Looking Out

Posted on Sun 30th Aug, 2020 @ 9:44am by Yuliette Marayan Dr. & Radak
Edited on on Mon 14th Sep, 2020 @ 5:08pm

1,992 words; about a 10 minute read

Mission: Resolution
Location: SB 109 Brown Sector
Timeline: MD12

Yuliette was working on keeping apace of Radak. For each one of his steps, she found she needed two or three. Which created a funny little rhythm between them. She had a feeling he was even trying not to stride so much. He was quieter now along the public walkway, looking like he was scanning the place from behind those coppery lenses.

When she chanced on a reflective window, Yuliette remembered how under dressed she was. She was still wearing her night clothes under the hoodie because of having left the rest of what little laundry she had out to dry. It left her legs cold and bare. She had no make up. What kind of impression was she making?

She left her hood off, though. Something told her no one was likely to throw trash and slur at her with Radak nearby. When he slowed down by a cart with a chubby balding Bajoran in a apron stained with grease spots, Yuliette was relieved about her state of dress and the potential cost. She put her hands in her pockets and looked between Radak, the price list that she couldn't read, and the entrepreneur and waited for some kind of help.

Radak turned towards her as if he could sense her unease. His lips turned up in a quirk of a smile. “It’s mostly pretty straightforward Bajoran,” he said. “The hasperat’s always good. So’s the veklava. If you want a sandwich, they get the mapa bread from a place down here that Kainon is fond of. It’s good.”

Hasperat she'd tried. Everyone had heard of hasperat. "I'll try veklava, please." She got her wallet out so there wouldn't be any awkward confusion about assumptions and money between her and Radak.

Radak ordered the makapa bread and jam, and paid for his food, letting her take care of hers. People liked to be independent here as often as not. A free lunch in Brown Sector often came with strings attached. “This is one of the best spots here,” Radak said. “The food is good. It’s always busy. It’s a nice place to be around people, when you want to be.”

Yuliette was catching on to how much Radak deferred to others in his thinking. Free to move, free to decide, free to feel, free to like. Or not. Whatever you wanted. He didn't want to assume. He was unassuming. She watched the Bajoran server assemble her order from the cart.

"You want Yamuk sauce?" The man reached for one of the condiment bottles.

"You have Yamuk sauce?" Her father had put Yamuk sauce on everything when she was little, but it was a Cardassian thing as far as she knew. "I didn't know Bajorans liked Yamuk sauce."

"It grew on us in some regions."

"Yes, please."

Yuliette collected her paper tray and flatware and watched Radak as he waited for his jam and bread. She stared at his ears. They were... cute. They looked a little small because he was so large and they popped out a little from his head and came to little points.

Radak became aware of her eyes on him, and turned slightly towards her. “I stand out,” he said, shrugging. “I always have, really. I was never very good at science back home. I was good with the animals. When I was young, my grandpa would have me help out with the stock. And then on the ship, well. You know. Here. I bump my head half a dozen times a day.” He smiled a little awkwardly.

He had a child-like heart. She'd sensed it in his posture outside of her door the first time she'd seen him that morning. For all of whatever awfulness had happened to him, losing his family and being taken by pirates and fighting to keep alive.... His heart was so gentle. "I can see you being good with animals," Yuliette said as they made makeshift seats out of a jutting foot of a support pillar. "You lived with your grandparents? I never met mine."

“My grandfather was alive. His wife had been human, and she passed before I was born,” Radak said. “The colony was small. A bunch of farms and some laboratories. Everybody knew everybody else. What about you? What was your home like?”

Yuliette looked into her food. Veklava was made from very finely sliced and roasted vegetables over a layered puffy kind of dough, it turned out. "Which one? We had five. One for each continent." She didn't say it like a brag. "Not homes. Just big houses. Full of people paid to like you between waxing the hovercars or cleaning the curtains." She took a bite of veklava with the yamuk sauce and tipped her head back and forth as she evaluated. It was good. "Sometimes I ate dinner with my parents. My dad..." Her brow furrowed. She knew she shouldn't be talking at all about where she came from. "He was really into his work. My mom was a socialite."

Radak bit into his bread and jam and chewed slowly while he thought that over. He knew enough about the universe to know that meant she came from money, but the rest of it was as alien to him as it she’d told him she came out of a wormhole or an alternate dimension. The people here could probably live for centuries on what her parents’ houses were worth. “What does a socialite do?”

"Show off the money. Wear it, eat it, flaunt it. This whole.... game of turning currency into social currency. My mom was wicked good at it. I was turning into a real disappointment in her life on that front." She wondered what her mother was going to do now, without all that money. Or if her dad had sent a shuttle for her as well. And then where would that leave her? "Well, all those houses aren't theirs anymore anyway. Luck changed."

