Chương 25: Calle Infierno

The Valley, San Teodoro, Vidako Imperium Stellarum September 28, 2847 Hard Burn had taken up the first six weeks of Arc's time at the academy, and following the final fourteen days in the jungle, he and the other cadets had immediately undergone surgery, which took place on a Monday. Three days of recovery in the infirmary left them with only a single day of classes before the weekend.

Arc had a suspicion that even that had been carefully timed by the faculty: it left two days for the cadets to report any delayed side effects following their first connection with a simulation pod, before they were due for another session with Lieutenant Commander Libby.

It also meant that, far sooner than he really felt prepared for, Arc was accompanying Cassie downhill along the sidewalk of Camino del Soldado, which ran through the apartment complexes housing the academy's faculty on the north slope of Academy Hill, with a garment bag slung over his left shoulder. It was a quiet street, shaded from Vidako's twin suns by overhanging boughs of black-leaved, genetically engineered strains of live oak.

The trees grew tall and spread wide, with limbs that dipped down low, almost to the point of brushing the heads of those walking beneath them and had been planted to either side of the street, between the apartment buildings and the sidewalks. Cadets who were given liberty to go out into the city were required to wear their uniforms, with the sole exception of their caps, for which all of the first-year cadets had a medical exemption until their sutures were out.

He, like his classmates, had an appointment at the infirmary on Sunday to see how his incisions were healing up, though he felt somewhat ambiguous about the prospect of getting the bandages off. On the one hand, his scalp was beginning to itch, where hair must already be growing back; on the other, he wasn't looking forward to getting a look at where his skull had been cut open.

Cassie must have noticed him touching his bandages with his free hand, where they were visible along the side of his head just above his ear, because halfway down the hill she spoke up.

"I know that in a few years I'm going to look somewhat normal," she said.

"All I have to do is look at the upperclassmen. Their hair has all grown back nicely, which means mine will, too. You can't even see the scars. But it's still nerve-wracking. Especially the prospect of going as a guest to one of the duke's dinners bald."

"I can't stop touching it," Arc admitted.

"It itches. I think I've got fuzz growing under the bandages."

"Here, do something else with your hand," Cassie chided him. She reached out, took his hand in hers, and held it as they walked. All thought of his irritated scalp immediately fled Arc's mind. He felt, suddenly, short of breath, and all too conscious of the feel of Cassie's hand in his, as if the nerves in the rest of his body had been dialed back, like the volume on a speaker. The feeling was electric.

He forced himself to breathe and couldn't help but check to see whether the occasional upperclassman or professor passing them on the sidewalk was staring. He certainly felt as if someone was watching them.

"Have you thought about wearing some kind of hat?" Arc asked, though the effort of maintaining something approaching a normal conversation seemed herculean.

"I don't have the slightest idea what sort of hats are in fashion here…"

"A sunhat would pass, during the day," Cassie told him.

"But we'll be attending a dinner party, and yes, we're expected to be bare-headed for it, once we get inside. You can get away with your academy dress whites, so long as they're actually well-fitted. I haven't got a great deal of faith in that, which was why I had you bring them. I presume you've never tried them on?"

"Not yet," Arc admitted.

"There hasn't really been time, or an occasion. But shouldn't you be able to wear your uniform, too?"

"Technically yes, if I were anyone else, but practically, no," Cassie explained.

"If Duke Montalban wanted a cadet, he could have invited his pick of upperclassmen. People like Ireti Ọlatẹru, who are on track to be up-and-coming officers, or even my cousin Bhaskar." Arc noticed that she frowned at that, but he refrained from saying anything.

"He didn't," Cassie went on.

"He invited a princess imperial, and that's what he expects to get. Commandant Marlowe has made it clear that she wants me to keep him happy. A happy duke makes for a happy academy, and so I need to give him what he wants. That means an evening dress. And even if I wore some kind of sunhat on our way in, I'd have to take it off once we went inside. I have thought about a wig, though." Arc couldn't help but glance at her, after she said that.

"A wig? Don't they look kind of…fake?"

"If it's a bad wig, of course it looks fake," Cassie said.

