Scarlet

Two

Scarlet spotted Gilles behind the hot top, ladling béchamel sauce on top of a ham sandwich. She walked around to the other side, yelling to get his attention, and was met with annoyance.

“I’m done,” she said, returning the scowl. “Come sign off on the delivery.”

Gilles shoveled a stack of frites beside the sandwich and slid the plate across the steel counter to her. “Run that out to the first booth and I’ll have it ready when you get back.”

Scarlet bristled. “I don’t work for you, Gilles.”

“Just be grateful I’m not sending you out to the alley with a scrub brush.” He turned his back on her, his white shirt yellowed from years of sweat.

Scarlet’s fingers twitched with the fantasy of chucking the sandwich at the back of his head and seeing how it compared to the tomatoes, but her grandma’s stern face just as quickly infiltrated the dream. How disappointed she would be to come back home only to find that Scarlet had lost one of their most loyal clients in a fit of temper.

Grabbing the plate, Scarlet stormed out of the kitchen and was nearly bowled over by a waiter as soon as the kitchen door swung shut behind her. The Rieux Tavern was not a nice place—the floors were sticky, the furniture was a mismatch of cheap tables and chairs, and the air was saturated with grease. But in a town where drinking and gossiping were the favorite pastimes, it was always busy, especially on Sundays when the local farmhands ignored their crops for a full twenty-four hours.

While she waited for a path to clear through the crowd, Scarlet’s attention landed on the netscreens behind the bar. All three were broadcasting the same news footage that had filled up the net since the night before. Everyone was talking about the Eastern Commonwealth’s annual ball, where the Lunar queen was a guest of honor and where a cyborg girl had infiltrated the party, blown up some chandeliers, and tried to assassinate the visiting queen … or maybe she’d been trying to assassinate the newly coronated emperor. Everyone seemed to have a different theory. The freeze-frame on the screens showed a close-up of the girl with dirt smudges on her face and strands of damp hair pulled from a messy ponytail. It was a mystery how she’d ever been admitted into a royal ball in the first place.

“They should have put her out of her misery when she fell on those stairs,” said Roland, a tavern regular, who looked like he’d been bellied to the bar since noon. He extended a finger toward the screen and mimed shooting a gun. “I’d have put a bullet right through her head. And good riddance.”

When a rustle of agreement passed through the nearest patrons, Scarlet rolled her eyes in disgust and shoved toward the first booth.

She recognized Émilie’s handsome street fighter immediately, partly due to an array of scars and bruises on his olive skin, but more because he was the only stranger in the tavern. He was more disheveled than she’d expected from Émilie’s swooning, with hair that stuck out every direction in messy clumps and a fresh bruise swelling around one eye. Beneath the table, both of his legs were jogging like a windup toy.

Three plates were already set out before him, empty but for splatters of grease, bits of egg salad, and untouched slices of tomato and lettuce.

She didn’t realize she’d been staring at him until his gaze shifted and collided with hers. His eyes were unnaturally green, like sour grapes still on the vine. Scarlet’s grip tightened on the plate and she suddenly understood Émilie’s swooning. He has these eyes …

Pushing through the crowd, she deposited the sandwich on the table. “You had le croque monsieur?”

“Thank you.” His voice startled her, not by being loud or gruff as she’d expected, but rather low and hesitant.

Maybe Émilie was right. Maybe he really was shy.

“Are you sure you don’t want us to just bring you the whole pig?” she said, stacking the three empty plates. “It would save the servers the trouble of running back and forth from the kitchen.”

His eyes widened and for a moment Scarlet expected him to ask if that was an option, but then his attention dipped down to the sandwich. “You have good food here.”

She withheld a scoff. “Good food” and “Rieux Tavern” were two phrases she didn’t normally associate with each other. “Fighting must work up quite an appetite.”

He didn’t respond. His fingers fidgeted with the straw in his drink and Scarlet could see the table beginning to shake from his bouncing legs.

“Well. Enjoy,” she said, picking up the dishes. But then she paused and tipped the plates toward him. “Are you sure you don’t want the tomatoes? They’re the best part, and they were grown in my own garden. The lettuce too, actually, but it wasn’t wilted like this when I harvested it. Never mind, you don’t want the lettuce. But the tomatoes?”

Some of the intensity drained from the fighter’s face. “I’ve never tried them.”

Scarlet arched an eyebrow. “Never?”

After a hesitant moment, he released his drinking glass and picked up the two slabs of tomato and shoved them into his mouth.

His expression froze mid-chew. He seemed to ponder for a moment, eyes unfixed, before swallowing. “Not what I expected,” he said, looking up at her again. “But not horrible. I’ll order some more of those, if I could?”

