Secondly, I’m shocked to see us immediately ushered into a plastic tent by a team of people in white biohazard suits and gas masks. (The news of the Colonies’ plague must have spread here.) One of them quickly inspects my eyes, nose, mouth, and ears, and then runs a bright green light across my entire body. I wait in tense silence as the person (male or female? I can’t be sure) analyzes the reading on a handheld device. From the corner of my eye, I can see Anden undergoing the same tests—being the Republic’s Elector does not apparently exempt one from being possibly contaminated with plague. It takes a good ten minutes before we are all cleared for entry and led out from under the tarp.
Anden greets three Antarctican people (each dressed respectively in a green, black, or blue suit, cut in an unfamiliar style) waiting for us on the landing bridge with a few guards. “I hope your flight went well,” one of them says as Mariana, Serge, and I approach. She greets us in English, but her accent is thick and lush. “If you prefer, we can send you home in one of our own jets.”
The Republic is hardly perfect; that much I’ve known for a long time, and certainly ever since I met Day. But the Antarctican woman’s words are so arrogant that I feel myself bristle. Apparently our Republic jets aren’t good enough for them. I look at Anden to see what his reaction will be, but he simply bows his head and offers a beautiful smile to the woman. “Gracias, Lady Medina. You are always so gracious,” he replies. “I’m very grateful for your offer, but I certainly don’t want to impose. We’ll make do.”
I can’t help admiring Anden. Every day, I see new evidence of the burdens he shoulders.
After some argument, I reluctantly let one of the guards take Ollie away to the hotel quarters where I’ll be staying. Then we all fall into a quiet procession as the Antarcticans lead us off the platform and along the bridge toward the connecting building (colored scarlet, although I’m not sure if it’s in honor of our landing). I make a point of walking close to the bridge’s edge, so that I can look down at the city. For once, it takes me a while to count the floors (based on the bridges branching out from every floor, this building has over three hundred floors—approximately three hundred twenty-seven, although eventually I look away to shake off a sense of vertigo). Sunlight bathes the uppermost floors, but the lower floors are also brightly illuminated; they must be simulating sunlight for those walking at ground level. I watch Anden and Lady Medina chat and laugh as if they are old friends. Anden falls so neatly into it that I can’t tell whether he genuinely likes this woman or he is simply playing the role of an agreeable politician. Apparently our late Elector had at least trained his son well in international relations.
The building’s bridge entrance, an archway framed with intricately carved swirls, slides open to greet us. We halt in a lavishly decorated lobby (thick ivory carpet that, to my fascination, bursts with swirls of color wherever I put my feet down; rows of potted palms; a curved glass wall displaying bright ads and what seem like interactive stations for things I don’t understand). As we walk, the Antarcticans hand each of us a thin pair of glasses. Anden and many of the Senators immediately put them on as if they’re used to this ritual, but the Antarcticans explain the glasses anyway. I wonder whether they know who I am, or whether they care. They certainly noticed my puzzlement at the glasses.
“Keep these on for the duration of your visit,” Lady Medina tells us with her rich accent, although I know her words are directed at me. “They will help you see Ross City as it really is.”
Intrigued, I put the glasses on.
I blink in surprise. The first thing I feel is a subtle tickle in my ears, and the first thing I see are the small, glowing numbers hovering over the heads of each of the Antarcticans. Lady Medina has 28,627: LEVEL 29, while her two companions (who have yet to utter a sound) respectively have 8,819: LEVEL 11 and 11,201: LEVEL 13. When I look around the lobby, I notice all sorts of virtual numbers and words—the green bulbous plant in the corner has WATER: +1 hovering over it, while CLEAN: +1 floats above a dark, half-circle side table. In the corner of my glasses, I see tiny, glowing words:
JUNE IPARIS
PRINCEPS-ELECT 3
REPUBLIC OF AMERICA
LEVEL 1
SEPT. 22. 2132
DAILY SCORE: 0
CUMULATIVE SCORE: 0
We’ve started walking again. None of the others seem particularly concerned about the onslaught of virtual text and numbers layered over the real world, so I’m left to my own intuition. (Although the Antarcticans aren’t wearing glasses, their eyes occasionally flicker to virtual things in the world in a way that makes me wonder whether they have something embedded in their eyes, or perhaps in their brains, that permanently simulates all of these virtual things for them.)
One of Lady Medina’s two companions, a broad-shouldered, white-haired man with very dark eyes and golden-brown skin, walks slower than the others. Eventually he reaches me near the end of the procession and falls into step beside me. I tense up at his presence. When he speaks, though, his voice is low and kind. “Miss June Iparis?”
“Yes, sir,” I reply, bowing my head respectfully in the way Anden had done. To my surprise, I see the numbers in the corner of my glasses change:
SEPT. 22. 2132
DAILY SCORE: 1
CUMULATIVE SCORE: 1
My mind spins. Somehow, the glasses must have recorded my bowing action and added a point to this Antarctican scoring system, which means bowing is equal to one point. This is also when I realize something else: When the white-haired man spoke, I heard absolutely no accent—he’s now speaking perfect English. I glance over to Lady Medina, and when I catch hints of what she’s saying to Anden, I notice that her English now sounds impeccable too. The tickle I’d felt in my ears when I put on the glasses . . . maybe it’s acting as some sort of language translation device, allowing the Antarcticans to revert to their native language while still communicating with us without missing a beat.