A few steps up the corridor was an open archway giving on a room with tables and chairs, occupied by Grallt in a miscellany of costumes, some the same style as Dee’s but more skintight overalls or jumpsuits, in a range of colors, mostly bright. Dee picked a table with four chairs around it, and they took seats. A male Grallt in white tunic and red trousers bustled up. “Table service?” Todd inquired with raised eyebrows.
Dee gave her humanlike shrug and exchanged gabble with the new Grallt for a while, and he moved off, still bustling. “I don’t understand your comment,” Dee said to Todd when he was gone.
Todd shrugged himself, and Peters replied, “Is he gonna bring our food to us?”
“Yes, that is his function. Is there a problem?”
“We’re not used to that,” Todd explained.
“What about afterwards?” Peters asked.
“I don’t understand.”
“Well, afterwards there are empty dishes,” Todd said. “On our ship, each person takes the empties to the scullery.”
“Scullery?” Dee paused for a moment. “Here, you simply leave the empty, ah, dishes. Someone will take them away to be cleaned.”
“Restaurant,” said Peters.
“I don’t mind,” Todd said with a grin.
“Me neither, but shit, this ain’t what we expected.” It was nicer than they’d expected. Peters wasn’t sure why he felt uncomfortable about that.
Todd knew. “Can you imagine Commander Bolton’s face when he sees this? Even the officers don’t have it this good on our ships.”
Peters nodded. “Yeah. Dee, what kind of setup do the officers get?”
“They are much the same as yours, except that they are arranged for only one person in each room.” She made a gesture, indicating the room and tables. “They will have food service in the same area, and some recreation facilities.”
The waiter came up with a tray, and the three leaned back, allowing him to arrange plates and glasses. A patty of something brown occupied the center of the plates, with other things arranged around the periphery. There were small pellets, about half red and half yellow, in a clear gooey sauce. Clockwise from that was a lump of tan paste, then blue leaves with black specks that turned out not to be part of the leaves. At that point Peters’s cognition cut out, and when Dee named the foods he heard nothing but gabble and didn’t remember that.
The liquid was fruit juice, sweet and tart. The red and yellow pellets were something like beans, the tan paste was gooey and didn’t taste like much of anything, and the leaves were crisp and crunchy with a citrus flavor. The patty was some kind of meat, coarse and grainy, fried by the taste and texture. The whole meal was bland but overall not bad. Dee’s food was different, probably the things she liked better; they didn’t ask. Peters and Todd dug in, finding themselves hungrier than they had expected.
They had almost finished when a male Grallt in one of the skintight jumpsuits came up. “Hello, Dreelig,” Dee greeted him, and when Peters looked closely he thought he could recognize the ambassador, or at least the pattern on his suit.
“Pleasant greetings,” Dreelig pronounced. “Have you finished your meal?”
Peters stuffed a last bite of meat in his mouth and followed it with a sip of juice. “I’m done,” he announced when his mouth was empty.
“Good,” Dreelig said. “It is time for you to be fitted for your protective garment.”
Todd frowned. “Protective garment?”
“Yes. You need a protective garment while you are working, in case of accident or equipment failure. It is easier to show you than to explain. Come with me.”
They stood to follow, not without looks at the empty plates, not accustomed to just leaving them behind. Dreelig led them to the left, a long way down the corridor and up a set of stairs. The new corridor was painted cream color; it was cleaner than the other areas they’d seen, and the doors were glass with etched designs, pictures and what were probably words or numbers. The one Dreelig gestured them into had what looked to Peters like three paper dolls, linked together, in a vise or maybe a C-clamp.
“Looks like a doctor’s office,” Peters observed. There were chairs upholstered in dark brown, a couch the same color with bare metal arms, a low table, and a desk with a female Grallt behind it.
Dreelig discussed something with the receptionist, then looked back at the two sailors. “They are ready for us. Just go on through the door.”
Inside was another Grallt, male this time. He gestured at a machine, a platform of shiny metal surrounded by gadgets. “What do we do?” Todd asked.
“Stand on the platform.” Dreelig pointed.
“Think I’ll let you do the honors,” Peters drawled.
“Thanks a lot.” Todd took a low step up and turned to face the others. “How’s that?”
The attendant gabbled something. “No,” said Dreelig. “You must remove your clothing.”
“All of it?”
“Yes. The measurements must be exact.”
Todd began to disrobe, beginning with his hat, which he handed to Peters. When he was down to skivvies he looked at Dreelig, who nodded and made a down-sweeping gesture; the skivvies went too. The attendant grabbed something on the end of an articulated arm and began moving it around. Todd flinched the first time the gadget touched him, but after that he was able to be stoic. The process took ten minutes, with more of it than he really liked spent in the area of his groin.
Finally the attendant stowed the gadget, handed Todd his skivvies and t-shirt, and fiddled with controls on a shiny panel. Todd stepped down and began getting back into his uniform, and the panel buzzed and extruded a strip. The attendant tore the paper off, laid it on a counter, and gestured; it was Peters’s turn.
Peters took his mind off the process by examining the machine. He had begun forming an impression of what Grallt machinery looked like: a little clunky, bigger than it needed to be, not terribly well finished. This looked more… well, elegant was probably the right term. All the joints were even and nearly invisible, there weren’t any exposed fasteners, and the shape was smooth curves, almost organic. He shook his head. The impression was more subliminal than direct—although he wouldn’t have used that word; his own thought was “just a feelin’”—and therefore wasn’t anything to depend on.
The attendant disappeared through another door, and Peters started getting dressed. “Now we will wait a little longer,” Dreelig said.
Todd and Peters discussed the measuring machine in low voices. Todd had gotten the same impression Peters had. The machine was—was what? “I dunno,” said Todd. “It just looks nicer than the other stuff.”
“Chill,” Peters advised. “Here’s our friend.” Dreelig came to sit next to Todd. The low table had something on it: folded paper, printed in bright colors. Well, a doctor’s office ought to have magazines. Peters picked one up and puzzled over it, unable to tell if it was backwards or frontwards, let alone read it. Right side up was easy, there were pictures of people to indicate that. There were lots of pictures, in bright colors; the text, if that’s what it was, was sparse and big, somehow simple. Kids’ books?