The lounge was dark, smoky, and loud as the dealer's room, and frankly, that was how Allen liked it.
If he just focused on the glass, the shitty disco lights reflecting off the surface, his peripheral vision would fade away, and it'd feel like he was the only one there. Safe. It was funny; you come to a convention to meet people, don't you? Wasn't that the whole goddamn point? But people were terrifying, amoral, judgmental creatures, and even in a gathering of 'like-minded people', Allen wouldn't find kin. The word even felt foreign. On the dance floor, pairs, groups, who the fuck even knew what contrived social grouping they were in, PEOPLE danced in elaborate costume. The DJ threw on another ten-year old Hamasaki song that the tweens probably didn't even know, hell, if they knew its Eurobeat roots, they'd probably call it filthy barbarian trash. Which it was. The stage lights blasted Allen's eyes, and for a brief moment, all he could see of the dancers was their perfect, detail-less outlines. THAT was the way to be. Always, at events like this, he craved anonymity. Attention only brought trouble from the blithering masses. They'd be polite, they'd be nice, but he could always smell the derision on their breath, a tonsolith tainting every word they spoke. On-line, behind a handle, behind a nice big ANONYMOUS tag, then you'd see their real face. And for most people, it was pocked and scarred and scowling, spitting fury and laughing with pretend irony at every real opinion. But then, you could avoid it. You could opt out, and be on your own. Pick your battles, and find the nice people. Find them, and pretend to be a real human fucking being for a couple hours, and then they'd be your 'friend', and you'd feel a little pang of hope, like you were someone normal with feelings that mattered, someone with a big ol' shipment of empathy and understanding headed your way.
But all of it was meaningless. It was fake diplomacy carried out under fake pretenses in the context of a fictional world, an "INTER-NET!" of cyberpunk novels and people who wore elf ears in public and put their wallet in their front pocket. And real friends? They were just the idiots you chose to tolerate.
"Hey, Allen."
Shit, what had he been thinking about?
"What?"
Stephen French, the perfect embodiment of the world, grinned at him. His slicked-back hair shone even in the low light, and try as he might, Allen couldn't ignore the over-applied cologne that had just wafted over to the table. Steve leaned onto the table, and nodded towards the bar.
"Check out the ass on that elf, bro."
Allen sighed, and considered LITERALLY facepalming. He didn't, of course, he had SOME standards. "For fuck's sake, Steve, stop using that stupid meme. You sound like a douche."
Steve laughed. "I'll stop when you stop being such a sperg. And you should try being a douche sometime, maybe then you'll get some pussy."
God, he was disgusting, being so forward with his baser urges. The semi-open shirt didn't help. And he was still staring expectantly at Allen. This was an unskippable event, apparently. And so he looked.
"Not bad."
"Not bad?" Steve said. "Get an erection for something that isn't screentoned, just once, Allen. Your virginity is fucking depressing."
Allen nearly smacked him. "Do you have to bring that up?"
Steve sat down, planted his elbows firmly on the table, and clasped his hands in front of his mouth, like some kind of swarthy psychologist. "I'm your friend, and I'm swimming in pussy. I have a fucking Olympic pool, packed end to end with pussy, and I still have to rent a storage shed to hold all the extra pussy I get. It's my RESPONSIBILITY to help you get laid. It's part of the Code."
"Jesus Christ Steve, not with the Wingman Code shit again." But Allen knew he was right, on some level. He felt those shameful urges, like anyone else did. And Steve got results. Allen didn't have the slightest idea HOW, but Steve would bring a girl back to the apartment about once a week. Most times, different ones.
"Look, Allen, third from the left at the bar. She's your type."
She was not. She was probably twelve. But a few stools to the left, next to an obnoxiously terrible Final Fantasy cosplayer, was an absolutely brilliant Haruhi cosplay. Appropriate body type, which unfortunately was a rarity amongst cosplayers, a perfect outfit, as far as he could tell. Not bad. He let his eyes wander for a bit, taking in the sight. For a moment, he could pretend she was the real deal. Well, the real deal that spoke English, hopefully better than the dub voice.
The fat Cloud, or was it Squall? The costume was so worthless that he couldn't even tell; gesticulated wildly, knocking over his beer, straight into the girl's lap. She bolted up, and (oh my god) put her hands on her hips, yelled his head off, and sat back down in a huff.
Steve noticed his staring, and followed his gaze. "Nice. Not my thing, but I'd give her an eight."
Allen didn't say a thing. He was transfixed.
"Don't fucking go silent on me, Allen. You want that? You can go get it! You're not a terrible-looking guy. I wouldn't fuck you, but I have standards. You're even dressed as her fucking boytoy. This was made to be, now man up!"
