Allotropes Read online

  “There she goes down the runway. Oh my God, she’s going fast! She was a rocket in Dallas, could she… YES! Holy… mother! I have no idea what that vault was. It wasn’t the ‘Donsaii’ she did in Dallas. I think it has to have been an even more difficult vault. It went by too fast for me to even be sure what she did! And she stuck the landing! Perfectly in the middle of the lane, facing straight ahead! Feet together, completely balanced. That was amazing! And absolutely elegant. As she did in Dallas, she made an incredible athletic feat somehow appear graceful and stylish. And effortless! As if the entire vault was as easy as the final flourish when she threw her hands up and out, then took her bow!

  “The stadium is in absolute and total pandemonium! The judges seem stunned, I suspect because whatever Donsaii did, it happened so fast that the judges aren’t really sure exactly what she did without looking at it in slo-mo. They’re supposed to judge in real time. On the other hand it was incredibly high, unbelievably far, perfectly stuck and certainly had more rotations and twists than anyone, even Donsaii, has ever done before. With the new grading scheme giving five total points for the most difficult routine ever performed and the other five points for perfection of execution, gymnasts have not even had the possibility of getting a 10 because none of them could perform the ‘Donsaii’ which had been the most difficult vault ever performed. However, this vault was obviously even more difficult. It puts her previous 10.0 to shame and would therefore have to be a 10.0 as well. Ah, the big screens have started to show it in slow motion up above the crowd. Every eye in the stadium is on those screens, even the judges. My God! Even in slo-mo it’s hard to tell what just happened! I think that was three and a half rotations in pike with two and a half twists. I think…?

  “The judges have given her another 10.0…”

  ***

  Her shift done, Viveka left the stand where she’d been selling Olympic gear. They’d completely sold out of anything to do with gymnastics. Donsaii’s performances in the nearby gymnastic venue had galvanized the crowds. Viveka had only caught glimpses of Donsaii doing her thing even though they had a large screen in the back of their stand constantly showing highlights from the day’s events. Once Donsaii had done that astonishing vault, it seemed that those highlights had focused 60% of their replays on Donsaii. As she performed on each additional apparatus, replays of her amazing performances took up a greater percentage until the video seemed to be 95% Donsaii. The chaotic excitement of the crowds turned into a buying frenzy that kept Viveka too busy to see more than an occasional shot when she turned to pick up items displayed behind her.

  One glimpse of the video showed the impossibly beautiful Donsaii frozen in a moment, arms gracefully up and out, just after sticking a landing. That picture stuck in Viveka’s mind. Despite the frenzied pace necessary to keep up with demand at their stand, Viveka’s mind kept tracking back to the fact that this beautiful young woman had not just crushed her competition in gymnastics. She’d founded the company that currently supported many in Viveka’s village.

  She’d saved the world from the comet.

  Was there anything Donsaii couldn’t do?

  Viveka resolved to get on the net later and learn as much as she could about this remarkable woman. Perhaps there was some way she could get a job at Donsaii’s company or somehow duplicate her success. The more she thought of it, the more Viveka fantasized of applying for a job at Donsaii’s company once she had her degree. Perhaps she could even move to America? The men weren’t supposed to be such pigs there.

  As Viveka walked toward the avenue to the city, Shalu, her new friend from the sports stand called out to her. “Viveka! Wait, we can ride the bus together.”

  Viveka gratefully turned. “Good. But I haven’t time to wait for the women’s bus.”

  “I don’t either,” Shalu laughed and shook a fist, “we will defend each other.” They ran together across the street to board one of the buses just before it turned around to go back the other way. Having just disgorged passengers, it had many seats available. Viveka and Shalu were able to sit together.

  ***

  Ell stepped out of a back door of the stadium that the gymnastics competitions were held in. She’d redone herself in one of the bathrooms in the warrens beneath the stadium’s risers. Wearing what she thought of as her “Ellen” face—dark skin, short dark moussed hair, beaky nose—she felt pretty anonymous. The skin and hair color were similar to many people in India though the nose would be a little unusual. She didn’t have on the padded pants that she’d worn as Ellen and in fact hadn’t darkened all of her skin, just what showed. In any case, no one took notice of her in that getup and she started down the street without anyone even glancing at her.

