A nod.

"Very well. I'll be at my accomodations in the Palace estate should I be needed before then." A frown towards Smoke. "Never mind. You can use one at my accomodations." Trust the Kang to bring -that- up.

'I said "public".'

Zhensassan works his datapad again.

"It is my honor to serve.  The staff at the Blue Pavilion have been directed to prepare for your arrival.  May I register the genosignature of your associate?  And what access clearance should I initiate for her?"  Zhensassan hesitates.  "Forgive me, but I have had only the standard training on offworld privilege and protocol.  I should not like to give offense in my humble ignorance of her standing and position.  Does your comrade happen to be titled, or a representative of a foreign power?  If not... if she has your personal trust, I believe the Ministry of Ways would afford her at least the status of Meritorious Outlander."

'The Blue Pavilion!' Smoke exclaimed, imaginating an icehot picknick hut in this humongous park. And it was blue, just right for a Blue Kang brainquarters.

She outlooked at the strange yawny big-wordy bellhopper, guessing he must be wondering at her name, though she'd just telled him. 'Smoke Alarm.' she pointed at herself. At his outlook of confuddlement, which most people tended to have on hearing a Kang's name for the first time, she pointed at him, 'Zhensassan,' then Sereth, 'Sereth,', then back to herself 'Smoke Alarm. I'm a Kang. A Blue Kang. Blue Kangs are best.' she informed him pointedly.

"...Smoke Alarm," Zhensassan says smoothly.  "I trust that is not an indication that fire is soon to follow."

The Blue Pavilion, when Sereth and Smoke make their way there, is slightly disappointing to the Kang.  It's a two-story structure, or perhaps four such structures bisected by an open breezeway in each direction, under a single angled roof.  The blueness doesn't really match up to Smoke Alarm's expectations: it's really more of a subdued, dark gray color that only shows with an iridescent sheen in the occasional slanting ray of the sun on its spare, understated scrollwork.
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:27, Wed 02 Dec 2015.

'Well, if there is, I'll show-and-tell you about it.' Smoke Alarm said, then added because she couldn't help herself 'No ball-games, no fly-posts, no fire-starting.' It was her promise, anyhow.

She outlooked disappointedly at the not-particularly Blue Pavilion. 'Whereabouts do you have the picknicks?'
This message was last edited by the player at 12:45, Thu 03 Dec 2015.

The staff of the Blue Pavilion set about preparing for all the needs of an Imperial Legate (and his plus-one) with practiced efficiency.  Quarters are readied for the use of Sereth and Smoke Alarm.  Data net reports are routed to Sereth concerning the refugee effort, the campaign of containment against the Fists (and indications of some internal conflicts developing within their hierarchy.)  It appears that at present, the momentum of their expansion has been blunted; it seems as if Warlock's change of heart is starting to make itself felt even if the tide has not yet turned in a decisive way.

Also in the briefing that Sereth receives is a rundown of the current petitioners and ministers of rank who are in attendance at the Palace at present.  He notes that on the list are Legate Aratannan, Minister of State Lestasel, and Prince Zevid, the Heir-Tributary.

Aratannan holds the same rank and responsibility as Sereth.  He is senior in service and experience to Sereth although the Imperial Legates are theoretically equal agents for the crown, and his greatest achievements are likely behind him.  He has always seemed to respect Sereth, and while not precisely a mentor has provided useful advice when Sereth was relatively new to his position.

Lestasel is another story.  He is of an old, old family and while such things are important to Draconians, the degree to which he trades upon that part of his influence is perhaps not as meet and proper as could be desired.  Sereth, and indeed all the Legates, have had conflict with Lestasel in the past over their choices in exercising their delegated authority -- in theory a Legate may speak with the Emperor's own Voice on missions to which they are assigned, and frequently these have to do with Draconia's relations to foreign powers.  Lestasel has his own opinions about policy and direction for these diplomatic actions, which is his Ministry's whole sphere of responsibility, and frequently does not see eye to eye with the Legates who have to take immediate action "on the spot".

Zevid, as Heir-Tributary, is the Emperor's second son and the backup to the Crown Prince in the succession.  Sereth doesn't know a lot about him personally: he is by all accounts bright and has carried out his training and preparation diligently, but to Sereth's knowledge has not demonstrated any great motivation or responsibility.

Smoke Alarm is of necessity left to her own devices while Sereth reviews the current state of affairs in the Empire and locally.

