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Not that it necessarily is a small city, where they are currently staying, thinks Roger.
It's just that it's incredibly dull.
Every house looks like the next.
All the clubs they tried earlier tonight looked the same as well.
Moreover, they only played bad music and they served bad drinks to top it all.
Their gig earlier was okay and the venue wasn't exactly small but otherwise...
It almost looks like their concert had been the only entertainment offered this night, concludes Roger.
"I'm bored out of my mind," he exclaims to Crystal as they stand outside the last club they tried.
Crystal nods and shrugs.
"Let's just go back to the hotel. It's not like we're going to find better drinks out here..." replies Crystal after a second.
They settle in Roger's room after collecting all the drinks from Crystal's room too.
Crystal jokes away and eventually, Roger's foul mood cracks.
Soon enough they are both elate from alcohol and the funny stories they share.
Until Crystal opens the fridge to get them another beer and the light inside it switches off, right as he touches the first can.
In fact, the whole thing calls it quits, ceasing its low buzzing as well.
After blindly picking up the cans, Crystal closes the fridge and turns around to face the pitch black room.
A power outage then.
And not just the hotel, seeing how the streetlamps don't shine through the window either. At least this neighbourhood, likely.
Right then, something white and flapping crosses the bedroom with a high-pitched wail or screech.
Crystal can barely make out its form, so dark is the room.
He freezes for a moment, his tipsy brain confused and startled.
It takes a few seconds of silence in the room, except for some rumbling from the upper floor.
Then Roger can't hold it any longer, breaking in a fit of laughter from under the bedsheet he has thrown over his head.
"Roger!" Crystal growls as he walks to the bed with his hand on the wall.
He sits down and fumbles around to place the beer cans on the nightstand.
His eyes are adjusting to the dark and when Roger finds the curtains and pulls them open from where he's sitting on the floor in a corner, he can make out the lighter coloured form with the extra light from the moon.
Looking around, he finds that Roger picked a fresh sheet from some closet.
"Hey, Crys, come on, get one for yourself!" urges Roger, standing up.
An exhilarating idea swims in his mind and now he has to carry it out too.
"Huh?" asks Crystal.
Roger stumbles over to the bed, nearly tripping over his own suitcase on the way, and pulls the covers off to free the sheet.
"Come on then!"
"What do you want to do?" asks Crystal.
"Oh don't you get it? We're going to scare everyone in the corridors!" says Roger, pausing to pull another corner of the blanket off the bed before he continues to explain: "I can screech and you can laugh at me, that's a scary sound too, at any rate!"
Crystal latches onto the idea. It's definitely going to spice up their night.
Dutifully, he pulls the sheet off and throws it over his head.
"Make sure it's not double over your face, you should be able to see through it, even I can see surprisingly well with this," instructs Roger.
Eagerly, he grabs their keys and opens the door.
"Wait, we should take our shoes off," says Crystal in the last moment, "then we're more silent."
Roger nods and quickly kicks his shoes off, immediately jumping in the hall with a wail bordering the top of his range.
Crystal follows a bit more careful, leaving the doo just not closed in a clear moment, thinking about how Roger has the only keys they have.
It really is hilarious, how Roger unsteadily dashes back and forth in the hall, scaring the couple peeking out right back in.
He runs and jumps around with an amount of energy he himself didn't even know he had, all the while producing hysterical screams and screeches.
Roger's enthusiasm is contagious and soon Crystal is jumping and flapping his arms just as weird.
A breathless laugh catches Roger off guard and just in time, he turns the sound high-pitched, high on exhilaration.
Crystal really doesn't know how he does that with his alcohol-whacked voice but he manages.
At the end of the corridor, Roger scoots up the stairs, jumping and tripping. He nearly falls off, ending up all splayed over the steps, forming a light area on the darker floor with the white sheet.
That's how Crystal finds him as he rounds the corner and he breaks down in laughter.
Roger scrambles up and continues up the stairs.
Judging by the sounds, more people are standing or walking around in the hallway on the next floor.
Not that Roger cares, or maybe it just doesn't even come up in his thoughts that he might knock someone over, as he sees barely anything in the dark through the sheet. Despite his words to Crystal.
So he jumps and dances in front of the stairs, just in view of the hall.
Crystal laughs and Roger shrieks, both just as exhilarated and rowdy as drunk.
The sound turns the people to face him and some start screaming on top of their lungs.
Whether from fear or confusion or something else, he doesn't know.
Either way, they're adding to the mess, thinks Roger satisfied.
