27 August 2030

23:35 QCT

With Lieutenant Hill gripping my arm, I march out of the Grand Hall toward the cigarette-ridden corridor containing the Silver Room. We find ourselves walking right into a cloud of smoke, the scent scorching my nostrils. Whoever isn't smoking is drinking instead, as careless drunkards swing their glasses in my face. We don't even have to traverse through the sinful hallway for long before reaching our destination, yet we already have our fair share of extravagance.

The young Corporal still stands firm in front of the door to the Silver Room. I don't know what Keira plans to do to get us in there. We aren't going to fight our way in there, especially not in front of all these civilians. It would be a bad look on the Imperial Guard; superior taking on inferior. What does me being her date have anything to do with it? The kid isn't going to give up that spot for his life. All he's thinking about is the money.

Keira plants herself in front of the young man. "Good evening, Micah."

The Corporal bows his head. "Evening, ma'am. Are you enjoying your night?"

She nods, tightening her hold on my arm. "I am, but I would like a favor from you. I am interested in speaking with someone in the Binet family and would appreciate passage into their holdout."

"I'm sorry, Lieutenant. The family has asked me to not allow anyone into the room unless they have permission. No Imperial Guards, either."

"Come on, Micah. What are you in this for? These are nobles." Keira laces her fingers together, forming a circle around my arm. "They don't care about you. They'll do anything to use you."

I trace my fingertips over the back of her hands. "See, kid, I told you. Even the Lieutenant agrees with me."

"Look, they promised to pay me a hundred grand to be their gatekeeper for the night, and I can't pass that up. Plus, they'll respect me for doing it, so they'll want to hire me for later. I think these rich people are more courteous than you guys make them out to be." The Corporal folds his arms over his tight jacket. "And because of that, I won't let you two through."

This kid needs to loosen up a little bit; stop being such a hardass when he can hardly even legally drink. He knows he's talking to his superiors, too, so what makes him think he has the right to speak to us like that? Is his loyalty to these aristocrats more important than his allegiance to the Imperial Guard? I'm the last person to care about strict regulation, but this kid is being a hassle.

"Corporal Terry, I think you are mistaken as to who you are speaking to." Keira releases me and takes a step toward the boy. "Not only are you defying orders from me, a Lieutenant, your mentor, but you are also in the presence of the Captain. He has power in high places, and he could easily put your name in for demotion due to lack of compliance and defiance. The last thing you want is to go straight from Corporal to Private after you worked so hard for that title. Is that what you want, Micah?"

The Corporal shuffles in place and shoots me a quick glance. "No, ma'am. But this is a very powerful family. I don't want to make them mad."

She moves back to my side. "We'll deal with them, Micah. If this turns into an issue, we promise to take care of it." Her hands curl around my bicep this time.

Micah steps out of the doorway, turning stiff. "Okay. You can both go. Please just be careful. They aren't very nice."

I turn the knob and push the door into the room. Whatever calamity was occurring before our intrusion lowers to an absolute minimum. To me, the same person, male and female, occupies every piece of furniture in the room with a drink in their hand. All of them, blonde and pale, except for the eldest ones seated by the balcony, whose hair is that of the clouds. Every pair of eyes, from all corners of the room, find Keira and I as we enter.

An older gentleman, one from the circle near the window, rises to his feet. "That damn boy. No wonder Walter distrusted the Imperial Guard. He can't do a job right. Now, you two better get the hell out of here before we make you."

Keira lets go of me as I maneuver around some spilled wine to reach the man. "Sir, I am only the messenger. I am looking for someone who is said to be residing in this room." I scan the area, all the reddening faces boiling at the sight of me. A red satin dress? There are a few women wearing red, and some maroon, but none of them appear to be Lord Cameron's age. Certainly, none of them are a "sight to see," either. They're almost bland; only attractive because of their money.

"Who sent you?"

"His Lordship, Cameron Hyka. He is searching for Miss Nicolette Binet. Is she here?" I doubt she's in this room. Not a single woman in this room could be Nicolette, from the looks of it. Maybe she already went searching for Cameron. We really compromised that poor kid's job for nothing.

"She's up on the deck outside with her bodyguard." A young man with his leg straddled on the arm of a chair announces. "Good luck talking to her. Not many people can get the opportunity."

So, she isn't inside after all. I motion for Keira to follow me as I start for the exit to the balcony. Every pair of eyes tear into me as I hold the door open for the Lieutenant before following her out. When I shut the door behind me, I peer in and notice the whole family return to their seating arrangements. If Nicolette is worse than these guys, then I hope Cameron enjoys himself, spending the early hours of the morning with her.

The stone steps leading up to the upper terrace are dry and cracked, illuminated by bright lights hanging against the wall of the Castle. Keira and I escalate, feeling the soft wind beginning to tease the side of our faces. The jarring sound of the waves crashing against the cliffs below surges to me until I hear a gentle piano melody up on the balcony. I can see sconces attached to the pillars on all angles of the pentagonal deck, giving life to the dark space. There is a sturdy man seated at a metallic patio table.

