Good Morrow, Cher Winklevoss!
Title: Good morrow, cher Winklevoss!
Words: 4k
Pairings: Mark/Eduardo with allusions to Chris/Dustin & Divya/W2
Rating: PG
Summary: The Social Network royalty AU. Mark needs a date to the ball.
A/N: For pidgeoned. With verbal help from crazykookie, shifty-gardener, & longswordho.
master fic post
Eduardo was just the sort of prince you'd expect to find as heir to the throne of a small country: thin, blushy, with wells of knowledge that encompassed all the events and concerns of his and all the neighboring countries and associated trading partners. He was fluent in eleven languages, two of those tonal, and had reached the black belt level in all martial arts that used that sort of scale. His knowledge of the bow and arrow were unmatched amongst his peers. He spoke with his hands and wore his heart on his sleeve. His ideals were giant.
In spite of all of the above traits, Mark's first impression of Eduardo was that he was a nerdy dude and had no right to be in the lab.
Eduardo burst in through the double doors, and said, "Oh. Hello."
Mark turned, eyes widening. "What are you even doing here? Get out, now!"
"Oh, goodness, I thought you were-I mean, I'm so-"
"Sorry, yes, I can see that," Mark snapped, waving his gloved hands. "Now shut the door behind you, you're letting in contaminated air."
The dude backed out and pulled the doors tight behind him. That was Mark's first face-to-face contact with HRH Eduardo of Shazdonia. The moment had lasted all of six seconds and consisted of a lot of shouting and stuttering, as was just related, and afterward Eduardo looked mournfully through the portal window on the white door while it sealed behind him like an airlock. Mark just shook his head and returned to his embryonic stem cell research, droppering clear liquid from one petri dish to the other and putting the interloper out of his mind.
+
Mark had been working in the palace labs for the last three years of his life. This was saying something, seeing as he was only twenty years old and had literally no connections. He was a self-made man, which was an American term than he donned and now wore like a cape to deflect the honest truth: that his family was poor, he didn't know his father, and he had luckily been sighted in high school as one of the top students in all subjects that were based in quantitative measures, and been sent to a top college in the capitol. He had to intern at the lab while other students attended frat parties and lost their various underclothes in other peoples' rooms.
Down in Chem Room B, Chris shoved a cardboard box onto the titanium steel table. Mark hastily tugged away his notes and graphs, but Chris didn't seem to notice that he'd disrupted Mark's calculations. He just said, "Dude, you have no idea what I'm about to show you. This is going to rock your life, you are going to be so jazzed. It's like a gps system, only better."
Mark waited patiently until Chris had finished telling him how he would react, so he could actually see the thing and react.
"You were right in this case," Mark said. He held the miniature chicken robot in his hand, felt the weight of it. "Wow."
"Dustin's going to present it as a gift this Friday." Mark looked at him blankly, and Chris rolled his eyes. "The ball? Celebrating Prince Eduardo's entrance into international affairs?"
"Oh, right." That did sound vaguely familiar. "Didn't he sign his first measure limiting greenhouse gasses?"
"So you do get out, then."
"We work in the palace. It's kind of hard not to hear something about news. And besides, the Prince's signing of the document was purely decorative, seeing as we don't even allow cars in the country, and thus don't emit greenhouse gasses." Mark pointed out. "It was just a gesture, nothing useful."
"Whatever," Chris said. He ruffled Mark's curls with a fondness that a lot of the other researchers showed him, as if they'd chosen to take his grumpiness as something endearing in its consistency, instead of taking offense, like many of Mark's peers seemed to. He didn't need friends, anyway, however much he sometimes thought it would be nice. He had his work.
Mark bore the hair-mussing with great strength for all of ten seconds and then shoved Chris and said, "Get out of here, man. Don't you have to be in bed by nine or something?"
"I'm twenty-one, not forty," Chris said. He shucked his lab coat and put it in the sterilization chute in the wall. "Remember, you're going to look like a tool if you can't find a date. I say this because I care."
"A date?" It hadn't occurred to him that that was something that would be required, but now that he thought about it, it made sense. "I guess I could ask-"
"Dustin is taken," Chris told him.
"By who?" Mark wasn't outraged, per se, just intensely incredulous at the idea that Dustin, a really nerdy guy who was kind of an ass, had a date and no one had even asked Mark.
"By me," Chris said. "And Divya is taking both of the Winklevosses, so you'll want to get a move on and find someone unaffiliated with our little circle. Good luck man."
With that, he grabbed his hoverboard from where he'd leaned it neatly against the wall, and scooted out the exit, leaving Mark alone in a lab that was empty save the chicken that was meant for the King and Queen of Shazdonia.
It was past the time normal people should be working. He wondered vaguely what it would be like to be so grounded in a social network, like Chris or the other scientists. Mark couldn't imagine it, not really. He had a hard enough time remembering to pack himself dinner (which he had not done today), let alone keep in mind and then find dates for superfluous events like royal functions.
+
The next evening, Mark was listening to music on a program he'd rigged himself. It did instant mash-ups based on the key and the tempo of songs, and sometimes the results were horrifying, but sometimes they were all right, like right now, and Mark was just in the zone.
