Continuous footsteps and the chatter of city life was all Eliza’s ears could take in. The cityscape of Anagora, an undying flame of colour, grit and culture, but she cannot see this city for what it claims to be. Up and above were colourful billboards and adverts, calling for all ‘Honest Republicans’ to celebrate the upcoming Victory Day later this week...
Though, Eliza knew she won’t be there to see it. She sighed, the fireworks were a bit loud at times, but the food stalls were to die for!
Still, Victory Day was just a façade, Eliza knew. For she was cursed with the numerous truths proclaimed by those who live in the underbelly of Anagora. Over the months she’s spent with Kazuki and the AGENCY, she’s seen so much of what she knew be questioned… Will it end?
Eliza took in the sight of the skyline, stretching out beyond her reach. Students passed by in the doorway leading into the university. Students had to shimmy around her. One accidentally bumped into her, as she took a few steps forward.
Twisting around, she nodded her head. “Pardon me, I shouldn’t have been block—”
“Oh?” A familiar, deep voice cut in. Eliza raised her head, taking a few more step backs. The person speaking took a few steps forward, getting out of the way of one of the university’s many side entrances. “It’s you.”
Eliza’s eyes came wide open. She saw a mockingbird brooch pinned to the person’ blue hoodie, glowing a bright green from its gem. It was a person she was familiar with in the past. “Noah?”
“Eliza?” the man returned. “Didn’t expect to see you here.”
“Neither did I,” Eliza exclaimed.
Noah was taller than her, a navy blue hue laid within his eyes, blended into his hair. He looked even sharper than how she remembered him. “Well, it’s a big university, hard to come by other people without planning,” he said, scratching his head.
He shot a look over his shoulder, shuffling even further away from the exit.
“I guess so,” Eliza said, gleefully. It’s been so long since she’s met someone from her past. Seems both Noah and Kazuki have grown since those days ten years ago. “I’m guessing you’re studying business?”
“Good guess, media. My parents want me to pick up their legacy after them… Probably because they want to retire to Kasté or somewhere,” Noah said, stepping forward as the two walked down the paved path, adorned with floating street lamps, off during the day, though still bright from the holo-posters hanging from them. “Part time, though, my parents have me help around in their business, not in journalism though.”
“Oh, yeah! You’re parents run that media group down in…” Eliza clicked her fingers, trying to think of the place. Honestly, she couldn’t, but she’ll squeeze the answer out of her mind some minute.
“Nova Mithradati?” Noah asked, placing his hands in his pockets.
She nodded, “That’s the place! I guess you’re in your first year? I did the first year speech last year and didn’t see you in the crowd, so…”
“Mhm, didn’t want took a leap year after scraping past the NATs with my parents.” Noah stopped beside one of the masterwork fountains.
“Oh, lucky you! It’s been what, five years, right?” she asked, her undying determination exuding from her voice alone, stirred with both compassion and knowledge.
She fidgeted with her hands inside her hoodie pockets, somewhat excited that someone else from her past has made it here.
He paused for a moment, before shrugging with an exaggerated expression. He said, “Yep, my parents wanted me back on Mithradat so I could help around. Kinda boring, though.”
“Well, you’re here! They don’t call Anagora the never sleeping city for nothing, I’m sure you’ll find loads to do around these parts.” Eliza said, thinking back to just how estatic the night life can be - especially around universities.
She slowly chuckled, thinking back to the hundreds of times that the Student Exec got drunk so badly that Kaz and Chloé had to carry them all… Actually, maybe it was just Kaz carrying all of them.
“Yeah, guess it’ll be fun?” He looked back at the fountain, falling into silence.
Eliza’s small smile dissipated into intrigue. She kept looking at him for a moment, before focusing on the fountain.
It was both a marvel of engineering and architecture, blending the old with the new. Glancing at it, she found it rather extravagant, especially for a fountain not even visible from the main entrance. Though, if the rumours were to be believed, this fountain was where the Republican Guard made a final stand against the Imperial onslaught during the siege… Sadly, there are little to attest to such a claim, and those that could were most likely dead.
It saddened her, slightly, as she frowned at it. Noah glanced towards her. He asked, “Getting sentimental about bricks and marble?”
