Dave stood, baffled and bemused, next to his bro, Dirk. They had just been pathetically antagonized by an angry short kid, reassured by a blue and green cat girl, and disapproved by a muscular pony boy. If that wasn't enough to make a guy gape and stare at nothing in particular, nothing was. However, he made sure to do so in an ironic, badass kind of way. For awhile, both of the Strider bros just stood there, faces blank in their mutual befuddlement. Their surprise was hidden behind their dark shades, unnoticed by unaffected passerby. Their brief stunned silence was interrupted by some bouncy kids requesting autographs. They exchanged a glance, shook it off, and carried on with the con casualties. Dave decided that he would ignore what had just happened. Dwelling on things wasn't in the least bit ironic, and he was sure that Dirk felt the same way. For awhile they just carried on signing autographs and giving handshakes, taking pictures with a few people. Dave was enjoying himself. He felt like a big-shot. Well, more than he usually did at least. This continued normally until two familiar faces appeared in the crowd, headed steadily towards them. He felt his lips curl upwards to reveal his shining white teeth.

"Dave! Dirk! How are you guys?"

Approaching were their two cousins, Rose and Roxy. Roxy was hobbling about clumsily, clutching Rose's shoulder dependently. She must be drunk again, Dave thought. Roxy struggled with alcohol abuse, and nobody seemed to want to help her except her loving sister, Rose.

"Hey guys, what's up?"

Rose and Roxy stopped in front of them, Rose steadying Roxy as she stumbled over her own feet.

"We just came to see how you were doing. It's awesome that a con finally accepted you guys as formal authors of an official web-comic!"

Dave nodded, arms folded.

"Well, with enough fans and a good petition, they'll let any 16 year old run a booth."

Rose was smiling triumphantly, pride lighting up her pretty face.

"Well, it's great!"

Roxy decided that now was a good time to interrupt and change the subject completely.

"You still -hic- haven't given 'ole Roxy a hug, have you Dirk?"

She hobbled over to where where he was standing and tripped right into him. She wrapped her arms around his torso and proceeded to stroke his arm.

"You been working out those -hic- muscles, haven't you?"

Her words were slurred and unfocused, and she had a faraway look in her eye, as though she was seeing a completely different world than everyone else was.

"You better be careful Dirk. You wouldn't wanna be giving 'ole Roxy a lady boner or things might get ugly. Your abs jus' as nice as your lovely biceps?"

She began stroking Dirk's stomach, and he was beginning to look a little bit uncomfortable. Looking over at Rose, Dave saw that she was red with embarrassment, shameful of her sister's behavior. In fact, she looked like she was about to smack her forehead.

"Roxy, for the hundredth time, Dirk is your cousin..."

Roxy ignored her sister, running a hand through Dirk's blonde hair.

"That's a good Dirky-poo."

She planted a kiss on his cheek and slowly progressed back to Rose. Now Rose really did facepalm, the flush in her cheeks deepening considerably.

"I'm sorry about her... again... I"m trying to get her to stop drinking so much, but there's only so much I can do for her. I can't just make her stop, and I would hate to put her through withdrawal."

She looked down in misery, tears welling up in her clear magenta eyes. She took Roxy's hand and squeezed it affectionately. A pang of sympathy rushed through Dave. He tried to imagine what it would be like if Dirk had an addiction such as this. It wouldn't be ironic, that was for sure. He scooted over to Rose and put a hand on her shoulder, patting her comfortingly. She looked up at him, gratitude showing in her eyes. He smiled at her sympathetically, but was forced to move back to where Dirk was standing upon the approach of two new people. The new strangers were kind of odd looking, and Dave hoped that they weren't like the little powerhouse of anger that had tormented them earlier. One was a short boy with tan skin and a dark mohawk. He was dressed in black pants, a collared jacket, and socks with sandals. His look was finalized with a headband that seemed to be bull horns. What is with all the animal head-wear at this place? Dave thought to himself. His companion was a taller girl who wore jeans and a blue jacket along with a pair of large glasses with the lenses poked out. She had long hair and a smirk that didn't seem to change very often. Rose and Roxy backed to the side to let the newcomers through. The girl shoved the mohawk boy forward, and he whimpered as the table made hard contact with his ribs. He stood up, rubbing his side, pain clouding his gaze.

"I, uh, read some of your comics... Uh, Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff, and, uh, well, I, uh..."

He trailed off, looking at his feet. His companion let out an impatient groan.

"Spit it out Tavros!"

He let out a high pitched squeak as she gave him another shove, and continued quickly.

"I, uh, just wanted to, uh, meet you and uh... maybe get your autographs?"

He looked to the girl fearfully, tensed like a puppy awaiting a kick from an abusive owner. Dave frowned, concerned.

"You shouldn't let her beat you around like that, man."

He snapped his fingers for Dirk to get a piece of paper, which he signed and handed to Dave. As he signed the paper, Dave continued.

"And you shouldn't be hurting him like that. What did the little dude ever do to you?"

He handed the paper to the Tavros kid and looked at the girl coolly.

"I, uh, don't mind it so much..." Tavros piped up in her defense.

Dirk stretched his arms, clearly nominating himself to be the next person to speak.

"You should mind. Shit man, nobody should have to put up with this kind of treatment. It's fucked up."

By now the girl looked really pissed off.

"Come on, Tavros. You got your autographs, now let's go."

Her voice was full of venom as she yanked his arm harshly, and Tavros let out another cry of pain. When they had gone, Rose and Roxy stepped back towards them again. Rose wore an expression full of anger.

"What a pathetic asshole, treating the poor boy that way. Nobody deserves to be treated like that. It's no wonder he seemed so nervous."