He had a beer in one hand and was titrating acid into a base with the other, waiting for it to turn purple. As he sat there, mind wandering during a lull while the program created a new song, the only sound was the sound of silence, and Mark felt all at inner and outer peace.
If he were the type to be freaked by anything it would have been then, when the doors creaked open out of nowhere, and someone peered in and said, "My goodness!" like Mark had been the one to jump out.
Instead of grabbing a small blade to defend himself, Mark just looked the guy up and down. He was smartly dressed, in a sort of pretentious suit, but had a kind and eager expression.
"I swear to God," Mark muttered. "Back again? Seriously? It's a good thing I'm not at an unstable phase in the experiment, because if I had to start over I'd be here all night."
"Yes, I'm back again," the guy said. "I thought you'd be out by now."
"Thought I'd be out? You can't just break into an empty lab! That's highly suspect!"
"Suspect?" The guy asked, legitimately puzzled.
"Yes! For all I know, you could be a spy from a nearby country who wants a peek at the blueprints for our up and coming projects of which I'm not at liberty to speak. It happens."
"Are you lonely down here?"
"No, of course not. I have plenty to do. Now leave, or I'll have to report you."
"Seriously? You're going to report me?"
There was something Mark liked about the way the dude smiled, like he was the only member of an in-joke.
"Look, I won't report you if you do me a favor."
"Fine, what? What are you going to ask me for? I'm relatively sure this is illegal."
"Legality issues aside," Mark said. "You could have put me out of a job twice today, bursting in like this. These experiments are highly sensitive."
"Well?" The guy spread his hands. "Ask away."
Here goes nothing, Mark thought, although his face was blank when he said. "I need a date to the ball on Friday."
"That's it?"
"That's it." He'd never asked anyone out in his life, but this seemed to be going rather well. "You'll be there anyway, I suppose. We all will."
"Well, yes, of course," the dude said. He looked flustered, which made Mark like him even more, in that way where he knew nothing about him, so could assume all sorts of things. "You'll have to excuse me, I've never been asked on a date before, I'm not sure that it's supposed to work this way."
"Look," Mark said. "I'll make this simple. Do you have a date to the ball already?"
"I-No, actually, no I don't-I wasn't planning on bringing anyone."
"You'll look like a tool," Mark informed him, thinking of Chris's advice. "Well then, it can't get any more awkward than it already is, and like I said, you owe me."
"I'll be arriving a bit late," the dude said meaningfully. He was probably trying for a last ditch attempt to get out of their arrangement, especially when he leaned in and raised his large eyebrows and said, "With my parents."
"I'm good with parents," Mark said, thinking of his own mother, who tended to fuss but seemed relatively charmed by his intellect.
The dude was obviously out of excuses.
"Well, all right then."
"Right," the dude said. "I'll just-" he made vague gestures to the door.
+
Mark realized he hadn't asked anything about the guy. He didn't know any personal information, not his age or his name. He didn't even know why the kid was trying to get into the lab in the first place.
"You didn't get any information about him?" Chris asked. "I'm starting to think this guy is made up."
Mark wracked his brain for anything concrete the guy had even told him, but it was hard because he'd been so focused on 1) impressing upon him the importance of not just bursting into labs, 2) logicing him into going to the ball as Mark's date, and 3) the ridiculous mass of hair that stuck straight up and lent the guy a surprised look.
"Oh," Mark said, when his memory alighted on the moment where the dude had leaned his face closer and looked uncomfortable. "He's coming to the ball with his parents."
"At least he's as big of a lame ass as you," Chris decided. "Ha!"
"I don't live with my mother."
"That's because she told you to get a life. Again, I say: ha!"
+
The ball was more of a state-sanctioned excuse for a raucous party. There were at least forty large pizzas and kegs all over, pumped by young servants of the crown into red cups emblazoned with the royal seal. Bulb lights hung all over the high ceiling, the disparate glow lending the whole thing an old and glitzy feel, like it was the nineteen-twenties and they were overseas, along the Riviera.
Mark didn't mind crowds much, but the crowd seemed to mind him, giving him a wide berth where he stood by the golden banister of the staircase.
"It's the tie, isn't it?" Mark asked.
"It's not the tie, it's the shoes," Chris told him. Chris was wearing a soft button-down, rolled at the sleeves, but expensive trousers and shoes that shone in the lights. Everyone was in jewel-toned clothing and had tamed their hair.
Mark, on the other hand, had been working all day, even though it was nearly the weekend. Science came first, and besides, he didn't even own a brush. He'd put on a nice checked shirt and sprayed cologne in his hair so the smell would stay instead of dissipating after one turn around the room.
"The guy hasn't arrived yet?" Chris asked him.
Mark shook his head, and sipped at his drink. "I think I would have noticed. Besides, he said he'd be late."
The trumpeting of the royal guard interrupted a rather intense dance number, in which some nameless folk from Mark's hall were celebrating by jumping up and down and the Winklevosses were dirty dancing with Divya in the center of the parqueted floor.
A host of footmen chanted, in Greek chorus meter, "Their Royal Highnesses, the King and Queen of Shazdonia." Spotlights swung crazily around the room, and then lit at the top of the sweeping red staircase as the King and Queen entered. They floated down the stairs, their faces familiar and nostalgic both, due to their portraits being on all currency in the country.
"And may we present, Prince Eduardo!"
