Antoinette noticed that while some of the doors were painted the same color as the corridor itself, many of them were painted in different colors, lacking any pattern as to their differences. “Why are some of ze doors different colored than the others?”
“You can decorate your room in any manner you wish,” Scott replied. “That includes the doors themselves. It also tends to make it easier to find your own room when you’re tired and don’t really want to be bothered with trying to read the numbers. Red, here, for example, painted his red, while Jay and his wife have theirs painted a sky blue.”
“Yeah,” Jay added. “Mandy wouldn’t let me paint any of our rooms that color. Said I spent enough time in the blue sky that I needed to be brought to earth. I have no idea what she meant by that,” he continued, grinning.
”This is the palm plate.” He pointed to a clear glass panel beside the door. He turned to a nearby wall comm and punched for Housing. “Locking imprint for one-seven-zero-one.”
”Ready,” the speaker responded.
Scott turned to her. “Press the palm of your right hand flat on the plate.”
She did as he told her.
”Imprint complete,” came from the speaker.
”Good,” Scott said. “There is another plate inside. All a person has to do is touch the panel and the latch will release.” He touched the palm plate, which triggered the click of a latch retracting. He pressed lightly on the door and it swung open noiselessly. “If you want to lock it, press your palm on the plate and it will remain locked until you press it again. If somebody wants admittance while the door is locked, it will sound a chime in the room to announce them.”
She nodded. “So, the keys are not needed. I like this way.” She looked through the open door. The room was simply but comfortably furnished. A large bed stood against one wall. A walk-in closet and bathroom opened off the back wall. Against the opposite wall stood a well-equipped desk area, complete with computer terminal.
She took the bag from Red, tossed it onto the bed, then took the case from Tracker. She laid it on the floor, opened it and stroked the neck of the shattered guitar. Then, with an abrupt, almost violent movement, she slammed the lid shut and slid the case far under the bed.
Tears filled her eyes as she rose to her feet.
”Come along,” Scott said with a jerk of his head. “We’ll show you the rest of the Base.” She followed him, wiping her eyes dry as Tracker padded silently beside her.
”M’sieur Scott,” she said after a minute, touching his arm.
He stopped and turned to her. “Just Scott,” he said. “What is it?”
”Scott,” she said, “the ones that kidnapped me, they had the names like Vengeance, or the Blacksnake. All of you have the unusual powers at well, but your names are normal, like Scott,” she pointed at him, “or Jay, or nicknames like Red. Only Trackeur, here, and Magnum have a name like theirs. Why is that?”
Scott grinned. “Because we want to blend in with the normals, not stand out. We want to be accepted without fear by society, so we wear a uniform, and use our own names mostly. Some use an alias, like Magnum, and on missions he covers his face with the blast shield of his helmet, so he can also act in his civilian identity separately from his identity as our director. Blacksnake, and most criminal EPs in general, want to flaunt their differences and want people to be afraid of them. For that reason, they take names that inspire fear and wear outlandish costumes.”
She nodded. “I see.”
They turned a corner and she stopped, staring in wide-eyed astonishment at the open space before her. The Plaza was enormous. Some two hundred feet across and four hundred feet long, it soared up through the second level of the living quarters in a long dome, marked by balconies running the full length of the room on either side and visible on the end opposite where she stood.
She looked around, awestruck. A huge free form pool filled one side of the Plaza, taking up almost two-thirds of the area. To the right, the floor sloped upwards into a large garden area which occupied a good quarter of the Plaza while in the far right corner a small waterfall fell in a shimmering ribbon from the ceiling into a plunge basin that drained into the main pool by way of a water slide made to look like a rocky stream. Bridges patterned after those in Japanese gardens crossed the pool. One crossed the plunge basin of the waterfall just above the stream, while a second marked off a pool equipped with low and high diving boards. These two pools flanked a spiraling ladder made to look carved into a tree rising to the balcony above. A third bridge crossed from left to right over the main pool, allowing easy access from one side to the other. The remaining third of the plaza was occupied with an artificial beach complete with playground, vollyball net and seating, separated from the pool itself by a wide boardwalk down its entire length.
”This is beyond belief,” she exclaimed. Her mobile hands gestured about her, encompassing her surroundings. She hurried to the edge of the pool. “The water, it is for swimming? Are there any rules for using it?”
Scott shrugged. “Don’t go in alone if you can’t swim.”
Red grinned “Considering how she reacted to being nude when we met her, I think she’d rather know if we require swimsuits. I’m sure I won’t mind if she goes in without one!”
”I have never seen the need for clothing,” Tracker commented in reply. “It only gets tangled in things when you need to move freely. All it’s good for is decoration and occasional protection from the weather.”
Scott shrugged again. “Most people do wear swimsuits, but I don’t know of any rules requiring them, here.”
She smiled. “When you have finished showing me around, I shall return here and swim. I love to swim!”
