you a vampire? Because if you are your Essence is skating on fragging thin ice, honey.
Why do you speak Or’zet? Granted, I’d like to speak Or’zet since I live in the Underground, but what aspect of your life convinced you to dedicate the time and effort to communicate with orks who, in all likelihood, already speak one of the other languages you speak?
What impact does paying bribes have to the local socioeconomic dynamics of the Barrens? Granted, goons need to eat too, but are they actually providing a service, like protection and order, or are they just a punitive force extracting resources from an economy that can barely spare them? Are we just perpetuating the cycle of violence because it’s convenient for us and we can, or is this the trickle-down economics that allows these fringe societies to survive?
“No, let’s keep moving.”
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Monday Morning, March 7, 2078, Redmond Barrens, Seattle
Tanya nods and continues walking, eating her noodles as she does. She apparently has no difficulty walking and using chopsticks at the same time, all while carrying on a conversation with Ichante. The next two blocks are uneventful and Ivan takes some time to inform Ichante of what is in the neighborhood, and especially what sort of buildings and who lives in them or controls them.
About a half-block from their destination, Ivan lifts an arm and points to one of the nicer-looking building Ichante has seen to far. She sees two men walking on the roof and another two standing near the wide door. As the group gets closer, she notes that all four of the men are wearing the same sort of armored jackets as her escort, including the tree emblems. There is a large sign on the front of the building, indicating that she is approaching the “Sally Bright Orphanage And Home For Abused Women”.
One of the men at the door waves to Ivan and moves forward to shake his hand. “Pretty much right on time, Ivan. The lads and I are ready to be relieved and go spend some of the money you pay us.” Both men chuckle and the new man turns to Tanya and takes her hand as well before looking at you and offering his hand. “Good day to you, Miss M. I hope this slacker did not take you down any wrong streets. And you have a guest. Hello, Miss. My name is Anton Bridger and I am the outgoing shift leader here. I trust that your walk was not too difficult?”
30
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“Ichante,” she introduces herself. “A pleasure, Anton. The walk was not difficult, no.”
She looks around and tries to get her bearings and a sense of the place. The mana in orphanages can often be desperate, often to the point of physical pain, but it can also be hopeful too. An orphanage usually doesn’t have the rock-bottom feeling you might get at a garbage dump, like in Rat City.
“I don’t know much about running an orphanage in the Barrens,” Ichante admits. “The whole prospect is interesting to me. I see plenty of security; is that just a deterrent or are there active threats? What are relations with the locals like?
“I didn’t realize it was a woman’s shelter too. Is it just a halfway house or are there longer-term occupants? How do you handle admissions?”
She looks around for some babies to hold, or some battered women to unbatter.
“Is there schooling as well? What do they eat? What do they play?”
She smiles apologetically. “20 questions, I know. Or if it’s not 20 yet then it will be soon. Perhaps a tour would be a good place to start.”
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Monday Noon, March 7, 2078, Redmond Barrens, Seattle
Anton lifts his arms in mock surrender. “Whoa, Miss Ichante. Too many questions too quickly. I am just one of the hired help down here. Let’s get you sorted with the administrator. Ah here she comes now.”
He nods to where a middle-aged woman is closing on them. She goes first to Tanya and embraces her, exchanging cheek kisses before turning to you, hand outstretched. “Hello. My name is Magritte Avenique and I am the administrator of this facility. I could not help but overhear some of your questions and can try to answer them. Please let me know if I miss anything.” She takes Ichante’s arm in hers and turns to face the building. “Hmmm, I think the order was as follows: The security is here for both reasons, but mainly as a deterrent. We have had a few incidents in the past when an abuser husband, boyfriend, whatever, tried to get his punching bag back. Some of those turned quite ugly until Lady Marisart set up the security arrangements. It is a women’s shelter as well as an orphanage, yes. For most of the women here it is just a place for them to get back on their feet. We try to train them in at least one useful skill and offer some limited job placement help. Some of the women are invited to stay longer than the normal period if they have useful skills that we need here. I was one of those. Admissions can be a tricky area, to be honest. We take any orphans we get and keep them on here unless they fall into bad habits or start mingling with gangs, that sort of thing. We do allow them a couple of chances than they are asked to leave. It breaks our hearts here, but some people just cannot be helped. It is a bit different for the women. We try to vette everyone who comes here, and have found some that are only interested in charity, not working for anything. The women, and the orphans, are expected to do their share to keep this place going. And, unfortunately, some of the women leave here only to come back in a few weeks or even days. There is a school here and we have some gifted teachers, but there is always room for more as it is difficult to keep them when the plight is so great. We have a cafeteria of sorts and the food is more generous than many would get from home but it is still not sufficient in my eyes to give young bodies the chance they need to grow. Some of the food convoys are waylaid and some of the food disappears due to graft or just plain shortages at the suppliers. There is a central playground in the middle of the building. It is open to the air above when it is good, but we can cover it during the acid rains.”
Magritte smiles as she runs an arm across her brow, wiping at some imaginary sweat. “Whew! I do hope I got all of them. Please ask more, though. I am quite proud of what we have built here. This place gives some hope to those who are too often ignored and forgotten. And, yes, I think that a tour is in order. Do you have any more questions before we go in?”
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