Mark was interested to see this. The Prince had not made his public debut until recently, and Mark couldn't remember what the dude looked like. He was imagining someone beefy and hard around the eyes, someone willing to defend the country's borders from all capitalist influence that threatened the economy of the Republic, but that is not whom he saw descending the red carpet.
"Holy eff," Mark said.
"He is rather attractive," Chris agreed. "But that's what being rich and not having to expose your delicate skin to chemicals will do to you."
"No, but that's...." Mark trailed off as the Prince reached the bottom of the staircase, the spotlights following his every step. He gave a little wave and the crowd freaked the fuck out. People whistled and men fainted, confetti rained from the ceiling in a reserved and tasteful way. Cameras blew up the room in voluminous and echoing neons.
Then the spotlight swung around the room crazily again, and Mark was blinded.
"What-"
"Man, you have got to be-" said Chris by his side. He fell back, however, as the crowd parted for the Prince to make his way to Mark.
Mark blinked and the Prince pulled to a halt in front of him. He looked absolutely gorgeous in a royal blue suit with a mustard-yellow shirt that had been spun with the organic silks of worms fed on the leaves of the renowned and locally grown mulberry bushes of Shazdonia.
The Prince looked at Mark. Mark looked at the prince.
The Prince extended a hand, and said, "Hey."
The crowd roared. Mark had no choice but to take the proffered hand, and allow himself to be led to where the King and the Queen were sitting in high-backed chairs on their dais.
+
A while later, the party resumed its previously interrupted timbre, and the Prince made the rounds, saying his hellos to heads of state and other important figures while Mark shifted by his side and tried to look as socially acceptable as possible.
They hadn't even had time to say much to one another, save the moment the Prince said, "You really didn't know?" and Mark had rambled a bit about people coming into his labs and it not being statistically probable that it would be the Prince of the country. For some reason this made the Prince smile, and then they were interrupted by people who wanted autographs.
+
Two hours later, the Prince dragged Mark into a side room. At a faint wave of his hand, the room cleared of guests and left Mark space to breathe. The murmur of the crowds was now safe beyond the doorway and Mark, who was rarely on his feet for this long, collapsed in an armchair. "Your Royal Highness-"
"I've already told you, call me Wardo," the Prince said. He stood with his hands in his pockets, casually looking over the portraits of his ancestors that lined the walls in swirly gilt frames. "This must be overwhelming for you."
"Why were you down in the chemistry lab that night?"
"I apportioned a large sum of money for technological advances," Eduardo said. "I read over your work and last week I wanted to come down and see how it was going for myself. Get my hands dirty."
"You're heading the project?" Mark said. "But you're not a scientist. Why aren't the heads of state research running this?"
"I had them hand over control to me," Eduardo shrugged. "A man can have his hobbies."
Mark thought about this as Lykke Li's "Unrequited Love" swelled from the main room where the band was performing.
"Why," Mark said after a time. "Why did you say yes? You know any relationship you have is going to be really high profile, and you don't even know me."
Eduardo just shrugged. "You're really dedicated to your work," he said.
"I guess I am."
"And I want to be there for you."
Mark didn't know how to respond to that. He stood and reached into his suit pocket to pull out a crumpled blue packet of imported candy, and held it out like an offering. "Twizzler?"
Eduardo reached into the packet and pulled one out, meeting Mark's eyes, and said, "Yes."
+
The next day, every paper in the country included a page dedicated to Mark, many of them with a fact sheet that included snippets of information such as, "Mark enjoys working on cell replication and drinking vodka redbull, although maybe not doing both at the same time" and also "Mark is two inches taller than the prince. Facts unverified." Another read, "Marcus, a young scientist, working in the palace. Attended college."
"What is this crap?" Mark shoved the stack of papers towards Chris, who was skimming through an article that he'd underlined and highlighted in orange, which read, "Mark is so pale, one wonders whether he has spent much time pursuing some of the prince's favorite outdoor activities. Will this couple last? Time, and yes tan lines, will only tell."
"It's a documentation of your first date," Chris said. "In all of its awkward, gory details. The moment you realized he was the prince, described by one paper as 'Royal date boggles at beauty of His Royal Highness.' And get this, 'An hour into the party, and the Prince introduces Mark to his parents. Mark bows the appropriate two feet, but fails to genuflect.'"
"Shit," Mark said. "There were just so many flashbulbs." He was thankful decapitation had been outlawed over two decades before.
"Here's one," Chris sat back in his rolly chair. "'Mark tries to cop a feel while Prince remains stoic.'"
"That is-what? When did I do that?" Mark grabbed the paper and saw that, yes, it did look like he was trying to grope Eduardo-er, Prince Eduardo. "I was just reaching behind him for another drink! This picture is highly misleading!"
Chris pulled the paper back to his pile and then tucked them all away into his backpack. "You know what, don't let it get to you. It's bound to be rough, dating the Prince. I don't know what you expected, though."
"Expected? I was just peer-pressured into finding a date! And he was sneaking into the lab and owed me one! How was I supposed to know that he was the one who was indirectly running this entire project?"
Chris patted him on the arm. "We all have our hardships. Just don't do anything that could land you in court."
Mark went back to his work, unsure how to feel. Yeah, he'd had a great time last night, felt like he and the Prince had known each other longer than a day, but he and Eduardo had barely had time to talk. And he had everything he needed right here.
