My name's Michael, and that's all that you're getting out of me. I'm not about to tell you my last name, cause in a world where you can literally decide a person's fate with just a name and a face, it's stupid to announce even one of those in public.
I might not even be Mike. And Sam's name might not even be Sam. But you don't know that, and no one will.
Sam is my best friend. And this story starts with an anime convention.
With an opening like that, you should at least have an inkling by now of what we are. Once we see what we like, we read the manga, watch the anime, OVAs, OSTs, official novelisations, and then we endure all the ridiculous movie adaptations and drama television shows. All in the japanese cartoonish style.
So of course, like all the other otaku freaks out there, we were cosplaying characters from our favourite piece of work. A true classic, really.
I was decked out in this totally awesome outfit of L Lawliet: unkempt bed-head hair and wide blank eyes, loose long-sleeved white shirt, baggy blue jeans, untied sneakers without socks, down to the shadows around the eyes almost like that of a raccoon's. I made sure not to overdo it with the makeup though. I did, however, went through the trouble to get black eye contacts - those ones that are just pure, solid color, with a thin ring of grey around the edges. You know the ones.
To go that extra mile (and because there's no point in cosplaying otherwise), I made sure to 'stay in character' all the while; slouching my back into a lazy hunch, shoving my hands in my pockets whilst walking, keeping my knees to my chest when sitting… the works.
Sam was cosplaying as Yagami (surname) Sayu (given name) before the major time skip. Meaning messy ponytail, her trademark yellow and orange shirt-dress one-piece and dark leggings. And since we couldn't find anything about Sayu's footwear, she decided to go with her normal white ankle socks plus silver and blue sneaker shoes combo. Lucky for her, her hair and eyes color were close enough to Sayu's so that she'll not make a big fuss about it, even though her hair was a few shades light. But shh. Don't tell her I noticed that.
Actually, she had toyed with the idea of showing up as Amane Misa for a while, aka MisaMisa. But personally I went against it. My first excuse was that gothic, lace-y dresses, in particular the ones Misa was always seen wearing, were just too sexualised. Second excuse was that she was a dumb character anyways, so contrasting to L's black-and-white quirky genius type. That second one kind of backfired briefly when I mentioned the mirror opposite nature between Misa and L and Sam just wanted to do it all the more, but then I came up with a third reason: "Misa would be lost without her Light."
I could go on, but I think you got the gist.
Sam was jumping all over the place, buying keychains, plushies, completing her collection of decorative figurines. And, of course -
"Mike! Look!" I've been looking all over for one of these!"
Manga.
I shuffled up next to her, looking over her shoulder. My eyes, previously already characteristically wide as always, went even wider. There, in her hands, was the very book that would completely our shared Death Note physical copy collection. Death Note: How to Read 13.
She squealed and quickly paid for it. I sighed at her fangirl-ness, but I couldn't hide an excited smile of my own. What? Did you think Sam was the only one to go around buying stuff? My own messenger bag was also heavy around my shoulders, dragging me down with merchandise. Yet still not as heavy as Sam's red backpack. She hadn't seemed to notice the weight though.
"Sam," I called, making her look up from the Death Note charm bracelets she was looking at. "I'm getting hungry. Let's eat something quick, then we'll look around for a while longer before going back home, kay?"
She nodded eagerly. "Kay! Just wait a minute, could you?" Sam turned back to stare at the bracelets, periodically reaching out and hanging them in front of her face for a while before putting them back on the display case.
A few minutes later found us in a cafe across the street.
Now that we were out of the crowded convention, I sat like I normally would, with my feet down like a normal person. Still maintained the slouched posture though. That was fun.
"I'll have a slice of strawberry cheesecake and a latte macchiato, please," Sam ordered. The waitress turned to me, dressed in a yellow and white maid outfit. She looked cute.
"And you, sir?"
"Chocolate pie, please. And a flat white," I copied L's monotone. If you hadn't guessed yet, we also each have quite the sweet tooth, though nowhere as big as L's.
The waitress walked away to deliver our orders.
