CenCom interrupted her confusion. "Whoop! He got right by me! Here he comes, Tia, ready or not!"
Alexander didn't bother with the lift, he ran up the stairs, arriving out of breath, with longish hair mussed and uniform rumpled.
That didn't earn him any points either, although it was better than Chria's leather.
He took a quick look around to orient himself, then turned immediately to face the central column where she was housed, a nicety that only Carl and Chria had observed. It didn't matter, really, and a lot of shell-persons didn't care, so long as the softpersons faced one set of 'eyes' at least, but Tia felt, as Moira did, that it was more considerate of a brawn to face where you were, rather than empty cabin.
"Hypatia, dear lady, I am most humbly sorry to be late for this interview," he said, slowly catching his breath. "My sensei engaged me in a game of Go, and I completely lost all track of time."
He ran his blunt-fingered hand through his unruly dark hair and grinned ruefully, little smile-crinkles forming around his brown eyes. "And here I had a perfectly wonderful speech all memorized, about how fitting it is that the lady named for the last librarian at Alexandria and the brawn named for Alexander should become partners, and the run knocked it right out of my head!"
Well! He knows where my name came from! Or at least he had the courtesy and foresight to look it up. Hmm. She considered that for a moment, then put it in the 'plus' column. He was not handsome, but he had a pleasant, blocky sort of face. He was short, well, so was the original Alexander, by both modern standards and those of his own time. She decided to put his general looks in the 'plus' column too, along with his politeness. While she certainly wasn't going to choose her brawns on the basis of looks, it would be nice to have someone who provided a nice bit of landscape.
'Minus', of course, were for being late and very untidy when he finally did arrive.
"I think I can bring myself to forgive you," she said dryly. "Although I'm not certain just what exactly detained you."
"Ah, besides a hobby of ancient history, Terran history, that is, especially military history and strategy, I, ah, I cultivate certain kinds of martial arts." He ran his hand through his hair again, in what was plainly a nervous gesture. "Oriental martial arts. One soft form and one hard form. Tai Chi and Karate. I know most people don't think that's at all necessary, but, well, A and E Couriers are unarmed, and I don't like to think of myself as helpless. Anyway, my sensei, that's a martial arts Master, got me involved in a game of Go, and when you're playing against a Master, there is nothing simple about Go." He bowed his head a moment and looked sheepish. "I lost all track of time, and they had to page me. I really am sorry about making you wait."
Tla wasn't quite sure what to make of that. "Sit down, will you?" she said absently, wondering why, with this fascination with things martial and military, he hadn't shown any interest in the Military Services. "Do you play chess as well?"
He nodded. "Chess, and Othello, and several computer games. And if you have any favorites that I don't know, I would be happy to learn them." He sat quietly, calmly, without any of Garrison's fidgeting. In fact, it was that very contrast with Garrison that made her decide resolutely against that young man. A few months of fidgeting, and she would be ready to trank him to keep him quiet.
"Why Terran history?" she asked, curiously. "That isn't the kind of fascination I'd expect to find in a, a space-jockey."
He grinned. It was a very engaging, lopsided grin. "What, haven't you interviewed my classmate Chria yet? Now there is someone with odd fascinations!" Behind the banter, Tia sensed a kind of affection, even though the tips of his ears went lightly red. "I started reading history because I was curious about my name, and got fascinated by Alexander's time period. One thing led to another, and the next thing I knew, every present I was getting was either a historical holotape or a bookdisk about history, and I was actually quite happy about the situation."
So he did know the origin of her name. "Then why military strategy?"
"Because all challenging games are games of strategy," he said. "I, ah, have a friend who's really a big games buff, my best friend when I was growing up, and I had to have some kind of edge on him. So I started studying strategy. That got me into The Art of War and that got me into Zen which got me into martial arts." He shrugged. "There you have it. One neat package. I think you'd really like Tai Chi, it's all about stress and energy flow and patterns, and it's a lot like Singularity mechanics and, "
"I'm sure," she interrupted, hauling him verbally back by the scruff of his neck. "But why didn't you opt for Military Service?"
"The same reason I studied martial arts. I don't like being helpless, but I don't want to hurt anyone," he replied, looking oddly distressed. "Both Tai Chi and Karate are about never using a bit more force than you need to, but Tai Chi is the essence of using greater force against itself, just like in The Art of War, and,"
Once again she had to haul him back to the question. He tended to go off on verbal tangents, she noticed. She continued to ask him questions, long after the time she had finished with the other brawns, and when she finally let him go, it was with a sense of dissatisfaction. He was the best choice so far, but although he was plainly both sensitive and intelligent, he showed no signs at all of any interest in her field. In fact, she had seen and heard nothing that would make her think he would be ready to help her in any way with her private quest.
As the sky darkened over the landing field, and the spaceport lights came on, glaring down on her smooth metal skin, she pondered all of her choices and couldn't come up with a clear winner. Alex was the best, but the rest were, for the most part, completely unsuitable. He was obviously absentminded, and his care for his person left a little to be desired. He wasn't exactly slovenly, but he did not wear his uniform with the air of distinction that Tia felt was required. In fact, on him it didn't look much like a uniform at all, more like a suit of comfortable, casual clothes. For the life of her, she couldn't imagine how he managed that.
His tendency to wander down conversational byways could be amusing in a social situation, but she could see where it could also be annoying to, oh, a Vegan, or someone like them. No telling what kind of trouble that could lead to, if they had to deal with AIs, who could be very literal-minded.
No, he wasn't perfect. In fact, he wasn't even close.
"XH One-Oh-Three-Three, you have an incoming transmission," CenCom broke in, disturbing her thoughts. "Hold onto your bustle, lady, it's the Wicked Witch of the West, and I think someone just dropped a house on her sister."
Whatever allusions the CenCom operator was making were lost on Tia, but the sharply impatient tone of her supervisor was not. "XH One-Oh-Three-Three, have you selected a brawn yet?" the woman asked, her voice making it sound as if Tia had been taking weeks to settle on a partner, rather than less than a day.
"Not yet, Supervisor," she replied, cautiously. "So far, to be honest, I don't think I've found anyone I can tolerate for truly long stretches of time."
That wasn't exactly the problem, but Beta Gerold y Caspian wouldn't understand the real problem. She might just as well be Vegan. She made very few allowances for the human vagaries of brawns and none at all for shell-persons.