Trang by Mary Sisson Page B

shower.”
    Patch gave him a genuinely
perplexed look, and then shrugged his shoulders. “It’s a diplomatic mission,
you know. Besides, by SF standards, those cubicles are fucking nice— you
can fit two people in one of those, easy—and we don’t always have showers. This
door is—oh, sorry, that’s another armory— this door is another office,
which I think the MC wants to use for now, but she could always give it up if
you wind up, like, needing a real staff. Is that all right with you?”
    “Not a problem,” said Philippe.
“Even if I need an assistant, my office looks big enough for two.”
    “Well, it’s up to you,” said Patch.
“More weapons stations, and then this—” he slapped his hand onto the blast
doors that sealed off the end of the corridor “—leads to the no man’s zone, and
through that is where the aliens are. Which is kind of a flight.”
    “And we’re going to visit them
today, right?” Philippe asked.
    “Yeah, if that’s what you want. I
think the MC wants to get everyone situated, and then we can go say hi. I’ll
tell her.”
    “Thanks,” said Philippe. “I’m going
to get situated myself, OK?”
    He walked into his room and began
to unpack his bag. There wasn’t much. The SA wouldn’t even let him bring a
razor or clippers, so he’d been forced to get his head, hands, and feet flashed
in Ottawa—the hair follicles on his face and scalp would be inactive for a full
year, and his nails would not grow. Of course, God only knew what flashing your
head did to the brain, and if he caught his finger in something or stubbed his
toe, he’d have to wear a bandage for months and months. This, it seemed, was progress.
    Philippe put away his gear, walked
into his office to make sure everything there was in working order, and went
back into the bedroom. He pulled off his casual clothes and put on his suit.
    Looking into the mirror he saw a reasonably
dapper man with dark hair and eyes—he had his father’s coloring, although his
eyes were round like his mothers. He looked more tired than either of them,
though. He had looked tired for the past year, and by this point, he was
beginning to wonder if it just meant he was old.
    He was also nervous. As always
before a big meeting, he began to obsess over his grooming, brushing his hair,
smoothing his eyebrows, straightening his suit again and again. He folded down
the turtleneck of the lonjons so that it didn’t stick out over the suit
jacket’s band collar.
    He kept smiling in the mirror— We
are friendly. We are not your enemy. Trust us.
    He felt like a wolf in sheep’s
clothing.
    The banging on his bedroom door
came as a relief. Shanti opened it without waiting for a response and charged
into the room. “Hey, Trang—holy shit! You look nice! Damn, I wish the
SFers got uniforms like that!”
    Philippe couldn’t help but laugh.
“Oh, the DiploCorps is famed for its tailoring. And this is just a traveling
suit—you should see what they wear in Ottawa.”
    “Well, hey, I got some accessories
for you,” said Shanti, shoving some pieces of cool fabric into Philippe’s
hands. “We’ve cleared our area—looks like they didn’t fuck with anything—and
we’ve unloaded, so as soon as you’re ready, we can go meet the freaks.”
    “You mean, fulfill our delicate and
historic mission?” asked Philippe, holding up what looked like two arm-length
gloves and a hood with a transparent face panel.
    “Yeah, that,” said Shanti. “You
know how to use those?”
    Philippe shrugged his shoulders.
“No idea,” he replied.
    She took the gloves and hood out of
his hand. “Take off your jacket,” she said.
    He did, and watched as Shanti
folded up the sleeves of his lonjons. Philippe pulled on the gloves, which
practically went up to his armpits, and Shanti folded the left sleeve down over
the top of the glove and pressed her hands around his arms. “Bango,
motherfucker’s airtight,” she said.
    Philippe did the same on the