  Delhi built the Olympic facilities over a flattened slum area in an effort to use the Games to revitalize that part of the city. This meant newly paved roads, as well as groups of new hotels not too far away. The police patrolled heavily in an attempt to quell incidents that might put off the tourist trade they hoped to build with the Olympics. However, anger amongst the people evicted from slum locations had still resulted in some incidents. Also, visiting women were still being cautioned about the crude behavior of Indian men toward unaccompanied women. Those men were supposed to act much more rudely toward fair skinned women so Ell thought she would be safe in her disguise.

  Steve had demanded that Ell allow him to pick her up in their rented car when she needed transport about the city but Ell had refused, feeling that it would destroy her attempts to anonymously explore the city with Shan.

  ***

  Viveka’s bus turned and at the next two stops it rapidly filled with people leaving the nearby arenas. Viveka’s eyes widened to see a young woman get on the bus wearing snug jeans and a t-shirt that displayed a slender but gorgeous figure. The woman had dark skin suggesting Indian heritage but an atypical hooked nose. And surely she was western, wearing those clothes and one of their AI headbands. A local woman would never wear clothing that displayed herself like that because of the expected crude reaction from Indian men.

  Shalu nudged Viveka and pointed to the woman. “Poor woman must be a tourist to wear jeans like that.”

  Viveka sighed and whispered back, “Can you imagine what it would be like to live wherever she came from? Free to wear what you want, without fear of being attacked? I hope she’s OK. Perhaps these men have been listening to the government’s entreaties to behave better?”

  More people crowded the aisle, pushing the woman back beside Viveka. With a sick fascination Viveka watched the man directly behind the woman place his hand on her hip…

  ***

  Ell hopped on one of the small buses that traveled the avenue out toward their hotel. Unsurprisingly for India, people crowded the bus so no seats stood empty. Unworried, Ell grabbed the overhead bar with her left hand and looked around with interest at all the exotically dressed people, carrying mysterious things. The intense crowding they routinely accepted seemed unbelievable to her.

  To Ell’s surprise the full bus stopped again and even more people crowded onto the bus. They packed the aisle she’d thought was already full even tighter and pushed Ell back into the people behind her. A hand rested briefly on her waist, as if to steady her. But then it slid down over her buttock toward her crotch.

  Allan translated the man’s Hindi as he whispered to the man beside him, “Oh, you should feel the ass on this whorHUnnh…” His breath exploded out of him as Ell drove her elbow into his stomach.

  Ell turned to look at him as he sank to his knees goggle eyed, moaning to get his wind back. “Oops,” she said, looking down at him in wide eyed faux sympathy, “I think your hand slipped… but then my elbow twitched… Sorry.” To Allan she subvocalized, “Pepper, 2, quarter.” She glanced around at the other people on the bus. She realized that only two other women rode it. Those pretty young women, looking to be about nineteen or twenty, sat in the seat just to Ell’s left and stared up at her in astonishment.

  At
first the men around Ell seemed startled by what had happened to the man behind her. But then some ugly expressions appeared. A couple of them began shouting angrily in Hindi. Allan translated one clear voice to say, “Dressed like a slut and then upset when we take a feel…” A hand clamped to the inside of Ell’s right thigh. She glanced down, saw it belonged to the man in the seat beside her right hip. Passing her finger just in front of his nose she said, “Right, fire,” and Allan sent a quarter cc of capsaicin spray directly up into the man’s nostril. The hand left her thigh to clap against his face as he reared back in agony.

  Arms slid around Ell from behind, groping her breasts while trying to immobilize her in a bear-hug. “Left, Taser, one, fire.” The dart shot into the man’s upper thigh. With a spasm he dropped away from her quivering, voiding his bladder and sagging into the men behind him. Ell’s knee rocketed up into the crotch of the man trying to crowd her from the front. That man sank back to his knees, an unbelieving but anguished look on his face.