"But I've worn extensions before, and unless you knew what you were looking for you'd never be able to tell. Anyway. We're going to a tailor first, to have you measured, and so we can leave your dress uniform for adjustments. Then I'm going to drag you all over The Valley while I try on dresses. Somewhere in there, we'll get lunch, and once we've finished, we'll pick your uniform up on our way back."

The prospect should have been painful: Arc had accompanied his mother and his sister, and even his friend Rashmi, on more than one interminably long shopping expedition during which his role had essentially boiled down to 'holder of all the bags.' But somehow, with Cassie, he found that he didn't mind, so long as there was a comfortable chair to rest in. The chance to spend time with her outside of the academy and away from their friends was too thrilling to pass up.

The tailor was an old man with a white mustache who used a measuring tape, rather than a modern biometric scanner, to check Arc over while Cassie watched. The shop was, like so many of the other businesses in The Valley, in one of the lower floors of the four or five-story mixed-use brick buildings which lined the Camino del Soldado. The road ran all the way down to the beach, crossed by half a dozen intersecting streets, with names such as Calle Perla or Calle Bahía.

Stairs led down to recessed storefronts set just beneath the street in the basements, or up to the first floor, and there were awnings and signs everywhere. In the case of Manuel's Fitting and Tailoring, a selection of mannequins had been posed in the windows to display fashionable and expensive menswear.

"Not terrible, but we can do better," Manuel muttered, as he tugged at the waistband of Arc's dress pants, which were uncomfortably tight.

"You've put muscle on your frame since they issued you this uniform, that's obvious. I'll let the shoulders out and adjust the waist. You can take it off, now."

"You can have it finished by this afternoon?" Cassie asked, from the chair she was perched in.

"For your Imperial Highness, I'll have it done by lunch," Manuel promised. Arc hesitated at the entrance to the little dressing room built into one side of the shop. He was certain that Cassie had been hoping not to be recognized, but if she was upset, she hid it well. She must have had a lifetime of training in how to manage her expressions, of course, so she just smiled kindly.

"Would you like a picture for your wall?" she asked.

"It's almost like advertising." Once he was dressed again, they set off on a haphazard, back and forth route that took them from one side street to the next, then back onto the Camino del Soldado, as they made their way slowly in the direction of Valley Beach Park. The heat of the two suns beat down upon them, and in between shops, they stopped to get cups of iced coffee from a café.

Everywhere, in the late Saturday morning, there were people: eating outside of small restaurants, at tables which had been set up beneath large parasols for shade, moving in and out of the shops, walking in groups down to the beach. Arc was surprised how many older cadets were visible, though from the rank insignia on their uniforms he saw that they were nearly all second or first class.

It wasn't just pilot candidates, either: he recognized the enlisted uniforms of the tech program students, as well, and in greater numbers. For the most part, the two groups did not mix, though occasionally he caught sight of a single piloting cadet engaged in conversation with one or two techs. Their repair crew, he surmised. This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Cassie dove into vintage shops, where she browsed shoes, handbags, and jewelry. She scanned the windows of beach stands that sold sun-dresses, sandals and wide-brimmed hats. Then they reached Calle Ensenada, the broad avenue which ran parallel to Valley Beach Park and the shore itself, where sun-bronzed bodies lounged on the sand or dove into the dark waves.

That street only had shops on one side, facing the bay, and she led him into the more fashionable stores, where she disappeared into changing rooms with an armful of dresses at a time. Arc waited in the chairs that each store provided, occupying himself with a review of his xenobiology notes for a few moments at a time. Each time she opened the door and came out, bare-footed and bare-shouldered in one dress after another, he tried to find something intelligent to say.

In truth, he thought that she looked gorgeous in every one, but they were discarded, one after another. All the dresses were in striking colors: black or white, but no shades of gray; cobalt, but never a pastel blue; fuchsia, but never a pale pink. To Arc, they felt bold, rather than soft, and Cassie seemed to know exactly what she wanted, even if she couldn't immediately find it.