By the time Sereth has gone over this information, a new message pops up in his in-box.  It's from Gilso, who is requesting an appointment for him and his sister to meet with Sereth and Smoke Alarm.  Their training duties are apparently wrapped up for the day.

Sereth studied the reports in great detail. He would perhaps to see some, if not all of those people when he visited the palace to give his briefing, and it was wise to be sure -exactly- what he was going to be facing. His eyes quirked ever so slightly when he noted Lestasel was here; but hopefully it would not be a problem. A potential war had been averted, no-one should be complaining about that. Gone were the days when all problems had to be answered with a call to arms.

When the message from Gilso came in, he smiled briefly. He sent a quick reply in the affirmative; as he had no other business, as of yet, to attend to. Only then did he raise his head and look around.

"Smoke Alarm?"

He wished he had clothes here that would fit her, it was only fitting that she was dressed appropriately when meeting Gilso and his sister. It was easy for him - he was -always- wearing clothes as befitted his station; but... a shake of his head. Never mind. She was an outsider, allowances must be made.

"We're going to see some old friends."

Having "quarters" (like brainquarters, only without the brain, she figured) of her own was a strange new concept for Smoke Alarm. As long as she could remember, she'd bunked with her fellow Blue Kangs in their brainquarters, and always got the bottom bunk. Even when they'd moved into the empty apartments after the downfall of the Chief Caretaker, they'd sleepover together in fours and threes and twos, as much for safety as companionship, in constant slumber parties and settling into cuddle-piles. She'd shared quarters on the Exeter with other crew-women, though she'd got the top bunk then. The rest of the time, the time on her own and lost, Smoke Alarm slept wherever she could find, any place sound-and-safe that she could fit. Even on the talkiphone box, no-one had show-and-telled her a quarters of her own, so Smoke footed about, but Sweet Boy always had a place that was sound-and-safe that she could fit.

But in this Blue Pavilion she had a quarters all of her own, with a bathroom, a cupboard, and a bedroom, bigger than even the apartments in Paradise Towers, with a big big bed all for her. But it felt strange and lonely to be a little mouse in such big rooms, lost in such an empty bed. Still, she could jump on it.

Loitering about while Sereth worked, mindful of his warnings about to-dos, Smoke Alarm only had time to explore the quarters themselves, outlooking at all the furniture and fixtures, before she footed out into the rest of the Blue Pavilion. The vast park outside was rather too much like the great outdoors for Smoke Alarm, so, like a mouse, she loitered around the familiar territory of the Pavilion and stayed under cover.

Dog-eared, she heard Sereth's words from a room away and came rushing into his office. 'Fadreen and Gilso? Icehot!'

Gilso's message explains that they, and the other Arsurans with them, are taking their classes at the Perceptum, one of the many historic buildings of the Capital repurposed from one ancient fortress or another.  It's the 'official' headquarters of that Ministry as opposed to being one of the less publicly known, high-security facilities that house the majority of sensitive analysis work.  The site is about twenty minutes from the Palace by aircar.

He nodded, and took her in. "Yes. Just let me get ready, and we'll go."

He headed off into his own quarters, and found one of his better sets of clothes. It had been a long time since he'd been able to be anything but the Legate, and the Traveller's companion. It was time he was more, once again. A Noble of Draconia. He soon stepped out again, ready.

"Remember Smoke. You and Fadreen can't behave as you did on Arsuran. It's different here."  A wry smile. "For starters, Draconians are better organised." If she really wanted to, she could probably cause some problems - but Sereth had no doubt that they would come together a lot better than the Fists had.

Loitering while Sereth changed his clothes, again (seriously, he must have had like five sets of clothes), Smoke Alarm was sitting on his desk with her legs swinging when he cameout. 'You're also taller. More reachy arms.' Smoke Alarm added with a smirk, stretching her own forward and upward to show-and-tell. She relented, accepting Sereth's words, and hopping off his desk. 'I knowhow, you keep saying-so. So, what can't we do here? No ball-games, no fly-posts, no what?'

OOC: You two can rock on as much as you like, just let me know when you want to shift scene to the Perceptum.

"Basically, don't make a nuisance of yourselves. Fadreen will be able to explain better I'm sure." What Sereth seemed to be saying, though he wasn't saying is 'be boring'. He shook his head and he eyed her again. "Well, unless you want to change to present the best image you can, maybe we should go?"

'What is a nuisance is only made-up by other people. Mostly yawny oldster rezzies and say-so caretakers.' Smoke Alarm opined, wise as a rat.