"Miss Binet?" Keira asserts upon finding level ground in her high heels. I step up beside her and stop dead, staring at the figure leaning out over the railing toward the ocean.

The woman twirls around from the edge to face us officers. Her flourishing hair, silken like her dress, misses her collarbone but entwines at her chin. A twinkling clip is locked in at the top of her head. Her cherry-red gown hardly reaches her knee, and the thin straps on her shoulders are sliding off, forcing her to reel them back toward her neck.

Her bracelets rattle off the railing behind her. A lustrous smile beams from the other end of the terrace. "Who do I have the pleasure of speaking to?" Her smile disappears, and her arms flex away from the balcony. "A couple of outsiders, no doubt. What is your business up here?"

I stride to the center of the terrace, below a slow ceiling fan. "Captain Brian Manchester, ma'am. I have come at the request of His Lordship, Cameron Hyka. From what I was told, you two are supposed to meet tonight."

She huffs. "And who's your girlfriend? What's she here for?"

Every inch of my face heats up. Delicate heels thump against the stones behind me before they are by my side. "Lieutenant Keira Hill. I was assisting the Captain in locating you. And I'm not his girlfriend."

Nicolette nods at the man by the steel table. "Xavier?"

Her bodyguard presses down on his knees and heaves himself up out of his chair. His chest protrudes from his polo shirt and his burly arms could strangle a bear. His face reminds me of that of Master Sergeant Petry, almost animalistic and disturbed. There is a brutality behind his countenance that cannot be altered. Xavier plants himself a few feet in front of me, where I own an inch or two in comparison.

"Is he actually the Captain or is he a fraud?" I see Nicolette lean against the railing past Xavier's ears. Do I not look like myself, or has she never seen me before in her life? Judging by her reaction to witnessing Keira and I appear on her terrace, I think she's clueless to our identity, or any Imperial Guard entity. Quite pathetic.

The bodyguard cranes his head toward his woman, and I notice an intense, wound scar behind his ear. "Yes, ma'am. He's telling the truth."

"I would like to speak to him alone if you don't mind." The blonde socialite shoots an index finger at Keira. "Leave and take her with you."

As Xavier begins to shuffle around me to my right, my hand intercepts him. "I don't think so, buddy. She stays or we both go." He gives the barrier I made a dismissal, and instead of my hand, I make my body a wall between the two. "You touch her, we're going to have a problem."

"Move, coward," Xavier growls. I've been called a coward more times than he thinks. It hardly even phases me anymore. In essence, however, he has a point. I am not planning on doing anything drastic, like inciting an altercation. Against a dog of a man like him, I admit that I wouldn't stand a chance. I can't remember the last time I actually fought anyone hand-to-hand.

"Brian, I'll go, it's okay." I sense light fingers glide down my spine through the felt of my jacket and cotton dress shirt. Once they reach my waist, they disappear. "I'll see you tomorrow at the ceremony. Have a good night." Her and Xavier wander down the stone steps to the Binet family trap in the Silver Room. I hope those clones don't start assuming anything.

Nicolette paces to the clearance in front of me with her arms by her side. Her touched skin is tinted by the radiance from the faint sconces on the pillars. I catch a drift of rich vanilla diffusing away from her. "Not your girlfriend, huh? You seem awfully protective of her."

I clasp my hands behind my back and regard her. "Lieutenant Hill and I are strictly friends. Any further interaction is prohibited in the Imperial Guard. I was merely looking after her, is all."

"Of course. How silly of me to assume." She leads over to the table where her bodyguard recently occupied. The absent back of her satin dress exposes her shoulder blades to the air. "Come over and have a drink with me, Captain. Or is that another Imperial Guard restriction?"

"Ma'am, with all due respect, I was given a task. His Lordship has asked me to locate you and take you to his room in response to an apparent barrage of scandalous letters from you. What you two decide to do beyond that is frankly none of my business."

The velocity in her movement collapses. She places herself in a once taken seat and glances up at me in the center of the terrace. The grace in her mannerisms dissolve. "Is that what he said? He's trying to paint me as a whore or something."

Damn him. He's making me look like a fool for believing him. How could I be so naive to trust the Emperor's son? This is the same boy who snuck out onto the Castle rooftop in his adolescence after telling his guardian he was going to his room for discipline. The same young man who is rumored to have been sexually involved with nearly fifty men and women since his eighteenth birthday. But no matter who he has slept with, one thing remains clear: Cameron is a career, troubled miscreant, and I fell for his trick. So I'm the idiot.

"You two have never spoken before?" I turn to face Nicolette as she reaches for a shadow on the floor beside her chair. "Never sent a letter or called over the phone? Have you two even met?"

Her dignified poise returns as a bottle appears in her hand. Argent, rose lips stretch across her face, showing polished teeth. "Oh, Captain, that's the culture. We come into these parties unaware of who pursues us or who we'll spend the night with. That's the whole fun of it. But I guess it would be quite difficult for you to understand, you being out of the high class and all."