They were boldly cut, as well, exposing Cassie's shoulders, arms, and often much of her back - even where she'd picked up quite the collection of bruises over the course of Hard Burn. Arc supposed there would be time for those to fade. Arc knew that she'd been in good shape even before arriving on Vidako, but weeks of hard work had only further developed Cassie's natural athleticism. She was strong without being over muscled or bulky, but no one could possibly call her delicate.

He found himself, as she showed off each dress, trying desperately not to let his eyes linger on glimpses of well-toned arms or calves. There'd been no luck yet by the time they both grew hungry for lunch, and their steps led them north along the beach toward Uptown. Here, the shops grew more expensive, more fashionable. Brands that Arc recognized from Terra or Luna, from Proxima or Mikaboshi, proudly displayed stylized logos above the door of upscale shops.

One of the more expensive places even had an enormous wall-mounted screen, and it was showing one of Cassie's cousins posing on a red carpet. He nodded to it, when Cassie came out of the dressing room.

"Ugh." She made a face.

"Cressida. What a piece of work. She's just like her father. Thinks we'd all be better off with her in charge. I can't stand it when I see people pandering to her. I don't know how everyone can't see how fake she is." Arc shrugged.

"Most people don't pay that much attention, I don't think," he said, and turned his attention back toward the dress she was modelling.

"I like the black one." And he thought that was the end of the conversation. They ate bread bowls of chowder from a beachside fish-shack, just at the edge of the border between The Valley and Uptown. Arc couldn't have picked out what was native to Vidako, and what was a Terran species farmed in the bay, but it was delicious, and both of them devoured the fresh bread along with every drop of creamy broth, until their fingers were sticky with it.

It was then that Cassie finally let out what must have been bubbling up inside her for the entire meal.

"You said most people don't pay attention," she said, leaning across the table.

"But that's crazy. It can't be true. It would be a disaster if Cressida took over after my father."

"Would it?" Arc asked.

"I mean, he seems like he does a decent enough job — but how much does it affect the average person, who the emperor is? How much difference does it really make?"

"It makes all the difference," Cassie said.

"The imperial election is the most important thing that happens in most people's lifetimes."

"More important than getting a good job?" Arc asked her.

"Than whether their kid survives a shuttle accident? Than who they get married to? Look, I'm not trying to say anything bad about your father," he said.

"Just that Auctoritas Station is really far away for most people. Maybe it's different in the core, but in the outworlds, no one takes all that much time to worry about it. That's something for dukes and senators to get all worked up about."

"So, you just don't care?" Cassie asked.

"It's not that I don't care, but I don't have any say in what happens, anyway," Arc pointed out. She sat back in her chair.

"In the imperial court, it runs through everything," Cassie explained.

"It's one of the reasons I can't stand talking to all those people. They always want to know who I'm going to support, and none of them believe me when I say I don't want to be empress. It's like they can't even conceive I'd be telling the truth."

"Are you disappointed I don't put a lot of thought into it?" Arc asked. Cassie seemed to consider her response for a long moment.

"I'm not sure I understand it," she said.

"But if it means I can take you at face value... That's a nice change." It was two streets into Uptown that they finally found The Dress. Arc couldn't help thinking about it in capital letters. It was of Zuran silk, which was what first drew his eye—and with a price tag to match. Before he could think better of it, Arc reached out and touched the cloth, as he'd learned to do from his father when measuring quality.

Then, he snatched his hand back as if burned—there was no way he could possibly afford to pay for something in this place if he damaged it.

"You like that?" Cassie asked, coming up on his side. She showed no qualms about touching the fabric at all—but he imagined the bank account of an imperial princess was rather substantial.

"Bronze isn't really my color; it doesn't go with my skin or my eyes… or my hair, but I suppose that isn't a problem at the moment."

"Not this one specifically," Arc admitted.

"The silk is from home. Here, look—you can tell it's the good stuff if you feel it. It should be perfectly smooth, like wax, and almost warm. And if you scrunch it up, you can actually hear the sound…" Cassie looked right into his eyes and grinned.

"Zuran silk, right? Your family helps to make this?"

"My father does," Arc said, with a shrug.

"I would have, too, if I hadn't got into the academy."

