Shinji Mimura checked himself out in the mirror, looking at every angle. At the cape, at the white button-down shirt, at the fangs. Vampires – what every chick liked, right? A sexy vampire.

And that was definitely what Shinji Mimura was for the Halloween party.

Yutaka poked his head inside. His entire face was painted green. "Wow, Shinji!" he said. "You look-"

"Incredibly attractive?" Shinji asked, flashing a grin at himself the mirror. "Yes. Yes, I do."

Yutaka giggled a little at him, then presented him with a bolt that was supposed to be affixed to the side of his neck. "C'mon, help me be Frankenstein."

"Frankenstein's monster," Shinji corrected him. He messed with the bolt for a little, popped it open, and found the temporary glue. "Got it."

"Thanks, Shinji," Yutaka said, looking up at him in that way that he always did. Shinji turned away and adjusted his cape. "You look fine. Come on, let's go before the party's over. You can check yourself out later."

He grabbed Shinji's arm and pulled him down the stairs. Shinji fixed his shirt as he went and, after sprinting the entire way to their gathering place at Shinji's uncle's place, fixed his sleeve.

Everyone was there. Perfect time, really. Everyone would look at him when he entered, and goddamn did he deserve to be looked at.

He threw the door open and it smacked Takako Chigusa in the face. She swore at him, and he looked her up and down. "Are you from Kill Bill?" he asked. Chigusa nodded, and ran a critical eye over him herself. Then she left, and he wondered why he couldn't get to her.

Probably because of Sugimura, who had been wrestled into a werewolf costume. He was standing awkwardly by the snack table, next to Nobu and Shuuya. Shinji had to stare at them for a while before realizing that they were supposed to be Mario and Luigi.

He strode over to them, crossing the dance floor as quickly as his long legs would allow. Which was, of course, very quickly. "Well, damn," he said. He made sure that Yutaka was still next to him, had to wait for him to catch up, and then propped an elbow on his head. "Thought you were supposed to couples cosplay when you were… you know, a couple."

"Who says we aren't?" Shuuya said, tilting his head to the side. The green Luigi hat tipped off of his head. "Oh, shit."

"Aren't Mario and Luigi brothers?" Yutaka asked. Shinji grimaced.

"I think so."

"Besides, Noriko's Princess Peach-" Nobu said, cutting off as he scanned the crowd. "But she left to go to the bathroom. What're you, Edward Cullen?"

"If that's what the ladies like," Shinji said, shrugging. "I prefer Dracula, though. Sounds a lot better. Oh, wow, please tell me that's Yukie Utsumi dressed as the girl from The Grudge."

"Wrong," Shuuya said. "It's Yoshimi Yahagi."

"What the fuck-"

"Souma's a stripper."

"Well, I knew that-"

"No, she's dressed as a stripper," Shuuya said. He stroked his Luigi moustache. "Don't know how much longer she'll be dressed, though. Too bad we didn't get a stripper Princess Peach costume, Nobu-"

Nobu elbowed him. "She'd never do that! She's too- too-"

"Wholesome?"

"I'll leave you to your lovers' quarrel," Shinji said. He gave a nod to Sugimura and continued through the party. He saw Utsumi and Tanizawa – they were both dressed as cowgirls, like some sort of lesbian Brokeback Mountain was about to go down – and Chisato, who did look abso-fucking-lutely adorable in whatever she was supposed to be. Akamatsu and Takiguchi were talking, probably bonding over something geeky.

Hell, even Kazuo Kiriyama was here.

And he'd stolen Shinji's vampire costume.

True, it looked a lot more 'unbelievably sexy' on Shinji and more 'oh my god he's going to kill me' on Kiriyama, but the principle was still there. The principle being that Shinji Mimura couldn't be wearing the same vampire costume as Kazuo Kiriyama.

Their eyes met as Kiriyama took a drink of punch. He missed his mouth and half of it went on his shirt. It only made him look more like a vampire, what the hell was it with Halloween parties and red punch?

Shinji headed over to him, parting his cronies like Moses and the Red Sea. Maybe he should've been Jesus. He would've been a hot Jesus.

"We match," Kiriyama said. His voice was completely deadpan.

"Yeah," Shinji said. He smirked. "I wear it better."

"True," Kiriyama said. He observed his own shirt. "I spilled punch on myself."

"Thought you were all about the hand-eye coordination. You can take out another guy's eyes, at least."

"It's strange," Kiriyama said. Shinji Mimura, who thought it possible that he could definitely take out most gangs of guys, was getting a little nervous about Kiriyama's contemplative look at the red stain – like, what if he decided he wanted to see real blood on that shirt?, so he managed a smirk and left.

Yutaka was waiting for him. "Nice backup, shrimp," Shinji said, flicking his nose. Yutaka rubbed his nose and effectively took off all of the green makeup on his nose. "Anyone else have a decent costume?"

"Nah," Yutaka said. He paused, then seemed to reconsider. "Well, Iijima makes a pretty good zombie."

Shinji snorted. "Iijima."

"So, are we heading back to my house after this? I got a bunch of scary movies, and my mom bought a bunch of candy, and we can make popcorn-"

"Alright, man, slow down," Shinji said. He scanned the crowd. "Nah, nobody here I wanna bang. Normally I would go out on the town, see what they got there, probably a nice crowd to pick from tonight, but, what the hell? I'm not really feeling it right now."

"Really?"

"Really," Shinji said. He straightened himself. "Now let's have some more fun here before we go. I think I saw Hirono spike the punch."


This was requested by a user on Tumblr, who wanted a BR Halloween party. Which was fun! I enjoyed it. Shinji has, as always, turned out more manga-Shinji than any other Shinji.