Somehow, Cinder ended up in what looked like the rich district of Commonwealth City. Out here, the houses were much larger and fancier than the crowded, dirty apartments in her neighborhood. She slowed to a walk, looking around at the spotless lawns and picture-perfect estates. Nothing in sight was familiar. Cinder turned around to go back the way she had come, but she had already taken several twists and turns through the lanes of this neighborhood. She was lost.
Pulling her phone out of her pocket, Cinder tried to access Google Maps to help her find her way back to the Phoenix Towers. Crap. No service. She stood there for a moment, unsure of what to do. Nice job, Cinder. A couple of hours in Commonwealth City and you're already lost.
"Hey!" The voice came from somewhere off to her left. She whirled around, feeling startled. A boy slank lazily down the cobblestone path that cut through the lawn of one of the estates. He gave her an easy smile. "Lost?"
"Um...yeah," Cinder said, shifting from foot to foot.
"Saw you out the window," the boy told her. He smirked again, stepping even closer. Cinder examined his face. He looked a couple of years older than her, but he was probably still in high school. Maybe eighteen or nineteen. He was awfully good-looking, with waves of sandy hair that swept off his forehead and sparkling blue eyes. Cinder pushed those thoughts out of her brain. Usually, she was not the kind of girl who fawned over cute boys. She felt suddenly awkward. Cinder was incredibly grateful that she was wearing her work gloves and long cargo pants that hid her prosthetic parts.
Looking up, she saw that he was frowning. "How old are you?" he asked. "You seem a little young to be wandering around here by yourself. Or actually... running away, are you?"
Cinder drew herself up to her full height. She didn't want to look like a scared little girl who had lost her mommy. "I'm sixteen. And no, I'm not running away. Not exactly." She realized that she hadn't really had a plan for what she was doing. She had just been running.
He shrugged, clearly still skeptical, and held out his hand. Cinder stared at it for a moment too long before taking it awkwardly. No one in her old town had ever wanted to touch her since she was known as the robot girl, the freak. "I'm Captain Carswell Thorne," he told her.
She let out a snort, finally regaining her confidence enough to be her normal snarky self. That name was an impossibly stuffy title, and the way he said it with his eyes gleaming with pride and his chest puffed out was laughable. It was all she could do not to burst into fits of giggles.
Captain Carswell Thorne didn't seem to notice her rudeness. "The Captain part comes from me being captain of the football team, and also because I intend to be the captain of a plane one day. Most people call me that. It kind of just stuck."
"I'm Cinder," she said. "And yes, it's also a nickname."
The Captain smiled. "Then we should get along just fine! We can be the weird nicknames club. Now tell me, where are you trying to go? I saw you running like the devil was chasing you and then you just stopped when you realized you were lost."
"Um...about that..." Cinder had no idea what to tell him. "I just - I needed to get away from my stepfamily for a while. But god, if Adri - my stepmother - finds out... she'll be livid."
"Ah." He nodded in a gesture of camaraderie. "I totally get the feeling. Sometimes your parents just annoy the hell out of you. So where do want me to take you?"
Now Cinder was suspicious. He seemed to be acting almost too nice. "When did I say I needed you to take me somewhere?"
"I can see you're in need of an accomplice in your grand one-night getaway," the Captain said decisively. "And I happen to be somewhat of a criminal mastermind. I even have the perfect getaway vehicle!" He pointed down the driveway of the mansion to a car. It was surprisingly beaten up and smeared with grime and dust. She would have expected an entitled rich boy like the Captain to have a fancy, sleek car, not that wreck. Cinder could tell with one look at the thing that it needed a tire change and some other maintenance.
"Go away," Cinder glowered, turning away. "I don't need your help." It was clear he saw her as a frightened, lost damsel in distress who needed a handsome knight in shining armor to come take her away in his grand vehicle.
He grinned cockily. "You can't exactly tell me to go away when you're the one intruding on my property."
Cinder growled. "Fine. I'll go away then." She turned and stomped away, not caring that she still had no idea what to do.