It was a terrible idea. A horrible, terrible idea. His heart could be crushed in an instant. But really, wouldn't that be wonderful? Wouldn't that feel nice? If he stayed in character, maybe he wouldn't have to show himself. He'd be insulated... whatever happened, it would be okay. It would be okay.
"You know what?" Allen stood up. "I've had enough to drink. I'm going for it."
Steve threw his arms up in the air, waggling them about like he'd just won the lotto, and cheered. "Don't fuck it up!"
The thumping bass shook his body, like his damn heart was pumping the skin off his bones. He found himself walking in beat, and it all felt right. All he had to be was an actor in a play, move at the right times, talk when it was required, follow the script, like a good boy. (Just get out of the fucking WAY, let it happen.) And there she was before him, surveying the damage to her uniform. Between the fantasy and the drink, the words came naturally.
"What kind of trouble are you getting up to now?"
She looked up at him, confused for a brief second (but he could edit that out, the image was already gone), and frowned. He felt a flash of panic surge through his blood.
"Some asshole spilled their booze on me. This stuff isn't even making the room spin. How disappointing."
That sounded stilted. Maybe it was lack of practice, but he could swear that wasn't natural conversation. Time to jump in.
"Was he a time-traveller, at least?" he asked, throwing every neuron at keeping the delivery deadpan.
She didn't even smile. "No. I'd be getting better research if Mikuru was here."
Perfect. She was fucking perfect. He felt his whole damn body flush, and thanked god that the room was dark enough to obscure it. Just keep going, come up with a line, don't fucking stop now.
"How disappointing. You'd think here of all places, you'd find someone interesting."
She turned, looking him over with a too-loud laugh, like a cartoon despot. "At least you're here. You'll keep me from getting too bored, right?"
He blinked. He grabbed the last of her martini, and downed it. "That's what I'm here for, right?"
She laughed. "Exactly!" She grabbed his wrist, her nails digging into his skin, and practially leapt off the stool. "Let's find someplace interesting!" She pulled him along with strength beyond her frame. He looked back into the crowd, looking for his friend. Someone gave him a thumbs-up and a smile. He was whipped back around, and all he could focus on was her long, confident strides.
He no longer had the slightest fucking clue where he was. The disconnected, schizophrenic beats of a hundred parties vibrated through the floors and walls of the building, as she dragged him by the wrist from room to room. He was laughing, laughing- Not sardonically, not with a condom of irony, but with legitimate, open joy, and she was grinning ear-to-goddamn ear. Everything and nothing made sense; a blur of aliens and cyborgs and faeries and impossible creatures all making conversation with him, with her. His responses were swift and funny, and she was brilliant, a whirl of smiles and flipped hair and affectionate aggression. A man with a horse's head strummed familiar music on an acoustic guitar, and he sat and watched and put his hand on her leg, that creamy skin that was so fucking smooth. She dropped, slowly, into his lap, looking up into his eyes.
"You know, Kyon, this place isn't half bad."
And there was his name again. It sounded so wonderful when she said it, like a Platonic form spun out of the aether onto a fucking harp-string and strummed by a masturbatorial artiste.
"Hey." she said, raising an eyebrow in a practiced motion. Shit. His cock was jamming his slacks into her temple, and she noticed before he did.
"It's just a natural reaction-" he stammered, before she placed her finger to his lips. She stood up, grabbed him by the tie, and pulled him to his feet. "We're leaving," she whispered, sounding like she wanted nothing more than to gut him. She dragged him into the hallway. His hands balled into fists, nails digging into his palm, and he closed his eyes, waiting for the inevitable rejection. He fucked it up again, he fucking knew it, that's the way it always was-
She grabbed him by the shoulders and slammed him into the wall. Her leg was between his, her hands were in his hair and she was pressing up against him and she was so warm and her breath was on his cheeks and her tounge was in his mouth and his eyes shot open and hers were closed, squinted, and she didn't even know what she was doing and for fuck's sake neither did he but god damnit he'd have to lead and hands what the fuck was he supposed to do with his hands and this was actually happening.
She pulled away, breathlessly. "Show me your room."
Their hands were charting out each other's terrain as he fumbled through the door. Her hands were slipping through the gaps between the buttons on his shirt, tracing little circles on his chest, nails scraping across the skin. The pain was so damn RIGHT. He shoved his hand under her skirt, tracing the line of her panties with one hand, while he slammed the door shut with the other. He dared an inch or two under them, and she was so perfectly smooth and her panties were practically sticking to her and her hands were moving up to the ribbon in her hair-
"No." His voice was authority. He was in charge here. "Keep it in." She smiled, and her hands moved to his shirt, stripping it off effortlessly. She licked his chest, tracing a line up to his neck, to his ear, biting it with a toothy smile and he let out a little whimper. As he struggled with her shirt, he caught her smirking, like she was gaining the upper hand. (No. YOU are the object, you are the target, I experience YOU) He seized her arm, spinning her around, and shoved her, off-balance, to the bed.
