Chapter Text
Tony’s been silently working on dismantling an accelerated textile processor for about an hour when he notices a familiar tingling feeling. He’s being watched, and it’s by someone who disapproves of whatever he’s doing. Memories of Howard doing the same thing come back far too easily.
He glances up from his work, then restrains himself from rolling his eyes with difficulty. Mendiel is glaring at him through his own projected calculations. At least, Tony assumes he’s glaring, from the intensity of his gaze and the darker hue around those unblinking eyes that Tony has interpreted as anger. Can someone without eyelids even glare?
He’s distracted enough by his own thoughts that he’s staring, apparently, because Mendiel suddenly sweeps aside the screen between himself and Tony and glares harder. “Need something?” Tony asks, giving a token effort at sounding genuinely curious, but knowing it comes out sarcastic.
“You looking for something else to do? Don’t tell me you’re still working on that processor. It’s just basic components.”
Tony bristles. He knows he’s being baited, and that Mendiel’s just being an ass for whatever reason, but he’s never been one to back down from a challenge. Never let them see you struggle. He defers to cockiness, letting his mouth quirk up into a sharp smirk. “What else have you got?”
Mendiel waves at his screens and then sweeps a stubby limb in Tony’s direction, and one of his own projects appears up on Tony’s workstation. “This auditory dampening system developed a bug yesterday, I just haven’t had time to get to fixing it yet. I’m sure you can figure it out.”
Tony frowns at the complex projection up in front of him. “I haven’t seen any of the functioning auditory systems yet.”
Even through the medium of the translator—which is, admittedly, incredibly sophisticated, going as far as to translate cultural idioms into compatible ones in other languages, and when Tony understands more about the basics he is absolutely going to take one apart—the mocking in Mendiel’s tone is clear. “You’re saying you’re giving up already, you can’t figure this out? You need to be walked through the simple stuff first?”
“Of course not,” Tony bluffs smoothly, adopting an unaffected air. “But I assume you want it back the way it was in the first place. Who knows, I could change the way it functions entirely.”
“On Tolsar we always welcome any real improvements to our systems,” Mendiel says, clearly calling his bluff.
Before Tony can try to come up with a retort, two of their team return from their break. “Mendiel, there’s food for you in the front,” Laiin says, and Mendiel abandons his staring contest with Tony to close down his workstation and slither off to his lunch.
Laiin and Loren are a couple from Diinovar IV, not that that means much to Tony, who’s still very new to the wider galaxy. He wonders sometimes whether he has some sort of natural inclination to like them and dislike Mendiel because of their physical appearances, if that’s some sort of space racism, and whether that means it’s his own fault that Mendiel is such a dick to him.
Laiin and Loren are fairly humanoid, a little longer limbed and differently shaped, but they’d probably be considered aesthetically pleasing to most humans. Mendiel better resembles a cross between a scorpion and a Hutt. Where the Diinovarians’ skin is a soft, pale cyan that reminds Tony of the oceans back home, Mendiel’s is a pebbled, muddy mix of browns and greens that reminds Tony more of vomit. And while the sounds of their voices are partly manufactured by his translator and can’t truly be attributed to them, Laiin and Loren’s come across like any normal human strangers, whereas Tony could swear on anything that Mendiel’s words inhabit the auditory imprint of Justin Hammer.
“How are things coming along?” Laiin asks as they approach Tony’s workstation. Tony sweeps aside the project Mendiel just gave him and returns to the gutted bits of the textile processor.
“I think I’m getting the patterns in how the spatial inhibitors have to be set up,” Tony says. “Thanks for letting me take things apart. It’s the same basic setup as all of the manufacturing equipment, at least at the smallest level of hardware.”
Loren looks pleased. “Glad to see you’re getting it! I also prefer to handle things physically rather than holographically. It just gives me better perspective.” They pick up the output modulator and examine it. “Did you put this back together?”
“How’d you know?” Tony squints at it, wondering if he put something in the wrong place.
Loren shows it to Laiin, smiling. “You re-crossed the outflow circuits. That’ll double the draw on the input and production would end up twice as fast.”
Tony takes the modulator back and turns it upside down to see the circuits in question. “Oh. Did it without thinking. But why can’t you just do the same with the inflow? Problem solved.”
Laiin leans over to pull up the interface on Tony’s station, scrolling through to find the schematics of the whole assembly and selecting the parts to demonstrate to Tony. “It’s not the inflow that’s the problem, it’s the design and detailing specifications.”
Tony leans in to examine the holographic schematics with interest while Loren goes on. “I didn’t even think about the specifics when I gave it to you, but the one you’ve got is only used for the Cindaran armor weave. The fabrication process requires their reflective natural minerals be combined into each cross-point of the fabric itself. The material is input in a liquid form, and crystal formation takes a certain amount of time that can’t be changed.”
