Garrant

by Annabelle Rex

  “Your highness,” she said, voice simpering.

  Nell couldn’t see Asha’s expression, but she could well imagine what it was.

  “My name is Asha,” she said. “And I’m a car mechanic, not a princess. You don’t have to bother with any of that.”

  “Oh,” the woman said, clearly unsure what to do with herself now. After a moment of hesitation, she snapped back into professional mode and ushered them inside.

  Instead of remaining in the shop front, they were taken through to a private room, where a bottle of champagne sat in an ice bucket, several empty glasses next to it. A girl with dark blue skin, four arms and eyes with two pupils stood off to one side, dressed in anonymous black. As soon as Angela sat down in one of the chairs, the girl peeled herself away from the wall and began pouring drinks, two of her hands giving out glasses, while the other two poured.

  “This is Tressian, she is here to see to your comfort,” the bubblegum woman said. “My name is Ishny. I’ve taken the liberty of selecting a few designs ahead of time - these are the height of current Intergalactic Community fashions.” Ishny looked round at them, studying them each in turn. “Yes, you are all quite different, aren’t you. But we should have something to suit each of you.” She scanned her eyes over them, then clicked her fingers at Tressian. “Tressian, would you please measure up these two,” she said, pointing to Nell and Angela. “I’ll take you two ladies.” She gestured to Asha and Allendi.

  Tressian measured them both with a ruthless sort of efficiency, then stood back and looked at them, both pupils narrowing as she studied them. Then, with a brisk nod of her head, she headed out of the room. Meanwhile, Ishny fussed over Asha as she took her measurements, asking her questions about what she was going to do with her hair and what accessories she might require.

  “I have no idea,” Asha said. “I thought you were going to tell me.”

  Nell could practically see Ishny calculating the size of her commission.

  “Well,” she said, reaching for a couple of the gowns she’d already picked out, handing one to Asha and one to Allendi. “Why don’t you start with these and we can narrow down from there. I’ll go pick out some shoes and jewellery.”

  She blustered out, nearly knocking Tressian over in her haste. Asha looked down at the giant poof of a dress she’d been handed.

  “I don’t think this is very me, do you?” she said, holding it up against herself. The satin-like fabric shimmered in the light, the skirt a soft pink colour, decorated with what might have been flowers made from tulle bedecked with gemstones. The bodice was a swirling pink and blue, the fabric ruched and pleated in intricate designs that might have been trying to mimic galaxies, again completed by a generous helping of glittering stones.

  “It’s hideous,” Nell said. “Please try it on.”

  Asha grinned, then stepped into the changing room at the far end of their private area.

  Tressian had returned with a far more sensible selection - nothing too frilly or fancy. She separated them out onto two different rails one full of greens and corals, the other creams and metallics.

  “You, these,” she said, indicating Nell and the rail with the greens. “You, these.”

  Angela picked out a long cream dress, holding it against herself. Tressian obviously had a good eye, for Nell could see immediately that Angela would look stunning in it. She only hoped the same applied to the selection she’d been given.

  Asha reemerged from the changing room, struggling to contain a laugh as she curtseyed in the giant dress. Although it was hideous still, Nell had to admit, Asha did look rather spectacular in it. Perhaps not the right sort of spectacle, but spectacle all the same.

  “Oh my,” Ishny gushed, nearly dropping all the shoes and jewellery boxes in her hands.

  Tressian folded both sets of arms across her chest and shook her head. At this point, Nell trusted Tressian’s taste far more than Ishny’s.

  “That’s definitely the one,” Ishny said.

  “Oh, it’s definitely not,” Asha said. “Can you find me something a bit less… wide?”

  “Me too,” Allendi said, handing back the similarly enormous dress she’d been given without even bothering to try it on first.

  Ishny looked momentarily heartbroken, but she shored herself up, then headed back out into the shop.

  Asha waded her way over to Nell’s rail.

  “These are nice,” she said, looking through them, pulling one out and holding it up in Nell’s direction.

