The end of another work day was, at last, approaching. It hadn't been a particularly exciting one, based on your personal experience. No one shelling you, no gunfire. Just the usual sort of deluge of paperwork and organizational nonsense. They'd finally told your shipmaids, members of the wartime Women's Naval Auxiliary, that they were not, in fact, all going to be dismissed sometime in the near future. What was going to happen instead was anyone's guess, but for now the Navy seemed happy to continue to pay them to drive trucks and watch over the corner of the base warehouses you'd taken over.
Things were winding down for the evening: there were some reports left to finish, but they would be just as good done tomorrow as now, so you simply organized your desk so everything would be smooth for tomorrow and headed out. Aiko had evening classes today, which meant there was no rush to get back to your cold, empty apartment.
Instead, you headed straight for the officer's club.
It was a warm space, though cozy would be the wrong word for it. It was finely appointed in the Western style. There was a roaring fire place, a side table with well-chosen alcohol, and a series of tables and comfortable chairs circled the room, allowing officers to speak, mingle, and socialize as they wished. There were even a pair of billiard tables. The walls themselves were decorated with nautical and naval themed bits and bobs, from a ship's wheel to a massive painting depicting a naval victory over the Cathayans, and a poster from the war featuring a heroic officer at the prow of his ship that had been deemed too awesome to take down. It was a monument to militarism and the well-bred officers that helped make the machine of the Navy tick.
You'd been hesitant for months to spend time here, and when you first braved the club after work you had received some unkind stares, but two weeks on and it seems most people had acclimated to your presence. Things had changed a lot since the Academy and your first posting, at least for you. It helped you had friends here.
One of them waved you over to one of the billiards tables, where he was setting up a new game. Ensign Ishinari Ryu had been your XO on your first command, and was a solid sort. For an Icthysian.
"Lieutenant Arisukawa. Fancy seeing you here," he said. "Want to play?"
"Ensign Ishinari. You know I'll just beat you again."
"There's a first time for everything, Lieutenant."
More officers started filtering in as you began playing, adding a pleasant background hum of conversation to the proceedings. The evening papers arrived and people started discussing the news: more political gridlock, war in the fractured states, announcements about the Altas Games, and new expansion of the Jobs Bureau. More rumors swirling about the Cathayan court intrigue that continued to build around the increasingly ailing Emperor.
"Liaoning threw in with Dyskelande, apparently. I'm telling you, that's our next war." somebody at a nearby table was muttering, the paper laid out over the cards they'd been studying a moment before. "Could be any day now. We're going to have to keep the Cathay communists down and the Westerners out."
"Does it make me a bad navy officer if I hope it's not too soon?" Ishinari asked, lining up a shot. He reconsidered after a few moments, pacing around the table to try another angle. "Three in the corner pocket."
With a clatter, he landed it. He was getting better, fast.
"I think it just makes you smart. That's going to be messy when it goes." you observed, leaning over to read the paper over the shoulder of one of the other officers. "Won't just be the Cathay navy this time, everyone's going to want a piece."
"Six, center pocket."
"Good luck."
He missed this time, but left you with a messy table. Not a lot of room to move. Felt appropriate.
"It's just facts," someone else was saying. "We're going to have to move in and support the new Emperor, whoever it is. Make sure that they're secured against outside influences."
"Outside influence other than Akitsukuni." you muttered, lining up a long shot. "Um… nine in far corner."
"Well, yeah, Lieutenant." the officer at the nearby table said, "It's gotta be somebody. They're too damn backward to keep the Europans out on their own. We just have to be sure they know who has their best interests in mind."
Ishinari stepped up to take the easy shot you left him. This was not going your way.
"Five in that corner. When you put it like that, makes sense, doesn't it?" he said.
"Sort of. But they probably want the Europans out as much as we do, probably more actually We got to choose our future here, shouldn't Cathay?" You moved to try another shot. "Seven… side pocket."
"If the Cathayans were responsible enough to pick their future, they wouldn't have gotten themselves hooked on opium last century," the officer said. "It's up to us to act as their guide now."
You missed.
---
You made it home late, but still beat Aiko home. Not that there was much conversation: she staggered through the door, threw her bookbag in the corner, and collapsed face-down in the futon you'd thoughtfully set out for her.
"How was analytic geometry?" you asked.
"
Fuck." Aiko replied, muffled by the pillows.
Yeah. She was doing well enough, but she'd just started third year and her new classes were brutal. You now no longer even theoretically understood the mathematics she was studying.
"You still going to be up for date night tomorrow?" you asked, sitting beside her. She turned her head to speak, the waves of her hair reduced to a smear of strands across her face that you pushed out of the way with a smile.
"Yes. Please. Save me. Take me away from all this."
"Have you eaten?" you asked, pretty sure of the answer.
"... yes." Aiko muttered, clearly lying.
"Since lunch?"
"... no…"
Yeah, she had things under control last semester, but two weeks into this one she was already a complete mess. Out were all the fun and practical classes, in with the intense, high-level calculus. She'd heard third year was like that, then the final year things would start making sense again.