“So the entire process has to be slowed to accommodate it,” Tony says, leaning back and nodding to himself. “And instead of trying to force a slowdown at a point that could backup or break down, you just cross the outflow circuits. Natural choke point in energy flow, it’s forced to double back on itself. Every time you start it up, you just have to wait a single cycle and it’s already slowed itself every time.”
“And that single cycle is built into this one.” Loren demonstrates on the hologram. “The feed is delayed by a single cycle, the first one running empty both to create the energy backflow and to test it before production. If there’s anything off with the flow from the first cycle, the sensor at the integration point will stop the process.”
Laiin laughs and puts a hand on Tony’s shoulder. “I didn’t think we’d be getting into this much detail yet. You really are good. If you want, I’ll bring in one of the sensors and you can take that apart. Of course, then we have to start getting into the coding stuff.”
“Been looking forward to it,” Tony says with a grin. He can’t help the glow of satisfaction at the praise. They’ve been more than kind to him so far, telling him to take his time learning all the basics here, but he’s still felt a drive to prove himself to him that comes from somewhere a lot deeper than just Mendiel’s sneering disbelief.
Speaking of which… “Have to get into the coding anyway, or I’ll have to listen to Mendiel call me an idiot for the next foreseeable ever over this auditory dampening thing.”
“What?” Loren and Laiin ask together, and Tony flicks a hand to expand the work Mendiel sent over to him. Loren leans in and makes an angry noise. “What’s this?”
Tony shrugs, not sure how much to tell them. He doesn’t exactly want to admit that he took up Mendiel on his ridiculous challenge like a posturing high school boy, but he’d also like to be able to rise to the challenge nonetheless. “Mendiel gave it to me just a few minutes ago and asked if I could figure it out. Sounds like he’s busy.” He carefully phrases it like it was a perfectly innocent request rather than a mocking dare, but Laiin and Loren still make annoyed sounds and exchange looks over Tony’s shoulder.
“Our entire auditory system’s structuring is in flux right now, there’s another team trying to integrate new tech into it. This system developed a bug because the first stage of the integration ran into unexpected problems. We don’t even know what’s wrong with it, and we’re not the primary team fixing it anyway, they just sent the info on to everyone in case anyone has an idea,” Loren says.
Laiin makes another frustrated noise. “This is nothing you should be dealing with yet and Mendiel knows it. Why would he tell you to do this?”
Tony bites his lip, trying to figure out a way to tell them about his problem with Mendiel without sounding like either a complete moron or a little kid running to the teacher after another kid pushed him on the playground. Before he can, though, Laiin makes a noise that Tony assumes is meant to be a sigh.
“We’re sorry about Mendiel. We hoped he wouldn’t be causing you too much trouble, but sometimes he can be… difficult. It’s not your fault you’re new to everything here.”
Tony’s stomach drops. So they have noticed something wrong with their interactions. Has he really been that obvious in his dislike of Mendiel? He could swear that when they met, Mendiel’s appearance didn’t bother him in the least, it was just another fascinating new alien thing to learn about on Tolsar. He’s fairly sure that Mendiel was rude and obnoxious to him right from the beginning, but maybe he’s projecting.
“Has he said anything to you? About me?” Tony hedges, still hoping to save face while he gleans more information. The answer, however, surprises him.
“Not since you got here,” Loren says. “He’s pretending it’s okay now, at least around the rest of us, but he’s not doing a very good job.”
Tony frowns at that. “What, he didn’t like me before I even got here?”
“As soon as we found out one of the new people was being assigned to this team,” Laiin answers, sounding exasperated, “he had an attitude about it. He’s always been bitter about newcomers.”
“Don’t mind him,” Loren says, “he’s a planet-born and he nearly didn’t make it through his own application. He’s had a problem with outside applicants ever since. They’re not all like that.”
“His application?” Tony asks, then, when they look surprised, hurriedly adds, “I studied up on the way here, but it’s all—all new.”
“Oh, of course,” Laiin reassures, and Tony relaxes a fraction. He doesn’t want to insult anyone, or look any more like an ignorant human who blundered here to Tolsar with no real qualifications and doesn’t deserve the recommendation from the queen that got him here. But it’s impossible to avoid just how much he doesn’t know, and sometimes he has to ask.
“You’ve had it hard, being cut off from, well, everything,” Laiin continues. “I can’t imagine coming here from a totally isolated planet. That’s amazing.”
“Really,” Loren adds at Tony’s disbelieving expression, “don’t let Mendiel’s attitude make you think we all see you that way. Your application wouldn’t have been accepted by the Council if you didn’t deserve a place here. And you’re learning incredibly fast, making amazing progress.”
Tony smiles a little at that and gets one in return. “Anyway, planet-born,” Laiin says. “You know all the people who live here have to apply for citizenship and be accepted by the Council. If a child is born here, or brought by a parent who’s accepted, then they live here freely until they reach adulthood.”