"Oh, really? What's that supposed to mean?" I move ahead to join her at the table. I could go for a glass or two. If this keeps up she's going to make me want to never stop drinking.

She pours herself a glass of dusky wine before providing it to me as well. "If you didn't grow up in Woodrow or any of the other capital cities, you simply aren't a part of the premier level of citizen. You wouldn't be able to comprehend the lives we lead and our idea of nightlife. Now, since you don't already have me pinned against a wall, I can assume that you are from one of the lesser boroughs of Queen's. But not Frayton, though, no, no. You are more imposing than that."

My fingers stroke the base of my wine glass, watching the liquid swirl from the bottle. With her paying mind to my drink, I glare at her. "I was born in Frayton. My family and I were forced to evacuate when I was months old and we returned when I was twelve." Once she finishes serving, I swipe my glass away. "It's not about where you're raised, ma'am. It's about how you are raised."

Nicolette stands the wine bottle near the center of the table. "Then I was mistaken. You are quite decorous for a man from Frayton. That makes you... interesting."

I put the rim of the glass to my lips and take a brief sip. "If I were you, Miss Binet, I would save the flirting for when you're with His Lordship."

"Flirting, Captain? Please. Anyone from the Imperial Guard would be lucky to be so much as in my presence. Even you. If anything, I was giving you a compliment."

I place my glass on the metal table between us, some wine sloshing around the bowl. "What kind of gripe does your family have against the Imperial Guard? First one of your older relatives misjudges the services of a young man who was suckered into needlessly protecting your family's stronghold in the Silver Room, and, if I wasn't tasked with such an arduous issue, I would have stood up for the kid. Now, you have the gall to insult not only me and my upbringing, but somehow raise yourself above everyone else in the Imperial Guard. Some people you are referring to are some of my closest friends. They may put my life through hell but you have no right to put yourself on an imaginary high-horse because you think that could not possibly be at the same level as them."

"You seem quite passionate about your Imperial Guard, Captain. If only your impudent General was half as engaged in the advancements we have to offer. You can thank him for my current attitude." She savors a taste of her wine and sets the glass next to mine. "During our meetings, he always turns down the idea of any kind of futuristic additions to the Imperial Guard weapons arsenal. My father did not serve twenty years to be cheated out of any kind of deal in our partnership. If he could see the current crisis in the Empire right now, he would knock some sense into your General."

"Who's running the company now?" I adjust the collar of my jacket to flare out my silver bars pin. It appears dull underneath this shred of light over the terrace.

Nicolette leans against the back of her seat and rests her elbows of the arms of the chair. "Captain, you are looking at her."

"Wow, good for you. I don't envy you, having to deal with General Hamilton directly. He is quite conservative and is stingy about any kind of upgrades." I reach for my wine again, feeling a smile starting to form. "He's interested in guns and proper armaments but the instant you mention laser beams," I snap, "he has an aneurysm."

She conceals a spurt of laughter with her own goblet of wine. "Precisely." After a short sip, she caresses the glass with her slender fingers. "I don't hate the Imperial Guard, Captain. I hope that isn't the notion you are receiving from me. I dislike when clients lack cooperation, and you all provide a lot of that."

"So everything I just said was because the Imperial Guard won't buy your guns. That's it?"

One of her fingers releases from the glass handle and guides toward me. "Now you're catching on."

I look past her, toward the endless expanse over the ocean. In the distance, far off the coast, a few sparks of light sparkle among the darkness. What I would do to get the hell out of here. Out of this party, out of this Empire. I never thought I would be envious of an inanimate object before, but a sailing ship against a bleak existence makes an exception.

I retrieve my attention and bring it back to Nicolette. "Is being unnecessarily petty over a business deal part of the "culture," too?"

The remote bell tower to the west of the Castle tolls, vibrating the air over the terrace. A rigid rhythm shakes through the atmosphere before dying into the night. No further chimes to signify the early hours of the morning. All of the patrons inside are just getting ready to start another round of drinks.

Nicolette steps off of her seat at the table and brushes off her gown, with her wine promptly in her other hand. "Well, it seems to be getting late. I guess it's time to go search for Lord Cameron. Thank you for notifying me of his request, Captain, uh-"

I vault out of my chair. "Wait, even after he lied and cheated his way to get to you, you still want to see him? Ma'am, you understand that if he were a real gentleman, he would seek you out himself, right? Lord Cameron is nothing but a cheat."

"All the more reason to meet the man. I understand your concern, but I am a grown woman, Captain. I believe that if there was an issue, I could take care of him."

I pick up my wine glass, nearly barren. "Well, ma'am, His Lordship also asked me to escort you to his quarters to await his arrival. I should accompany you up there."

Nicolette clicks her high heels over to the stone steps toward the Silver Room. She sways her wine glass in my direction as if to enthrall me. "Then we shouldn't make haste. Cameron could yearning for my presence as we speak. Come, my new Imperial Guard companion." Before she reaches the railing to the staircase, she pauses and turns back to me with glittering eyes. "And stop calling me ma'am."