If Valjean had indeed set this all up, then how did she know what happened after I left the crêpe shop? How could she know about The Game? The more I thought about it, more unlikely that this note came from her. So that left me with the big question of who wrote the note, and what did they know about The Game.
I slowly cleared my throat. “Fine. I’ll accept the challenge. However, I’m not planning to look like a fool. If I do this then I want to do it right.”
For a long while they all stared at me in silence, before a mixture of emotions that ranged from disbelief to curiosity to amazement flooded their faces.
However, one face amongst them expressed a markedly different reaction.
Tobias looked shocked and then horrified, and his voice – when he found it – sounded strangled and hoarse.
“Are you freaking serious?”
Chapter 7.
- I -
After his initial outburst, Tobias calmed down but only a little.
He stepped closer to me, which meant brushing Felicia and Angela aside, both of whom had stunned faces yet distant eyes as though deep in an imaginary land. In other words, they were probably picturing me as a girl. Distressing as that was, it was all in response to my declaration to cross-dress so I had no choice but to accept the blame for their state of mind, and bear the brunt of Tobias’ contempt.
“What the Hell are you saying?” he demanded, keeping his voice surprisingly low and disturbingly intimate which made me uncomfortable all of a sudden.
“I…I said I’ll do it.”
“Why?”
I had expected him to be louder and more vociferous but instead he was backing me up into a corner with nothing more than his quiet tone and insistent stare.
Tobias stepped closer. “Why? Didn’t you say you weren’t going to dress up?”
“I said I wasn’t going to dress up for you.”
“Fine. Then why are you doing it now? Who are you doing it for?”
I pressed my lips together for a short moment. “I’m doing it for me.”
Tobias sucked in air through clenched teeth. “You’re not making sense—” He glanced down at my trousers. “What was in that note?”
I stiffened. “Nothing. Nothing I can tell you about.”
“You said it wasn’t important but you’re not going to show us?” He held out his hand. “Show me the note.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
I clenched my hands and returned his hard stare. “Because I can’t. Because it’s about something I can’t explain. So if I want an answer, I need to do this. I’m sorry. That’s all I’m going to say.”
“I thought we were friends,” he remarked.
I nodded faintly. “Mat, something happened that I can’t explain. And I don’t want to say anything more until I know what I’m dealing with. I may be crazy, or it may all have been a dream, but until I know more you’re going to have to trust me. If not then please…don’t interfere.” I held onto a moment of silence. “Don’t make this harder for me than it already is.”
“You’re going to cross-dress.”
After a deep breath, I nodded more firmly than before. “Yes.”
“After everything you’ve said to me over the past year. After making me listen to hours of your complaints about how you look. After the trouble you’re in because of Silver Blue—you’re now going to cross-dress.”
“This isn’t about the way I look.”
“Then is it about Silver Blue?”
I hesitated then nodded again. “Some of it.”
Tobias looked pained. “Damn it, Cass. Just be honest with me—”
On impulse, and perhaps in desperation, I stepped up to him, and then leaned toward him such that our faces were as close as they would ever be without our bodies touching. “Mat, please. Trust me. When I know what’s going on, I’ll tell you everything. But not now. Not yet.”
He leaned back as though repulsed by my presence, but then I wondered if it was something else when I noticed he was blushing hotly. However, it only last a few moments, and soon he straightened and shook his head slowly down at me.
“You’re going about this the wrong way.”
“Maybe I am. You could be right. But I’ve made up my mind.” Retreating a step, I looked at Angela, then Felicia, and even spared Shirohime a glance. “However, I don’t want to be ridiculed by dressing up in this. I want to do it right. I don’t want students stopping me in the corridors and pointing at me like I’m some sort of freak in garb.”
Tobias sighed with a tortured expression, but held his peace by the proverbial thread. He went further by retreating a few steps, undoubtedly in order to deal with his conflicted feelings.