“Like a certain age? Is there a cutoff?” Tony asks.
Laiin shakes their head. “Not specifically. Every culture is different, and sometimes even the same species has different ideas of what constitutes adulthood depending on where they come from or their own customs.” Tony nods at that, knowing it’s similar back on Earth, among various humans.
“It’s a relatively loose rule, but there’s generally a clear period, and most children who grow up here are eager to prove themselves.” Here, Laiin hesitates, and Loren steps in.
“There’s a… view, among some people here, that children who grow up on the planet are living on the privilege of their parents.”
Tony tenses at that. He doesn’t want to infer the wrong thing, and he knows every society has its problems, but he doesn’t like the idea of children being seen as… freeloaders. “You mean that they don’t deserve their place here?”
Loren looks taken aback. “No! Nothing so cruel. Children here are given every advantage and opportunity the planet offers. But there’s an expectation that because of the advancements on Tolsar, children will be able to thrive and rise above what they would achieve if they’d grown up on their home planets. They have to apply for citizenship when they reach adulthood, and there are some people—”
“—Like Mendiel,” Laiin interjects, and Loren nods.
“People like Mendiel, who feel that the Council has unfairly high expectations on planet-born applicants, and that outside applicants have an easier time being accepted.”
“Oh,” Tony says, frowning while he thinks that over. “Weird. I mean, where I come from, you’d expect the opposite. That anyone trying to join a group from the outside would have a harder time than someone who’s already in.”
“But Tolsar is built on the idea of bringing together the best minds from around the galaxy,” Laiin says, “and the diversity of ideas that comes from reaching out to far different people. A lot of people here think that isolation and stagnation of culture stifle innovation and creativity. No one has a problem with children growing up and earning their place here, but the idea of Tolsar accepting mostly, or entirely, its own planet-born as citizens instead of bringing in outsiders is generally seen as something to be avoided to most people here.”
“That does make sense,” Tony admits.
“There’s some truth to it,” Laiin says. “The expectations are high on planet-borns. It’s why we’ve considered moving to have our own children.” Laiin and Loren touch hands, something Tony’s seen them do before to greet each other—he’s interpreted it like a kiss on the cheek to a human.
“Moving?” Tony asks, curious, but hoping he’s not intruding.
Loren nods. “It’s a great place to raise a child, without doubt, and they would have every opportunity and advantage that the planet offers. But as we’ve said, the expectations are high, and not everyone meets them. Some people simply do not excel in any one area, and there are planet-born children whose applications for citizenship are denied.”
“Sometimes their parents move away with them, sometimes they set out on their own,” Laiin continues. “In either scenario, it must be devastating for the child. They may feel abandoned if they’re forced to leave the planet and their family doesn’t accompany them. Yet, if their parents do leave with them, they may feel guilty about making them leave Tolsar.”
Tony can’t imagine. He thinks he’d be terrified of raising a child here, worried about the possibility that they wouldn’t qualify as a citizen and he’d face an impossible choice.
“Some are confident that their children will excel here,” Loren says, “and for some, the choice to leave will not be difficult if their children are not granted citizenship. There are also some people whose cultures consider their children no longer part of the family once they reach adulthood; those people are not concerned with the problem, of course.”
Laiin nods and touches Loren’s hand again. “But some choose to leave the planet to raise children. They have to reapply for citizenship if they want to come back, but it’s usually easier if they’ve already lived on Tolsar. When their children are grown, they will apply for themselves, and if they’re not accepted, then the family will simply remain where it is. That way also offers the chance to wait longer before the children apply. They may need longer than the beginning of adulthood to prove themselves.”
“Sounds… difficult,” Tony says with genuine sympathy. He considers what he’s heard and feels a little guilty about his assumptions about Mendiel. “Thank you for teaching me about some of this. I really didn’t know anything coming here… I can see why Mendiel would resent me for it, if he grew up with that constant expectation and then I came waltzing in here knowing nothing.” Privately, Tony thinks he knows a thing or two about that sort of feeling.
Laiin and Loren, however, shake their heads in unison. “It is not your fault, or your responsibility to ease his own insecurities. He’ll be kinder to you with time. You’re already doing very well. And eventually, when you’re settled in here completely, he’ll forget you were ever an outsider.” Loren says it with such confidence, Tony can’t help but believe them. “We’re still sorry that you have to deal with his rudeness.”
Tony’s the one to shake his head this time, a hint of a smile grazing his face. “Don’t apologize for him. And please, don’t make trouble over this, not for me. I’ve dealt with way worse than him, it’s really not an issue. He’s just… keeping me on my toes.” Once again, he doesn’t see the look they exchange over his head, but he’s already clearing his station of the disassembled parts and leaning forward eagerly. “Now, about that sensor you promised me…”