Three men, with their entourage, men with guns. Their heads were interesting. Leader and soldier, they were very in sync, much like the group that was still gathered outside the Bet portal were of similar minds as they chanted or sang together. They felt like an odd fit. Foreign worlders?

Leaders of Earth Cheit. Abrahamic theocrats. They’re our guests, here about the people of theirs who died in the broken trigger incident.

A serious subject. Crystalclear was aware of a few other things that had come up in regard to the group, until the broken trigger had consumed everyone’s attention. The discussions in the late-night media had been derailed by the deaths of the ninety-two individuals caught by the broken trigger.

“If you’ll follow us,” Weld said.

They walked up the stairs, with Weld in front, and Relay and Crystalclear toward the rear. The armed guard trailed even further behind, with one waiting at the base of the stairwell.

They had a bit of a distance to walk to reach the room at the top. It looked like a ball room, with fancy curtains, a lacquered floor, and lots of empty space. A table was set to one side, and there were curtains closed that didn’t stop the light from passing through. Sheers, possibly, to obscure the view of the world outside, or perhaps more importantly, to obscure those on the outside from seeing those within.

People were seated at the table already, paperwork around them.

The one closest to the door was a serious looking woman, slender, in a blouse and a skirt that highlighted how narrow she was. The belt of her skirt cinched in at the waist, emphasizing her figure. She had a lot of the anxiety that the refugees departing the train had had, but she didn’t show it in how she sat or how she moved as she stood to greet the men.

Sierra Kiley, Relay communicated. Board member of Rock Bay Reconstruction Group. That’s one of the biggest construction firms, with its roots in Brockton Bay. She’s a candidate for mayor of the Megalopolis, but she’s not expected to win. Foresight thinks she has her hat in the ring for other reasons. Access, possibly. We know she has ties to organized crime, if you couldn’t guess from her background in Brockton Bay. She doesn’t necessarily know we know.

Next were a couple, male and female. She wore a nice suit-dress. He wore a dress shirt, slacks, and carried the paperwork. Their focus was sharp, they clearly worked well together from how well they coordinated. As with Big Picture, there was something else going on with the man’s perceptions. He wasn’t a cone—his perceptions were covering a lot of ground, and his fractures were very different from the norm. They were closer to being etches.