When Selene awoke, she inhaled a sharp breath and hacked it out immediately, lurching forward and doubling over. It was so hot outside that she felt like she was being roasted over a bonfire.

Someone had removed her cotton sweatshirt and she was burning in her black t-shirt. Sweating, she pulled at the collar and tossed the sheet that had been thrown over her off.

She was still in the med tent, she realized, farther back and laying on one of the cots. Linh Peony peeked around the curtain and sighed audibly, coming forward and perching on the end of Selene's cot. She reached into her bag and pulled out an apple, handing it to Selene.

"Stars," Linh said, "you keep giving me heart attacks and I've only known you for, like, thirty minutes. Are you okay?"

Selene's brows knitted together. "Um- Miss Linh, you don't have anywhere to be?"

Linh started a little and smiled. "Are you European? Or American?"

Selene stared. "What?"

"'Miss?'" Linh Peony smiled and shook her head. "Never mind. Don't answer that. I have nowhere in particular to be, no, why?"

Selene shifted in her seat."I'm just thinking that you don't really have to do this. Stuff like this happens to me all the time. It's not a big deal. You should go home."

Peony smiled warmly. "That may be so, but I can't just let an injured person find a med-stand on their own, especially not if they collapse once we get there. I'm sorry, but even if you are a stranger, I want to make sure you're okay before going our separate paths."

Selene looked away, clutching the sheet. "Miss Linh, what if I told you it wasn't blood loss or heatstroke that made me collapse?"

"What-"

"It's PTSD," Selene cut in, "it's trauma, and it's none of your business. So it would be really helpful if you stayed away."

Peony was silent. Selene stroked the apple, avoiding Peony's eyes. Finally, Selene felt the springs under the mattress release as Peony stood. She glanced up at the girl, who stared with a pleading look etched across her face.

"I'm sorry," Linh Peony said, "but at least let me take you home."

Selene shook her head, turning her head to watch the curtains ripple. "That's a really bad idea."

"Please. I can't just leave you alone after that."

Selene shook her head adamantly. "Miss Linh, you don't know how bad an idea that is. You can't take me home. I don't even really live here. I'm a stranger in this... city, and I'm not looking for everyone here to know all about me from one person," Selene hesitated, her flighty, nervous attention turning back to her hand.

"What are you talking about?" Peony asked, her voice laced with confusion. "I have a hover, and I'm just not going to leave you to go home by yourself after you just collapsed. I'm not trying to find out anything about you!"

"As soon as you know my name, you'll know everything about me. At least, you'll think you do."

Peony slammed the heel of her hand into the cot's bedpost. "Why are you so stubborn?"

Selene glanced up at her sharply. "I could ask the same of you. I don't even know you, and now you think you're acting on some sense of false chivalry by refusing to take no for an answer?"

"It's not false. Even if I don't know you, I know I can't leave you alone. It goes against everything I stand for."

Selene glared, averting her eyes and letting her head spin fervently. She felt sick. After a long silence, Selene swung her legs off the edge of the bed and grabbed her sweatshirt off the post, pulling it over her head and looking up at Peony. "Fine. Escort me. But don't ask any more questions, and don't tell anyone anything about this."

Peony's scowl immediately disappeared as she beamed at Selene.

•

Peony's hover was nowhere near as luxurious as the cab.

The seats smelled faintly of grease, somehow, and the leather was faded and torn in a few places. Selene stared out the smudged window, her curled steel fingers brushing against her lips. She was grateful for the blissful cool of them in this horrible heat.

Peony chatted like nothing had ever happened as Selene barked out directions to the best of her memory. "This is actually my mom's hover," she mused to Selene as she took turns and hummed along to the faint songs on the radio. "She doesn't take very good care of it, so she sends me into town for renovations once in a while. It's been a while since the last, so I'm sorry for the state it's in." Peony let out a chirp of laughter.

Iko, the android, held a piece of paper in her pronged hands, cooing at it. Turning to Selene in the spacious backseat, Iko waved it in her face excitedly. It was a clipping from a magazine, based on the glossy sheer to it, and printed on it was a large photograph of Prince Kai, smiling charismatically at the camera.

"Isn't Prince Kai just dreamy?" Iko asked Selene, ripping it out of her face to admire him some more. "I wish I could meet him someday. Oh, I bet he's even more attractive in real life!"

Selene smiled, bemused, at the android. She had heard that Kai had a devoted fan base of teenage girls on Earth, but she never would have expected an android to be included within it. She felt a strange pang in her chest.

"Oh, I can't wait for the Peace Ball!" Peony squealed upon hearing Iko's words. "If I do end up meeting Prince Kai, I'll put in a good word for you, Iko! Although I may be so distracted by his beauty to remember!" She sighed dreamily, almost missing a turn. Iko protested.

Selene looked to Peony, startled. "Wait... You're going to the Peace Ball?"

"Yes!" She squealed. "It's so great! I'm just soooooo excited! Are you going?"

Selene had almost forgotten up until that moment that the Eastern Commonwealth's annual Peace Ball was coming up soon. "Yeah."

"Wow! Maybe I'll see you there!" Peony giggled."You live awfully close to the palace, don't you?"

Selene shifted in her seat uncomfortably.

"Imagine living as close to Prince Kai as she does," Iko sighed."Have you ever seen him before?"

Selene shifted again. "Yes."

"I mean in real life."

"Yes, I said."

Iko's huge plastic eyes gazed up at Selene in almost a state of shock. "Seriously? Oh my stars, is he everything I've ever imagined and more?"

Selene stared down at Iko uncomfortably. "I... don't know. Depends on what you imagined."

"Oh, just absolutely, breathtakingly handsome, the kindest person in the Commonwealth, an amazing leader, super charming...I could go on forever." Iko leaned forward.

"He's good-looking as men go. And he's nice enough, I suppose." Selene turned to the window and froze with Iko's next words.

"Wait, you've met him?"

Selene opened her mouth to contradict this, when Peony asked which turn to take on the final intersection. Selene swallowed her growing discomfort and called out the right turn. Peony looked over her shoulder.

"Are you sure? That's..."

Selene nodded slowly. "Yes, I'm sure."

Selene could notice the confusion in how Peony's eyebrows knit together and her fingers twitched almost imperceptibly. She turned onto the long road, winding along a hill to the palace, and Iko started fidgeting as they grew closer. There was dead silence as the road ended right before the gates blocking the way to the grand palace. Selene pressed a button on the hover's door and let it hiss open before she hopped out, her hood falling off. She started up toward the palace, her heart beating faster the farther she went, when Peony called out, "Wait!"

Selene turned around. The winds were picking up, she noted, and made a welcome respite from the heat even if the heat wasn't the only reason for the sweat dotting her forehead. Peony's face was white as a sheet as she leaned our her window.

"If you don't mind me asking- what's your name?"

Selene swallowed a lump in her throat. She knew this was coming. Hell.

"Selene Blackburn," she called back to the dirty hover, turning away from Peony, who looked as though she was about to faint.