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Emilia
After breakfast, Emilia and the kids headed down to the garage. Dyrk had to be taken to school in the village, so it was time to pick up the gadabout.
Inside the garage she found half a dozen truly breathtaking vehicles. A service droid was waxing the glossy paint job of one of them. Ra’as Drayven clearly liked nice things.
They walked past the gorgeous crafts and approached Emilia’s gadabout, which looked even shabbier compared with the others.
“This is yours?” Dyrk asked dubiously when she used her bracelet to open it.
“It’s not really mine,” she hedged. “It’s a rental.”
In the full light of the morning, it was easy to appreciate just how ugly the gadabout truly was. The purple paint job, which she had thought was blotchy before, was really practically smeared on. And each segment of the bruised looking body was riddled with dents and scratches.
The whole thing made her think of a chunk of chewed up uva bubble gum that had been scraped off the sidewalk and squeezed into a rough approximation of a gadabout by someone who had never actually seen one before.
Dyrk scowled, but he got in, and Mimi hopped in beside him.
“Why did you pick this one, Emilia?” Mimi asked politely.
Emilia tried to hide her smile as she slipped into the driver’s seat. The little girl was doing a good job not saying that the gadabout was ugly. She deserved an equally respectful answer.
“I didn’t get to pick it,” Emilia said. “It was the only one the worker would rent to me.”
“Because you’re poor?” Dyrk wondered aloud.
“Maybe he thought I couldn’t afford a better one,” Emilia said carefully, noting to herself that it would be good to talk with the children about how to refer to money situations more politely at some point. “But he didn’t ask me about my budget. Anyway, it will get us to the village, and that’s the important thing, right?”
“Right,” Mimi yelled.
Dyrk shrugged noncommittally, like he wasn’t so sure.
Emilia didn’t exactly blame him.
The little craft roared unevenly, like a startled lion, and then lifted off the ground to hover level. Emilia guided it down the drive and then programmed the coordinates for the school.
“You don’t have to take me all the way to school,” Dyrk offered. “You can drop me off in the village and I’ll walk. Then you and Mimi can go get stuff for the garden.”
“We’re very happy to drop you off, Dyrk,” she told him. “Besides, Mimi and I are going home again after we take you to school. We need to pick out a good spot for a garden and find out what tools you already have before we go shopping for anything new.”
He nodded once and then turned to stare listlessly out the window.
Mimi began naming the ingredients for the cupcakes they made. She wanted to be able to tell Cook all about it at lunchtime.
Emilia helped her remember all the steps they had taken to go from a pile of ingredients to a plate of delicious cupcakes. But she couldn’t help but notice that Dyrk never took his eyes off the trees.
Ten minutes later, the misty forest gave way to a winding lane leading down the mountain.
The little town below was visible at intervals between the tall trees. There appeared to be a village square with greenery in the center, and then the usual stout domes and graceful spires of an old-fashioned Ulfgardian village.
Another gadabout passed them going the other direction, and Emilia saw a Vystian family inside, their tentacles waving excitedly as they talked to one another on the way to wherever they were headed.
Ulfgard was very diverse. It was often referred to as an intergalactic stew - with bits and pieces from all over the galaxy. Its reputation as a hub for the arts and technology and its open ports policy made it a home for aspiring creators everywhere.
It was one thing to read about, and another altogether to see it in action. It gave Emilia a little shiver of excitement, even though she had already learned that, like everywhere else in the galaxy, Terrans were considered a less than savory ingredient in that stew of diversity here on Ulfgard.
Was that why Dyrk didn’t want her to drop him at the school? Was he embarrassed to be seen with a Terran? She certainly hoped not. It seemed very out of character for the kind-hearted boy she was getting to know.
At last, they pulled up in front of a glassy structure with a real grass yard in front.