  “Very nice and very expensive,” Nell said, the niggling discomfort she’d been feeling rising to the surface.

  Asha just smiled. “Consider it every birthday and Christmas present I couldn’t afford to buy you. Try this one.”

  “Strapless?” Nell said, looking at the plunging neckline with some nervousness.

  Asha just rolled her eyes. “You’ve got great boobs. Make the most of it.”

  Nell eyed the dress again. It was an off the shoulder number, with a plain bodice and long, glittering skirt. The design was simple, an understated sort of elegant that appealed to Nell. She took it from Asha’s outstretched hand and stepped into the changing room.

  The material slipped over her frame, a little too long, a little too big. Nell tried to do it up at the back, but couldn’t fathom the ties out. She stepped out from behind the curtain and gestured to the back of the dress.

  “Can someone give me a hand?”

  Tressian stepped forwards, and with the same efficiency she’d measured Nell with, she pinched and tucked the material, pinning it into place and fixing it together at the back. Suddenly, the bodice hugged tight around Nell’s curves, shaping her waist and lifting her breasts, the neckline revealing enough cleavage to be sexy without leaving her feeling exposed. The skirts were still a little long, but they sparkled as they caught the light, swishing about her legs as she turned from one side to the other to look at herself in the mirror. Then Tressian handed Nell a pair of shoes with a small heel. When Nell put them on, it made the skirt fall just right about her feet. She took a few steps, the skirts parting on the right side to reveal a long flash of leg. Angela whistled.

  “You look amazing,” Asha said. “You definitely have to get it.”

  Nell wanted to. Wearing it felt… magical. It might have been Asha Matched with a prince, but Nell found she rather liked dressing the part of a princess. Still, the money kept coming back to her mind.

  “I don’t know…” she said.

  Asha opened her mouth to say something, but before she could, Ishny returned with arms full of dresses, immediately holding them up against Asha, talking at a hundred miles an hour about different galactic trends.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Allendi said, stepping up beside her. “You’re thinking it’s expensive, and you couldn’t justify spending your own money on it, so you can’t justify spending someone else’s.”

  It was almost exactly what she’d been thinking.

  “It just feels wrong to me that a single item of clothing could cost more than my monthly expenses.”

  Allendi’s smile was warm and understanding. “I find it helps if you think that he’s not actually buying you a dress. He’s not buying any of us a dress. He’s showing his appreciation, saying thank you.”

  Nell frowned. “What does he have to say thank you to me for? Surely it’s the other way round?”

  For months she’d felt hopelessly indebted to Cael for everything he’d done for her. He’d helped her complete her training, offered her the job at the translator clinic - a job that paid enough that she could move into a better neighbourhood, get Mikey in to a better school. She owed him so much, even before she considered everything he’d done for Asha.

  “He knows he’s completely upended your life as well as Asha’s,” Allendi said. “People say that all little girls dream of being princesses, but in reality, being a princess is damn hard work. As is being associated with them. But you’ve taken it all in your stride, ac
cepted him into your family without question.”

  Nell thought back to when she first met Cael. Still reeling from the invasion of her home, the threat to her family, she’d accepted his presence as just one more weird thing that she’d process later. By the time she’d got round to that processing, she’d already seen just how deeply he cared for Asha, how genuine his affection for Mikey was, and how earnestly he wanted her to be a part of things, too. In the face of all that, how could she not accept him without question?

  “I don’t think I’ve done anything that’s worth…” she went to look at the price tag, but stopped herself. “I’m not even going to look. I can’t.”

  Allendi laughed. “Probably sensible. Don’t think about it, and don’t worry about it. Let my brother buy you this thank you gift and then go out and make the most of it by having a fabulous time tonight. That’s what I’m going to do.”

  “Okay,” Nell said. “I think I can do that.”

  Ishny continued to pick ridiculous dresses for Asha and Allendi until, eventually, Tressian took pity and brought some dresses in while Ishny was out picking her next monstrosity. She selected dark purples for Asha and browns for Allendi, immediately handing them one dress each. Nell suspected that these were the dresses Tressian thought best, and that she’d only brought a selection because that was what she was supposed to do. Asha took one look at the dress in her hand and nodded approvingly, before heading into the changing area.