He was pretty much at peace with this, was barely even thinking about it, when there was a knock at their door, and then it swung open.
"Seriously?" Mark heard Chris shouting through his sound-canceling earbuds. He smirked, imagining the poor intern who was getting it now. "You do not just burst into a lab, even when-oh. Oh. Right, of course, my apologies."
Mark looked up, confused, and saw that Chris was bowing in deference to a woman dressed in the garb of one of the head royal advisers. She said, "Mark, I am to escort you by royal orders."
Chris just looked helplessly at Mark, who shucked his lab coat and adjusted his grungy jeans before following the woman out the door.
After walking for a good five minutes through the maze of corridors, and up a floor, they passed a reporter in the hall who was interviewing a physicist Mark thought maybe he recognized.
"Oh god," he said when the reporter saw him. He tried to duck his head, but a microphone was shoved in his direction.
The physicist called after him as he ran off, "What up, Marcus?"
"My name is Mark," Mark called. "It's not short for anything." He wished he'd brought a hat. Hats, of course, weren't allowed inside the palace, save the ceremonial head wear of the royal family and their guests, so the hat would have been wrung in his hands rather than placed upon his head, but it would have served as some sort of false security.
He and the adviser turned the corner as the physicist was saying: "Yeah, I'm best friends with Marcus. His hair is not actually that curly. He gets it curled. He likes the way it looks."
"So," said the reporter. "An original man, with a unique take on fashion."
+
The adviser led Mark not up into the conference room or the throne room as he had dreaded, but out the East entrance and into the rose gardens.
Eduardo was standing in the sun, looking regal and fresh in the sunlight in his maroon cords and blue and white flannel shirt.
"Hey," Mark said. A camera flashed from the bushes, and Mark frowned in that direction.
Eduardo took him casually by the arm, and led them around the bright garden and away from the paparazzi. He said, under his breath, "We need to at least make this second appearance to show that we're friends. The public needs closure."
"Right," Mark said, feeling a weird tugging around the chest area, his mouth turning to a frown without his realizing.
"Unless," Eduardo said, hesitatingly and stopping to touch a rose that was sticking out of a thorny bush. "Unless of course, you'll accept my proposition."
"Proposition?"
"Look," Eduardo said quietly. "I'd rather you didn't break up with me. The public is already so attached, you know."
"I have work to do," Mark told him. "And no room for a social life, even less room for a boyfriend who might break my heart by choosing his country over me."
Eduardo looked upset, which made Mark feel like maybe he was being an asshole.
Also, it became obvious then that he didn't want closure. It's just that, everything became simpler with Eduardo around. Instead of should, the question became a matter of do we or don't we. This could have had a lot to do with the fact that Eduardo was on his way to being one of the most powerful dictators in the world, of course.
"The truth is though," Mark continued. "I need you."
"Seriously?" Eduardo looked thrilled.
"You have the funding for my project in the palm of my hand, after all."
"Very compelling," Eduardo agreed. "And I suppose that is the only reason?"
"Of course," Mark said, but then he said seriously, "What about my standing, though? I'm not born and bred for this."
"Don't worry about it. I've been advised to view my life like a narrative work." Eduardo spread his hands. "So that's a yes? At least for today?"
Mark felt it went against much of who he was to admit it so candidly, but he found himself saying, "I'd like that."
Eduardo looked weak with relief. "Good."
A servant came up and placed a croquet mallet in Mark's hand. He'd almost forgotten where they were.
"Now what?" Mark said.
Eduardo shrugged. "Now we play."
fin
HRH Eduardo's Timestamps
Words: 4k
Pairings: Mark/Eduardo with allusions to Chris/Dustin & Divya/W2
Rating: PG
Summary: The Social Network royalty AU. Mark needs a date to the ball.
A/N: For pidgeoned. With verbal help from crazykookie, shifty-gardener, & longswordho.
master fic post
Eduardo was just the sort of prince you'd expect to find as heir to the throne of a small country: thin, blushy, with wells of knowledge that encompassed all the events and concerns of his and all the neighboring countries and associated trading partners. He was fluent in eleven languages, two of those tonal, and had reached the black belt level in all martial arts that used that sort of scale. His knowledge of the bow and arrow were unmatched amongst his peers. He spoke with his hands and wore his heart on his sleeve. His ideals were giant.
In spite of all of the above traits, Mark's first impression of Eduardo was that he was a nerdy dude and had no right to be in the lab.
Eduardo burst in through the double doors, and said, "Oh. Hello."
Mark turned, eyes widening. "What are you even doing here? Get out, now!"
"Oh, goodness, I thought you were-I mean, I'm so-"
"Sorry, yes, I can see that," Mark snapped, waving his gloved hands. "Now shut the door behind you, you're letting in contaminated air."
The dude backed out and pulled the doors tight behind him. That was Mark's first face-to-face contact with HRH Eduardo of Shazdonia. The moment had lasted all of six seconds and consisted of a lot of shouting and stuttering, as was just related, and afterward Eduardo looked mournfully through the portal window on the white door while it sealed behind him like an airlock. Mark just shook his head and returned to his embryonic stem cell research, droppering clear liquid from one petri dish to the other and putting the interloper out of his mind.
