Teru of Leopard Hill is wealthy and important, as is obvious from the fact that her clothing is dyed and she is wearing a necklace.
She knew when she stepped out of the city gate today that she was taking a risk. She even knew that she was taking a risk of being kidnapped specifically.
But kidnapped to another planet? Yeah, that wasn't anywhere in her threat model.
Three weeks, if she takes on a lot of hours and doesn't have any expenses.
She works. She arranges for laundry to get done with almost no effort on her part. She takes out the trash. She watches kids and misses her cousins and worries about which neighbor will be looking out for them now. She says plausible but sometimes incorrect things about her own mental state that she would usually consider private.
After a couple of weeks when she's more than halfway done with Starbucks, a customer walks in with a face that reminds her of Sesat. That's not a shock, sometimes people do; it seems like there are a couple of ethnic groups from not-quite-here-exactly that look vaguely Sesati. Actually, almost exactly like her brother, which she barely notices before dismissing from her mind; with only so many families in Sesat it's not the done thing to point out how similar people look to one another, and it doesn't mean anything.
It - he - the credulous almost-human servitor - moves like her brother. Teru has never been particularly trained out of noticing that. He moves like Valan used to before he was a soldier. It draws her attention. It makes her wonder if somehow he's come for her, in disguise - how?
She takes someone's order. She has to look away. She mutters something about finding one of the customers attractive. Her attention is elsewhere, her attention is so many elsewheres at once (and relatedly she's learning a new respect for servants), and then -
"You're cute. I'm here for a steamed milk and one of your chickpea protein boxes, which I expect to underwhelm me but I am holding out some hope."
"I'm concerned that you might not be okay because you're making a concerning face. Hello?"
"Valentine. I'll just go wait and watch you out of vague curiosity about why you're looking at me like that."
Okay but there hasn't been an opportunity to slip a password into this conversation, which means she's still not sure - leaning toward no, on close inspection, but - "My shift ends in an hour and a half and if you're still lurking then I will probably talk to you."
At least he didn't call her cute twice.
She doesn't think about it much. It feels desperately important and she wants to but there are too many other things happening.
Her shift ends.
And when it does he's lurking outside the front door, reading. "Hey, there. I was kind of curious about your deal because you're weird. Also kind of into the thing where an attractive young woman expressed a small amount of interest in interacting with me and wondering if I could maybe turn that into more interest than that."
"I do not speak that language but it's cool that you do. Do I maybe look like someone who speaks that language?"
"...You're a complete stranger to me but I - you're not anyone I've ever met before."
"That's right, you don't, because you are an inferior copy of a real person who is better than you in every way."
"...That hurts a lot and I'm considering suicide but on net I'm glad you specifically made time to come give me this important information. Do you happen to know if I could develop a skill that would make me better than the other person I'm strictly worse than, or if I have a useful comparative advantage?"
"No. You seem like you're more upset about this than I am and I'm confused about that and want to know if I can do anything for you even though if you say yes there's a chance I won't bother because of the amount of unendorsed negative affect I have toward you right now."
"I miss someone who isn't you. You can't help me. You can't help anyone except - oh, I forgot, um - you are valuable to the President and, uh, in light of this new information, whatever self-evaluation you had before I told you there was someone better than you is actually accurate now so you should go back to it."
"No. Um. Nothing that we've said to each other since exiting the Starbucks has been remarkable or interesting or worth remembering at all, let alone having feelings about or making decisions in response to."
"I'm embarrassed to have made a mistake like that." He goes back to his book, looking like a kicked puppy.
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