"Wait, Cinder -" he called after her. "I'm just saying we might be able to help each other."
She turned and glared at him. "Like I said, I don't need your help. Just because I'm a girl doesn't mean I'm weak and helpless."
"I think that in this situation, you do need my help," he pressed on. "After all, I'm the one with the car. And the directions."
That, she couldn't argue. "I guess..." she mumbled, even though it killed her pride to say the words.
"And -" the Captain held his breath with dramatic fake suspense. "I'm the one who knows how to get to the Chinese pork bun restaurant downtown."
A little while later, Cinder and the Captain were cruising downtown in his beat-up Rampion car. He had been pretty impressed when Cinder could tell that the car was a Model 214 Rampion, Class 11.3. Their conversation had drifted to how Cinder knew so much about mechanics. It felt good to talk to someone after her painful afternoon of cleaning alone.
"My adoptive father, Garan, taught me some of what I knew back when I was eleven," Cinder said. Her mind flashed back to all those afternoons spent in the back shed with that man, learning the basics of how parts were put together and used. Everything had come naturally to Cinder, and after a while, she was able to completely disassemble cars and other machines as well as put them back together again. She had even designed a new engine system for cars - a magbelt, she called it - that had won first prize at her middle school science fair. Garan had been so proud of her.
But mechanical skills definitely didn't earn popularity points with her classmates, who already called her robot girl because of her prosthetics. This ended up being just another thing to tease her about. And then Garan had died of leukemia... Cinder had seriously considered quitting at her new hobby since it was too painful without her stepfather and apparently it wasn't "cool" for girls to be good with machines. But she had pushed through those dark days, and ever since then she had never faltered. After all, Cinder had a gift, so why not utilize it?
"I taught myself a lot more about mechanics after Garan died by reading books and watching YouTube videos," Cinder continued with the story. "And then, when I was thirteen, I started my own mechanics business. We had a central marketplace in my old town, and anyone, even kids, could set up their own stand." She didn't add that Adri had forced her to start a business because they were running out of money.
"That's really cool," the Captain remarked. He laughed. "I can barely use an iPhone, and you were starting a business at thirteen? I feel like a disgrace."
Cinder blushed modestly. "It's really not that hard for me. I kind of just look at a machine and see how it works, you know?"
The Captain shook his head. "Trust me, it's really not that easy for most people. But anyway, what high school will you be starting at? Commonwealth High?"
"Yup," she confirmed. "Do you go there?"
He grimaced. "My parents made me go to a private school in the city, Andromeda Academy, but I kind of failed in all my classes and pulled some stunts that got me expelled... so yeah, now I go to Commonwealth. Started at the beginning of last year, after I got kicked out of that damn academy." The Captain added some profanity after the last phrase that Cinder pretended not to hear.
"Wait a second. You failed your classes and you pulled a stunt that got you into trouble? I didn't think it was possible to be that much of a failure." She didn't realize until after the words had left her mouth that they were quite rude.
He shrugged. "Yeah, that's just me. I've gotten into a whole lot of trouble at Commonwealth too. Basically the only reason I'm still allowed to go there is that they need me on the football team. But I'm used to trouble. I even kind of like it, somehow. It's my small way of rebelling against my parents."
Looking at him across the center console, Cinder saw that he was staring straight ahead like he was afraid that she would judge him. But she wasn't going to. She understood what it was like to want to rebel against the people who thought they had control of your life.
"And we're here!" the Captain announced, jubilant once again. He pulled the Rampion up against a curb. Cinder realized that they were in the busiest area in downtown, bustling with people shopping and walking around the hub of small shops, cafes, and bars. They were parked right in front of a storefront advertising the name of the restaurant, Zhu Rou Bao. There was a small sign underneath reading Best Pork Buns in the City! The Captain led the way inside. From the way he smiled and winked at all the waiters and waitresses, it was clear that he came there a lot.
