23
IN THE NEXT HOUR or so, I discovered that Barendrecht was one of those new social-experiment, high-tech, low-impact suburbs that replaced older centres which had fallen victim to the rising water levels. Built in a pentagon design around a central square with bus shelters and a tram station, and surrounded by shops. Or so the map on Thayu’s reader said. Barendrecht had no train station on the main line and rather than wait for a taxi in the cold and wet, the group declared it was safe and less conspicuous to use the tram. It was only two stops along the line.
As to inconspicuous . . . when I stepped aboard, with two obsidian-black guards much taller than myself and four guards much wider than myself, a sole puny human in an unearthly blue outfit surrounded by a wall of flesh and body
