The blue alien didn't live too far from his office, luckily. At the end of the day he and Minion would exit the office, head down Main Street of Metro City and arrive at a block of apartments that had been strung up on the top of the busy median mall that ran through the city. As they entered the narrow entranceway Megamind checked their mailbox for mail and only found some bills, so he made an unhappy face as Minion started his way up the stairs.
Living on the ninth floor with no elevator always tuckered Megamind out so he normally ended up being carried by the gorilla robot suit since it never got tired.
"Another day, another three bills and we minus our savings by point sixty four percent." Megamind sighed as he opened the door to their apartment. They had a two-bedroom apartment with modest living room with joined kitchen area. Megamind dropped his backpack onto the floor and began to undo his tie as Minion did the same after setting their dinner (a large pizza half pepperoni half cheese) onto the bench bar in the kitchen section.
"Can you believe it, Wayne and his big chin coming and poking it into our area and telling us that our processes are wrong! As if he knows anything about pulling recovery archives and locating one single invoice that some low life idiot filed incorrectly!" Megamind ranted as he kicked off his shoes before going through to his bedroom to change into his after work gear.
"Halo it is." Minion whispered as he grabbed the XBox and plugged it into the television and stepped back. Spread out in front of their huge flat screen monitor television set was every single console that had been ever created since 1980. Genesis, Atari, Nintendo, Sega, Dreamcast, every single one. And on either side of the huge television were bookshelves as tall as the ceiling and full to the brim with video game cartridges still in their boxes.
"So what did you think, Sir?" the fish asked.
"Think what?" came the voice from the bedroom.
"Of the new girl, Miss Ritchi!" Minion explained.
"Why are you asking me about the girl?" Megamind asked as he exited the bedroom wearing an AC/DC black t-shirt and thin blue jeans with little black slippers, which had tiny bat wings and angry red eyes on them. He went to the pizza and lifted the box, and lifted out his cheese only slice and stuck it to a plate before doing the same for Minion as the fish continued powering up the machine. "I could care less about that brown haired girl." he added.
"Couldn't care less." Minion pointed out. Megamind gave him a silent stare of disapproval, before the fish continued. "Well she seems nice enough, Sir. She actually spoke to us, for once! Half of them on that whole floor much less the entire company ever say two words to us at the best of time." Minion went on to explain as he sat down on their old leather couch, which had indention marks showing where the two normally sat.
Megamind shrugged and grabbed some napkins before hurrying to the couch and handed Minion his plate of pizza and he sat on his side of the couch. "Big deal." he said with a shrug before biting into his cheese pizza.
Minion just gave the alien a side on glance before picking up the controller in his robotic hands. "So what are we going to do tonight, Sir?"
"The same thing we do every night, Minion. Pwn some noobs." Megamind replied, before the two exchanged high fives, bunkered down, and played video games well into the night.
~*~
Meanwhile across town a young man was lounging in front of his own television, in little else but a white polo shirt and his boxers. His skin was rich deep brown that made his surprisingly blue eyes stand out even more then any other color would. In his ears were plugged some white headphones and he was bopping his left foot as he stared blankly at the television screen which was, surprisingly off.
Suddenly in the reflection of the black screen he saw the door to the apartment opened and he saw a silhouette reflected due to the light streaming in from outside. He sat up, smiled broadly, and turned around and kneeled on the couch.
"Welcome home Bernie." he greeted before climbing over the couch as Bernard shut the door and turned the light on.
"Don't call me that." Bernard replied before leaning in for a greeting but stopped and looked down at the half dressed man in front of him. "Steve, where are your pants?"
Steve blinked, then looked down at himself. He looks a little bewildered for a moment, before glancing around in a curious manner before looking back at Bernard. "I was getting changed and realized, hey, it's not the first time he's seen me without my pants."
"Put on your pants." Bernard said dryly as he pulled his jacket off.
"Another lovely day at work, hm?" Steve asked as he picked up the jacket from where Bernard had dropped it.