Scarlet adjusted the dishes in her grip, keeping a butter knife from slipping off. “You know, I don’t actually work—”

“Here it comes!” said someone near the bar, spurring an excited murmur that rippled through the tavern. Scarlet glanced up at the netscreens. They showed a lush garden, flourishing with bamboo and lilies and sparkling from a recent downpour. The red warmth of the ball spilled down a grand staircase. The security camera was above the door, angled toward the long shadows that stretched out into the path. It was beautiful. Tranquil.

“I have ten univs that say some girl’s about to lose her foot on those stairs!” someone shouted, followed by a round of laughter from the bar. “Anyone want to bet me? Come on, what are the odds, really?”

A moment later, the cyborg girl appeared on the screen. She bolted from the doorway and down the stairs, shattering the garden’s serenity with her billowing silver gown. Scarlet held her breath, knowing what happened next, but she still flinched when the girl stumbled and fell. She crashed down the steps and landed awkwardly at their base, sprawled across the rocky path. Though there was no sound, Scarlet imagined the girl panting as she rolled onto her back and gawked up at the doorway. Shadows cut across the stairs and a series of unrecognizable figures appeared above her.

Having heard the story a dozen times, Scarlet sought out the missing foot still on the stairs, the light from the ballroom glinting off the metal. The girl’s cyborg foot.

“They say the one on the left is the queen,” said Émilie. Scarlet jumped, not having heard the waitress approach.

The prince—no, the emperor now—crept down the steps and stooped to pick up the foot. The girl reached for the hem of her skirt, tugging it down over her calves, but she couldn’t hide the dead tentacle wires dangling from their metal stump.

Scarlet knew what the rumors were saying. Not only had the girl been confirmed as a Lunar—an illegal fugitive and a danger to Earthen society—but she’d even managed to brainwash Emperor Kai. Some thought she’d been after power, others riches. Some believed she’d been trying to start the war that had so long been threatened. But no matter what the girl’s intentions were, Scarlet couldn’t help a twinge of pity. After all, she was only a teenager, younger than Scarlet even, and she looked wholly pathetic lying at the base of those stairs.

“What was that about putting her out of her misery?” said one of the guys at the bar.

Roland jutted his finger toward the screen. “Exactly. I’ve never seen anything so disgusting in my life.”

Someone near the end leaned forward so he could look around the other patrons at Roland. “I’m not sure I agree. I think she’s kind of cute, pretending to be all helpless and innocent like that. Maybe instead of sending her back to the moon, they should let her come stay with me?”

He was met with robust laughter. Roland thumped his palm on the bar, rattling a mustard dish. “No doubt that metal leg of hers would make for a real cozy bedmate!”

“Swine,” Scarlet muttered, but her comment was lost in the guffaws.

“I wouldn’t mind the chance to warm her up!” someone new added, and the tables rattled with cheers and amusement.

Anger clawed its way back up Scarlet’s throat and she half slammed, half dropped the stack of plates back onto the booth’s table. She ignored the startled expressions around her and shoved through the crowd, circling to the back of the bar.

The bewildered bartender watched on as Scarlet pushed some liquor bottles out of the way and climbed up onto the counter that stretched the length of the wall. Reaching up, she opened a wall panel beneath a shelf of cognac glasses and plucked out the netlink cable. All three screens went black, the palace garden and cyborg girl vanishing.

A roar of protest bellowed up around her.

Scarlet spun to face them, accidentally kicking a bottle of wine off the bar. The glass shattered on the floor, but Scarlet barely heard it as she waved the cable at the incensed crowd. “You all should have some respect! That girl’s going to be executed!”

“That girl’s a Lunar!” a woman yelled. “She should be executed!”

The sentiment was enforced with nods and someone lobbing a crust of bread at Scarlet’s shoulder. She planted both hands on her hips. “She’s only sixteen.”

A brash of arguments roared up, men and women alike clambering to their feet and screaming about Lunars and evil and that girl tried to kill a Union leader!

“Hey, hey, everyone calm down! Give Scarlet a break!” Roland yelled, his confidence bolstered by the whiskey on his breath. He held his hands out toward the jostling crowd. “We all know crazy runs in her family. First that old goose runs off, and now Scar’s defending Lunar rights!”

A parade of laughter and jeers marched past Scarlet’s ears, but were muddled by the sound of her own rushing blood. Without knowing how she’d gotten off the counter, she was suddenly halfway over the bar, bottles and glasses scattering, her fist connecting with Roland’s ear.