I could sense this was just the first skirmish between us. Our disagreement wasn’t over, and if I didn’t reach some conclusion, some resolution to this mess, I believed we were headed for an ugly falling out. But I was also afraid that my decision to cross-dress one last time would somehow spell the end for our friendship.
Stepping before me, Angela tapped her lips with a fingertip. “Okay. We’ve got about eight minutes before homeroom, so that’s not enough time to do much.”
I blinked slowly, my eyes widening too. “Does this mean you’ll help me?”
“I will. If you wear that uniform, then you wear it with pride.”
I couldn’t help sounding crestfallen. “Ah…well, it’s not like I really want to do this.”
Felicia punched a fist into an open palm. “Don’t worry. We’ll back you up on the rooftop.”
I drew back a little in concern. Perhaps I was trying to alleviate some of my tension when I weakly joked, “Just how much is this protection going to cost me?”
Felicia looked mystified as she lowered her hands to her sides. “Well…nothing. Why would it cost you anything?”
It wasn’t the response I’d expected, and felt guilty over what I’d said leaving me at a loss over how to respond.
However, after a few moments the familiar Cheshire Cat grin spread across her face, and she held up a finger. “Well, how about dinner at that new curry place under the mag-lev station in Ring One, District Four.”
I realized she was sparing me from feeling regretful. It was also something I could confidently cover with the monthly allowance I received from my sister, so I gave her a nod to indicate I accepted her terms.
Shirohime shook her head. “I underestimated you.”
“In what way?” I asked her.
“You’re a bigger pervert than I could have ever imagined,” she answered with a disgusted pout while folding her arms under her Aphrodite quality bust. “Dressing up as a girl. Seriously. How far will you degrade yourself?”
I regarded her with a sullen expression. “Well, I was wrong about you too….”
“Huh?” she muttered at me.
“And you’re not earning yourself any points either.” I wagged my eyebrows at her.
Shirohime flinched as she looked past me at Tobias, and after a few moments of internal conflict, she exhaled loudly and planted her hands on her hips. “Fine. I’ll help. But I’d better get something out of this….”
“Oh, that’s so reassuring,” I sniped at her, wondering if it was safer not to involve her in my problems.
“You’ll be fine,” Felicia declared with infectious enthusiasm. “That’s what we’re here for.” She struck an odd pose as though attempting to appear thoughtful. “Besides, I didn’t get to see him as Princess Silver Blue, so I’m curious to see how he turns out this time.”
I narrowed my eyes at her and muttered, “You’re having way too much fun at my expense.” Once I changed into my indoor shoes, I closed my locker door and addressed Angela. “I’m in your care.”
Felicia gaped then jerked a thumb at her chest. “Hey, what about me?”
Angela patted the girl’s shoulder but spoke to me. With a nod, she said, “We won’t do anything about it now. The note simply says to come to the rooftop wea
ring the uniform. It doesn’t say you have to change into it now, so we’ll wait until lunchtime.”
“Sounds good to me.”
From a couple of feet behind her down the aisle, Tobias exhaled loudly. “Thank heavens for small mercies.”
I shot him a cold glare. “You really didn’t think I was going to attend classes dressed in a girl’s uniform, did you now?”
“Actually,” he replied, “with you I’m terrified anything is possible today.”
I growled at him through clenched teeth, then huffed and turned my back on him.
“See—you’re evening huffing like a girl,” he snapped at my back.
Irritated with him, I walked with hands clenched and arms trembling out of the locker room, then up the stairs leading to the first floor where Class One-Cee’s room was located. From somewhere behind me, I heard the girls chase after me, their footsteps being noticeably different from those of a male student. On that note, how did my footsteps sound to others?
Our class was on the second floor of the first block. The Academy building was shaped like a broken circle and was divided into six blocks – three for high school, three for middle school, with the permaglass see-through library sitting in between the two halves like a keystone. The building had four levels – ground floor through to third floor – and a dozen rooftop courtyards for students to eat at, as well as two decadently spacious cafeterias on the ground floor on opposite sides of the building. Again, one was for high schoolers and the other for middle schoolers.
