AnimeCon Harem 16: Epilogue pt E (Patreon)

Chloe-Ravioli: Have Brian

Chloe-Ravioli: Bring his stuff back down

♥ iXi Cerulean iXi ♥: omg

♥ iXi Cerulean iXi ♥: kk

Emily jolted into motion in a panic, throwing aside her phone and jumping for the bags by the door. They’d carried the mess of stuff up earlier to make room for Brian, and in the excruciating hours spent in the hotel room with nothing else to do Emily had repacked everything so that it took up less space. The Darkmask pouches and belt rolled up with his bodysuit and gloves to fit neatly inside the helmet—all of the parts of that costume except the boots fit in there that way. The gun, holster, and belt from Brian’s Lance cosplay then fit neatly inside the Darkmask boots, and likewise some creative rearranging made his Lance shoes and running shoes crammed into place across the bottom of his personal bag.

His Lance jacket was on a clothes hanger, from which also hung the posters he’d bought, as well as the Sarah Star print. All of that was in a large plastic protector that had a close tab and tape, so she’d just slipped it through and closed the clear plastic lip around the bottom bar of the hanger. Emily threw the strap of Brian’s bag around one shoulder, hooked her own bag with her other arm, hugged the Darkmask helmet upside-down against herself so its contents—and her phone—wouldn’t spill out, carefully took the hanger with the jacket, and she was off out the door.

He’s not gonna be awake, Emily reminded herself as she hurried for the stairs down. But he’s still gonna need lots of kisses to get better.

The pool courtyard of the Westerlin was a ghost town late into a Monday afternoon, and Emily barely spared the inviting blue waters or gorgeous flowering plants a glance as she tromped down the exterior stairwell towards the ground. She didn’t want to remember sitting on the loungers by the poolside with the girls while they tried to map out the dreamscape thing. Remembering the heated night they’d had in the other hotel room now wasn’t going to help, either.

We’ll be back to do it all again, Emily told herself. Next year.

She found herself almost out of breath simply from speed-walking down several flights of stairs and then bustling past the pool towards the gate that led to the parking lot, and after fussing with the latch and sidling through with everything she was carrying, Emily broke into a run. The last decorative hedges passed by, her beat-up sneakers clapped against the concrete of the walkway, and the row of parked vehicles came into view.

There they are, Emily made a beeline for Brian’s car as soon as she spotted it.

Brian came into view as she all but lunged over to peer through the windows—he was in a hospital gown and laid out across the rear bench. He was too tall to quite fit, so his legs were bent at the knees, and at some point during Kelly’s drive a leg had started to slip off the seat.

“Emily,” Kelly said, stepping out of the driver’s side. “Hey. Emily.”

“Yeah?” Emily snapped out of her daze.

“He’s fine for now,” Kelly assured her as she stepped forward and started taking things from Emily’s hands. “For four-plus-some more hours, he’s in total stasis. We can’t put magic into the things, yet. Here. Can you unlock the trunk?”

“Yeah. Yeah,” Emily nodded, scrabbling to grab the spare key. “Thanks. Uh. So—so, what do we do? What’s the plan? Did they say anything? Are we gonna—”

“She said… a lot of things,” Kelly muttered under her breath. “A lot of fucking things. Not gonna get into most of that. She uh, well, we have paperwork for Brian. Discharge papers, all the scan results—she said we can ignore those, but we’ll at least have them for proof if anyone asks. Transfer notice thing, saying he’s been moved into private care, and that all the forwarding stuff for the police or whatever will go to some lawyer. She said not to worry ‘bout any of that, and that we shouldn’t bother trying any of the numbers listed with it, ‘cause we’ll just get legal run-around that doesn’t go anywhere.”

Kelly was beautiful and had always struck Emily as an extremely put-together girl, whether facing off against a screaming Chloe or even when staggering around in near-hypnotic bliss at the convention together. She’d seen Kelly grow increasingly flustered throughout the nightmare yesterday with the future sends and Brian getting hurt, and now it appeared the red-headed femme fatale was finally nearing the end of her rope. Kelly had bags under her eyes, her posture was stiff with irritation, each of her sentences a little more brisk then they had been in the days past.

“Cool,” Emily got the trunk in and dropped both bags inside. “Did you get out of work for good? Are we outta here?”

“Off tomorrow,” Kelly said, rubbing her eyes. “Work opening shifts Wednesday through Friday, then I’m done.”

“Okay, so—” Emily grabbed her phone and then slammed the trunk closed. “What are we doing?”