“Luck tends to do that,” Radak said. “A place like this has to be a pretty big shock coming from all that money.” He took another bite and smiled as he thought about what she said. Turning money into social currency, whatever that was. He wondered what the Orions would think about that. “Social currency. That won’t get you many places here."

"Social currency is everywhere. Sometimes it adds up to power or clout which can lead to more opportunities for bigger money. People trade social currency all the time. They figure you out, flash you some skin, string you along with promises or lies. Or maybe they come by it honestly. Just by being someone people like. The way you do with people. Helping out."

"Where are they now, your parents?"

Yuliette frowned. "Wraiths only know." She wanted a change of subject. "Can you really see in the dark? I heard you telling Madigan it didn't bother you if the lighting was out."

“Yeah, these things aren’t really top-of-the-line, but they can see in different spectrums and low light conditions. Well, ‘see’ isn’t really the right word. But it’s good enough.”

"What about x-ray vision? Because that would come in real handy."

“I don’t think even the best ones do x-ray vision,” Radak said, a smile forcing its way back onto his face.

"thermals?"

“Thermals I can do.”

"Does it layer those things, or switch, or do you see like scans or something? What do I look like to you?"

This time, Radak laughed. It was like being interrogated. “It switches. It doesn’t layer. You look like...” He thought over how best to explain it. “You’re sort of an impression of yourself. I can see the way the light bounces off you, but I can’t see the light itself. I can see your body temperature and the shape of you without seeing the details of you. It’s almost like looking at person on a really foggy night.”

It was like he had super-vision, but still... lived with disability. She felt silly that she had worried about her looks when it was all a blur anyway. "I probably stand out a little on the thermals. It probably looks like I'm running a temperature. Most the time I feel like I'm just struggling to stay warm. I'm actually glad there seems to be a sluggish air exchanger near my apartment."

“You’re hot,” Radak said. “Warm, I mean.” He shook his head and took a bite of bread and jam.

She flushed a little warmer at Radak's slip of phrase.

“Are people here pretty rough on you, being a Cardassian?”

"Some of them. I didn't think about it a lot, you know. I never knew any other Cardassians as a kid. Just my Dad who barely mentioned his homeworld. I never met many Bajorans besides a few passing through on Risa. And now I can't even...." she shook her head, brokenhearted, angry and confused about her father. "I'm just having culture shock or something I guess. I don't.... I don't know exactly how to handle it when it comes up. And I'm not sure... I'm not sure they're so wrong. I don't know. It's. Really messy." She chewed on another bite. "I did run into another mixed Cardassian though. He's not exactly helping race relations."

“Bo,” Radak replied. “Yeah. He doesn’t exactly help most things, besides himself. Me and Kainon know him.” Radak turned towards her. “You’d be smart to avoid him. He’s always getting mixed up in something or other, and somehow he’s never the one who’s caught holding the bag.”

None of that was surprising. "Well, I'm doing my best to stay clear. He just kind of sneaks up on me, gets in my space. The first time, these blue collar Bajorans were trying to be funny by buying me Kanar shots, and Bo inserted himself. He made it worse. Today he was following me, I think. I don't know for how long."

Radak frowned at that. “He’s been following you? That’s...” He shook his head. Bo had never exactly been what you could call an upstanding member of the community. If he could hustle anything from anybody, he’d do it. It wasn’t often he got this personal, though. “Do you want me to talk to him? He might listen to me if I ask him to back off.”

She couldn't imagine anyone not listening to Radak drawing a line with them. One of his biceps was about as thick as she was. "Would you? I mean, I don't want to involve you in anything silly. I just. It's really uncomfortable. And with everything else. It's just. It would be such a relief if he would stop."

“He shouldn’t behave that way,” Radak replied. “And you shouldn’t be made to feel uncomfortable here. I’ll have a word with him. And if he does bother you again, I want you to feel free to talk to me about it. About anything, really.” Radak hesitated as soon as the words were out of his mouth. “I just mean, you know, if you want somebody to talk to, I should say.”

"I do want to tell you something..." She arched her neck up hoping he would make up the difference and lean in.

Radak leaned closer as she did, curious. “What’s that?”

Her heart raced. She wanted to tell him her name. Her real name. Instead she whispered in his pointy ear. "I can't finish this veklava."

He felt her warm breath ghost over his ear and felt a little warm for a second until he realized what she said. Giving a small chuckle, he reached out and took the last bit of her veklava and put it in his mouth. “Done.”

"I had a feeling you were the man for the job."

 

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