The Doomful Encounter
Description: Brief under-650-words one-shot.
Rating: PG for one highly minor word. (Highly minor… does that make sense?)
This is a piece of unbetaed peculiarity (forgive me if it's a little rough as far as sentence structure) written while trying to get ideas for where to go next with Amon and Laundry while I was having a rather bad day. It occurred to me that it would be most interesting if Robin met up with a shoujo heroine her own age…
The mental picture cheered me up a great deal.
It was an ordinary day, which, with the exception of the excess of cherry blossom petals, was just like any other ordinary day. People with vague character design stiffly crossed the street at the light. The sky looked as though it might rain at some point within the next few hours. And Robin walked along quietly, keeping to herself, trailing several feet after Amon.
Suddenly the air was rent with a piercing noise. It sounded like… like… a giggle? Several hundred pairs of eyes quickly shot in its direction and then averted.
The sky seemed to become a bright cerulean blue as the source of the giggle progressed along the sidewalk. The cherry blossom petals thickened. Robin felt decidedly confused. She was just about to ask Amon if he had any clue what was going on when she heard a sharp, rather disturbing noise.
A small, sparkling, feminine personage coming along the sidewalk had caught sight of Robin, and uttered what sounded to inexperienced ears like a series of squeaks.
"Yip! Yippy yippity yipyip yip YIP!"
Robin, however, was provided with a handy built-in language translator, so to her it sounded like this:
"Oh my GOD! SUSIE! I haven't seen you in like YEARS!"
"Um…" answered Robin.
"Oh my GOD! You look so… so… GOTH!"
"Well…" began Robin. Her eyes, unromantically the color of somewhat low-quality emeralds, blinked twice.
"I would have never GUESSED! Oh my GOD! Is this your boyfriend?"
"No…"
"Last time I saw you, you were going out with JOE!"
By this time Robin appeared to be nodding vigorously, as the being was bouncing up and down constantly, or perhaps just vibrating on some higher frequency.
"I don't…"
"It is SO good that you dumped him. I could never understand that one."
"I never…"
"Ooooo! Did you get a new cell phone?"
"Um…"
"You were always complaining about the old one. I think the new one's SO much cuter."
By this time Robin seemed to have regained her senses.
"Um… I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I don't remember you."
The girl's enormous blue eyes blinked several times and began to glitter. "You… you mean you don't remember me at all? But… but we were best friends in middle school… I mean…"
"No, no, I'm afraid you have the wrong person. My name is Robin."
"Oh. Oh my oh my oh my oh my oh my… I'm so sorry!"
"No, no, that's quite all right."
"But…"
"No, really. I'm sorry I'm not who you're looking for!"
"Thanks…"
The girl looked down in embarrassment and then suddenly seemed to cheer up.
"Oooooo! Is that a Prada purse? I saw one JUST LIKE IT in Vogue!"
"No, sorry. I bought it from a street vendor in Mexico seven years ago for about a dollar."
"Oh. Well, sorry to bother you!" the girl said brightly, recovering from her momentary disappointment, waving, and skipping off.
Robin looked up to see if Amon was still there. He appeared to be in shock.
"Sorry, Amon, I didn't mean to make you wait," she apologized politely.
He coughed, cleared his throat, coughed again, and attempted to look badass.
"Robin… I am afraid… you have just had an encounter with one of your own kind."
Robin blinked once in confusion. "What do you mean? Oh… you don't mean…"
"Yes. I mean a… a fifteen-year-old girl. An especially perky one."
Robin blinked twice in surprise. "Really? Is that what I'm supposed to act like?"
"Perhaps you do no act your age, but it is understandable," he said. "However, that one was from another universe, one most hideous and repulsive to those in our world." He paused, glanced around, and lowered his voice. "A universe called… Shoujo."
For an entire minute all was enveloped in a shocked silence. A child who had overheard began to weep, and his mother gave Amon an angry look. A flock of pigeons was temporarily paralyzed, and global warming increased ten degrees in five seconds.
Robin blinked three times in decision. "Let us never speak of this again."
"Agreed."
And they walked on to Harry's for a double espresso and a whiskey sour.
Finis.
Not that I don't like shoujo; in fact it happens to be a part of The Perfect Ais-perfected Cure for Brokenheartedness. But WHR is rather on the opposite side of the coin to shoujo of any kind…
And besides, it cheered me up.
Merry (belated) Christmas and Happy New Year,
------Ais