4
A Quick Study
He was sitting on a tattered bit of carpet, cross-legged in a faded pair of canvas pants that barely reached past his knees and a dashiki of red and orange that looked new, if a bit too large for him. There were six game boards sitting on the carpet in front of him, each with a different opponent frowning over the pieces. April crept closer, watching as he shifted his attention from one to the next, addressing one man in the patois of the space station, another in what she thought was Arabic, and a third in English. His face was younger than his voice; he couldn’t be more than a year or two older than she, maybe eighteen at the most. She could still ask him for help. Without her veils, he wouldn’t know her.
April crept into the alley, making sure no one was near or watch