Her head snapped towards him. “Ah, no, just… lost in my thoughts, I guess?”
Noah hid a muffled snicker. “Heh, and here I thought you went a complete one-eighty,” he said, continuing to walk as he pricked his uplink online. “You’ve changed a lot, I thought you’d just be as cold as you were back in school.”
“Ah, well, things change?” suggested Eliza, shrugging.
Noah answered her shrug with another. “Guess it is…” He trailed off, visibly thinking before saying, “My parents have me running the local Galatimes news office, but I’m free for now.”
“Oh! Galatime Magazines…” Eliza said. It’s one of the largest media brands in the galaxy, operating out of both the Republic and even the Erudian Holy See. “I’m rather impressed they gave you such an important position, given the agency’s role.”
He chuckled. “Don’t be. Trust me… trying to sift through all that work is exhausting, plus… my parents want me to really submit something into the news outlets, sometimes.”
“Oh?”
Noah lowered his voice. “It’s nothing important… Just… Want to get something? I think I need to clear my head from all this work.”
A lens within Eliza’s aug-glasses highlighted the time, it just struck mid-day, before showing the times across the planet and the galaxy. “Sure, it never hurts to catch up with others, does it?”
She lightened up the moon against Noah’s pretty stiff attitude. She doesn’t remember much from middle school, but was Noah always this cold? Ugh… He’ll probably get along with Kazuki, she thought. The thought rang with familiarity to her, but she wasn’t able to place her thumb directly on it. .
“Not wrong,” he asserted. “So uh… did anything happen between the end of middle school and now?”
He glanced around the place as they made their way towards the entrance of the university grounds, a large ornate gated wall, with imagery and murals of the past. It showed the university’s long history, from developing weapons during the Long Crusade against the aliens… the Imperial Peace and even the Crisis.
Some murals showed heavily armoured crusaders with their knightly banners, with even the Orastrians and Kiapra Knights involved.
Eliza caught herself thinking too deep as she pulled herself back out. “Hmm? Oh, right! I did say to catch up, didn’t I?” she mused for a moment to herself. What exactly has changed? She can’t pin her thumb on anything in particular immediately… “Well, nothing comes to mind.” She nervously chuckled to herself.
Noah raised an eyebrow. “Well, I’m probably stating the obvious, but you seem a lot more alive now.”
Oh yeah, she was more alive nowadays, she thought… “Oh, that, I completely overlooked that!”
Noah shook his head in disbelief.
“I didn’t know it was possible to get tunnel vision in your own memory, but here we are!” he jested, shifting to the side. A garbage disposal drone hovered past the two. “You’ve been listening to my advice, then? You remember that, at least, right?”
This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.
“Uh…” She trailed off, not knowing the best way to say ‘I forgot’ in the nicest of manners. Scratching behind her ear, she let off an embarrassed chuckle. “I don’t seem to recall, maybe you could jog my memory?”
“Life selfishly! No point to live for other people if you can’t live for yourself, can you?” Noah replied. “Live, like, seriously… enjoy life, it’s too short to dig your head into books for half of it.”
Eliza doesn’t recall it at all… She swore she would have remembered those words, yet all she could remember were the countless revision sessions and study periods she had.
∗ ∗ ∗
A hand gently slapped Eliza across the back of her head. “Hey, did you forget about me?” a voice snapped. Both Noah and Eliza twisted around to the voice, a peach-blonde haired woman. Eliza gently rubbed the back of her head. “You’re lucky you didn’t leave Hania hanging, she would’ve slammed you into the ground.”
“Oh… friend of yours?” asked Noah, turning to Eliza.
“Y—yeah… Why’d you do that, Chloe?” Eliza raised her voice, looking at another fellow uni student, the vice president of this year’s student exec. She had the distinct face tattoos of the Theonari-Feina people, two lines beneath her green eyes to signify her age.
Chloé placed her hands on her waist, angrily rolling her eyes. “Didn’t you say to meet at the exit? Or did those two thousand reports a day quota finally fry your head?!”
She ignored Noah’s existence.
Eliza straightened herself out. “Absolutely not! I…”
Chloé squinted. Eliza quickly realised that Chloé was absolutely right, in the first part that was. She had completely forgotten why she was waiting in the first place!