"Sunshine, lolly pops and rainbows." came the sarcastic reply as he walked through to the bedroom.
"Everything that's wonderful with the world, hm?" Steve asked as he followed after his boyfriend, leaning on the doorframe leading into the bedroom as he watched Bernard continue to remove himself from the clothes that no doubt stunk of work.
"New girl started today, remember I told you?" Bernard asked as he kicked his socks off and stretched his toes.
"Is she cute?" Steve walked in and picked up the socks, rolling them into a ball.
"I don't think anyone's cute." Bernard pointed out.
"Not even me?" the dark man looked aghast at this revelation.
"Ehhhhnnn..." he lifted a hand and shifted it from side to side as if balancing something invisible.
Steve suddenly erupted into laughter before all but tackling Bernard onto the bed, no doubt ruffling the other man's business pants in the process. But Bernard, in a rare moment of clarity, decided not to complain about it.
~*~
"Thank God." Roxanne sighed as she kicked off her heels, and rubbed at the sore heels of her feet. She, like Megamind and Minion, lived in the city so communing from work and home again was fairly easy for her. But unfortunately the brand new shoes she had bought had cut into her heels. "Last time I buy shoes from there." she muttered as she walked across the carpet to change into something more comfortable.
Granted, she went over her first day on the new job and wondered just how much work the people on her floor really got done. Those around her spent most of the afternoon putting people on hold, then talking about how sick their kids were or who was dating whom.
Already she knew far too much about those on the other side of the floor without even knowing the names to the faces.
"I mean who cares if Rachel and Brett made out at the last drinks party despite her having a boyfriend and then just yesterday both of them were sick on the exact same day? I don't CARE about this!" so why was she talking about it now, to herself?
Sighing, she found her bed and threw herself onto it, face down.
"At least the coffee's good."
Coffee was very important, especially free coffee. And they offered Well Being at Work programs that involved yoga, Pilates, and weight watchers. Roxanne subconsciously pressed a hand to her rear and groaned at the size of it. No matter how hard she dieted, or worked out, her butt refused to shrink.
"Damnit."
Some of those girls in the office were so god damn beautiful, perfect hair, make up, boobs, waists and butts. What were they doing in such a dead end job, shouldn't they be on TV somewhere running slow-mo on a beach?
Roxanne threw herself backwards so she was now lying on her back and staring up at her ceiling. Then, suddenly, just as it had done for the past seven nights she had been living in this apartment, she heard the noise. The floor above her somebody was playing video games. Very, very, loud video games.
Groaning, Roxanne dragged her hands over her face. She didn't need this, not now. Not now that she had a full time job! She needed her sleep to be up and fresh in the mornings and she couldn't if she was awake half the night listening to two idiots shouting back and forth beneath the deafening racket that was things exploding and irritating video game music.
Moving with purpose Roxanne pulled on her slippers, grabbed her keys and stormed upstairs. The elevator wasn't working, which was annoying but the flat was decently priced and spacious so she took the good with the bad. Reaching the ninth floor Roxanne counted the doors until she was at the one that was immediately above her own, and unleashed a pounding on that door it would never had experienced in its lifetime.
She kept banging until her hand got sore, and when that happened she began to change to the other when the door was suddenly pulled open.
"Finally!" she started just as the door started, "Don't you realize there are other people in this apartment block? Other people who have a JOB who need to GET UP EARLY and- and..." Roxanne's rant died on her tongue as she saw who stood at the door.
It was Minion.
Minion the fish.
Minion the fish in a gorilla robot suit.
From work.
Her eyes were wide and her mouth slung open in a mix of both surprise and abject horror.
"Why Miss Ritchi!" Minion started, obviously a little embarrassed within his fish bowl of a head since he was attempting to hide behind his fins and failing. "My upmost apologies I did not-Sir! Put your pants back on!"
"Why who is it?" Megamind's voice could be heard from just behind Minion.
"It's Miss Ritchi! From work!" the fish explained, turning his body in the glass head to peer at his boss. The image alone disturbing something deep within Roxanne, and reminded her of seeing The Exorcist long before she should have.