+
Mark had been working in the palace labs for the last three years of his life. This was saying something, seeing as he was only twenty years old and had literally no connections. He was a self-made man, which was an American term than he donned and now wore like a cape to deflect the honest truth: that his family was poor, he didn't know his father, and he had luckily been sighted in high school as one of the top students in all subjects that were based in quantitative measures, and been sent to a top college in the capitol. He had to intern at the lab while other students attended frat parties and lost their various underclothes in other peoples' rooms.
Down in Chem Room B, Chris shoved a cardboard box onto the titanium steel table. Mark hastily tugged away his notes and graphs, but Chris didn't seem to notice that he'd disrupted Mark's calculations. He just said, "Dude, you have no idea what I'm about to show you. This is going to rock your life, you are going to be so jazzed. It's like a gps system, only better."
Mark waited patiently until Chris had finished telling him how he would react, so he could actually see the thing and react.
"You were right in this case," Mark said. He held the miniature chicken robot in his hand, felt the weight of it. "Wow."
"Dustin's going to present it as a gift this Friday." Mark looked at him blankly, and Chris rolled his eyes. "The ball? Celebrating Prince Eduardo's entrance into international affairs?"
"Oh, right." That did sound vaguely familiar. "Didn't he sign his first measure limiting greenhouse gasses?"
"So you do get out, then."
"We work in the palace. It's kind of hard not to hear something about news. And besides, the Prince's signing of the document was purely decorative, seeing as we don't even allow cars in the country, and thus don't emit greenhouse gasses." Mark pointed out. "It was just a gesture, nothing useful."
"Whatever," Chris said. He ruffled Mark's curls with a fondness that a lot of the other researchers showed him, as if they'd chosen to take his grumpiness as something endearing in its consistency, instead of taking offense, like many of Mark's peers seemed to. He didn't need friends, anyway, however much he sometimes thought it would be nice. He had his work.
Mark bore the hair-mussing with great strength for all of ten seconds and then shoved Chris and said, "Get out of here, man. Don't you have to be in bed by nine or something?"
"I'm twenty-one, not forty," Chris said. He shucked his lab coat and put it in the sterilization chute in the wall. "Remember, you're going to look like a tool if you can't find a date. I say this because I care."
"A date?" It hadn't occurred to him that that was something that would be required, but now that he thought about it, it made sense. "I guess I could ask-"
"Dustin is taken," Chris told him.
"By who?" Mark wasn't outraged, per se, just intensely incredulous at the idea that Dustin, a really nerdy guy who was kind of an ass, had a date and no one had even asked Mark.
"By me," Chris said. "And Divya is taking both of the Winklevosses, so you'll want to get a move on and find someone unaffiliated with our little circle. Good luck man."
With that, he grabbed his hoverboard from where he'd leaned it neatly against the wall, and scooted out the exit, leaving Mark alone in a lab that was empty save the chicken that was meant for the King and Queen of Shazdonia.
It was past the time normal people should be working. He wondered vaguely what it would be like to be so grounded in a social network, like Chris or the other scientists. Mark couldn't imagine it, not really. He had a hard enough time remembering to pack himself dinner (which he had not done today), let alone keep in mind and then find dates for superfluous events like royal functions.
+
The next evening, Mark was listening to music on a program he'd rigged himself. It did instant mash-ups based on the key and the tempo of songs, and sometimes the results were horrifying, but sometimes they were all right, like right now, and Mark was just in the zone.
He had a beer in one hand and was titrating acid into a base with the other, waiting for it to turn purple. As he sat there, mind wandering during a lull while the program created a new song, the only sound was the sound of silence, and Mark felt all at inner and outer peace.
If he were the type to be freaked by anything it would have been then, when the doors creaked open out of nowhere, and someone peered in and said, "My goodness!" like Mark had been the one to jump out.
Instead of grabbing a small blade to defend himself, Mark just looked the guy up and down. He was smartly dressed, in a sort of pretentious suit, but had a kind and eager expression.
"I swear to God," Mark muttered. "Back again? Seriously? It's a good thing I'm not at an unstable phase in the experiment, because if I had to start over I'd be here all night."
"Yes, I'm back again," the guy said. "I thought you'd be out by now."
"Thought I'd be out? You can't just break into an empty lab! That's highly suspect!"
"Suspect?" The guy asked, legitimately puzzled.
"Yes! For all I know, you could be a spy from a nearby country who wants a peek at the blueprints for our up and coming projects of which I'm not at liberty to speak. It happens."
"Are you lonely down here?"
"No, of course not. I have plenty to do. Now leave, or I'll have to report you."
"Seriously? You're going to report me?"
There was something Mark liked about the way the dude smiled, like he was the only member of an in-joke.
"Look, I won't report you if you do me a favor."
"Fine, what? What are you going to ask me for? I'm relatively sure this is illegal."
"Legality issues aside," Mark said. "You could have put me out of a job twice today, bursting in like this. These experiments are highly sensitive."
"Well?" The guy spread his hands. "Ask away."
Here goes nothing, Mark thought, although his face was blank when he said. "I need a date to the ball on Friday."
"That's it?"
"That's it." He'd never asked anyone out in his life, but this seemed to be going rather well. "You'll be there anyway, I suppose. We all will."