He yelped and spun back to face her. “What—”

“My grandma’s not crazy!” She grabbed the front of his shirt. “Is that what you told the detective? When he questioned you? Did you tell him she was crazy?”

“Of course I told him she was crazy!” he yelled back, the stench of alcohol flooding over her. She squeezed the fabric until her fists ached. “And I bet I wasn’t the only one. With the way she keeps herself holed up in that old house, talks to animals and androids like they’re people, chases folk away with a rifle—”

“One time, and he was an escort salesman!”

“I’m not one tinge surprised that Granny Benoit split her last rocket. Seems to me it’s been coming a long while.”

Scarlet shoved Roland hard with both hands. He stumbled back into Émilie, who’d been trying to get in between them. Émilie screamed and fell back onto a table in her effort to keep Roland from crushing her.

Roland regained his balance, looking like he couldn’t decide if he wanted to smirk or snarl. “Better be careful, Scar, or you’re going to end up just like the old—”

Table legs screeched against tile and then the fighter had one hand wrapped around Roland’s neck, lifting him clear off the floor.

The tavern fell silent. The fighter, unconcerned, held Roland aloft like he was nothing more than a doll, ignoring Roland’s gagging.

Scarlet gaped, the edge of the bar digging into her stomach.

“I believe you owe her an apology,” the fighter said in his quiet, even tone.

A gurgle slipped out of Roland’s mouth. His feet flailed in search of the ground.

“Hey, let him go!” a man yelled, leaping off his stool. “You’re going to kill him!” He grasped the fighter’s wrist, but he might have grabbed an iron bar for as much as the limb budged. Flushing, the man let go and pulled back for a punch, but as soon as he swung, the fighter’s free hand came up and blocked it.

Scarlet staggered back from the bar, dully noting a tattoo of nonsensical letters and numbers stamped across the fighter’s forearm. LSOP962.

The fighter still seemed angry, but now there was also the tiniest bit of amusement in his expression, like he’d just remembered the rules to a game. He eased Roland’s feet back to the ground, simultaneously releasing him and the other man’s fist.

Roland caught his balance on a stool. “What’s wrong with you?” he choked out, rubbing his neck. “Are you some lunatic city transplant or something?”

“You were being disrespectful.”

“Disrespectful?” barked Roland. “You just tried to kill me!”

Gilles erupted from the kitchen, shoving through the swinging doors. “What’s going on out here?”

“This guy’s trying to start a fight,” someone said from the crowd.

“And Scarlet broke the screens!”

“I didn’t break them, you idiot!” Scarlet yelled, though she wasn’t sure who had said it.

Gilles surveyed the dead screens, Roland still rubbing his neck, the broken bottles and glasses littering the wet floor. He glowered at the street fighter. “You,” he said, pointing. “Get out of my tavern.”

Scarlet’s gut tightened. “He didn’t do any—”

“Don’t you start, Scarlet. How much destruction were you planning on causing today? Are you trying to get me to close my account?”

She bristled, her face still burning. “Maybe I’ll just take back the delivery and we’ll see how your customers like eating spoiled vegetables from now on.”

Rounding the bar, Gilles snatched the cable out of Scarlet’s hand. “Do you really think you’re the only working farm in France? Honestly, Scar, I only order from you because your grandmother would give me hell if I didn’t!”

Scarlet pursed her lips, holding back the frustrated reminder that her grandmother wasn’t here anymore so maybe he should just order from someone else if that’s what he wanted.

Gilles turned his attention back to the fighter. “I said get out!”

Ignoring him, the fighter held his hand out to Émilie, who was still half curled against a table. Her face was flushed and her skirt was soaked through with beer, but her gaze glowed with infatuation as she let herself be pulled to her feet.

“Thank you,” she said, her whisper carrying in the uncanny silence.

Finally, the fighter met Gilles’s scowl. “I will go, but I haven’t paid for my meal.” He hesitated. “I can pay for the broken glasses as well.”

Scarlet blinked. “What?”

“I don’t want your money!” Gilles screamed, sounding insulted, which came as an even further shock to Scarlet, who had only ever heard Gilles complain about money and how his vendors were bleeding him dry. “I want you out of my tavern.”

The fighter’s pale eyes darted to Scarlet, and for a moment she sensed a connection between them.

Here they were, both outcasts. Unwanted. Crazy.

Pulse thrumming, she buried the thought. This man was trouble. He fought people for a living—or perhaps even for fun. She wasn’t sure which was worse.

Turning away, the fighter dipped his head in what almost looked like an apology and shuffled toward the exit. Scarlet couldn’t help thinking as he passed that despite all signs of brutality, he looked no more menacing now than a scolded dog.