"I'll make you something." Cooking had been… weird at first, but you thought you were starting to get the hang of it. Having a gas stove made it easier. You just turned on the gas and lit a match, and you had flame! No waiting around, which was good, because you weren't great at waiting.
By the time you had food ready, Aiko was snoring gently, still in her clothes. They were really running her ragged, on top of all her other obligations. She was a lot like you, she always had to be doing something.
You poked her awake, and kept up a conversation about her day for fear she'd drift off again. Even exhausted, she was the best conversation you could ask for.
---
Fortunately, she was a lot more energetic the next evening as the two of you headed off to the Cottage, the eccentrically named local dance hall. You were meeting friends along the way: Mai was bringing along her new boyfriend, a young man named Makoto who also worked as a conductor on the streetcars. Also coming along was Miss Clara Rose Sanders, along with her latest Akitsukuni conquest.
You had been wary of Miss Clara Rose Sanders at first, particularly because of the abrupt way she had entered your social circle. She had seemed to suddenly be there, hanging about with Aiko. She spoke your language well enough but she was off in other ways which made her come off strange. She was too loud, too direct, and too quick to accept praise. You never thought you'd say this about a person, and even just thinking rankled against most of what you stood for, but she was rather too opinionated for a woman. She tended to spout off at every opportunity even when it was a situation where really, the polite thing to do was to just be quiet.
Despite all that, she had this irritating way of being ingratiating, though. Her eagerness to be involved, to learn new things and to try and be friendly… it was nice. At first it had felt frustrating that Aiko seemed to want to invite her along to things, but she had begun to grow on you when you had realized that all the things that scraped up against your sensibilities were things that might bother Aiko, too--but because Aiko probably wanted to be able to be more like her odd, Occidental friend.
Actually, the whole thing was revealing to you the stark absence that you hadn't even noticed, years and years without having a real female friend. For almost six years most every woman you talked to was in passing. You'd had plenty of flings, but no friendships since secondary school, surrounded at all times by Navy men. So even if these new friends were odd, they were something you
needed.
The Cottage was built out of a building that had once been a much more respectable and high-class establishment, but tastes had moved on, as had the old owners, and the new business was much more open and a lot less respectable. The first sign of that was that you could hear the music pouring out of the open door, along with the loud conversation and the shuffling of feet. The second part you couldn't help but notice was the bar against the far wall, and you had to stop and promise yourself that you weren't going to drink, that this was far, far too routine an occasion.
You were starting to realize this wasn't a thing you were just going to get over.
Still, there was plenty to distract you, the music loud and the open space in front of the small stage the band played on was crowded with couples doing their best to figure out how to dance to the strange musical experiment unfolding before them. It certainly didn't sound like any music you recognized.
"Do people listen to this stuff?" you muttered, and Aiko playfully nudged you.
"Yes. Young people."
"Ouch."
"It's ragtime," said Clara (Rose Sanders), "or at least, they're trying. An attempt was made."
Mai had already tugged Makoto onto the dance floor and was happily getting acquainted with the new music. And with her boyfriend.
"Are you supposed to dance that close?" you wondered, "Like… it just seems improper is all."
"Haruna, you need to relax--" And then Clara Rose was following her own dance partner.
"I
am relaxed," you insisted. "This is me relaxing."
"You look like you're in a parade." Aiko said. She took a few steps and then tugged you after her. And then she tugged you close. Very close.
Okay, maybe this sort of dancing was alright.
--
With the war gone and with you finally having spare time for your personal projects, you had gotten back into your linguistic studies. It had taken time for you to adjust to Caspian, in part because unlike every other Occidental language it
didn't use the same alphabet. It was awful, but not as bad as having to memorize classical Cathay characters. More importantly, between a pocket dictionary and your efforts to at least learn how to read it, the little diary you had found during the war was finally giving up its secrets.
The first thing you had learned was that this book had been the property of starshi lieutenant Ekaterina Konstantinovna Alexeyeva, which made her the same rank as you. If she was still living. There was also an address on the inside of the front cover along with a name, and you slaved over a letter to her, noting the circumstances of your retrieving her diary, wishing her well, and asking her to please write back if she wished. And then your letter had been sent off in the international post. You kept the diary, for now. Spoils of war and all that.
Besides, you couldn't help but read on. It was good practice reading the handwritten form of their characters, and there was new and increasingly bizarre relationship drama on each page. This poor woman was a disaster.
"Are you still reading that poor Caspian lady's diary? Send it back already, that's terrible." Aiko said, looking up a moment from her studies.
"It's just getting to the good part! Zigfrids tried to ask her to marry her while she was at sea, but he doesn't know that she's still seeing Kazimir, and honestly it sounds like she can't decide. There's only three pages left, I want to know who she chose!"
"I thought you hated both of them."
"Oh, neither of them are good enough for her, it's obvious. I don't understand straight women."
"Well, at least send it back when you're done. I have to get to class."
