The Monster's Ball attracted all sorts of people. Legend and logic held that if you separated any one person from the crowd and had them walk across an open field, any sane person would assume they were on a walk of shame. The bright stage lights reflected on the glittery nation of little monsters, shining quite into the eyes of a certain pink-haired woman. Revenge on her mind and anger in her heart, she surveyed the crowd. To her dismay several of the concert goers wore outfits that echoed her own—Glitter! Sequins! Claws, stripes, and...even a few bedazzled wheelchairs.
The woman grit her teeth. This simply would not do.
"Em, are you sure about this?"
"As sure as I've ever been. I'm going to show this bitch."
"But are you sure?" the burlesque dancer was giving her a raised eyebrow. Perfectly manicured and cared for, of course. "If I have to spend the night in prison...I mean yeah, that's punk rock, but who's going to walk Niney?"
"Yes, V. Yes, I'm sure."
To be entirely honest, Emilie didn't care about the dog. She didn't care about the cops trying to shove her back behind the barricade, or how smudged her make up was, or even the Burger King representatives on the stage throwing Whoppers into the air. As the meat rained down around her pale, vegan body, only one thing was on her mind:
Showing Lady Gaga who was Top Bitch.
"I'm going to need a distraction," said Emilie. Her eyes scanned the area. Presumably the dressing room was backstage, somewhere, but how could she find it without being stopped? Spotted, actually, being spotted was the problem. This venue was a lot bigger than any of the ones she had ever played. Where the hell did they keep the dressing rooms here? She wondered.
"Where the hell do they keep the dressing rooms here?" she asked.
"All the way down the hall and to the right. You're looking for the fourth door," said Veronica matter-of-factly.
Emilie looked at her with some shock. "How did you know that?"
"I did a show here once."
"You did a show here once?"
"I did a show here once," Veronica said. "One of those big fashion events."
Emilie said nothing. The concertgoers around her were a lot less quiet. Having heard the location of their goddess, their Lady GayGay, Our Lady of Highway Unicorns, Nuestra Señora de las Trajes de Carne, they quickly set off. It was a stampede of gayness, trampling the heteronormative, colorblind, tastefully modest members of society—if they even existed.
Veronica laughed and charged right along with them, motivated by the same need for trampling the heteronormative and the same love of glittery unicorns charging down highways. Perhaps not the same love of Lady Gaga herself, but that was of no matter. It was a Lady Gaga concert. No one would think a woman in stockings, a corset, and a sparkly bra was at all out of place.
Naturally this meant that Emilie herself could move about unnoticed. And that she did. Weaving her way through the crowd towards her destination, the scent of intellectual property theft in the air, Emilie was much like a shark, only she didn't have nearly as many teeth, and she rather hated the taste of dolphin (they had been touring Japan at the time and no one spoke of it after the event). The dressing room lay before her. In it was the charlatan.
She adjusted her stockings for warfare.
The crowd of Monsters were chanting a song. She wasn't sure which, but it seemed to be some sort of fast paced song deriding a certain man for taking advantage of an innocent young girl, sung in a manner that painted him as quite the gothic novel villain. She wasn't sure if it was I Know Where You Sleep or Monster.
But why would they be singing I Know Where You Sleep? Surely the charlatan's chicanery had not swayed so many! She listened through the rat ears she'd sewn onto her headband.
What she heard only fueled her angry ratty rage.
"Out of the way! Costume department!" she shouted, shoving her way through the masses chanting their strange bastardization of her completely original melody.
For some reason the amassed gays and lesbians of the gaga brigade thought nothing was strange about this. It was, of course, not the first time she'd done this. Oh no. This was not her first ride at the rodeo, nor was it her first walk around the block, or her first time in a rocket going off into space to orbit her own ego. Several years ago the girls had played a show in Texas right next to a venue KISS was playing. Emilie had broken a heel on her boots and needed a replacement. Wasting no time at all Veronica had run backstage, announcing herself as a costumer; no one had batted an eye. And she still had the boots.
So as the Red Sequin Sea parted, Emilie made her way in with a smirk the likes of which would have shamed the Cheshire Cat, if he ever smirked rather than grinned. She was momentarily proud of herself for making such a comparison to Alice in Wonderland and so she really did grin.
It did not compare to the Cheshire Cat's grin.
She kicked in the door with an angry look on her face.
Lady Gaga—or as the Pope insisted on calling her, Stefani—was laying about her room. She was seated on two oiled up males, quite the exemplary specimens, painted in metallic rainbow paint. There were no chairs in the room, simply men, in various degrees of clothing and paint. Emilie blinked. She had trouble believing they were real.
Some of them, in fact, were not.
The Lady herself was reclining. Four wigs of varying colors, from pink glitter to piss glitter, were on the table besides her.
She regarded the newcomer with a passing glance and waved.
The door was closed by yet two more men in metallic paint.
"Costume department?" she asked.
"You stole my routine!"
Gaga adjusted her hair in the mirror. "So you are from the costume department."
Rage coursed through her veins. She charged towards the charlatan sitting on her fleshy flesh throne. One of the painted gay men held her back, expending barely an ounce of his magical gay bouncer powers. He held her as Queen Elizabeth held the Spanish Armada.
Lady Gaga raised a brow. It was a sequined brow. The gems on her eyelash likely cost more than Emilie saw in several weeks. It was all very impressive.