"We've found what we want, then," Cassie declared, and raised her hand to call one of the shopkeeper's assistants over.

"Show me everything you have in genuine Zuran silk," she commanded, and her tone left not the slightest doubt that she would be obeyed. Dress after dress was brought forward for her examination and approval, only to be met by a shake of Cassie's head or a cutting motion of her hand, until finally the clerk presented a dress of dark, midnight blue and brilliant white.

"I'll try that one," she said, and stepped into the changing room. When she emerged, Arc, for the first time in his life, understood what it meant to say that someone had to pick their jaw up off the ground. Unlike some of the other dresses, the hem went down to the floor, and there was no slit to expose her legs. Instead, the blue of the lower dress gave way to an angled cut of white, forming a triangle or arrow of dark fabric pointing up from just above her hips, to either side, to her sternum.

Above it, the white silk cupped her breasts, leaving a small cut-out which exposed the skin at the center of her chest and then rising to a sort of 'x' shape that circled her neck and left her shoulders and arms exposed completely. When she turned, Arc saw that it left her back entirely exposed, with a dagger of white silk pointing down from her lower back. For a moment, Arc was completely unable to form words. In the past, you've asked me not to comment on your hormone levels, Iceni broke in.

She'd been remarkably quiet during the day, save for when he'd asked her to help them navigate. So, I will merely comment that this seems to have made an impact.

"Yeah," Cassie said, nodding with a satisfied smirk on her face, and turned to the clerk.

"This is the one. I'll take it, and I want it packed in a garment bag. We can drop it off with Manuel when we pick up your uniform," she told Arc.

"It looks –" Arc tried to search for a word, a phrase that wouldn't be too much.

"It looks good. You look good in it."

"Mmm-hmm." Cassie only grinned wider, walked straight up to him, and then spun around to retreat to the dressing room. She was, Arc decided, having entirely too much fun. Especially when he was the one who had to carry the bags. Once they had the dress—and he didn't even want to know how many credits it had cost—the rest went quickly enough. Cassie needed shoes, of course, and a handbag, and a few pieces of jewelry, all of which she'd scouted over the course of the morning.

It meant they returned to several shops for a second visit, and that Arc ended up with several more bags to lug block after block, but he comforted himself with the knowledge that they were nearly done, and that she'd found something she was clearly happy with. They were halfway to the base of Academy Hill when the rain hit. It came all at once, and just after they'd picked Arc's dress uniform up from Manuel, where they'd also left Cassie's dress for a few minor adjustments.

In the jungle, they'd been able to shelter in tents, but on the road they were soaked through nearly instantly. All around them, Arc saw people dashing into stores or huddling beneath awnings. There wasn't any danger of being cold—in fact, it was almost refreshing, after spending all day walking beneath the heat of paired suns.

"Back to the shop?" Arc asked, leaning in toward Cassie and raising his voice to be heard over the staccato slap of thousands of drops hitting the street. She shook her head.

"We can't get any wetter. Let's just get back to the dorm." Shoulders hunched, they hurried on through the now-empty streets. Arc had to blink water out of his eyes, and that might have been what caused him to look twice as they passed a side-street heading east, at the bottom of the north slope of Academy Hill, down toward the river.

"Cassie," he said, and took hold of her arm with one hand, drawing her to a halt. Arc nodded toward the street, and she turned to follow his gaze. He wasn't certain if she would recognize what was happening, but Arc had seen it before, in the meaner sections of Avataran Shahar, back home. One rain-soaked cadet in the uniform of a tech student was surrounded by three worn-looking youths, all of them pressing into his personal space. They wore gang colors—he could tell in an instant.

Reds, oranges and yellows, and flame patterns wherever possible. There were tattoos, as well, and jewelry, all with the same iconography: a cracked road, crossed by burning tire tracks or, where there wasn't room for that, simple flames. On the back of one shirt, Calle Infierno, in gothic lettering.

"We should report this," he said, and was just about to give Iceni an order when one of the street toughs punched the cadet in his stomach, doubling him over. The tech student gasped for breath, then dropped to the ground, clutching his belly. Cassie dropped her bags, sprinting down the street toward them without a second thought.