"Leave the uniform on." He didn't remember sounding like this. He sounded strong and sure, and it was nearly as erotic to him as the half-naked girl laying on his bed, blouse open and skirt hiked up. He stepped out of his pants, and loomed over her. He hesitated, watching nervously as she surveyed him. She smiled, and curled her fingers back, beckoning him to her. He threw caution to the wind and slid himself inside her. He gasped. How had he never done this before? How much had he been missing out on? He struggled for half-remembered bits of advice, trying to keep a constant beat, thinking of math problems and fanzines and anything to keep this going. The moments began to blur together, a few singular sensations breaking through like a blast of sunlight into a dark room. Nails digging into his back, her leading his hand to her breasts, her lips sucking on his tongue, surprised, giggling moans, her body writhing beneath his. She convulsed, clinging to him so tightly that she lifted off the bed, and he came.
He lay atop her, just listening to her breathe. His head rose and fell with her chest, and they lay there like that for what felt like hours.
He pulled himself up. He wanted to see his conquest, the object of his endless affections, finally his. He looked over her, smiling back up at him.
No.
Something was wrong. Horribly wrong. Her hair. It was lopsided, and poking out onto her brow was a shock of blonde.
No.
He stared at it, eyes wide.
"First time having sex in costume?" The girl said, playfully.
"You're not her. You're a fake." Allen whimpered.
"What?"
His hands tensed. "You're not her."
His hands flew to her throat, and he choked the damned impostor to death.
His hands still stank. The blood and gore were gone, but he could still smell the SEX on his hands. He still couldn't believe he slept with her, with some whore parlaying his feelings for a character much better than she could ever hope to be into base depravity. He had been taken for a fool and she had gotten what she deserved.
It had taken the entire night, but with what little he could recall from episodes of CSI, he managed to fit her body into a couple of trash bags, and in the last hour before sunrise, he tossed them into one of the hotel's dumpsters. All the evidence was gone, thrown out like wadded up tissue. Since then, he had been sitting on a bench, outside of the mall that connected the hotel and the convention hall. The cold stone on his ass kept him awake. He watched cars go by in the early dawn, trying not to flinch whenever he saw a cop.
The last time he had seen sunrise had been years ago, back when he was in college. He never was a morning person, but studying for finals, writing papers, hell, in the last year, even going to sleep itself, he struggled to just sit down and DO it. The hours would creep by, nothing done, until light made a golden frame around his blinds. Then he would get to work. Not because he should, but because it was so damn embarrassing. The image hurt him more than any scorn from his classmates or disappointment from his professors. He would see that light, and know that he was becoming a stereotype, a basement-dwelling failure, and that inevitable future was creeping towards him, day by day.
He'd fight it, of course, but always too late. He'd always be too tired, too wound up, or just plain out of time, and he would stumble into class late, unshowered, in a stained shirt, with a paper two pages short and devoid of content. As he'd walk across campus, essay in hand, he'd feel their eyes on him, laughter just on the edge of his hearing, derisive grins spreading through the crowds wherever he'd look.
And now, when a single suspicious eye on him could mean the end, he felt invisible. He had killed a girl. KILLED someone! And somehow, no one knew. No one was watching him. Rushing businessmen and college students and streetworkers passed on the sidewalk, eyes forward, judging no one. And it was the same in the halls of the convention center. He was surrounded by ten thousand nerds and geeks and outcasts, a crowd where he looked normal, where no pertinent information was coded into his hair or clothes or mannerisms. He wasn't anything: just another person. It was freeing.
For once, through bleary eyes, the sun was beautiful.
He stood up, and took in the whole of it. Flanked by shrubs, a statue, some oxidized mythological figure leaping into the sky, stood in the center of the square. Behind that, twin sets of stairs rose up onto a small green, full of benches and tables for the mall crowd. Soon, the conventioneers would pull themselves out of bed, struggle into over-elaborate costume, and make their way here for breakfast. From then on out, the plaza would be packed, crowded with themed photoshoots and friends looking for a place to meet. The occasional outsider would wander through, bewildered, and they'd catch a glimpse of how it felt to be Allen French. Through all of it, the statue would be ignored. Hell, he'd been coming here for years, and he still hadn't learned what it was supposed to be.
Maybe the lack of attention was nice. Allen bid a silent farewell to the statue, and walked back towards the convention hall. Life was waiting to be lived.