"Well, yes, of course," the dude said. He looked flustered, which made Mark like him even more, in that way where he knew nothing about him, so could assume all sorts of things. "You'll have to excuse me, I've never been asked on a date before, I'm not sure that it's supposed to work this way."
"Look," Mark said. "I'll make this simple. Do you have a date to the ball already?"
"I-No, actually, no I don't-I wasn't planning on bringing anyone."
"You'll look like a tool," Mark informed him, thinking of Chris's advice. "Well then, it can't get any more awkward than it already is, and like I said, you owe me."
"I'll be arriving a bit late," the dude said meaningfully. He was probably trying for a last ditch attempt to get out of their arrangement, especially when he leaned in and raised his large eyebrows and said, "With my parents."
"I'm good with parents," Mark said, thinking of his own mother, who tended to fuss but seemed relatively charmed by his intellect.
The dude was obviously out of excuses.
"Well, all right then."
"Right," the dude said. "I'll just-" he made vague gestures to the door.
+
Mark realized he hadn't asked anything about the guy. He didn't know any personal information, not his age or his name. He didn't even know why the kid was trying to get into the lab in the first place.
"You didn't get any information about him?" Chris asked. "I'm starting to think this guy is made up."
Mark wracked his brain for anything concrete the guy had even told him, but it was hard because he'd been so focused on 1) impressing upon him the importance of not just bursting into labs, 2) logicing him into going to the ball as Mark's date, and 3) the ridiculous mass of hair that stuck straight up and lent the guy a surprised look.
"Oh," Mark said, when his memory alighted on the moment where the dude had leaned his face closer and looked uncomfortable. "He's coming to the ball with his parents."
"At least he's as big of a lame ass as you," Chris decided. "Ha!"
"I don't live with my mother."
"That's because she told you to get a life. Again, I say: ha!"
+
The ball was more of a state-sanctioned excuse for a raucous party. There were at least forty large pizzas and kegs all over, pumped by young servants of the crown into red cups emblazoned with the royal seal. Bulb lights hung all over the high ceiling, the disparate glow lending the whole thing an old and glitzy feel, like it was the nineteen-twenties and they were overseas, along the Riviera.
Mark didn't mind crowds much, but the crowd seemed to mind him, giving him a wide berth where he stood by the golden banister of the staircase.
"It's the tie, isn't it?" Mark asked.
"It's not the tie, it's the shoes," Chris told him. Chris was wearing a soft button-down, rolled at the sleeves, but expensive trousers and shoes that shone in the lights. Everyone was in jewel-toned clothing and had tamed their hair.
Mark, on the other hand, had been working all day, even though it was nearly the weekend. Science came first, and besides, he didn't even own a brush. He'd put on a nice checked shirt and sprayed cologne in his hair so the smell would stay instead of dissipating after one turn around the room.
"The guy hasn't arrived yet?" Chris asked him.
Mark shook his head, and sipped at his drink. "I think I would have noticed. Besides, he said he'd be late."
The trumpeting of the royal guard interrupted a rather intense dance number, in which some nameless folk from Mark's hall were celebrating by jumping up and down and the Winklevosses were dirty dancing with Divya in the center of the parqueted floor.
A host of footmen chanted, in Greek chorus meter, "Their Royal Highnesses, the King and Queen of Shazdonia." Spotlights swung crazily around the room, and then lit at the top of the sweeping red staircase as the King and Queen entered. They floated down the stairs, their faces familiar and nostalgic both, due to their portraits being on all currency in the country.
"And may we present, Prince Eduardo!"
Mark was interested to see this. The Prince had not made his public debut until recently, and Mark couldn't remember what the dude looked like. He was imagining someone beefy and hard around the eyes, someone willing to defend the country's borders from all capitalist influence that threatened the economy of the Republic, but that is not whom he saw descending the red carpet.
"Holy eff," Mark said.
"He is rather attractive," Chris agreed. "But that's what being rich and not having to expose your delicate skin to chemicals will do to you."
"No, but that's...." Mark trailed off as the Prince reached the bottom of the staircase, the spotlights following his every step. He gave a little wave and the crowd freaked the fuck out. People whistled and men fainted, confetti rained from the ceiling in a reserved and tasteful way. Cameras blew up the room in voluminous and echoing neons.
Then the spotlight swung around the room crazily again, and Mark was blinded.
"What-"
"Man, you have got to be-" said Chris by his side. He fell back, however, as the crowd parted for the Prince to make his way to Mark.
Mark blinked and the Prince pulled to a halt in front of him. He looked absolutely gorgeous in a royal blue suit with a mustard-yellow shirt that had been spun with the organic silks of worms fed on the leaves of the renowned and locally grown mulberry bushes of Shazdonia.
The Prince looked at Mark. Mark looked at the prince.
The Prince extended a hand, and said, "Hey."
The crowd roared. Mark had no choice but to take the proffered hand, and allow himself to be led to where the King and the Queen were sitting in high-backed chairs on their dais.
+
A while later, the party resumed its previously interrupted timbre, and the Prince made the rounds, saying his hellos to heads of state and other important figures while Mark shifted by his side and tried to look as socially acceptable as possible.
