Before today, Emilena would have stabbed a man who hugged her the way Adrian just did. But as Emilena prepared to suppress her murderous urge, instead she found that it never came. Adrian had more than earned her trust...actually, it was rather alarming how many opportunities he'd had to kill her while she completely defenseless. Somehow, it had become second-nature for her to trust him, which almost felt like something of a nice break from standard operating procedure.
Still, she broke the hug. They had a job to do. "The easiest way to get in would be to pose as patients. Your left arm is injured, as are both of my hands. We'd have to pretend to be interested in getting the wounded areas cybernetically replaced," Hell, he might legitimately be interested in doing just that, she realized, "but I will simply refuse the surgery at the last moment. It still gets us through the door and into the back rooms, where we can investigate."
---------------------------
At breakfast, Lily ate ravenously. With her strength back, she quickly put it to good use replenishing the energy she'd lost on her 3 days on the lam.
"So," she said, in between biting into her fifth grapefruit, "We need to get into Mantreads Shoe Suppliers, but I can't be seen in public. I was thinking we disguise ourselves as Sapaar."
The Sapaar were a religious group that had fully integrated into modern society. The men behaved and dressed pretty much like anybody else, but the women dressed head-to-toe in a silver reflective tunic that covered even the head, representing their subservience to the modern world. "I figure we don't have silver cloth floating around, but the poorer ones use white. We could cut up a sheet or something!"
She seemed remarkably chipper, especially considering her subdued behavior the night previous. She was still riding the high from a good night's sleep, and from the reminder that not everyone in the world was indifferent to her plight or wanted her dead.