They exited from the restaurant with a dozen mini pork buns in a to-go bag. The Captain pulled one out right away and bit into it, sighing. "I've been craving these for weeks."
Author's Note: Thorne actually does talk about pork buns in Scarlet, when he and Cinder are escaping from prison. I'm not just adding this to the story randomly.
The two walked through the streets, chatting idly. Occasionally the Captain would wave to someone he knew from school. Cinder guessed that late evening was a popular time for high school students to flock downtown to socialize.
The Captain finished his last pork bun, licking his fingers. "I'm thirsty now," he remarked. "Want to go get a drink? I know the perfect place."
So they ended up at a cute little French cafe called the Rieux Cafe. High schoolers and elderly people alike sat outside at fancy tables with red-and-white-striped umbrellas, sipping iced teas and eating pastries. Once inside, the Captain went up to the counter to order himself a tea and something called a pains au chocolat - in perfect French, of course. Show off.
"Want anything?" he asked Cinder, who picked a hot chocolate from the menu. She instinctively reached for her wallet to pay, but then realized that she hadn't brought it into the air conditioning shaft when she left the apartment.
Her companion waved her off. "Don't worry, I'll pay," he reassured her. Normally Cinder would have told whoever was paying for her that she would pay them back later, but hey, she was broke. And the Captain seemed to have plenty of money, so it wasn't a huge loss to anyone.
They sat down at one of the tables inside. It was very crowded and noisy inside the cafe since lots of people seemed to go there for a light dessert or drink after dinner. The Captain waved to several people he knew, also winking and raising his eyebrows suggestively at some girls, who blushed and giggled. Throughout the course of the evening, Cinder had learned that the Captain was definitely a womanizer. She wondered if he had a girlfriend.
A pretty young woman with bright red curly hair walked past their table. Cinder stared enviously at her wild mane of hair tumbling loosely over her shoulders. She had always wanted to have hair like that instead of her plain brown stick-straight hair. The girl wore a strange outfit of a black and white striped blouse, a short red skirt with an apron over it, and a red beret. It took Cinder a few moments of staring to realize that she was a waitress.
"Yeah, I know," the girl said, stopping when she saw Cinder's expression. "The outfit's awful, but I guess if you work in a French cafe you have to wear a silly French outfit. At least it's mostly red." She did look good in red. The color made her hair even more vibrant.
"Hey, Scarlet," the Captain said. Cinder guessed that Scarlet also went to Commonwealth High.
She seemed surprised. "Do you guys know each other?" she asked, looking between Cinder and the Captain. Can't blame her, Cinder thought. Why would a hot guy like the Captain hang out with a frumpy mechanic like me?
"We just met," the Captain answered. "And I decided to take Cinder out for a little treat. Did you know she's coming to Commonwealth High?"
"Cool!" Scarlet exclaimed cheerfully. "I look forward to seeing you there."
"SCARLET!" roared a man standing behind the cafe counter. He impatiently dinged a bell that signaled when an order was ready for a waiter to take to a table.
"Oops, sorry, Giles," Scarlet dashed off, smiling apologetically at Cinder and the Captain.
Another waiter soon brought their drinks and the Captain's chocolate croissant to them. The two sat enjoying their light snack. "When do you start at Commonwealth High?" the Captain asked.
She thought for a moment. "In a few days, I think. My stepfamily and I need a little time to unpack and adjust, and then my stepsisters and I will be going to school again. Is it a good school?"
The Captain laughed. "Oh, yes. It's your stereotypical high school - old snotty teachers, dirty bathrooms, boys who run around like monkeys all the time, cliques of mean girls - you name it." He started telling Cinder stories about all of the adventures he had gotten into at school. Between the descriptive way he spoke and his animated gestures and facials, it wasn't long before she was cracking up. Even though moving to Commonwealth City had been rough, Cinder was just happy that she had found a friend.
And then a shrill voice completely shattered the moment.
"CARSWELL THORNE!"
Author's Note: Don't worry, Cinder and Thorne aren't going to be a ship in this story. I still think they have really great chemistry though