“I’ll handle it, Sanuel. That’s what I’m here for.”
The assistant eyed the three visitors uneasily. “Let me know if you need anything, Administrator. Anything at all.” Somewhat reluctantly, he stepped back out into the outer office, closing the door behind him.
The single Sakuntala present, Matthias noted as she sat down behind her desk, looked troubled but not angry. For that much she was grateful. The two Deyzara were making enough noise to drown out the sound of rain on the trees outside her window.
Raising both hands, she managed to get the pair to sit down. Next to them yet distant, the female Hata Sakuntala crouched silently on her haunches, her tail moving back and forth behind her in slow, measured arcs.
“You absolutely for certain must do something!” The male Deyzara’s trunks were wandering all over the place.
“Yes.” His female companion glared over at the serene Sakuntala. “Our people are being driven from their homes; they are having their property looted and destroyed. There have been injuries and killings. All of this is decidedly unprovoked. We demand Commonwealth protection, and that the perpetrators of these miserable, cowardly acts be brought to justice and appropriately punished!”
Matthias nodded as she folded her hands on the desk. “I’m still gathering information.”
“Information? I will give you information!” Quivering with anger, the male’s speaking trunk threatened to snap off his head and go careening around the room on its own. “I will give you so much information it will make your hirsute head hurt! Why, Administrator Matthias, down in Kawili District alone there have been—”