"WHAT!" Megamind's shrill voice pierced her ears. "STALL HER!" then came the clattering noise f somebody running through a lot of things, accompanied with cries of pain.
Minion turned his body back to Roxanne and smiled nervously. "So... you're our neighbour!" the fish declared as he held up his giant robot hands. "That's just super! You see the rest of this place is pretty much full of old deaf people, since the rent has stayed the same since the 1950's. That's why we can play our games normally as loud as we please, nobody really cares. Until now." he said and bowed suddenly, causing the woman to jump back, hands raised as if expecting him to attack her. "We're so sorry!"
"Sorry for what, who is it? Who dares disturb the Master Chief in his noob pwning?" Megamind demanded as he finally returned, wearing pants, and tugged at Minion's arm to tug him out of the way. "...Roxanne!" Megamind gaped, suddenly looking very apprehensive and almost shy being discovered in his personal space.
Roxanne stared at him, and realized just how different he looked when not wearing the nerd get up she saw him at work. Here, he wasn't wearing his glasses. Or that ridiculous tie and suit combination that only made him look far skinnier then he really was. Here he was just a guy relaxing in his casual clothes, just like she would be doing right now if she hadn't stormed up here to chew his head off.
Which reminded her.
"You guys play your games too loud." she finally said.
Megamind narrowed an eye, as if contemplating how to answer. Nobody had ever told them off before but then again a GIRL had never come to their door before making demands.
"I... guess we could turn it down...? But we were living here first. By rights of who was here first should be able to play their music as loud as they please." he added quickly, glancing at Minion for confirmation. The fish merely blinked.
"That's ridiculous!" Roxanne snapped, her apprehension vanishing quickly. "I have to get a good nights sleep, so do you! You start work at what, eight thirty?"
"Seven." Minion piped up.
"S-seven?" the woman opened her eyes wide. "But you leave the same time I do!"
"Yes. We work an extra hour and a half in return we work less one hour so we have a larger out-pouring of work." Megamind said quickly and rapidly before waving his hands at her. "If we can play our video games until past midnight and still be at work in time at seven o'clock then I do not see what the problem is."
"We're two.. uh.. three very different people... fish?" Roxanne glanced to Minion who simply smiled at her. "Not everyone can go to bed past midnight and operate on six hours sleep. I am NOT one of those people and I am NOT going to become one just so you can feed your geeky video game obsession. Lower the volume. Or I'm going to make a formal complaint to the super."
"You wouldn't." Megamind said, narrowing his eyes.
"I will." Roxanne replied. She reached forward and jabbed her finger into his chest, easily nudging the skinny alien back. "So lower the volume. Or else."
She turned on her sore heels, held her head up and stormed off. Megamind leaned out of his door and watched her go, his eyes flitting to her rear before back to her head as she quickly vanished down the stairs. Suddenly realizing he should have said something he called out after her.
"BRING IT ON SISTER!" before slamming the door shut and turned, arms folding over his chest and glared ahead of him.
"That went well!" Minion said with a big grin, but promptly lost it when Megamind shot him an angry glare.
"If she thinks she can move in and muscle in on OUR territory with her girly needs and desires she's got another thing coming!" Megamind announced before unzipping his jeans and tugging them off and throwing them to the floor. "And don't pick it up! It's manly to throw your clothes to the floor and leave them to fester!"
"Is it?" Minion asked, looking down at the jeans in disgust. "I just found it sloppy."
"You know me too. Sorry." Megamind quickly grabbed up his jeans and hurried through to his bedroom, mind going a million miles a minute. Roxanne, the new girl from work, was his neighbour. Right now she was downstairs, in her apartment. What was she doing? Was she changing for bed? Was she in the shower, trying to cool off from yelling at him?
Why was he suddenly thinking of things like this? He gave off a frustrated grunt as he folded his jeans and put them into their proper drawer before going back out to join Minion on the couch.
They ended up watching the Fifth Element instead, and at a reasonable volume.
