White: no particular race
The same code was used to render the dots that made up the ring. So, a predominantly Dinan habitat would be colored blue, and so on. Because they were so tiny and so numerous, the dots all merged into an iridescent, sparkling arc on the screen. But general trends could be seen. Whether or not it had been a deliberate choice on Eve Moira’s part, colors in the cool part of the palette—blue, green, purple, cyan—were linked to the four Eves she was personally closest to, while warm colors—red, yellow, orange—were saved for the others.
When the entire ring was plotted according to this scheme, and the plot was viewed as a whole, with Greenwich at twelve o’clock and Tokomaru at six, one therefore saw a great arc of cool colors starting at about ten o’clock (the western end of the Indus boneyard) and sweeping around to about five o’clock (the eastern end of the Hawaii boneyard). A shorter arc of warm colors ran from a little before six o’clock to a little after nine. The ring’s “top”-most segment, centered on Greenwich, was frosty white, like a polar icecap flanked by purple mountains, green hills, and blue water. But on its bottom left side, the ring looked as if it were being heated by a blowtorch, glowing in the warm tones that spoke of predominantly Camite, A?dan, and Julian populations.
That segment was marked off, on the plot, by two red lines drawn athwart the ring. One was located at the longitude of 166 degrees, 30 minutes west, above the former Pacific island of Kiribati. This placed it near the eastern end of the Julian segment. The other was at precisely 90 degrees east, running through the habitat called Dhaka, in the exact center of the Camites’ arc. The lines were borders: not just imaginary frontiers but literal barriers that had been constructed, like turnpikes, across the ring. The warm-colored arc of habitats stretching between them, incorporating most of the Julian segment, all of the A?dan segment, and exactly half of the Camite segment, was, to Kath Two and the others aboard this flivver, another country. The relationship between it and the larger, cool-colored segment where they lived could be described in many possible ways, of which the most succinct was war.
THE TEKLAN, SEEING THAT KATH TWO HAD LIFTED HER HEAD FROM the rest and thereby joined the temporary society of the flivver, turned toward her. He stuck his right elbow out to the side, made a blade of his hand, palm down, and snapped it in until his thumbnail was touching the point of his chin, then, after a moment’s pause, elevated it to the level of his forehead. “Beled Tomov,” he said. But Kath Two had already known this, since it was stenciled on the outside of his suit.
Kath Two made a similar gesture, though in the style of her race she used her left hand and kept the palm toward her, fingers curled into a loose fist. “Kath Amalthova, Two.”