The political situation here was complicated. Fleet retained power in the system beyond the planet Sudoria by dint of the fact that it controlled the hilldiggers: big-fuck warships that could employ gravtech weapons capable of doing just what their name implied. According to the last report from the survey drone, Admiral Carnasus and his twelve captains ran this fleet, and lieutenants of theirs held twenty-five seats in the Sudorian parliament. A further thirty-nine seats were controlled by the various planetary parties, while another fifteen were controlled by Orbital Combine—the rational scientific political unit holding sway in Sudoria's many space stations which, like the three main Corisanthe space stations, were originally part of the war industry.

When we first contacted them here, subsequent communications made it clear that Fleet did not want any dealings with the Polity, but Combine desperately wanted access to our artificial intelligences and underspace technology, and all but a few of the Sudorian planetary parties wanted trade. Orbital Combine and those parties then agreed to the establishing of a consulate on Sudoria. Fleet, being outvoted, cited laws established during the war here to prevent technological import (though where they had expected it to be imported from back then, I've no idea), but could do nothing, legally, to prevent Polity humans from coming here. I was to be the test case, and it long ago occurred to me that Fleet might now try something drastic to discourage further contact with the Polity.

After a few minutes, three more individuals entered the hold. These wore no armour, and the only visible weaponry they carried were sidearms—probably straightforward chemical projectile guns. They were clad in the one-piece foamite suits that were the uniform of Fleet personnel; garments that closely followed their musculature, though being over a half-inch thick they made the three of them appear quite bulky. The uniforms were cut low around the neck and down below terminated in wide deck boots. Belts and webbing straps held their sidearms, ammunition clips, an assortment of tools and the rank patches containing their security scanner barcodes. The two to the rear wore around their throats necklaces consisting of variously coloured bars, perhaps to visibly indicate their rank to their associates. The one I assumed to be the boss here, preceding these two, wore a simple platinum band around his throat. His red foamite suit stood out in vivid contrast to their dull blue ones, and he carried fewer tools. But it was the physical appearance of these three that interested me much more than their attire, for the people of Sudoria had been changed by old adaptogenic drugs and technologies to live on a planet where the temperature did not sink much below sixty degrees Celsius, and sometimes rose above a hundred degrees at the equator.

Projecting lower jaws were balanced by the bulbous rearward projection of the skulls, while their ears were just shapeless knubs as if seared by the heat of their world. Their noses ran narrow down the angular jut of their faces, with nostrils apparently normal but capable of opening as wide as an average human eye. They retained their head hair, though some cosmetic genetic tweak prevented it from growing on their faces or anywhere else on their bodies. Fleet personnel shaved the front of their skulls and plaited the rest in a queue in the manner of the ancient samurai. Their skin was a dark metallic violet that grew more reflective as the intensity of the sunlight increased. Though little different in appearance from standard, their eyes possessed nictitating membranes. Webs extended between their fingers, for cooling rather than swimming, but were probably unnecessary here in the ship, with its temperature maintained at a comfortable fifty-five degrees Celsius.

I undogged my suit helmet and placed it to one side. The one in the red suit halted by the sphere and peered inside at me, his nostrils flaring wide and the nictitating membranes momentarily dulling his eyes. I guessed I would eventually learn what such reactions meant, but the twist to his mouth and rest of his expression seemed likely to be a sneer. After a moment he stepped back and gestured for me to step out into the hold. I unfolded myself from the floor, reached over and pulled down the manual locking mechanism, and the door section, consisting of twelve hexagonal chainglass sheets inside a single ceramal frame, thumped up from its seals. I pushed it open and stepped outside.

Hot, damned hot.

I felt a slight shifting of the fibres tangled throughout my body as the two viral forms at war inside me readjusted their positions. Though not myself thermodapted, one of those conflicting viral forms enabled me to easily tolerate this temperature—just within the normal human range—and also other temperatures, both high and low, that would result in those standing before me curling up and expiring. Unfortunately, the second viral form might result in a similar end for me, too. But what would they know; they hadn't seen a 'normal human' in 800 years.

"I am told that you can speak our language," the boss began.

"Fluently," I replied. Most people working for ECS loaded languages to their cerebral augs for instant translation., or loaded them via internal gridlinks directly to their minds. Due to certain physiological… differences, I couldn't use any form of prosthetic augmentation so had to learn them the old-fashioned way. However, I am, I believe, a competent linguist. It took me a year or so to learn four of the languages spoken here (in one case, sort-of spoken), which brought the total of the languages I was conversant with up to one hundred and twenty, though I suspect I might have since forgotten one or two. "I presume you are the captain of this ship?"

"I am Captain Inigis," he replied, "and knowing your facility with our language you will understand this instruction." He gestured at me with one webbed hand. "Strip."

I shrugged, unsurprised. The dilemma faced by the Orbital Combine and the planetary parties was that those who most objected to my presence here were also the ones necessarily employed to pick me up. So I went through the laborious process of undoing all the catches and stickpads of the suit, stripped it off and kicked it to one side. I stood there for a moment in the absorbent undersuit until the captain gestured again, so I stripped that off too and stood naked before them.

Inigis now walked over to two of the scanning pillars that had earlier risen from the floor and pointed down between them. "Come and stand here." I padded over as instructed and noticed the captain quickly stepping back out of the way—touch of xenophobia there. The pillars revolved until their scanning lenses were pointing in towards me. I felt a tingling of my skin and momentary hot flushes as if a blow torch quickly skimmed over it, not held there long enough to burn, but long enough for me to be aware of it. X-ray, terahertz, magnetic resonance, point radar and much else besides. More viral shifting, but no slippage as yet. A faint ringing started in my ears and I suddenly gained the distinct impression that someone else had just entered the hold: a tall man, slightly stooped, features shadowed. I glanced over, wondering how he fitted into this scenario, then felt my stomach sink and my skin prickle. No one there—it had to be an effect of the scanning, since I was receiving the full works without any regard for my health. Someone else would have suffered radiation sickness after this and the cancer-cell hunting nanites in their bodies would have needed to work overtime. In fact I rather suspected Inigis hoped I would die from such heavy inspection. As the scan completed, he seemed rather disappointed I didn't keel over.

Next, Inigis stood over by one of his companions, viewing an unscrolled flimsy screen. I noted how an optic cord joined this screen to the suit of the individual who handed it over, and inspected him more closely. His foamite suit was bulked with additional equipment, earphones covered his ears, a close-viewing screen covered one eye, a microphone was fixed before his mouth, and wires actually penetrated his skull. He seemed to be muttering perpetually, and moving his fingers in a continuous dance while operating the virtual control gloves he wore. Tacom, I realised. Fleet communications were run by individuals like this. Returning my attention to Inigis, I could see—even though not quite used to their facial expressions yet—he was at first puzzled, but began to show a growing satisfaction.