Two Princes In Panama

Chapter 2: Bernardo

Looking down through the glass floor, I watched as the browns, greens, and yellows of the countryside passed underneath my feet. The grid-like layout of the rural region we were flying over, where millions of people were probably settling in for the night, or already fast asleep. Like my mother, who sat two seats ahead of me with her eyes sealed shut.

My father was awake and conversing quietly with my older brother and two younger sisters. I couldn't help but think they were speaking about my upcoming nuptials. What else was there to talk about?

Not over two months ago, my mother called me into her private throne room and discussed a plan involving me. She said I would have to marry Prince Myles Cider, the youngest prince of the North American Union, at age twenty-one making him four years my junior.

My brother, Aécio Junior, turned over to me and smiled mischievously. He had been trying to get under my skin since we departed the airfield, but I wasn't willing to give him the satisfaction. Yet, giving him a look had his muscular body rippling with laughter.

"What's the matter, little brother? You don't seem to be happy about meeting your new husband," he joked in English. We were all brushing up on the language since we knew the Northerners had limited understanding in Portugueses.

"Fuck you," I snarled.

He laughed harder while taking deep breaths to not wake our mother. It was funny to him that the non homosexual brother was being asked to marry a man. Aécio was happily married to his husband, Ruel, a close friend of mine. I had no problem like most of the world with homosexuality; it was the 28th century after all. I preferred the feeling of a lithe woman under me.

"Be nice," my father interjected. I rolled my eyes and went back to staring at the surface below. My youngest sister Alexa walked over to me, her head crowned by russet curls that bounced as she walked. She was only seven, but with every day that passed she made it clear who would sit on the throne. Not a surprise since she was born to parents in their eighties that could impart the knowledge gained by a little under a third of our general lifespan.

"I'm confused, will you be a prince of North America?"

"Not completely, I will have some of the same rights but without the ability to become their king. I'll still be a prince of the South," I answered. She nodded, satisfied with the answer.

"What does he look like," she inquired. I wondered why she had not looked that up for herself.

"He's a prince." I shrugged, unsure of how to answer. He wasn't an ugly man, his honey-colored skin was blemish less in the pictures I had looked up. In all the pictures, he kept his jet black hair low and his eyelashes were long. They jutted from the folds of his hooded lids, curling upward. My brother found him attractive. If only he was the one marrying Myles.

When I had researched him, I focused more on his accomplishments, which is where I found the most disappointing tidbit of information. All I could find were accounts of humanitarian work, which was fine but didn't make someone worthy of taking a throne.

The world was all about how you could dominate another. You proved your place by how you performed on the battlefield as a monarch. Some said we had regressed socially, that were merely barbarians living in glass cities. I believe that the world has become as it should, people showing how capable they were of defending the people who put their trust in you. Unfortunately, I would have to marry a man who had openly stated his contempt for at least the last six battles.

"I think he's cute," my sister Rosa barged into the conversation. She looked at me and was smiling as she moved her hands along her silk green dress to smooth out non-existent wrinkles.