“I… uh…” She trailed off, feeling embarrassed at the whole thing. Her eyes glanced to the side, her face slightly dejected. “I… forgot.”
Giving a dismissive sigh, Chloé’s head twisted over towards Noah. “Oho!”
Her eyes looked down at Eliza, as she sidestepped to the left. Muttering to herself, she said, “Seems like there’s competition.” Before raising her voice and clearing her throat. “Made a new friend, Lizzie?”
“Well, old friend, back from middle school,” said Eliza.
“Oh, so this was before you decided to liven up in high school?” Chloé’s eyes lit up with interest. She snapped her fingers, pointing her index at Noah. “So—”
“Noah, Noah Slyra-Montageu,” Noah cut her off. He stepped forward, and shook her hand.
Chloé immediately shook him off. “Sorry, taken, but still, didn’t expect Liz to be close to people in the past.”
Noah scratched the back of his head. “Not exactly close? I mean… Eliza wasn’t close to anyone in middle school.”
“Hey! It was by choice, alright?” Eliza snapped.
Chloé immediately peddled back onto an agenda. “Noah, got any embarrassing moments for Liz in middle school? I’ll trade you two university and one high school moments for two of yours,” she said with a smug smirk smeared over her face and attitude.
Eliza’s face went as red as her eyes as she grabbed onto Chloé’s shoulders with both hands. “Hold up!” Eliza begged Chloé, shaking her with both hands frantically. “I beg of you, if anything: NOT THE SPEECH ONE.”
Noah burst out laughing at the sight.
Both Eliza and Chloé looked towards him, the latter having to slowly pry Eliza off herself. “Jeez, I’ve missed a lot, haven't I?”
He had a wide grin on his face. But despite her best intentions, Eliza could feel a hint of confusion in his eyes.
Eliza smiled, ignoring the signs, it must just be her mind bothering with the smaller details, she thought. She has to look at the bigger picture, lest she forget why she continues to sweat, study and metaphorically bleed for.
“And you don’t mind me saying one embarrassing moment, right Eliza?” asked Noah, sitting down on the fountain and stretching his arms.
“Hmnn,” Eliza pondered for a moment, in deep thought. “Fine… but nothing too embarrassing, okay?”
“Alright,” Noah said, nodding. “Anyways, there was this one time in middle school that this classmate of ours—”
“—No,” Eliza cut in. Her red eyes beat a violent red. She absolutely did not want this one to be spoken of. “Not that one…”
Noah paused, before taking a deep breath. “But… that was the least embarrassing one?”
She quickly shut down the conversation. “Well, then NO EMBARRASSING STORIES.”
“Ugh, don’t worry, Liz, I’ll steal some secrets from you at the Dassant. You are coming, right?” Chloé asked. If it wasn’t for how she was joking about that, she would have thought Archius had taken her place, looks, voice and mind and all.
The trio sat down at the fountain as a group of students walked by, the hover-ball team. “Wait, you guys are going this year?” he asked. “The Dassat, I mean.”
Both Eliza and Chloé nodded in unison, a steady image of pink and green. “Yeah! I missed out last year because of work and I missed some juicy stuff,” said Chloé, “I’m not missing out this year.”
“I see…” Noah’s eyes narrowed at Chloé. He stayed motionless for a second, before saying, “Are you sure about this? I know it’s not my place but… I heard what happened.”
Eliza’s smile was wiped away with a single sentence. Her eyes skidded towards the side. Dammit, here she was silently sulking when Noah was worrying about her… He hasn’t even seen her in years and he still cares, she thought.
“No… I’m quite fine to go this time, I mean: I’ll have Chloé with me, so that’s a plus!” Eliza explained. “I’ll have to go on my father and brother’s behalf.”
“Heh, you have your own room, or you gonna bunk with me?” Chloé asked, prodding her uplink offline as she pulled out her holophone. She ignited it, showing the two of them where she was going to stay. “A-12, amazing view of the planet! Are any of you guys interested?”
“Oh! Why don’t you ask Barclay to come?” asked Eliza.
Chloé rolled her eyes again, before her voice fell to a bashful complaint. “Absolutely not, he rarely responds to my messages, you think he’ll show up on such short notice?!”