Emilie snarled. "The wheelchar was mine! You took it! The gems are even arranged the same!"
"Did Grace send you?" asked Gaga. She set something down on the table and bid her slaves to help her rise. They did so, humming the chorus to Bad Romance. She thanked them all by name.
For some reason they were all Hispanic.
"Who?"
"Grace Jones," replied Gaga. She was advancing slowly given her Alexander McQueen heels. One did not walk in Alexander McQueen heels. One hobbled. Elegantly. "Her spies are many. And they're all in my costume department."
Was this some sort of trick? Some sort of strange misdirection? Emilie's crazed eyes scanned the room for any traces of weaponry. She saw many rods, but none she could use to defend herself.
"I don't even know who she is!" She shouted. "I don't listen to your terrible pop music, you...you..."
Lady Gaga crossed her arms. She looked the intruder up and down, the same way she had looked no good touble-making bitches up and down back in Catholic school. Little had changed since then—she was still an Italian girl with nails longer than some men's hair staring down a Goth chick who thought she owned the place.
"Well, I don't know who you are either, honey."
Never had Emilie been dealt such a blow. Cracks crept into the edge of her vision. Lying, she had to be lying. Everyone knew who Emilie Autumn was! She was the biggest violin-based industrial act out there! Whole hundreds of people turned out to her shows in the US! And Gaga had gone and stolen her wheelchair act from one of Emilie's very unique medically themed burlesque shows—not one of the many other medical shows!
No. This was all a lie.
A fabrication.
"What? I'm Emilie Autumn! You saw my wheelchair on YouTube and used it for your Paparazzi video!"
A look of confusion passed over Gaga's face that quickly settled into exasperation. "Oh, you're one of those. Okay. Juan Carlos, let her go."
The large hispanic gay man let her go.
"Jose, Fernando, Alejandro, if you could leave us alone? For a second, pretty please?"
The other men began leaving. On his way out, Fernando turned back. "Would you like a sandwich, ma'am?"
"Yes. Heavy on the miracle whip."
"Tiberium?"
"Extra."
Emilie watched, bewildered, as they were left alone.
She didn't have any rods now.
Gaga looked over her nails. Emilie searched frantically for a way to get out of this situation. For some irrefutable evidence that Wheelie was, indeed, her own totally original creation; that all the derisive tweets had not been in vain. She had fans to impress! Or at least, that was what fLee told her. She hadn't actually dealt with any of them for a while now. And it always seemed to be the same five people.
Well, she thought she had fans to impress!
"Look. I'll make you a deal. You admit that you stole Wheelie from me-"
"Wheelie?"
"My wheelchair."
"You named it?"
"It's very important to me!" shouted the exasperated violinist. "As I was saying. If you admit you got that idea from me, then I won't ask for any damages. Just link to my site, maybe tell people about my music-"
"I thought you were the Goth act," said Gaga, smirking. She appeared to be looking for something, though what it was was uncertain.
Emilie looked away. The damned woman had a point, there. She had said that. Or at least thought it.
"Yes, well, we can all use publicity every now and then. All I'm saying is, admit it and we'll have no problems. Otherwise I'll hire a lawyer."
For a moment nothing was said. Gaga studied her opponent as she searched for whatever item it was she needed. Emilie grinned. She had her. The lawyer bit always got them! Even when they were as big as Gaga, they had to fear lawyers...
"That's a Timeless Trends corset," replied Gaga after a while.
"...What?"
"It's from Timeless Trends. You ordered it online. It cost you a hundred dollars," replied Gaga, pointing to the bedazzled, be-hearted article of clothing keeping Emilie's waist from breaking free of her body and running for freedom.
"So what if it is?"
Gaga pointed to her nails. "These are real diamonds on each nail. Do you really want to play duelling lawyers?"
Perhaps she had a point.
"Well. I'll say bad things about you on the internet!"
Gaga let out a sigh. "Look, you can say all the bad things you like to all your little goth friends or whatever. I don't really care. You see that red latex dress? I met the queen in that. The queen. You know, of England? I could care less what you say. My fans love me and that's all that matters. But I will make you a deal."
Emilie did not voice her extreme jealousy at meeting the queen, because she had no such jealousies to speak of. It wasn't like she'd dreamed of entering Buckingham Palace as a child. It wasn't as if she had a special set of China, just in case. It wasn't like that at all.
Of course not.
"What...what is this offer?"
Gaga finally found what she was after.
It was a diamond encrusted riding crop.
"You're not bad looking. You have a score to settle with me, and you want to use me to increase your fame. Is that right?"
Emilie bit her lip. This was reminding her of that one time in Germany, with the club they were promised was an absolutely great time.
Gaga advanced, hitting the crop into her hand. "You can either have sex with me, and always be able to say you fucked Lady Gaga. Or you can walk out knowing you had the chance. It's up to you, and I won't stop you either way."
Emilie weighed her options.
On the one hand, she could fuck Lady Gaga. She could see if the woman really did shoot glitter out of every orifice. She could hire her own personal government hooker for a day. It wasn't like the charlatan was unattractive or anything. And she could certainly write about this in a thinly veiled autobiography set in Victorian England. Hell, the woman's name even started with Lady.
Or she could leave.
Several hours later, they shared a sandwich.