“A Geiger counter?” Bec was holding this cube and it was going nuts. It was clicking wildly, and a meter was redlining on the top display.

“Yup, you thought I was joking about you leaking radiation? We’ll deal with this by locking you in a Faraday cage until you’ve gotten a handle on this. We figured the radiation thing out when we tried to take a picture of you, and it was so full of noise that we didn’t know if the central core would even recognize you. We got a confident ‘No Record’ from the core so that meant it could recognize you, but that you had never visited the City before.”

“Food?” Bec asked, pathetically hungry.

“We’re going to the cafeteria right now, Bec. Don’t you worry your little head over food. We’re not like the really far-out frontier settlements. We’re only just passed the Suburbs of the City.”

Bec entered the cafeteria to see about 15 colorfully dressed men and women shuffling around different tables and buffet aisle. “Buffet style? That’s so wasteful!”

“If we were actually worried about food, yes, but we’ve been online and running for months now. We’ve got cuisine creators out of ears.”

Bec salivated. “Cuisine creators? Like food replicators?”

The dated reference even for Bec, went right over Robert’s head, “No Bec, Dust damn food fabricators are awful. We’ve thankfully not needed to use the ‘food’ Word in ages. Someone got cuisine a hundred years back and we’ve not needed to deal with food ever since. Bec, if I didn’t know for a fact that you are actually 18, I would’ve said you were actually a Founder. Food waste.” Robert snorted at the word.

“That’s all I needed to hear!” Bec slid up to an aisle that said ‘Mediterranean’ and was split into many sections with many single sized portions of pastas, stews, something ratatouille-esque, and bread. She had so many choices, but the amounts were so… so small. She wasn’t about to destroy the entire tray of dinner rolls while others needed to eat and, worse yet, she saw no serving implements so she just froze, staring longingly at the food.

Robert saw her locking up and decided to help. “Here, watch.” He grabbed the tub of spaghetti and meatball and a pita pan and dumped them onto his plate. He placed them back into their spot and Bec watched as the sauce residue evaporated into wisps, and, suddenly, the sections were full of the food again.

Bec didn’t have words for this. She… she could have cried. “So, we can have as much as we want of any of this?”

Robert gave a nod. Bec loaded her plate with a disgusting number of rolls, letting the pan refill multiple times. She piled a dozen wrapped pats of what was labeled as butter. Butter! My god! I haven’t had butter since I went to that fancy restaurant for my 16th birthday. She dumped a heap of olive tapenade and… is that compound butter? She placed the ball on her plate. She grabbed 2 cannoli and a square of something called basbousa and put them on another plate. Bec saw that the lines of food were ended in a row of spigots, with a quick inspection saw that they were drinks! Wines, sodas, juices! Bec poured a cup of apricot juice (labeled Qamar Al Deen) and sipped it immediately. Bec moaned. “Robert, please let me live here. Please.”

“Maybe, when you stop leaking lethal doses of radiation.”

“Are these people gonna be okay?” Bec had already found a table and only voiced her concern after she choked down a roll covered in grape preserves.

Robert waved his hands, “their nanites will handle it. I’m talking about dosing a baby or something.”

Bec sighed in relief. She was already chewing on a roll she jammed full of tapenade with her thumb, when she noticed a lady in dark red sitting across from her. This woman was aghast at the display of gluttony coming from the oddly dressed woman seated on the other side.

“Oh. Sorry.” Bec said this with her mouth full. What is wrong with me! Bec swallowed. “Sorry about that. Would you believe I’ve only eaten a single cooked fish this week? The rest were eaten raw on the side of a river as I nearly bled to death.” Oversharing now? I was hoping to keep that episode to myself… Bec was always in awe of how she could bungle interactions and realize her mistake instantly after the blunder had happened.

The woman looked at her white bread sandwich and mumbled something about how she’d expected someone with her manners to eat raw river fish exclusively.

“Sorry. Sorry.” Robert took a seat. “I see you’ve met Ms. Scarlet! She’s our political defense coordinator here at the Mountain’s Border.”

“Mr. Black! Is this the prisoner? The one with the bombs?!”

“It was a mistake. She actually helped us locate them!” Robert smiled.

“Did she now? Interesting.” Ms. Scarlet looked back to Bec to see bread-based brutality in full display. Bec was wadding olive oil drenched bread and entire pats of butter into her mouth with a gusto that befit a prisoner of the Green Gulags of Siberia. “Did you starve this poor girl?”

“She came to us on the brink of starvation, I think.” Robert, or apparently, Mr. Black said with a shrug.

“Well, thanks to you, erm,” Robert filled in Bec’s name. “Thanks to you, Bec, I’ve not had to lose face. It was my reputation at stake when we found signs of sabotage in our midst. I’m the one that’s supposed to stop those things.”

“Is it your Word that helps with that or is it a certain other set of skills?”

“Blunt, I like that in a person.” She bit into her whole wheat hoagie. Chewing and swallowing, she coughed a little and continued, “I do use my Word. It synergizes well with my career choice, but I can’t say that all security experts have that benefit. That being said, because of my Word, I’m the one of the best at what I do.” She looked off into the distance, “But what I do isn’t very nice.”

“What do you do, besides stop bombings?”

“I keep my finger on the pulse of Dust. All forms of business need people like me to make sure they’ve not angered the wrong people, or, more likely that they already have and need to be careful.” She took another bite of her sandwich, this was when Bec noticed that she was eating an entirely different type of submarine sandwich then when the conversation started. Al, keep an eye on that sandwich! I bet it’s her Word!

“Teach me! Please! I need to find a way to make money and your job seems to be very… information driven. I like research!”

