They were on public transport, heading into the major retail area of downtown Arrhazon City. Four-year-old llhaesa accompanied her mum Saehressa on this day long excursion.

The transport was full, and so Saehressa first found and then held dearly to a support post provided for those who rode standing; llhaesa dutifully mimicked her mum and stood under Saehressa’s watchful and protective invisible umbrella, also clinging to the provided support.

They came to the next transport-stop, where several people disembarked. Saehressa saw opportunity in the newly vacated seating, quickly grabbed her young daughter’s hand, and headed for two open seats.

Llhaesa near jumped onto the window-side seat; Saehressa moved more slowly and circumspectly, not quite reaching sitting position when a voice harshly and authoritatively called out to her.

“That is my seat!” A man at once admonished and commanded, expecting Saehressa to yield her and llhaesa’s claim simply because of their apparent respective genders. Saehressa looked over to llhaesa, and knew her response would be as much for llhaesa as it would be for herself. Llhaesa was watching with those great big all seeing eyes of hers, eyes that rarely missed a trick.

Saehressa ignored the man and looked forward, focusing toward the front of the transport.

“I said this is my seat!” reprised the unsatisfied annoyance, this time his voice louder and more urgent. The transport lurched forward, and the man briefly stumbled until he found balance. Again, Saehressa remained silent.

Her body began to shake. The man’s hand was on her shoulder, mildly shaking Saehressa to draw her attention. After all, he was speaking to her, and women should meekly submit to the requests of Arrhazonan men. Saehressa again looked toward llhaesa, evaluating possible options, with llhaesa as the central reason for what she would next choose to do.

“By whose authority do you claim this seating, sir?” Saehressa politely asked, knowing there was no answer other than discriminatory and outdated social mores.

“You know perfectly well why. Now relinquish your seats, or I’ll have you and the young bitch with you thrown off the transport.”

Young bitch.

Saehressa stood nearly as tall as the adult llhaesa would one day be. The average height for an Arrhazonan woman was 1.65 metres, while the average Arrhazonan man stood at 1.75 metres. Saehressa measured 1.842 metres. She rightly guessed this man’s height at a bit less than the average Arrhazonan male.

Taking a chance, she rose out of her seat, extending her body to its full height. She next glared downward, her eyes telegraphing their readiness to pierce the strongest of materials, to stand in defiance of any aggressor.

The man hesitated, clearly taking in the altered circumstance of this confrontation. He stole a glance upward at Saehressa’s face, quickly coming away with a conclusion on what he most feared but heretofore failed to consider. Pushing this confrontation would end badly for him.

Attempting to salvage his dignity, he moved to make it look like his choice to disengage. He spat in Saehressa’s face and walked away.

None of this was lost on llhaesa. She watched it all unfold, her highly intelligent but young mind processing what unfolded. She would remember this through her life, remember the discrimination, remember how her mum coolly handled the confrontation and stood her ground, clearly thinking of what llhaesa would take away from it all.

It was not the last incident the mother-daughter team would encounter on llhaesa’s way toward adulthood, but it remained the most vivid, largely because of her child’s outlook at that time – that everything works according to some humanist ideal, that people all get along.

When it came time to face the entrenched misguided social mores wrought by millennia of Arrhazonan patriarchy, llhaesa had grown into its foremost and most formidable opponent, and that was largely the result of her parents – for Mrevan was fierce in defending the equal rights of Saehressa and llhaesa – outlook and conduct.

Winding her way through school, llhaesa and all of the other young women dealt with the sense of entitlement carried by some of her male classmates. Mostly there were verbal insults, but occasionally someone felt some entitlement to her body. When that happened, without fail the person left having learned a profound if incomplete lesson: do not mess with llhaesa.

The most serious problem arose in her first year of high school, as she practised alone in a dimly lit music room, trying to master a particular play technique that continued to elude her.

Another student approached from behind, llhaesa entirely unaware of his presence. Suddenly his hand was inside her open collared shirt, sending a wave of shock through llhaesa, but one that galvanised in immediate action. Inside of five seconds, the young man lie shaking on the floor, blurting out “I thought you would like it!” and “don’t hurt me!”

Llhaesa was standing over him, her mind squelching the anger brought by way of adrenaline, calling upon Aailhra to guide her. “Go. If you ever lay a hand on me – or any other student – again, I will come looking for you.”

The young man found purchase with his feet, his hands pushing him up off the floor until he was upright. He immediately ran from the room, and over the next 3 years of school never once made eye contact or uttered so much as a one syllable word at llhaesa.

On another occasion, a teacher in North 41 made a pass at her, and this time Saehressa witnessed the attempt, fortuitously coming to get llhaesa and head home at the precise moment the teacher made his move. The man lost his employment on top of walking awkwardly for a week.

These were the memorable events, but countless little indignities stretched across the experiences of her young life, the little indignities oppressors expect the oppressed to endure. The collective package well shaped Llhaesa’s outlook by the time she walked into her first class at N’rellia. She would play some role in seeing this world to change, or she would die in the attempt.