The one hundredth floor of this building—like all of the buildings throughout the whole city, except the transit tower—is dedicated to the sky trains. When I lead Chrys through the waiting areas to the train that has just pulled into the west side terminal, she asks, “Do we need to buy a ticket?”
“No, they’re operated by the city. Passengers ride free.”
“The longer I’m here, the less it feels like you guys have money.Everythingfeels free.”
“It’s not, but I get it.”
I take her to one of the sets of seats that looks out the window instead of straight ahead and she hums a happy little sound as we pull away from the building.
“It’s a good thing I’m not afraid of heights.” But she sits closer to me than she might normally and I’m not mad about it.
“Shock showed me some of the art before. But this definitely gives you a great view of it.”
“They just finished that flower garden that looks like a zurgle,” I tell her, pointing down to it. “I think Kissu would agree they could have chosen a more handsome model if they’d only asked him.”
She laughs and drops her head to my shoulder, “He probably would.”
The train takes us through four buildings before I stand and help her up too. Once we step inside of the building that houses Riann’s office, she shuffles a little closer.
The station is almost empty. It does give a sort of ghostly feel to it. As soon as we cross into Riann’s office, I know she hates it.
White.
Lifeless.
Boring.
“Welcome back,” he says to me before turning to Chrys. “And you must be the woman who fell out of the sky.”
“That’s me,” she says with a little wave. “I’m Chrys.”
“Riann.” He dips his head. “It is very nice to meet you, dajzha.”
“Did you just move in?”
He blinks at her for a moment and then looks around the room with her. “Ah, no. But I try to be here as little as possible. Leaving it like this helps give me incentive to leave whenever I can.”
“Okay.”
Riann looks at me, brow ridges quirked in confusion before he looks back at her. “You don’t like that answer.”
“I don’t like your office,” she says with an apologetic smile.
“I don’t either.”
I look at the floor and make sure I’m not going to laugh before I say, “We came to ask if you’d found anything new?”
He has, but telling me won’t be easy this time either.
“I’ve confirmed with Noa that the escape pod was not original to the ship, but he can’t, or won’t tell me any more about it.” He glances at Chrys, as if distracted. “You really do love color, don’t you?”
“How could you tell?” She looks down at herself.
“There’s something you should see.”
He closes out of his work and motions for us to follow him.
Three CSS officers greet him as he walks us back through the halls. One woman and two men… all of them have propositioned him at one point or another.