“Ah… fair point…” said Eliza. “I’ll probably get my own suite.”
Chloé’s eyes shifted towards Noah, as she retracted her hand. Shoving it into her hand, she acted like she didn’t invite them to bunk with her. She placed her hands together in a clap. “Anyways…”
Noah glanced at Eliza. “You staying with anyone? I’m going with my parents to make some new connections.”
Eliza answered without thinking, in a warm manner as always, “Oh, Kazuki.”
The exact moment that word left her lips, she noticed Noah slowly trail away in thought. His eyes were locked in a moment of thought - she paused for a moment as Noah composed himself.
“Oh, Kazuki! I… haven’t seen him in a while,” said Noah. Eliza stayed silent for a few moments.
“Yeah, you two went to different schools after Victoria died, didn’t you?” Eliza asked, “I’m sorry… bringing her up is—”
“It’s fine, it’s probably for the best, though,” Noah interjected. “We have different ways of dealing with loss?”
“Oh… it is?” Eliza was confused. The two were friends, right? She pondered to herself, they must have different ways of mourning people. But something just didn’t sit right within Eliza.
He looked at Chloé’s holographic ID card, a blazing red colour to signify her position within the Student Executive. “Chloé… you want to join me and Eliza? We’re gonna get something to eat.”
“I hope we are!” Chloé shot back, “I’m starving and I waited like five minutes for you, thinking you were still scrounging around for things YOU HAVEN’T revised yet!”
A red blush crept back onto Eliza’s face. “Hey, I’m sorry!” she said, noticing a few passing glances as she felt a modicum of awkwardness fall over her. She hid her face behind her hands, expecting a second fusillade of embarrassments… but nothing came. Then, whispers, murmurs… She opened her eyes.
Glancing at the two of them, she noticed that both of their glares were highlighted at the entrance. In fact, everyone’s glares and eyes were pinpointed in that direction, as three shuttles skidded through the gate. They were black, yet all the same felt familiar… They stopped near the entrance.
“Uh… those are government, right?” asked Chloé. “I always thought black sketchy shuttles fitted them.”
Noah stepped in front of the two, as if warding against any potential threats. They were definitely suspicious, the shuttles. “No, my parents brought me to a few tele-com deals with the Federal government, they DEFINITELY don’t use shady black shuttles.”
Eliza stayed calm. Despite possible implications, she didn’t feel any sense of threat from them. They were let into the university, and security, both drone and people, doesn’t seem too worried about it. Then, the shuttle doors slid open, as suited men and women left the confines of their transport.
“Wait a minute…” Eliza squinted her eyes as she steadied her glasses. She thinks she knows one of them… A large, broad-shouldered figure looked around the place, as his eyes landed on Eliza. The figure looked back into the shuttle and said something. “Oh! It’s Kaz…”
Noah glanced at her, then back at the shuttle. “Oh, if he’s here then I guess you’re busy, then. I’ll head over to work earlier,” he said, walking away.”Tell him I said hi, though.”
Eliza noted that he was walking over to a different exit, instead of the one closest to them, but thought nothing of it.
“Best of luck to you!” said Eliza, as Noah walked away, waving back towards them as he faded into the crowd of people around them. “We can get lunch together another day, then.”
“Yeah!” Noah shouted back. “See you two at the Dassant.” He disappeared into a crowd of students…
It only then dawned on Eliza that she hadn’t asked Noah on why he was so eager to leave… Kaz and him knew each other in the past, yet why did Noah seem quite hesitant to meet him? Or at least stay around to greet one another.
Chloé spoke up, “Kaz? Really? You think he comes in a shady convoy of black shuttles?” The two looked at each other, eyes off the convoy.
“Well… I know one of those bodyguards… I think?” Eliza pondered for a moment, pushing her glasses up her nose bridge. “Yeah, I most definitely recognise one of them.”
“No way you can see that far, you need glasses!” Chloé interjected, “You’re probably the one in five trillion that don’t wear glasses for the looks. Like, Kaz always looked like a total nerd with his aug-glasses.”
“That’s… why I have glasses…” Eliza trailed off.
A new voice cut into the conversation. “What did you say?” It was cold, emotionless: sparkless. Chloé’s head twisted in downright fear, as Eliza swiftly looked towards the voice.