Calore Dance Academy// Red Queen AU

Chapter 44

As we stroll down a street in Greenwich Village, I give my brother a suspicious look.

We're half a mile uptown from his apartment, surrounded by elegant brick buildings of various beige and brown shades. Their windows are large, and while the buildings themselves are only slightly taller than those in East Harlem, they're infinitely less depressing with their sculptural designs and golden street numbers. Plants in gigantic concrete pots line the way, and ordinary cars—as opposed to the town cars and limousines of last night—fill parking spots. Chattering young people emerge from wide doors with books under their arms and backpacks on their shoulders, and vivid purple flags jut out from buildings and into the air.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" I ask, eyeing another New York University torch logo upon a flag as we pass it.

Shade told me that we were going out after I realized who the handkerchief belonged to.

I asked him where, and he told me that we were going uptown to pay Professor Julian Jacos at NYU a visit.

"It's certainly not a bad one," Shade says in turn, a skip in his step as we cross the street. "And anyway, since when are you into good ideas?"

I trail my brother across the street and to the narrow building that he beelines for. It's the color of pale sand, and its glass doors wait for me and Shade. The word Hall follows a man's name, and beneath the name of the building reads the word Anthropology.

"True," I mutter. "Good ideas have never really been my thing."

But . . . still. NYU is a little less than two miles north of Wall Street, and though things seem relatively normal up here, I hear people talk.

About the Calores, about the Scarlet Street Fighters.

The terrorists.

College kids whisper their wild theories about what the hell is going on in New York City. They make it all sound more like a story than a reality, more like . . . a dream. In the last twelve hours, the internet has exploded with news regarding the Calore family and the little anybody knows about the Scarlet Street Fighters—who have officially been titled a domestic terrorism group. Nobody, however, really seems to think that the Calores are on the bad side of things, and somewhere along the line, everybody decided that the Street Fighters are just a bunch of Socialist radicals who hate the ultra-rich.

"Room nine hundred and five," Shade says, stopping not far from the door. "I have to go buy groceries."

I halt with him. It appears that Shade's giving me my first real mission. And I'm doing it alone.

Part of me just wants to ask if he's actually buying groceries this time.

"What?" Shade asks, noting my raised eyebrows and partial cringe. "You know him better than me."

I scoff. "Not really, actually."

Shade just smiles. "Then I guess after today, you'll know him better than me."

<><><>

The old hallway that I walk down is a quiet place.

Commercial carpeting absorbs the clicks that my boots would otherwise make, and I don't hear the voice of a single student or professor of anthropology. Sunlight streams into the hall from windows, filling it with that clean, airy color that autumn brings. The only people that surround me are those in the portraits lining the corridor, and the men and women are of all different eras and places. Some of them have faces more similar to monkeys than those of humans.

Room nine hundred and five approaches soon enough. The door is already open, and some slow acoustic music filters out into the hall from it.

I don't let myself think about much of anything—not why I'm here nor what I'm doing—as I take a step in front of the office door and then another inside. My knuckles rap against the wall to alert the professor of my presence.