They hadn't even had time to say much to one another, save the moment the Prince said, "You really didn't know?" and Mark had rambled a bit about people coming into his labs and it not being statistically probable that it would be the Prince of the country. For some reason this made the Prince smile, and then they were interrupted by people who wanted autographs.
+
Two hours later, the Prince dragged Mark into a side room. At a faint wave of his hand, the room cleared of guests and left Mark space to breathe. The murmur of the crowds was now safe beyond the doorway and Mark, who was rarely on his feet for this long, collapsed in an armchair. "Your Royal Highness-"
"I've already told you, call me Wardo," the Prince said. He stood with his hands in his pockets, casually looking over the portraits of his ancestors that lined the walls in swirly gilt frames. "This must be overwhelming for you."
"Why were you down in the chemistry lab that night?"
"I apportioned a large sum of money for technological advances," Eduardo said. "I read over your work and last week I wanted to come down and see how it was going for myself. Get my hands dirty."
"You're heading the project?" Mark said. "But you're not a scientist. Why aren't the heads of state research running this?"
"I had them hand over control to me," Eduardo shrugged. "A man can have his hobbies."
Mark thought about this as Lykke Li's "Unrequited Love" swelled from the main room where the band was performing.
"Why," Mark said after a time. "Why did you say yes? You know any relationship you have is going to be really high profile, and you don't even know me."
Eduardo just shrugged. "You're really dedicated to your work," he said.
"I guess I am."
"And I want to be there for you."
Mark didn't know how to respond to that. He stood and reached into his suit pocket to pull out a crumpled blue packet of imported candy, and held it out like an offering. "Twizzler?"
Eduardo reached into the packet and pulled one out, meeting Mark's eyes, and said, "Yes."
+
The next day, every paper in the country included a page dedicated to Mark, many of them with a fact sheet that included snippets of information such as, "Mark enjoys working on cell replication and drinking vodka redbull, although maybe not doing both at the same time" and also "Mark is two inches taller than the prince. Facts unverified." Another read, "Marcus, a young scientist, working in the palace. Attended college."
"What is this crap?" Mark shoved the stack of papers towards Chris, who was skimming through an article that he'd underlined and highlighted in orange, which read, "Mark is so pale, one wonders whether he has spent much time pursuing some of the prince's favorite outdoor activities. Will this couple last? Time, and yes tan lines, will only tell."
"It's a documentation of your first date," Chris said. "In all of its awkward, gory details. The moment you realized he was the prince, described by one paper as 'Royal date boggles at beauty of His Royal Highness.' And get this, 'An hour into the party, and the Prince introduces Mark to his parents. Mark bows the appropriate two feet, but fails to genuflect.'"
"Shit," Mark said. "There were just so many flashbulbs." He was thankful decapitation had been outlawed over two decades before.
"Here's one," Chris sat back in his rolly chair. "'Mark tries to cop a feel while Prince remains stoic.'"
"That is-what? When did I do that?" Mark grabbed the paper and saw that, yes, it did look like he was trying to grope Eduardo-er, Prince Eduardo. "I was just reaching behind him for another drink! This picture is highly misleading!"
Chris pulled the paper back to his pile and then tucked them all away into his backpack. "You know what, don't let it get to you. It's bound to be rough, dating the Prince. I don't know what you expected, though."
"Expected? I was just peer-pressured into finding a date! And he was sneaking into the lab and owed me one! How was I supposed to know that he was the one who was indirectly running this entire project?"
Chris patted him on the arm. "We all have our hardships. Just don't do anything that could land you in court."
Mark went back to his work, unsure how to feel. Yeah, he'd had a great time last night, felt like he and the Prince had known each other longer than a day, but he and Eduardo had barely had time to talk. And he had everything he needed right here.
He was pretty much at peace with this, was barely even thinking about it, when there was a knock at their door, and then it swung open.
"Seriously?" Mark heard Chris shouting through his sound-canceling earbuds. He smirked, imagining the poor intern who was getting it now. "You do not just burst into a lab, even when-oh. Oh. Right, of course, my apologies."
Mark looked up, confused, and saw that Chris was bowing in deference to a woman dressed in the garb of one of the head royal advisers. She said, "Mark, I am to escort you by royal orders."
Chris just looked helplessly at Mark, who shucked his lab coat and adjusted his grungy jeans before following the woman out the door.
After walking for a good five minutes through the maze of corridors, and up a floor, they passed a reporter in the hall who was interviewing a physicist Mark thought maybe he recognized.
"Oh god," he said when the reporter saw him. He tried to duck his head, but a microphone was shoved in his direction.
The physicist called after him as he ran off, "What up, Marcus?"
"My name is Mark," Mark called. "It's not short for anything." He wished he'd brought a hat. Hats, of course, weren't allowed inside the palace, save the ceremonial head wear of the royal family and their guests, so the hat would have been wrung in his hands rather than placed upon his head, but it would have served as some sort of false security.
He and the adviser turned the corner as the physicist was saying: "Yeah, I'm best friends with Marcus. His hair is not actually that curly. He gets it curled. He likes the way it looks."
"So," said the reporter. "An original man, with a unique take on fashion."
+
The adviser led Mark not up into the conference room or the throne room as he had dreaded, but out the East entrance and into the rose gardens.
Eduardo was standing in the sun, looking regal and fresh in the sunlight in his maroon cords and blue and white flannel shirt.