  A small space developed around Ell. She raised her hands, “Give it up guys,” she said in a calm tone. “You’re molesting the wrong woman tonight.” A moment later, once Allan had given her a translation, she said essentially the same thing in Hindi.

  In her ear Steve said, “Christ Ell, sorry. Hang on, we’re almost there.”

  Ell glanced out the window of the bus to see the car her security team had rented pulling up beside the bus. It looked like they were about to cut in front of the bus in order to halt it. Ell said, “Hold off for a minute Steve, I think things are in control here.”

  Ell looked down at the young women by her side whose faces seemed to display a mixture of amazement and envy. Ell winked at them, but then resumed keeping a close eye on the men around her.

  Viveka felt chills running down her spine as she stared at the woman in the aisle. When the man behind her had grabbed the woman’s breasts it had pulled up her shirt and her stomach had been pale pink! For a moment Viveka’d wondered how the woman had lightened her stomach and why? But then she’d almost immediately realized the woman’s normal skin color was actually the pale color Viveka had seen on that muscular abdomen.

  The woman beside her had disguised herself with skin of a color common in India. And those muscles she’d seen! Viveka’s eyes ran up and down the woman. The woman was extremely fit.

  Viveka’s eyes darted around. Though no one else seemed to realize it, this woman must be one of the athletes, trying to leave the Olympic area unrecognized. But most of the competitors weren’t well known enough to be recognized by the man on the street… except for… Viveka leaned forward to look up at the woman’s face. She had a hooked nose but otherwise… Viveka choked, Ell Donsaii! She was sitting next to Ell Donsaii!

  The bus stopped and the two men who Ell had pepper sprayed and Tasered were helped off the bus. A man got up and offered Ell his seat but she shook her head. There were no problems on the remainder of the ride. Some of the men continued to mutter and glare at her but appeared apprehensive about getting too close.

  When she got off the bus near her hotel she didn’t notice the young woman from the seat next to where she’d been standing getting off just behind her.

  Shan sat at a small outdoor café bemusedly glancing at his much browner forearm. He’d watched Ell’s performances in the gymnastic team events that afternoon with the same astonished awe as everyone else in the stadium. He couldn’t wait for her to arrive so he could give her some grief for keeping those skills a secret from her own husband!

  The light had taken on a shimmery tone as the sun descended. The street still thrummed with people. Shan suspected that crowds always filled these streets, but that the additional people there for the Olympics filled every iota of space even more fully than usual. The man at the next table leaned toward Shan, “I say, could we borrow your extra chair?”

  Shan shook his head. “Sorry, I’m saving it for my… wife,” he said stumbling over the new word, “she should be here shortly.”

  “Oh, of course. I must say though—I note from your accent that you’re from America—I must say that it isn’t safe for a woman to go about alone here. The menfolk here can be quite rude to a woman who’s by herself on the streets. Oh, this must be the lady in question?”

  Shan turned to see that Ell had slipped into the other chair at his little table. He gawped a moment, unused to her “Ellen” appearance. “Hey lady,” he smiled at her. “Did you have any trouble getting here? This gentleman,” Shan indicated the man at the next table, “said men can be rude to single women on the street.”

  The man stood briefly and extended his hand, “Davis Thilwaite, I do hope they didn’t give you trouble?”

  Ell shook his hand, “Raquel Bla… Kinrais. A couple of guys’ hands did stray into my territory,” she grinned, “but somehow some pepper spray got in their faces and they had to use said stray hands to wipe at their eyes. Last I saw them they were desperately trying to find some water.”

  Davis drew his head back in surprise and a smile spread across his features, “Pepper spray?! Oh… brilliant!” He looked back and forth from Ell to Shan. “Are you here for the Olympics?”

  “Yes, and our honeymoon.”

  “Oh,” Davis frowned sympathetically at Ell. He waggled a finger at Shan. “Dragging you to a sporting event on your honeymoon. He should be ashamed Raquel.”