Ms. Scarlet leaned in and pulled Bec’s hand before she could grab another roll. She turned it palm side up and looked at it. She tsk’ed in disappointment. “No, no, no, I won’t train you. Not for a hundred years. You are as green as the grass, Bec. You don’t have what it takes to be trained by me. See here? Your hands have barely just formed callouses like you spent your days reading books in some library of the City. Bec, what I do? I get my hands dirty.”

“You’re right… I can’t handle you, Ms. Scarlet.” Bec hung her head. What was she thinking trying to get an expert to train her so fast? Bec looked at her hand and sighed.

“Bec, what are you doing? Giving up? That’s not like you!” Al chided her.

“Yeah, yeah, Al. I don’t care. I’m outclassed by her in every way, I can just feel it.”

“Isn’t that a reason to keep trying? You could learn a lot from her.”

“I guess.”

“Anyways, you’re gonna want to hear what happened just now before you decide for sure,” Al said with utmost confidence.

“Are you talking to yourself?” Ms. Scarlet had that same aghast look on her face as before. “Black! She’s nuts!”

“It’s her assistant AI. She calls him Al.” Mr. Black’s face was sympathetic. “Al is her only friend.”

“Oh? Ooooh.” Understanding dawned on Ms. Scarlet’s face. She looked at Bec and saw her smile. That was surprising. Bec laughed in this weird, off-putting way and looked right into Ms. Scarlet’s eyes. That was even more surprising.

“Ms. Scarlet, come here, I think I have something to say to you that may change your mind about training me.”

“I very much doubt that.”

Bec leaned in to whisper a single word. “Sub.”

Ms. Scarlet bit into her sandwich which was now a roast beef and cheddar. “Hmm. Correct. That is pretty impressive.”

Mr. Black frowned. “Did she just figure out your Word?”

“Yes, yes she just did.” Ms. Scarlet cracked a finger with her thumb. Her utilitarian nail polish didn’t match her red garb, much to Bec’s disappointment.

Bec had realized Scarlet sandwich was being changed. A sub sandwich. So stupid, but so obvious. She is substituting her sandwich with each bit. The thing that Al caught was the key, Bec realized. That talk of callouses was a trick. She liked blunt people? Because she was subtle. She needed to touch Bec for her power to really work. She made Bec submit on contact. It was an amazing power for people in counterintelligence. I bet she can make a sublime sub.

Bec smiled. “Does that mean I get to train under you?”

Mr. Black shook his head. “No, Bec. It means you’re about to get beaten to a pulp unless you tell her yours.”

Bec’s mouth hung open. “Wha-why?”

“No one gets my Word for free. It’s equivalent exchange, Bec. Give…” Ms. Scarlet cracked her neck. “And take, Bec. The world revolves around this basic principle, Bec.”

“Careful, Ms. Scarlet, she’s a tier 0 on the healing scale.”

“What?” Her rising from the seat was halted. “I… I’ll kill her with a single stab?”

“No, maybe only stab her once or twice.”

“I only need one!”

Bec didn’t see where the short sword Scarlet pulled from behind her back came from, but she was sure it was a real sword after it was driven through her thigh. Ms. Scarlet was nice enough to only stab her once, but she drove it through her leg like butter when Bec tried to run. She twisted it as she removed it from Bec’s leg.

“Why? I thought we were getting along so well. You’ve ruined my jeans!” Bec cried out. Some people in the cafeteria watched with detached amusement, others kept eating. Ms. Scarlet glowered down at her. Bec began to panic and screamed, “I’M SORRY ABOUT THE GROSS FOOD EATING!”

The crimson demon laid a knee on Bec’s wound causing pain to shoot through her entire left side. She leaned in, pressing hard on Bec wound and whispered, “tell me your Word and I’ll train you… if you are driven and talented. I will also not make it a habit to stab you, unless it’s for a good reason.” Bec was bleeding out, she was sure of it.

“Don’t tell Robert. Black. We’ve,” Bec gasped. “We’ve got a bet.”

“I’m sorry. That was a whole bunch of words, none of which were your WORD.” The short sword pointed precariously at Bec’s shoulder. Bec was so scared that she could barely whisper, “it’s wave.”

“Hmm, good.” Ms. Scarlet jammed a dinner roll into Bec’s gaping leg wound.

“WHYYY?” Bec cried out again. This day just keeps getting better and better.

“Lesson one: Don’t give your Word to anyone, even under duress. Except me, of course. You don’t stand a chance against me.” Bec flopped around on the floor. “Oh, quit making a scene. You’re fine. Get up. UP!” Bec saw Ms. Scarlet offer a hand, now red with blood, to Bec.

“Wha—” Bec saw the leg wound was gone. The blood was still there, but the wound was very much gone. “You used bread to patch me up?”

“Yes, now come on! Before everything dries up!”

Bec took the hand and was pulled to her feet. When she stood and looked at her hand, she saw it was slick with… lotion? Bec sniffed it. Floral. Ms. Scarlet leaned down, touching the puddle of blood and it turned clear. Rapidly, it began bubbling and turned to a cool mist that hugged the floor and dissipated. The floor was clean. Ms. Scarlet hopped up and dusted Bec off. The blood literally dusted off of Bec. The blood on her pants and shirt turned to a clear fluid with an acrid smell. Rubbing alcohol? She patted Bec on the cheek, smiled, and walked back to the table.

Ms. Scarlet sat back at her seat and called to Bec, “Come, dear. Let’s finish our food and then we’ll talk.”

I’m going to need a therapist after this. She took a seat and realized she was actually very hungry again.

Robert snorted, “Ms. Scarlet, I don’t know why we gave you that color when you always come out of all bloodbaths clean and smelling like roses.”

“Roses are red,” Ms. Scarlet smiled. “Now what’s this about a bet? Can I get in?”