Arknights | Coronation

[veryroundbird]

Rating: Mild
Words: 1310
Characters: Estelle, Utage, Tomimi
Relationships: Gen
Summary: Estelle is unexpectedly dragged along on a shopping trip by Utage, with expected results—well, expected to everyone but Estelle.
Notes: Pride Month 2021 request for MY WIFE

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Estelle was starting to think (not for the first time, not for the last) that maybe she'd made a mistake, standing in the dressing room behind the thin fabric curtain, looking at an intimidatingly-large pile of outfits that had been thrust into her arms.

Honestly, it had taken all her courage to ask Utage and Tomimi where they were going, when Utage came by the dorm earlier that day to pick Tomimi up, and then Utage had looked her up and down with a cool, thoughtful expression, and said, "Wow, your bod is absolutely wasted on that outfit, girl. Here, you come too."

It was just—well. Estelle didn't get out much. She intended to! Every time the landship docked, she had a routine—she'd ask Closure for a list of tourist destinations and clothing stores, and she'd look at her credit account, and think about how many things she could buy to be fashionable, and then...

...she'd think about it, and then about it, and think about it for long enough that the landship would be on its way to the next destination.

And as she looked in the dressing-room mirror, she thought about the reason why—

The horns on her head stuck out wide, pointed—that wasn't the problem, since plenty of shops accommodated for that in larger cities. No, it was the little crown of crystals growing like a circlet from her scalp.

She touched one, gingerly—the translucent black glinting from the bright store lights above. In a way—when she was small, she might have thought it was pretty. As a little girl, her tribe had gotten a rare item—a new-print picture book off a shipment from one of the big Sargonian mobile cities, about a princess and her beloved pets, and Estelle had read it over and over and over again until the binding broke. Estelle had always wanted to be that girl.

"Estelle~?" called a voice, from little hallway outside the fitting rooms. "You like... still alive in there?"

That'd be Utage; Estelle opened her mouth toe say something, made an involuntary squeak, and coughed to cover it up. "Um... I'll be out in a moment."

"Got it, got it~ Tomimi wants opinions on her outfit and whether Gavial's going to wanna kiss her if she wears it—"

There was an indignant yelp from a little farther away. Honestly... Tomimi could look cute in anything, though. She nodded, and then realized that Utage wouldn't know she was doing it.

"Um—sure, I'll be out soon..."

The crown of crystals from her head—well, in some places Rhodes Island docked, it meant she couldn't go out to see things at all. Not everywhere they went was kind to the Infected, after all; in fact, a lot of the time that was why Rhodes Island was there.

Where she'd grown up—well, she'd never met Gavial or Tomimi, since it was a big country. But the culture wasn't too different—either Infected or not, it wasn't who you were. It was just a fact of life. But in the wide world...

...well, it was a little like Miss Eunectes had said, one time when she'd asked Estelle to help her with something in the workshop. "The world is so wide... I was hoping that all the technology and all of the knowledge... that it would be wonderful. Instead, it's more complicated, isn't it?"

She was older than Estelle, and had been the chief of her own tribe back in Acahualla, but she had turned to look at Estelle like she was a worldlier woman who might have some kind of wisdom or comfort to offer.

Estelle didn't know what to say. None of her experience with the world had taught her very much, in that way. Mostly just that she was in over her head at all times, except in combat, which wasn't... very princess-like at all.

Which brought her to the matter of the dress.

It was white, which she liked, and it was long—the kind of thing she might see in a wedding catalog and sigh over. It barely fit over her horns, impractically zipper-less, and was tight enough that it would be hard to move in. It looked like the kind of thing a model would wear to the point that it felt odd to see herself in.

There was a sudden knock that almost caused Estelle to jump out of her skin and knock into one of the flimsy dressing-room cubicle walls—and then she realized it was just Utage sticking her hand in through the curtain to rap her knuckles against the particle board.

"Heyyyyy, come in, Estelle, you alive?"

"Um—yes..."

"Come on, I, like, wanna see how it looks and see if I was right, you know?" A long, exaggerated sigh. "If you're decent, I can come in."

Estelle looked down at her hands, and took a deep breath. "Okay," she says, finally.

"Right right~" The curtain swept aside, just for the barest moment for Utage to breeze in—

"Damn!"

Estelle hunched her shoulders. "It really doesn't suit me, does it..."

"No no no no no—like, what I mean is... damn, it looks really good. Like, have you really looked at yourself in the mirror in here?" Utage put a finger to her chin. "I, like, want to get half the clothes off the rack in this store and see you try them on."

Oh. Estelle flushed; she really wasn't used to this. If Utage had thought it looked silly, Estelle would have at least known how to deal with that. "Um," says Estelle. "I think..."

She looked down at herself again, her legs in the sweeping skirt. "It's not really practical..."

Utage shrugged. "That's, like, the point, isn't it? If you want it to be practical, you can let Orchid take her sewing machine to it, but—c'mon, you should get a look at it out in the better light, too. Or, what, are you just going to, like... wear it in private where no one can see you?"

And before she could protest, she was getting dragged by the wrist out to the big mirrors at one end of the fitting rooms. "It took you a while—" Tomimi started, and then...

...stared...

There was a shove to her back, and Estelle found herself stumbling forward into the lighted half-circle of mirrors, next to Tomimi, who was still looking up at her and seeming faintly astounded.

Estelle looked up, into the mirrors, and—

...a princess looked back at her, falls of green hair cascading over her shoulders, crowned in crystals; the long skirt of her dress trailing behind her with ruffles like a churning river.

"Oh," said Estelle.

"I want something like that! That's what I want!" said Tomimi, pointing frantically.

"Fine, fine~" Utage bopped Tomimi on the top of her head. "Just relax a little. We'll get to it. After all, everyone on this trip has gotta become two hundred percent cuter or I'm leaving you behind~"

"—what?" Tomimi and Estelle both stood up very straight, nearly in unison.

"Ehh, it's all jokes. Don't worry, don't worry~" amended Utage, waving a hand. "I'll get you your dream wedding dress, Mimi, and get back to those fitting rooms, because, like, you've got a lot to try on and we've only got an hour until the sneaker drop down the road. Which I am so not missing."

At the end of the day, Estelle walked home with about as many bags as she could carry, full of clothes—but it was the white one she took to Miss Orchid in HR, the next morning, to shyly inquire about tailoring. After all—

...well, maybe Utage was right that it didn't have to be practical, but it did if she wanted to wear it all the time.