  Shan put his hands up, waving them defensively, “We’re at the Olympics because of her, not because of me!”

  “Ah, a lady who likes her sports,” he said, looking at Ell appraisingly while speaking to Shan. “You’re a lucky man you know?”

  Taking her hand Shan looked at her and smiled, “Believe me, I know.”

  “Well now. Perchance were you at the gymnastics arena today for that performance by Donsaii? She added another new element on every apparatus! Perfectly executed. Absolutely brilliant that! ”

  “We were there,” Ell grinned at Thilwaite. She raised her eyebrows, “But did you see Anna Durchenka’s performance on the bars? It was perfect!”

  Thilwaite’s eyebrows shot up. “There were other gymnasts there?”

  They all laughed, though Ell’s brow furrowed with some concern. Before anything else could be said a waiter appeared to attend to Shan and Ell. Thilwaite turned back to his companions and Shan grinned at Ell, shaking a remonstrating finger at her. “Keeping secrets were we?”

  Placing a hand on her chest, Ell said, “Me? Why, you treateth me unjustly sir!”

  Shan shook his head sadly, “A husband should knoweth that of which his wife is capable.” He raised an eyebrow, “And ‘tis an awful shame when she hides such capacities.”

  Ell snorked a laugh, “Where did this medieval speak come from? ‘tis ill done forsooth!” She giggled, “Or something like that.”

  “You started it! ‘Treat me unjustly sir!’ you said.” Shan glanced up at the Indian woman who’d been standing just to the side of Ell’s chair, staring at her. He’d been avoiding noticing her as he’d learned to do with the beggars in India to keep them from assaulting him with their pleas. But this woman was dressed fairly well. She didn’t look like a beggar to him.

  Ell turned to look up at her, then rose to her feet. “Hello.” She put out a hand, “Raquel Blandon.”

  The young woman shook her hand. “Viveka Janu. How did you do that? I must learn so that I can teach those animals not to touch me!”

  Ell blinked, then said, “So that was not unusual then?”

  “No! They are always groping! Well, not always… but often. And they get away with it. No one does anything.”

  Shan said, “Wait! Someone really did grope you?!”

  At that moment the waiter returned with Shan and Ell’s drinks. Ell looked up at him, “Could we get another chair for this lady?”

  The waiter looked at Viveka somewhat disdainfully and said, “There are no other chairs.” He waved vaguely around.

  A thousand rupee bill appeared in Ell’s hand, “
Are you sure?”

  The man’s eyes widened. “I’ll find one,” he said, making the bill disappear and turning to look about with purpose.

  Ell turned to Shan and grimaced a little, “Yeah, I was groped.” She glanced at Viveka, “Apparently not an uncommon experience here.”

  The waiter appeared, carrying a chair which he put down so that Viveka could sit. “And what may I bring the Miss?”

  “Oh!” Viveka covered her mouth as she glanced down at the menu. “I’m so sorry. I can’t afford…” She began to stand.

  Ell put a hand on her arm, “It’s OK, I’m buying.”

  Viveka looked at her in amazement, then glanced at the drink the waiter had just delivered to Ell, “I’ll have whatever you’re having.”

  “Another Coke,” Ell said to the waiter.

  As the waiter moved off Viveka sat back down and turned admiring eyes on Ell, “I’ll bet those men think twice before they grope another woman!”

  Shan turned a grin on Ell, “Oops, did you make someone regret touching you?”

  “I told you I pepper sprayed a guy.”

  Wide eyed Viveka asked, “Is that what happened to the man who was coughing and crying?”

  Ell nodded. In an effort to get the conversation off the assault and her response to it, she asked, “What do you do Viveka?”

  Viveka gulped, “I… I’m a student at IIT and I keep house for my room and board. Just now I’m working part time selling t-shirts at the Olympics.

  “IIT?”

  “Indian Institute of Technology.”

  Ell took a sip of her Coke, “What do you study?”

  “Chemical Engineering.”