  “Let’s hope this goes a little better, or we’ll be stuck here until the Opening Ceremony is done,” Angela said under her breath, making Nell laugh.

  “I think we know where the real talent in this shop lies,” Nell murmured back.

  Tressian, working on the adjustments for Nell’s dress at the back of the room, said nothing, but Nell caught the briefest flash of a smile on the girl’s face before she resumed her professional blankness.

  There was a shuffling from the direction of the changing room, and Asha poked her head out from behind the curtain.

  “Nell, help me out, would you?” she said.

  Nell nodded, heading over and slipping inside. Asha had put the dress on, but was holding it up.

  “I can’t get the straps untangled,” she said.

  “Let me have a look.”

  The front of the dress was modest in the bodice, but on the shorter side with the skirt - not short enough to be risqué, falling just above Asha’s knees. At the back, the skirt was fuller, longer, almost down to the floor. Apart from two thin straps over her shoulders and a couple of ties across the middle, there was nothing to the back of the bodice.

  “Bear in mind you will have to get Cael to sort this out for you later if you choose this one,” Nell said, tugging the straps loose from the knots they’d got tied in.

  “I’m sure he’ll manage,” Asha said. “You should see how complicated some of his formal clothes are.”

  “He’s not going to be able to keep his hands off you if you wear this,” Nell said as she clipped the ends of the ties together, adjusting them until they were snug.

  Asha’s grin in the mirror was wicked. “That would not be a terrible outcome.”

  Nell grinned in response, but a hollow feeling filled her chest. She would never have considered herself lonely - she had work, she had Mikey, and all of this Intergalactic Community stuff to keep her busy - but sometimes it crept up on her. A feeling that her life could be more. If things hadn’t gone the way they had, if she hadn’t… but no. To go down that line of thought was to frame Mikey’s existence as a ‘mistake’, and she would not think of her gorgeous boy that way. Never. He might not have been planned, might not have been what she thought she wanted for herself, but she could never consider him a mistake.

  “What do you think?” Asha asked.

  “You look gorgeous,” Nell said, fluffing out the skirts until they fell just right. “But you still look like you.”

  Asha grinned. “Then I think this is the one.”

  They left the dresses with Tressian, who needed to make adjustments to perfect the fit.

  “They’ll be hand delivered to your suites in plenty of time before the ceremony tonight,” Ishny promised, her eyes sparkling as she rung up the cost of the dresses, the accessories and the shoes, charging them to Cael’s account.

  Cael messaged Asha to let her know he, Ardan and Randar were with the children on the lower level, so they rode back down to meet them. Mikey came running over to Nell as soon as he saw her.

  “Look what I bought, Mummy,” he said, holding up a stone that changed colour every few seconds. It was attached to a chord around his neck.

  “Oh, that’s pretty,” Nell said, scooping him up into her arms.

  “It’s a breathing stone,” Mikey said. “You breathe the colours, look.”

  He squinted in concentration, breathing in and out in time with the changing colours.

  “An Iparshana Meditation Stone,” Allendi said, then turned to her daughter. “Why couldn’t you have picked something like that.”

  Sassi just waved the noisemaker she’d chosen, unrepentant.

  Allendi and Ardan, who had already spent more than a week on the Olympia, led the way back to the Residential District. The lower levels reminded Nell of a budget hotel - rows of doors in an anonymous corridor, leading in to what she imagined would be functional, but basic rooms. But when they rode the lift platform up and up, right to the top level, the space opened up into something like a promenade, groups of rooms set back from the main walkway, clustered around a central point - in some, a large tree, in others, a water feature. Allendi turned in to one with a fish tank in the middle of it, four doors in a semicircle around it. The kids ran up to the fish, immediately pressing their faces right up against the glass, sticky mouths and fingers smearing all over it as they pointed out their favourites to each other.

