756 756 Final Touches
Their next stop was only a few stores down the road, a fancy designer suit store, where Nico assured Max that she could get something that properly suited him and his personality.
When they entered, Max was struck by the eclectic nature of the items on the racks. It looked like the Vampire who was running the place had simply grabbed random items from every possible culture and species and slapped them together in a way that somehow worked.
Well, most of the time. Max wasn’t sure that the bright orange sneakers with the officers’ coat and leather short shorts were a good idea.
“How might I help you today? As you can see, I have a bit of everything, and I can turn anyone into the most fashion-forward trendsetter on the World Ship.” The pale man greeted them with a smile that showed his fangs.
“Now, this place is more like it. There are a lot of standard clothing stores on the ship, but only a few that carry a wide enough selection for a proper Reaver fashion makeover.” Nico cheered as she disappeared into the racks of clothing.
“Ah, Reavers. Yes, there is an actual lack of Reaver clothing in stores since most of them seem to prefer to operate on the cheaper end of the scale and either use captured items or whatever they can print from the Replicators for minimal cost.
But when you’re expecting to ruin clothes on a regular basis, there really isn’t much need to go overboard on the spending. Just look at how things go in the taverns. Between spilled drinks, fights and desperate women, many of the humans ruin multiple clothing items a month.” The Vampire chuckled.
“That will happen. Humans tend to go through a lot of clothing when they get excited. They lose patience for taking it off properly and just shred it. The Titans are known for the same thing, and I suspect that the Valkia are as well, though they would never admit to it.” Max laughed.
“You have no idea. The Valkia are so picky about their clothing, but they buy a lot of it. If they’re not ruining it, they must have a huge closet somewhere to be storing it all.”
“They actually do have huge closets. The Valkia love sending things home to their families, so once they find something here and wear it a few times, they’ll wash it and send it back home for others. It’s a tradition with their people, some sort of cultural objection to rampant waste and consumerism, so they reuse clothing through the family.
The problem is that they have already found a way around it, and they just have one person buy it all and distribute it to everyone else so that they can say that they didn’t buy anything new.” Max explained after taking a second to check the Valkia’s thoughts on the matter.
Nico came back a few minutes later, carrying an armload of items. “First, I want you to try this pile. Then I will hand you the next outfit.”
Max went to the changing room and put on the outfit that looked suspiciously like the Captain Harkness Cosplay that he had worn for the gaming tournament, with a shirt that only had buttons halfway up, leather pants and a pair of gold chains.
“Is this an outfit to go out, or are we doing cosplay?” He asked as he stepped out for Nico to see how it looked.
“I think it looks good. Very Mob boss. If we can just style your hair, you would fit right in with the other Black Market leaders.” The Vampire smirked.
The Alliance had rejected them many times in the past, but they had still managed to get a few things from the Black Market and had used them as the basis for a lot of their technological advances. Ironically, that made it even harder to impress the Alliance since their tech was a direct ripoff of obsolete Alliance tech, and the Federation of Species that occupied that quadrant of the Galaxy which Max was from, had hit a dead end while trying to get anywhere with negotiations.
Max held out his hand for the next outfit. “What’s next? I’m not sure that this is the right outfit for today. Though maybe it is. I don’t think it would stand out too badly, and it might even impress someone.”
Knowing Mary Tarith, she might actually approve of this outfit more than anything that Max had picked for himself. Her fashion sense was particularly odd, as most Reavers were, but while she preferred matronly outfits for herself, everyone around her was encouraged to be flamboyant and creative. Max was pretty sure that she picked the simple dresses and aprons to wear around the house just to throw people off their game. Nobody would expect that Mary Tarith was the leader of a major Reaver Family until you saw her at work.
The second outfit was even more outrageous, but in a way that Max actually approved of. It paired black cargo pants with a red tunic, black leather bracers that covered most of his forearms, and a unique pair of boots that had a gravity field built in.
They were an Alliance product obtained by the Vampire once he got aboard Absolution and could use the Terminus Trading Company’s name to get things imported to his store. They were most popular with teens who were into parkour, as they would let you more easily run up walls and perform tricks, but they looked good, in a doc marten sort of way.
“Oh, that’s a good look. We should bring out the hoverboards and take a flight around the city.” Nico praised him when Max came out in his new outfit.
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“How about we switch things up a little? I found something good back on the racks.” Nico replied with a smirk, but she was hiding her thoughts from him again, so Max couldn’t peek in advance.
When she came back out, Nico had changed into a pair of very short denim shorts and a powder blue hoodie. She had tied her hair up in Dutch braids, and she looked like the picture of youthful innocence.
That might have something to do with her ability to alter her face shape, but it was a very different look for Nico.
“You look absolutely perfect. Now, let’s head to our next destination.” Max congratulated her, before paying for their items and leading her out by the shoulder before she could change her mind.
Mary was going to love this outfit.