Nothing interesting or worth mentioning about happened while we ate, although there was that one guy who was another convention goer who dressed up like Allen Walker of D'Gray Man… and failed miserably. Not to be shallow, but asides from his large and disproportionate body type (ahem he looked the part of a McDonald's customer), it really seemed like he wasn't trying. I could see his five o'clock shadow from where I sat, his weave hadn't been clipped on properly and… I don't want to see such a disgrace ever again.
"Come on, Mike! Hurry up or the sun's gonna set before I get to explore every inch of every part!"
That last bit made me pause. "Every part?"
She nodded enthusiastically, full of energy and ready-handed with her money. "Yup!"
I sighed. Guess there was no way around it.
"Hi there."
Sam screamed, and my fists came up automatically in order to defend my and herself from whatever threat was present. But, physically speaking, there was no threat.
Standing in front of us was a girl that looked no older than ten years old. She had long, midnight hair only held back by a blood-red headband. Her eyes were a deep crimson, though it could had been a trick of the light, I doubted it for some reason. Her clothing looked like it had come straight from a manga: a plain deep garnet-colored ankle-length, sleeveless dress with black accents. She was walking barefoot, but gold and onyx rings hung loosely from her ankles, wrists and neck.
All in all, though the rational part of my brain pushed my arms back down to lie beside my body, she looked pretty intimidating.
Whoa. When did she sneak up on us? I thought.
You might accuse me of being a scaredy cat or a baby or even a coward to be scared of a child standing 4'3 - no taller than my chin, but really, she was radiating something that should had been impossible. Depending on your views, it had many names.
Killer Intent. Demonic atmosphere. Murder aura.
The point was that very fiber in my body screamed at me to RUN!
Sam didn't seem to get that though. She was standing there calmly, staring straight into the mysterious kid's eyes as if daring her to do something, anything. She was barely moving a muscle - and I could tell she was doing it on purpose. Meanwhile, I was stuck there, frozen in unabashed horror, fear rooting my feet to the polished cafe floor.
Suddenly the strange girl started to chuckle. Scratch that, she was now laughing uncontrollably, first throwing her head back like a maniac before doing a one-eighty and doubling over. She clutched at her unhealthy flat stomach. "HAHAHAHAHA! You're good, girl! I like you!"
What struck me the most odd at that very moment was the fact that nobody else seemed the slightest bit intrigued by the prepubescent psycho. No stares, no raised eyebrows. In fact, the other people were suddenly blurred, as if I was looking at everything through a low-quality zoom camera. Nothing was focused; our surroundings were just one big blob of color.
Strangely, neither Sam nor the girl seemed to notice anything wrong. For the time being I entertained the notion that I might need glasses soon, and then my colored contacts wouldn't be there just for show.
Sam's stony expression faltered. "Wha -? What do you mean?"
The laughter ceased so abruptly I had to fight the urge to look for cameras in the bushes. Maybe this was like a prank reality show, filming people's reactions to a real-life lolita. The girl had shut her mouth, snapping her teeth with an audible click, but a large grin was still in place, stretching from ear to ear and making it seem as if the girl was crazy. Maybe insane. Maybe an abnormal Titan from Shingeki no Kyoujin. "If you were given a choice, girl. Choice. To have a fictional power and to go to a fictional world with it - any of them, they don't have to be the same - and meet them... Fictional characters, which - one - would - you - choose?"
Sam didn't even hesitate. She didn't even acknowledge my warning glance before she shouted, "I WANNA BE A WEAPON! Like from Soul Eater! And for the world mechanics, and the characters - DEATH NOTE, DEATH NOTE, DEATH NOTE!"
"No! Sam, you're not thinking this through!"
The grin, if possible, grew even wider, and I had a vision of it stretching out, opening up, and her unnaturally sharp teeth opening and disappearing so that I was just staring at a black hole. My eyes widened and my pupils shrunk, but my body was frozen completely in fear. Sweat trickled past my forehead. I was staring at the face of death.
And then it disappeared. And with it, the girl. I breathed and closed my eyes in relief.
But the feeling of calm left as soon as it started when Sam screamed in my ear. The feeling of vertigo quickly overcame me, and I notice that the blurs of colors around us had started to spin, faster and faster until they were nothing but dimmed multicolored lines. I slapped a hand over my mouth as nausea threatened to make me blow my forty-dollar cake and coffee.
And then darkness.