  “They’ve been getting on like a house on fire,” Cael said, grinning as he watched them.

  “Is that supposed to be a good thing?” Allendi asked, arching an eyebrow.

  “It’s a Human idiom,” Cael explained. “It means they’re getting on really well. Are we still doing drinks at yours later?”

  Allendi nodded. “I’m inviting everyone round before the Opening Ceremony,” she said to Nell and Angela. “I thought it would be nice to have a little drink together before we head over. A toast to new Matches and new friendships. Oh, and I invited Garrant along, too, I hope that’s okay.” This, she addressed to Cael.

  Cael just looked amused. “It’s your party. We’ve a spare seat in our box tonight for the ceremony, he’s more than welcome to join us for that too.”

  Allendi beamed. “I’ll let him know.”

  A spare seat, Nell thought, as she let herself in to her suite. Because unlike her friends, she didn’t have a Match of her own. Instead, she’d be spending the evening sat next to a stranger.

  At least she’d look spectacular while doing so, she thought.

  The suite was not unlike the guest suite on the Station, though perhaps a little more fancy. The walls oozed class, from the light, airy colour of them, to the artworks and decorations that looked the expensive kind of simple. She trailed her hand over the back of the sofa, noting the plush quality of the material. Mikey ran straight to his bedroom, though he did at least take off his shoes before launching himself into the bed.

  “What do you think?” Nell called as she dragged their suitcase into her own bedroom.

  “It’s amazing!” Mikey called back.

  They spent the afternoon unpacking, then poking round in the bathroom until they learned what everything did. One of the shower functions sprayed water from a nozzle at about waist height, and both Nell and Mikey ended up soaked and doubled over with laughter before they figured out how to turn it off. Then Nell figured out the kitchen, cooking one of the ready-made meals in the fridge for Mikey’s dinner, while he drew pictures of the things he’d seen so far, clutching his new meditation stone in his hand.
>
  Then, suddenly, there was a knock at her door and her dress was being delivered. Nell had Mikey change into his pyjamas, ready for the babysitter she’d hired for the evening, then got showered and changed herself, slipping back in to the gorgeous dress. With the adjustments done, it fit her like a dream, and she couldn’t resist giving a little twirl, letting the skirts flare out about her.

  When she stepped back through into the living room, Mikey stared at her, open-mouthed and wide-eyed.

  “What do you think?” she asked him.

  “Mummy, you look like a princess.”

  Nell smiled, hugging him carefully. He was clean now, but then he was also a five year old boy. You could never be a hundred percent sure he hadn’t found some dirt to play with in the few minutes you had your back turned.

  Mikey studied her for a moment, then reached for the cord around his neck, lifting it up over his head.

  “You need this, Mummy,” he said, carefully placing it over her head, avoiding her styled hair. Nell looked down at the glowing stone as it settled against her breast.

  “I think you’re right,” she said. “Can I borrow it for the evening? I promise to keep it safe.”

  Mikey nodded, grinning at her. Then his expression turned thoughtful. “Now you need a handsome prince.”

  Nell kissed his forehead.

  “What do I need a handsome prince for when I’ve got you?”

  Chapter 4

  DESPITE HIS SHOULDER PAIN DISAPPEARING THANKS to the serum, Garrant’s mood got progressively worse throughout the day. Banned from training sessions, he headed back to his suite and proceeded to pace about restlessly, wondering what to do with himself. As an athlete, he got one of the nicer suites on board the Olympia - no tiny little cupboard room with a bathroom barely big enough to stand in for him - but ten minutes of lapping it and Garrant was bored, frustrated and clueless as to what to do about it.

  He made himself breakfast. Before training he usually had a protein bar to line his stomach - working that hard that early didn’t mix well with eating - and he was usually ravenous afterwards. But as he pulled out the tray labelled with ‘breakfast’ and the day’s date on it, sticking it into the rapid induction heater, he found himself hard pressed to work up the enthusiasm for another meal of synth meats and vegetables.