Dave knew that she was extremely sensitive to other peoples' psychological states and problems and knew just about everything there was to know on the topic.

"It's alright Rose, maybe you can talk to him sometime."

Anything she may have said next was interrupted by the sudden arrival of yet another stranger. She looked flustered and rushed, her breaths short and heavy.

"Have you seen a boy with a mohawk and a girl with big glasses?"

Dirk pointed in the direction that the two had gone in, and she hurried off, gasping a quick thanks over her shoulder. Dave couldn't help but notice how gothic the girl looked with her short black hair and black lipstick that went surprisingly well with her highly fashionable outfit. Rose stared after her, probably thinking something similar. She adjusted her hair and looked back at him.

"Hopefully that girl is nice to him. I doubt he could take harassment from two people. Even somebody with lots of confidence would find that task to be difficult."

She looked back in the direction they went, fixing her hair again. Dirk let a little cough.

"I'm sure he'll be OK. That girl seemed nice enough, and pretty concerned about not being able to find them. Maybe it was out of the fear of leaving them alone together."

Rose took a deep breath.

"You're probably right. Maybe I'll talk to them."

She seemed eager to go and do just that. In fact, she was uncharacteristically bouncy with anticipation. She must really love helping insecure people I guess, Dave thought. Oh well, she can do what she wants, and it's not like that's a bad hobby. He was snapped out of his thoughts by another familiar voice.

"Hey Dave! Hey Dirk! We came to see you guys at the con!"

It was his best bro, John, accompanied by two others whom Dave wasn't acquainted with.

"Hey man. Who are your friends?"

He nodded towards the boy and girl that John was standing with. John looked startled, as though he had forgotten that he hadn't come alone. Typical John, thought Dave with a sneer. What an airhead. Face flushed with embarrassment, John turned towards the girl.

"This is my cousin Jade, and this is her cousin, Jake. He's not my cousin though."

John grinned. What a dork. It was almost comical what John found amusing. Looking at Jake, Dave could immediately tell that something was up with the guy. He wore a tank-top and a belt that was loaded with incredibly fake looking artillery that obviously couldn't be loaded into the dual be-be hand guns that he clutched in each hand. The most interesting part of this incredibly abnormal cosplay was without a doubt the lower half. He appeared to be wearing... booty shorts.

"What the fuck are you wearing?"

He nodded at Jake in disgust. Jake looked up through his glasses at him with a stupid grin that was weirdly like John's. He wondered how the hell they weren't related.

"I'm Lara Croft!"

Dave decided not to ask. He frowned, shaking his head. Could this day get any weirder? Dirk seemed to be sizing Jake up as well. If even Dirk was curious about this kid's outfit then it must really be weird. Dirk was pretty laid back and didn't really judge people very often. Dave shook his head again, shifting his attention back to the girl. She was pretty normal looking, excluding the white dog ears she wore on her head. Actually, she was pretty cute, and the dog ears made her even cuter. His thoughts were once again interrupted by Rose, who was impatiently shuffling her feet like a five year old who really needed to pee.

"If I may intrude, we're going to go now."

Without waiting for an answer, she grasped Roxy's hand and practically yanked her away. Roxy let out a yelp of surprise and attempted to say goodbye before leaving, instead managing only to let out a noise that sounded something like "gubbuh." Dave raised an eyebrow at the quick departure, but her was getting used to odd behavior by this point, and dismissed it without questioning. With a jolt he realized he had forgotten to introduce himself.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I'm Dave and this is-"

"Dirk. I'm Dirk."

Dirk's hand shot out and he gave each of them a firm and unnecessarily long handshake. Dave sighed. Jesus Christ, what the fuck is up with everyone today? He thought. Am I the only sane person left on this planet? When Dirk was finished with his rather weird introduction, Dave decided that he might as well shake their hands as well, though his was less tense and much shorter. He was rewarded by a quiet "Nice to meet you" from Jade and a smile that sent a chill down his spine. There was an awkward silence after that and Dave was grateful when John decided to be the one to break it. They talked for a good half hour before the three had to take off. Dave noticed that Dirk stalled the goodbye, cracking lots of ironic jokes and making sure that each of them left with autographs, which Dave thought was really lame since John was a really good friend of theirs and Jade was his cousin. Jake's relation wasn't direct, but since he was a relative of a relative, that had to count for something. Eventually they managed to sneak away from Dirk, who became very quiet, seemingly lost in thought. Dave frowned beneath his shades.

"Dude, what the fuck?"

Dirk turned to face him, eyebrows raised in apparent surprise.

"Sup, Bro?"

Dave's fist clenched with agitation.

"Don't play dumb, man. You were acting all weird. What the fuck?"

Dirk ran a hand through his hair casually.

"I dunno what you're talkin' about."

Dave sighed in resignation. It didn't matter. If his bro didn't want to talk about something then he wouldn't force him to, though he was mildly offended that he didn't feel Dave worthy of knowing his innermost thoughts as he usually did. He decided instead to change the subject.

"Whatever. So have you seen any hot chicks today?"

Dirk stared ahead blankly.

"Eh."

Dave shrugged.

"Yeah, I guess this isn't the ideal gathering place for pretty women."

Dirk put his hands in his pockets.

"Guess not."

Dave decided to shut up. He looked away. Dirk never seemed to want to talk about girls. It was weird. There was no need for him to be insecure about it in Dave's opinion. Dirk was a good looking guy; he would be able to get a good looking girl pretty easily. Plus, talking about girls was supposed to be a really good bro bonding activity. Ah well. Epic rap battles and intense sword fights worked well enough. Looking back at Dirk, Dave could see that he was thinking hard about something or other. Dave decided to leave him to his thoughts, and have thoughts of his own. It had been a long day.