'I'll neverever change.' Smoke Alarm declared, then followed Sereth's gaze down to her clothes. Having recently visited Earth's 21st and 20th centuries, Smoke Alarm had acquired some local clothes and incorporated it into her Blue Kang fabshion. She wore a size-too-large blue tie-dye shirt she'd got at Woodstock, a black t-shirt under that, some rather worn and baggy blue jeans, and black runners with mismatched black and blue socks (one always escaped or got a hole) Over this, she had her belt (held together with a padlock), bracelets, and dog-fang necklace, and scraps of blue and black fabric tied around arm or leg to keep it all together. She had her arrowgun and quiver at her belt and her packback on, with Puddy peeking out. 'But these are my newest and bestest clothes. Lets be outgoing.'

"Hmm." A nod from the Draconian, then he led the way towards the car. Smoke would likely notice that despite all his talk of being presentable, his sword was still with him. There was a difference though - on Arsuran, he carried it nearby for ease of access. Here? It seemed to be as much to be noticed.

The car lifts up and over the city of Dryn Savato.  It's an open-air model, and there's plenty for Smoke Alarm to look around and look at.  Outside of the Palace grounds, the capitol is a very modern city punctuated by open islands around much, much older structures that each have their own little island of well-tended greenery.  Flying cars are plentiful although -- as Smoke Alarm notes and Sereth takes as a matter of course -- all the traffic takes a wide berth around the towering form of the Palace.

The one that Sereth soon steers toward is like a truncated pyramid with cut-out platforms on each corner serving as landing spaces.  Most of it has a functional look, but in the center of each of its faces is a great, ancient-looking carving of a single eye, so that the building seems to be eyespying out in all directions.

Sereth brings them hovering in to land on one of these, and attendants in archaic-looking uniforms come out to greet them, bowing their greetings to Sereth (and to Smoke, though not without a slight double-take) as Sereth leads the way toward the security checkpoint leading into the building, one of the guards gets in the vehicle and lifts off with it to clear space for more arrivals.

Inside, once Sereth shows his credentials and he and Smoke Alarm are passed into the interior, the look of the building has more in common with those huge old carvings.  The old stone interior is still intact, intricately patterned and meticulously preserved, although Smoke can see where modern furnishings as well as technology like eye-spies and picturespouts and electronic security coders have been added.

There's an obvious interior checkpoint that leads farther into the building, outfitted with surrounding seats and tables as a sort of lobby and waiting area.  Two people rise up as the pair of them approach.  Fadreen and Gilso!  They're both wearing dark green uniform-like jumpsuits, more utilitarian than the guards.

Fadreen gives a very pleased smile of greeting to Smoke Alarm, while Gilso is obviously making an effort at propriety.  Each of them gives the formal greeting, "My life at your command," to Sereth, each with a slight variation on the formal salute.  (Sereth recognizes the protocol as being formalized by long, long tradition according to gender roles.)

Smoke Alarm notices that although Fadreen is woefully lacking in most of her Blue Kang gear, she is wearing the fancy hand-made forearm wrap that she made for the Draconian girl.  "I told them it was a traditional sign of honor on the colony," Fadreen explains, "and so it's permitted for everyday dress.  And, well, it is now, isn't it?"

Outlooking around and eyespying all the sights, Smoke Alarm enjoyed her ride in the flying car, though it was perhaps not as icehot as Dev's flying bike. The Draconian city was nice too, but it was too orderly, all blank walls and clean lines, everything laid out neatly, not lived-in by messy people at all. It seemed the kind of place the Great Architect would build. The ginormous eyes on the tower were extra intimidating, like massive spyeyes for caretakers, eyespying the whole city. It made her feel the aircon was too low.

'Fadreen!' Smoke Alarm cheered, eyespying her friend. She was about to say the quick, everyday how-you-do, but stopsigned as they did a proper salute-thingey at Sereth. So Smoke Alarm performed a proper full how-you-do to Fadreen, ending with clapped hands and a shared curtsey. Fadreen definitely remembered how to do it. The crushing hug she gave her friend right after wasn't a normal part of the how-you-do, but nor was it a no-no.

She touched her forearm to Fadreen's, matching their blue colours together. 'Yep. Traditionals don't have to be oldstery. And Blue Kangs are best.' she agreed. 'What do you do here? Anything fun?'

