Touchstone 1 - Stray

then ‘assume the position’ – the thinking about doing a star jump pose for spray-on swimsuits. This time I ended up in a Setari uniform.
    There’s a mirrored wall in the cubicles, and I spent a long time staring at myself. Barely recognisable as the girl who walked home from her exams and missed her path. My skin had tanned on Muina, since I was outside so much, but that’s faded a lot and other than a few acne scars and tiny freckles it’s looking pretty good. I seem to have developed a jaw line, which wearing a tight throat-hugging collar certainly emphasised, but my figure isn’t nearly up to Setari standards. I look like a gawky crow. My hair has gone blonder than I expected, with only the lower layers brown – again that’s from being out in the sun so much – and it’s grown a couple of inches. I’ve been wearing it in a loose braid most of the time to keep it out of the way. I haven’t suddenly become beautiful or anything – my mouth is still too wide and I’ve always thought my nose a bit too long – but I was looking better than I expected and not really me at all.
    I feel like the longer I’m here, the less chance I’ll have of going back, and that putting on this uniform somehow made it nearly impossible. Like I’ve visited Faerie and stupidly eaten the food.
    Mara asked if I’d fallen asleep, so I came out, and something about the way she looked at me made me feel I was right about the Faerie food. No-one’s ever asked me to join KOTIS or offered any kind of choice at all. They did rescue me from Muina before I was eaten, though. And they’re fighting against monsters and I can help with that, in possibly the most passive way imaginable, but still apparently I might be useful. Just because I’ve never said yes, or been given the chance to say no, doesn’t mean I haven’t agreed to anything.
    Enhancing the Setari is a better option than washing dishes, which is where I’d probably have ended up as just another stray. They’re more interested in finding Earth now, as well, and while I’m not keen on many of the possibilities of being useful to the Setari, I’m trying to focus on the day-to-day and not what the rest of my life is likely to be.
    Suits made of nanoliquid are beyond weird to wear. The harness is a specific control mechanism for the nanites which doesn’t rely on the wearer’s personal interface, and lets the Setari do all sorts of fun stuff with their suits. Make them thicker, give themselves kneepads, make the gloves cover the whole hand or go away altogether. Make pockets. You could probably even stick yourself to another Setari. Mara taught me how to manipulate mine and then told me to play for a while. Tomorrow we’re going to go into the Ena to test out how my amplification works there, and to try a couple of talents which don’t work in actual space. We’re not going to be fighting Ionoth or anything, but it’s still all a bit daunting.
    Thursday, February 7
    Glimpse
    The excursion into the Ena was scheduled for the morning, so no dodging practice. Mara collected me, made sure I brought my uniform harness, and took me to the nearest “nano-changing room”. I think the Setari must have these in their own apartments, rather than having to leave their clothes in little lockers about the place.
    I didn’t like walking through the facility in uniform, and almost wished they’d given me my own colour or something, for all that it would make me stand out more. But I’m willing to bet that the black nanosuit is something that these people earn , not just parade about in. I was glad I’d made the effort to do my hair really neatly in a French braid, but I still felt vaguely like I was going to be arrested for the equivalent of impersonating a police officer. And for a moment there it felt like Maze and Lohn and Zee didn’t even recognise me. Lohn at least murmured “All grown up,” before getting serious and professional. Going into the Ena is the most formal I’ve ever seen First Squad when a bluesuit isn’t around. Because, even though we were going to the safest bit they could find, the Ena is dangerous.
    The blast doors emphasised that point. KOTIS was built on this island because it’s a very ‘torn’ space and there are lots of places where it’s easy to get from actual space to the Ena, and vice versa. Wherever they find one of these torn spots on Tare, they build a metal box around it, with doors that only the nastiest of monsters could