"Hey," Mark said. A camera flashed from the bushes, and Mark frowned in that direction.
Eduardo took him casually by the arm, and led them around the bright garden and away from the paparazzi. He said, under his breath, "We need to at least make this second appearance to show that we're friends. The public needs closure."
"Right," Mark said, feeling a weird tugging around the chest area, his mouth turning to a frown without his realizing.
"Unless," Eduardo said, hesitatingly and stopping to touch a rose that was sticking out of a thorny bush. "Unless of course, you'll accept my proposition."
"Proposition?"
"Look," Eduardo said quietly. "I'd rather you didn't break up with me. The public is already so attached, you know."
"I have work to do," Mark told him. "And no room for a social life, even less room for a boyfriend who might break my heart by choosing his country over me."
Eduardo looked upset, which made Mark feel like maybe he was being an asshole.
Also, it became obvious then that he didn't want closure. It's just that, everything became simpler with Eduardo around. Instead of should, the question became a matter of do we or don't we. This could have had a lot to do with the fact that Eduardo was on his way to being one of the most powerful dictators in the world, of course.
"The truth is though," Mark continued. "I need you."
"Seriously?" Eduardo looked thrilled.
"You have the funding for my project in the palm of my hand, after all."
"Very compelling," Eduardo agreed. "And I suppose that is the only reason?"
"Of course," Mark said, but then he said seriously, "What about my standing, though? I'm not born and bred for this."
"Don't worry about it. I've been advised to view my life like a narrative work." Eduardo spread his hands. "So that's a yes? At least for today?"
Mark felt it went against much of who he was to admit it so candidly, but he found himself saying, "I'd like that."
Eduardo looked weak with relief. "Good."
A servant came up and placed a croquet mallet in Mark's hand. He'd almost forgotten where they were.
"Now what?" Mark said.
Eduardo shrugged. "Now we play."
fin
HRH Eduardo's Timestamps
- Press conference, for longswordho
"Eduardo, Eduardo! Can you tell us more about why you attended the ball with a commoner?"
He had been trained in diplomacy since the age of eight, but never to talk about his love life with foreign and national press.
"Well," Eduardo said. "I am very interested in the chemistry department."
"So, do you two have chemistry?"
"Yes," Eduardo said, decisive.
"And tell us more about Marcus!"
"Well, um, his name is Mark. Next question?"
"What, exactly, made you two fall in love?"
Eduardo colored, and stuttered out, "Well, he's like, smart...and stuff?"
When the press conference was over, Eduardo returned to the study. Over at the computer, Mark toasted with his beer and said, "Nice deflection."
"You saw that, huh?"
Mark smirked. "So you like that I'm um, smart and stuff?"
"That's only part of it," Eduardo told him earnestly. "I love your naturally curling hair, it reminds me of the golden ringlets of a sun child, and your level of hotness can only be expressed in an elaborate equation that I shall now write on the window with a chalk pen."
- Wedding, for pidgeoned
Thankfully, Mark agreed to having a wedding ceremony, which of course was an extremely necessary celebration of their dedication and love for one another. The affair was pre-planned and traditional, so all Eduardo had to do was memorize his vows and show up. And calm Mark.
The week before, Mark had said cuttingly to the man who was trying to explain how he should behave in front of the cameras, "I guess I sort of don't mind weddings, and Eduardo really wants one. And my mom is ecstatic so-"
Eduardo had just laughed.
The king's shadow fell across Eduardo's face the morning of, when he was adjusting his bow tie in the mirror.
"Son, I expect a child out of this," the king said. "I've taught you to be extremely self-sufficient, so just make it happen. Make me proud."
Eduardo worried that he wouldn't.
But when they met at in front of the five hundred guests in attendance and the three billion people who would eventually see this broadcast on television and on tumblr, his heart swelled with a calm assurance.
Dustin was Mark's best man. He gave out a joyous whoop the moment the rabbi said, "You may kiss the commoner." and five thousand pounds of rose petals fluttered down from the ceiling.
They took an overseas honeymoon on a private island off of the coast of Australia. Life was pretty much awesome.
- Foreign Affairs, for crazykookie
"I'm sorry," said the American Head of Public Relations as Eduardo made a fuss about Mark's name card on their table which simply read Mark Zuckerberg, guest of HRH Saverin of Shazdonia. "We don't yet recognize same-sex marriages."
"Seriously?" Eduardo asked. "Even for foreign dignitaries? Even if we were basically destined to be together?"
The man bowed in apology. "Seriously. It should be about five minutes."
"Excuse me?" Mark asked.
"We started pushing Freedom of Marriage Act through Congress when we heard you'd be arriving," the man said. "We couldn't have such important guests feeling unwelcome. The votes are being counted as we speak."
They were served tiramisu and expensive coffee in golden cups. Mark wanted to sit down and eat, but Eduardo refused to be seated until a man in a black suit and sunglasses appeared out of nowhere to whisper in the Head of PR's ear.
The Head of PR accepted a new namecard off of a fancy platter and changed it out for the one that had previously lain in front of Mark's place setting.
They sat. The President arrived. The international conference began.
Mark picked up a pencil engraved with "The White House" to play with while important world matters were being discussed. He was somewhat bored, but Eduardo's smile every time he looked over made everything worth it.