Along the way to my classroom, I may have projected a confident aura, but inwardly my stomach was in knots, knowing that I was about to break the promise I’d made to myself never to cross-dress again after my experience playing Silver Blue.
With lunchtime as my deadline, I had time to refuse the challenge. There were other avenues open to me such as choosing to keep a low profile and waiting for the storm to blow over. So far I’d had only one faintly unpleasant encounter with students, but things could get ugly for me later in the day, so it was comforting to have the girls’ support. When thinking that, I felt unhappy about dragging Felicia and Angela into a mess that was clearly of my making. That made me question if learning the identity of Anonymous was worth the trouble of cross-dressing and involving the girls who’d kindly chosen to look out for me.
I considered going back on my request and telling them I would face my troubles on my own, but Felicia undoubtedly would declare she was helping me because it was fun and dinner was her reward. Angela would state that if she left Felicia alone, I was bound to end up in deeper strife. Last and perhaps least, Shirohime would claim she was doing this for her own benefit – namely to score points with Tobias. For a moment, I wondered if Shirohime was being the most honest of us all.
Arriving at the first floor, I noticed that most of my irritation with Tobias had faded, replaced by a growing, creeping dread. I glanced at my reflection in the corridor’s floor-to-ceiling windows that faced into the school grounds, and didn’t like what I saw – a worried girlish boy with short hair wearing a male school uniform.
I had decided to embark upon a risk fraught venture to learn the truth about who revealed my identity as Silver Blue to the Valjean Witch. However, the true reason was to learn if The Game had been real or not. Had I imagined it? Had I dreamt it? Or had I experienced that nightmare?
Had I died in the plaza?
I needed an answer to that question more than any other did.
I stopped and faced the closed classroom door to One-Cee just as the girls caught up to me, with a sullen Tobias trailing behind them.
The first stage of my journey lay before me, beyond that closed classroom door, and thus the first test of my resolve. It wasn’t as though I had the option to turn back. Even if I didn’t walk in there now, I would have to do so sooner rather than later. Thus, it was best not to delay the inevitable.
Hesitantly, and with mounting trepidation, I reached out and pulled the sliding door aside.
- II -
It’s a weird, uncomfortable, and disturbing feeling that washes through you when you step into a room and all conversation comes to an end within a matter of heartbeats. However, it escalates when individual gazes focus en mass upon you, eliciting a sensation akin to needle tips raking your skin without breaking it.
Such was the nature of the greeting I received from my classmates when I stepped into the homeroom. Although they weren’t hostile, they weren’t friendly either. Their eyes were critical and judgmental yet also curious and intrigued, combining to form a distinctly unpleasant spotlight of attention centered squarely upon me, evidence that everyone in my class knew that I had cross-played as the Princess Silver Blue.
My life as a high school student had experienced an irrevocable lane change.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t hide under a box while attending classes. I would have to weather the attention, and ride the stormy seas of classroom life with a little help from my friends…if they truly were my friends.
Felicia led the way into the room, plowing through the uncomfortable silence like an icebreaker at full steam through the polar caps. I followed in her wake, somewhat envious of her fearlessness. Angela walked behind me, and when my steps faltered a short distance into the room, a gentle push from her reminded me that I wasn’t alone and she had my back. Thus with them clearing the way and propelling me along, I arrived at my intelli-desk by the window, slung my bag on the side of the desk, then pulled the seat back and sat down as my trembling legs gave way, feeling fatigued as though I’d journeyed miles through a heavy headwind instead of forty feet across the classroom.