She shuffled out to her evening class and you curled up with your paper and dictionary to translate the last few pages. Unfortunately, and rather obviously in retrospect, it ended on a cliffhanger, as her last entry left no information regarding why her ship was abandoned, only noting that her supper had been dull (as usual) and talking about the eerie beauty of the ice and something that you translated three times to make sure that you had right because it was about "the inherent eroticism of the sea." You
really didn't understand straight girls.
"I'M HOME!" You jolted out of her your work when you heard the front door slam open and Aiko came charging into the apartment. Had it been that long already?
"Haruna!" She announced, immediately throwing her bag across the room. She was waving a letter in one hand. "Haruna they want the rowing team to go to Otrusia! For the
Atlas Games!"
"Wait,
really?" You reached out, trying to get hold of it and unable to manage it. The Atlas games were a recently started show of international cooperation and friendly competition. Amateur only, of course. They showed off all sorts of bits and pieces of national pride, from track and field athletics, to fencing and rowing, even auto races.
"Yes! The national committee says that we're the only complete woman's rowing team in the country. Plus we won like, all of our races last year. And they want us to go show the flag! Oh Spirits!
Otrusia in the summer! It's going to be so pretty!" she babbled.
"Well. I'll have to make sure I get leave. You think it'll be the whole summer…?" You were doing maths in your head. The limited kind of maths you were actually good at. So, a nice modern ocean liner could probably maintain roughly 21 knots. And with the distance between Tokei and the port of Serenitas that would mean… roughly 22 days at sea. That would mean a month there, a month back, accounting for stops in other ports and possible delays. Plus the month or so the games were ongoing. So yes, the whole summer. There was no way they'd let you go on leave for that long with all the post-war work, the ranks being reshuffled and all. Plus they still needed someone to mind the WNA… Maybe you could take the zeppelin there and back and at least see her compete for a little while?
"Oh, probably. But won't it be fun?"
"I'm sure it will be. I just don't know if the Navy will let me go for three months. Maybe longer. They probably have
plans for me." Well, maybe.
"Well, you have to
ask at least! The national Atlas games committee is going to pay for our transportation and we'll be staying in special housing for the athletes. I'd never be able to afford this, otherwise…"
That was a bit odd. From your reading the last one, it sounded more like a bunch of rich people getting together to play sports with one another, interesting mostly because of how many there were and how far afield they were from. Maybe you were wrong?
"I'll do my best. At the least I'll take the zeppelin over and stay a week or two so I can watch you compete, I promise."
---
"Of course you're going," said the admiral. "The Otrusian pinkos are making this some kind of international to-do so they can show off how advanced they are. Victory lap for the war against the Sultanate, you know. So why not show the West our highly decorated and courageous woman officer? You're the sort of example we want them to look at so they can nod and agree that yes, Akitsukuni is very civilized."
"Er, thank you, sir."
"We'd have sent you whether or not your girlfriend was going, of course. A happy coincidence for everyone involved. Try not to freak them out too badly though, they don't take well to that sort of thing. We can ill-afford another war right now."
"I'll make sure not to cause any international incidents, sir."
This was going to mean a lot of planning in a very short amount of time. It was already almost April and you'd want to leave for Europa no later than the start of June. You'd need to pack civilian clothes, not just your uniform, which meant probably having to deal with your mother. And you'd need to get tickets--only the best, of course. You were lost in your mental planning as you made your way home. You paused at your usual streetcar stop when someone else nudged into your side. You glanced up, ready to assert your personal space. He was a tall, slender, stick of a man with awkward looking sideburns, dressed in a lieutenant commander's uniform.
"Lieutenant. Can you spare me a moment of your time?"
"Sorry, I don't do autographs." you explained.
"I am afraid I'm not one of your admirers," he said. "I am Lieutenant Commander Sekiguchi. Intelligence Division, Naval Special Police." Oh. Wonderful.
"And what do you want from me, sir?"
"Just to relay a few things. While you're in Otrusia, we're hoping you can get a look at the new Otrusian battleship,
Proletariato."
"I see. I'll see what I can manage, though I imagine they'll be watching me like a hawk."
"Perhaps. Perhaps not. Less so than some of our other officers. You'll meet our man from the embassy when you get to Otrusia and he'll have more instructions for you then. When you arrive, cable the embassy and report that you'll need to see an Akitsukuni tailor for a new uniform jacket."
"I'll… do my best to remember that."
"I'm sure you will. We'll speak again before you leave. Good night, lieutenant." Then he stepped away down the street and you were left alone at the streetcar stop. Lovely.
You'd been imagining this as something like a vacation, you supposed, where your duties would mostly be to show up and look fancy and modern. On the one hand, it was nice you'd have something to do. On the other, you weren't entirely sure if this was the sort of duty you'd like to be assigned.
---
Haruna goes to the library and researches… (+1 Stress for each past the first)
[ ] The Otrusian navy, it's composition and recent history.
[ ] The Otrusian government, and how it turned socialist.
[ ] Potential vacation spots you could bring Aiko: pretty islands in the Superum Sea? Secluded coves along the coast? Romantic mountain vistas?
[ ] More about the city of Serenitas. What was there to see you could bring Aiko to? What might she like there?