"Fun?  Well... I think you'd think a lot of it was yawny.  But a lot of it's about being sneaky too.  Passing messages, keeping watch on people and keeping them from watching you, hiding in plain sight."  Fadreen briefly describes some of the basic tradecraft techniques that the instructors at the Perceptum are passing along.

"It's so when we go back we can do a better job of helping everyone resist the Fists.  Hopefully, without provoking fights that get people hurt.  No wipeouts!  And I'm supposed to be teaching too, when I go back.  There's dozens and dozens of Kangs, all over Arsuran now!"

"Important work." Sereth shook his head. He wasn't sneaky. The work Fadreen and Gilso were doing would be beyond him. "The Fists made a mistake when they tried, even subtly, threaten Draconia. Our friends here will make them see that."

His eyes glittering as he regarded the pair of them.

"My own task with dealing with the Fists has come to an end, at least as Legate, and yours is just beginning."

Smoke Alarm listened in fascination as Fadreen show-and-telled her studies, though she figured it sounded mostly like basic Kang knowhow: keeping outlook and eyespying, running unseen and unheard, but with more techie stuff too. 'Huh. If school had show-and-telled that sort of knowhow when I was there, I might've mayhaps stayed longer.' she reflected ruefully.

She was more amazed to hear of Arsuran. 'Dozens and dozens? Like, lots of Kangs? You'll be like me.' Smoke Alarm was grinning from ear to ear, feeling like a blue balloon, so puffy with pride that she'd inspired something in Fadreen and the rest of Arsuran, in these Kang wannabes. But she didn't feel a special connection with these others; they were friends, but not the ones she'd grown up with, had lived and ran and been made unalive with. Nor did she feel an ownership of them. They weren't her Kangs; they were their own Kangs, and she wanted to eyespy them lost-and-found their own Kangliness, to make their own ways down the carrydoors of the universe.

But the tell that there were Kangs came alongside the darker tell that there were Fists. 'So the Fists are still there, being Fists and caretakers and meanieheads? Is Warlock making them play nice, or was he a pants-on-fire liar?'

The two siblings trade looks.

It's Gilso who answers Smoke Alarm.  "The Fists haven't gone, no," he says.  "Whether the Warlock has changed his ways, neither of us can really say, first hand.  We hear from the Traveller's friend, the wise brother of Shaolin, from time to time.  He says the Warlock travels between the worlds held held by the Fists, finding the ones in their order whose actions are key in holding their empire captive by coercion and force and fear.  The two of them work to remove such people from power and loosen the hold the Fists have over the captive worlds.  The wise brother says, 'one cannot move another down the Noble Eightfold Path at a forced march'."

Gilso frowns.  "I don't understand his religion, as such, but I get the sense of what he is saying and the way he and the Warlock are working.  Ridding Arsuran of the Fists by force and war would not work without getting a lot of people hurt, and maybe not at all, because the whole doctrine of the Fists is about bringing people to their way of thinking through conflict.  Defeating their goals through a fight that looks like no fight at all, that is the plan they are working to."

Smoke Alarm pouted unhappily, still not satisfied, filled with righteous impatience. 'But it's a slowpoke way though! Big bosses and say-so caretakers, they always say they will only fix-it in their own way at their own time, and then they be lazybones and slowpokes and nothing gets fixited. They need to be pushed or something.'

Fadreen looks unhappy herself, at Smoke Alarm's reaction.

"What you're saying," she says slowly, "that's very much like what the Fists say, to justify what they're doing.  Because all the rest of us can't be trusted to think the right ways and do the right things.  I don't know what you'd want Mr. Warlock to do.  Blow a bunch of them up?  Turn that awful mind-control thing on all of them?"

'No!' Smoke Alarm retorted hotly, upset and unbrave as all her words were twisted around. She struggled to explain, her face screwed up in concentration and frustration, knowing she lacked the words and knowhow for this. 'No, I mean... We can't just loiter until they go away, coz they won't if they don't have to. We can ask them to take the exits, and they'll say no, coz they're meanieheads. We can't just loiter coz... because the Fists will stop being visitors and become residents, and little ones will grow up into big ones knowing only the Fists being architects and caretakers, knowing only being chased and being hungry and being taken to the cleaners.' The words flowed out with a frightened sob, heartfelt and fast. Smoke could show-and-tell from personal knowhow, hard-learned and painful, what such a life was like. 'We need to show-and-tell them what they're doing is wrong-way. Shoplift their nasty weapons and throw them in the bin. Be too hard and too messy for them to control. Make it so they don't want to stay.'