“You’re gonna stay with Brian,” Kelly instructed. “I’ll drive you both out to Brian’s place. You juice him up, soon as he’s out of stasis. You stay there with him, basically. If you want we can do a grocery run or whatever; we have Christine’s credit card, still. We get you holed up there with Brian. I drive back out here to the Westerlin and stay, finish out my Dollarydoos sentence. Then meet you back there at his place after my Friday shift.”

“Let me drive,” Emily said. “You look like shit.”

“Thanks,” Kelly snorted. “Yeah.”

“Get some sleep,” Emily took the other key from Kelly and then gave her a hug. “Hey. Love you, babe. Just want you to know that. Spent all day like, crying about everything and getting all my feelings ‘bout this sorted out. And—yeah, I do have feelings for you, I really care about you. Are we still good?”

“Yeah. Yeah?” Kelly hugged her back. “I’m just… tired.”

“I know. Get some rest,” Emily said. “We’re almost through all of this. We’ve got this. Okay? We’ve got this. You wanna call Stephie real quick, before you zonk out?”

“Fuck yes,” Kelly sighed. “Please.”

*     *     *

The drive back was long and tedious. Stephanie joined them on speakerphone for the first fifteen minutes and Kelly’s mood improved, but after catching everyone up on their current status ferrying Brian, there wasn’t a lot any of them had to say. They missed each other. Post-con depression was real and it was terrible. They wanted to all stay in close contact, but were already having difficulty doing so—Kelly’s phone and Brian’s were both destroyed. Rebecca and Christine were off the grid and out of touch, no one knew how they were doing until they got back into cell service range.

After a drawn out set of exceptionally difficult goodbyes, they ended the call. Kelly crossed her arms and hunched herself up against the passenger’s side door and went still and silent. It didn’t look comfortable, and Emily spared occasional glances at the girl whenever she was done turning to check on Brian. He didn’t look good—his nose was still broken and twisted slightly to one side, the bruising now looked fearsome, and the swelling and abrasions across his face made him difficult for Emily to recognize. It hurt seeing him like this, the hurt made her angry, and she blinked through tears and glared as she drove, trying to focus on the road.

When they were most of the way home, just perhaps fifteen minutes away from the exit she would need to take to pull off the interstate, Emily’s phone started to ring. Frowning, she snatched it and accepted the call before the anime ringtone could startle Kelly awake.

“Tanya?” Emily asked.

“Emily,” Tanya greeted her through the phone. “What are you doing tonight?”

“I’m just driving back from AnimeCon,” Emily said. “With Brian.”

“Brian’s letting you drive?” Tanya teased. “The madman! I thought we weren’t doing AnimeCon this year?”

“No, that’s just what Chloe kept telling everyone,” Emily hissed out in a low voice. “She was all ‘oh, things don’t work out this year,’ and like, ‘I don’t think Brian can even go.’ Brian was always going! His plan never changed. Chloe was just gaslighting everyone. Again. As fucking always.”

“Who all went this year?” Tanya asked.

“Brian went on his own, Chloe followed him,” Emily snarled. “Rebecca and I got there halfway through Saturday. Mark was probably there, I dunno. Didn’t see him.”

“Are Chloe and Brian back together?” Tanya probed. “Becky said that they might—”

“No,” Emily interrupted, feeling the blue spots of color suffusing her body grow cold. “No. They’re not back together. Chloe went full psychopath on him. Tried to get him—us—kicked out of the con. And worse.”

“For serious?”

“Yeah. For serious.”

“Fucking hell.”

“Yeah.”

“Well. You or Brian up to chill tonight?” Tanya asked. “Sounds like you’ve got a whole story to tell.”

“No, I—no,” Emily grumbled. “It’s complicated. Actually, are Michael and Will free right now? Could use their help, we’re almost back to town. Pulling off our exit in a couple minutes, here.”

“Michael’s here playing his Gamestation or whatever,” Tanya answered. “Think Will’s still at work for another couple hours. We were gonna get together an’ have a bonfire tonight, since I had to work all weekend. You guys okay? Is Brian okay?”

“Long, long story there, but no, Brian is not okay,” Emily sighed. “Can you and Michael come by Brian’s apartment for a bit and help me get him inside?”

“Jesus,” Tanya paused. “He’s that bad? I thought Brian didn’t drink?”

“He doesn’t,” Emily scowled. “He’s—well, you’ll see.”

“Okay, we’ll meet you there, then,” Tanya said, and then it was apparent she had turned away from her phone so she could shout. “MICHAEL! GET YOUR STUPID ASS UP, WE’RE GOIN’ OVER TO BRIAN’S! YEAH, HE IS! I DUNNO, ANIMECON, I GUESS? NO—NO, THEY’RE STILL BROKEN UP! Hey, Emily? Yeah, we’ll be there. See you soon!”