Felicia gave me a slight wave and walked over to her intelli-desk. Angela hung back for a moment and tapped my shoulder. I acknowledged it with a grateful smile, and then she too assumed her seat in the middle of the classroom. However, left alone at my desk I began to feel vulnerable and came to appreciate how much their support meant to me. Without it, I feared that my resolve alone would not see me through the week, let alone the day. But of a sudden, I worried that I was selfishly relying on the girls far too much, concerned that by sharing the stage with me, if not the spotlight, they placed their school lives at risk. Students talk and gossip can spread faster than wildfires, reshaping a student’s social landscape in mere minutes, turning a vibrant, joyous existence into an ashen, desolate reality. Thus, the girls risked being burnt by associating with me, the cross-playing Ronin Kassius.
As for Shirohime, she made it appear as though she happened to arrive to class behind us and wasn’t a part of the escort. Her detached performance was indeed masterful as no one spared her a look, except for the guys who were unswervingly drawn to her beauty.
Tobias took his seat at the intelli-desk ahead of mine, wearing a complicated expression that masked the conflict within him. He didn’t look at me as he sat down and powered up his desk, but I knew he was fully aware of me gaze.
While going through the motions of starting up my own intelli-desk, I felt a little empty inside and realized that I was hopeful of his eventual support. I appreciated what the girls were doing for me, but I yearned for his support because I believed he was my best friend. Without it, I was left with a void in my chest, pushing against my heart, paining me at a time when I was at my most vulnerable for though I’d arrived safely at my intelli-desk I was still under the spotlight.
The tense, loaded quiet that surrounded me was like the calm before the storm. Clenching my hands did nothing to stop the cold sweat trickling down my back or the trembling in my limbs as I sat on my chair and waited for the intelli-desk to complete the process of automatically setting itself up for the day’s classes. With nothing to do for a few seconds, I grew unbearably conscious of the oppressive attention from my classmates, and seeking to escape it, I looked out the window. My gaze landed on the clubroom building occupying much of the view, and naturally my thoughts turned to the Cosplay Club.
Had the girls of the club betrayed me? Had Va
ljean made them an offer they couldn’t refuse or had she threatened or blackmailed them? If so then what motive did she have for going to them first? In order to approach the Cosplay Club, she would have needed to suspect that I was the Silver Blue Princess and possessed some evidence to support that assumption. That implied she had a reason for seeking out the identity of the Silver Blue Princess, but why would she want to learn the identity of the Silver Blue Princess?
I narrowed my eyes as I stared out the window at the permaglass façade of the clubroom building.
What if she was after me, and was looking for something to use against me?
What does she have against me?
I found myself glancing at Tobias’ back.
Is she trying to break up our friendship? Why? Tobias said dating her was out of the question so what reason—what motive—does she have for driving a wedge between us?
A loud bang roared across the classroom as the front door slammed aside with enough force to make the walls shake. Gasps, squeaks, and small cries fluttered into the air as everyone in our class stared at two girls standing in the doorway, both breathing heavily as their eyes frantically searched the classroom. Though it had been a year, I recognized them within heartbeats as the President and Treasurer of the Cosplay Club.
The President spotted me first. “There he is,” she panted, then stormed into the classroom at a fast walk with the Treasurer hot on her heels, ignoring the stares and confused whisperings of my classmates as they hurried over to my intelli-desk.
The President was a tall, slender girl with a firm cee-cup, long flaxen hair, a pretty face, and penetrating violet eyes. When I first met her, I thought she was wearing contacts, but soon learnt her eyes were naturally violet. Appearance aside, she was loud, energetic, and a devout cosplayer. Back when I agreed to help them out as Princess Silver Blue, she had cosplayed as Silver Blue’s right hand woman, a female knight with a name that presently eluded me, and one of two women that staunchly support the princess. However, unlike the character she was cosplaying, she pretty much abandoned me as I was chased through the school by ardent fans, so should I be surprised if she and the girls eventually broke their promise to me as well?
Gun Princess Royale: Awakening the Princess, Book One Page 18
