Over the years, Tikka’s job as a Minor Propagandist for the planet Porcelain’s Bureau of Tourism had come to shape her way of thinking. She dealt primarily in quintets of attractions, lists of five which were distributed through the Bureau’s publications and information dollops: Five Major China Factories Where the Population of Porcelain Can Be Seen Being Created; Five Views of Porcelain’s Clay Fields; Five Restaurants Serving Native Cuisine at Its Most Natural.
Today she was composing Five Signs of Spring in Eletak, her native city. Here along the waterfront, she added chimmerees to her list as she watched the native creatives, cross between fish and flower, surface, each chimerene spreading its white petals as it surfaced, white clusters holding golden centers, tendrils of golden thread sending their scent into the air along with the most delicate whisper of sound, barely audible over the lapping of the sound’s water.
The urge to pose beat along every energy vein of her silica body, but she resisted it. She would remain alone this spring, as she had every spring since she had made her vow and inscribed it in the notebook where she kept her personal lists, under “Life Resolutions,” #4 under “Keep myself clean in thought and mind,” “Devote myself to promoting Porcelain’s tourism,” and “Fall in love.” The third item had been crossed off at the same time, in vehement black pen strokes.
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