Chasing after a few kids they spot, both dash into the hall, scaring the people who weren't startled yet too.
They run all the way to the other side, to disappear up the stairs on the other side.
Once out of sight, they pause and look at each other in their sheets, surprised how well it works.
Of course, they blame their incredible skills at playing ghosts, oblivious to the effect of the already spooky decor that the dark hotel makes.
The next floor is the highest floor, as there are no more stairs leading up. Not at this side at least.
They're not yet visible from the hall and to Roger's surprise, he hears Brian and Freddie talking around the corner.
They're wondering what may have caused the outage.
Of course, Brian was already thinking of a cause, ever needing to know the how and why, ever searching to know everything, thinks Roger.
Freddie throws in a new possibility, each even more peculiar than the last thing he said, every time Brian is done figuring out the previous theory to ease his mind.
He clearly has no idea that he is, actually, not being helpful.
The exchange is actually quite funny to Roger so he listens as they catch their breath.
Standing just behind the corner, Roger looks at Crystal and beckons him over before jumping into Freddie and Brian's sightline with the most otherworldly wail he's let out yet all evening.
Freddie screeches in surprise and blinks at the two light forms that appear where the stairs are.
The door leading to stairs to the roof at the other end of the hall is open.
The moon shines through the opening into the dark space, making their white sheets clearly visible against the dark wall.
Roger keeps the fabric moving, punching it lightly from under it.
He sort of yips while jumping up and down toward the pair.
Freddie finally moves and jumps behind Brian, using the taller man as a shield.
The sight is too funny and Roger stumbles over his own feet, doubling over in real, unrestricted laughter, following Crystal who'd been laughing ever since he found Roger splayed out over the stairs.
Brian shakes his head.
"Fred, it's just Roger and Crystal, no ghost in sight," he soothes.
After a moment, Freddie lets go of him and growls to the two sheet-ghosts instead.
Then, a fit of laughter hits him too.
"Oh, Rog, dear, please don't ever do that to me again, please?" he hiccups.
John chooses that moment to speak up, poking his head through the open door.
"Guys, half the city has light again," he announces, absolutely unimpressed by Roger and Crystal's antics.
He warns them though: "If you don't want to get caught, I'd go back to your own room real quick," he says, sending them a look.
Roger stares at him through the sheet over his head.
"Huh?" he asks, inelegantly.
"If part of the electricity is back already, it probably won't take long before the rest is back too," explains John. "Oh, and Bri, you forgot something," he continues.
"My notes!" exclaims Brian, "do you have them?!" he asks, already walking back to the door.
"Yeah, I've got them. Not that hour new lyrics are still secret now" answers John.
Meanwhile, Freddie has fully recovered from the scare and he starts shooing the 'ghosts'away.
"Go, straight down the stairs, or I'll unmask you myself." he urges.
Crystal acts first and he pulls Roger along to the stairs next to the door, where John stands.
"You scared Fred just right, though," says John, acknowledging the worth of their joke as they pass him.
The first flight of stairs go alright. Roger loses his balance once or twice but he doesn't fall.
The success assures Roger he is still up to the task, despite his state of tipsiness and tiredness added to the extra difficulty from having a huge bedsheet hanging over his head.
Ascending second stairs goes alright too and Roger gains even more confidence, passing Crystal on the way.
Bold from the success, Roger starts running down.
He misses the last step and, with a ghost-worthy cry, he falls flat on his face.
"Oof," he grunts indignantly.
Crystal tries, he really does but he can't help it.
He starts laughing again with his voice still hoarse from drinking, which gives the sound a sinister tone to it. Just as Roger predicted before they went 'haunting' the hotel.
Crystal laughs so hard he nearly rolls down the rest of the stairs, instead of waking down.
Right as he steps on the floor, when Roger starts scraping himself off the ground once again, the light in the hall springs on with a 'tick'-like sound.
Startled, Roger hurries to grab the sheet together and scoot in the corner next to the stairs.
Crystal nods and hurriedly pulls his own sheet off.
Holding the bundle in his arms, Roger looks helplessly at Crystal.
"What do we do now?!" he whispers.
"I don't know, try rolling it up and hiding it under your shirt?" replies Crystal, moving to do the same already.
Roger looks outright ridiculous with the badly folded sheet under his sweater.
Half of it even hangs out of the sweater, so big is the bundle.
Crystal has more luck, his bundle is a bit smaller and just about fits.
Footsteps sound on the stairs and impulsively, Crystal yanks Rogers's belt loose.
"Put the rest in your pants!" he says, trying to help Roger and nearly pushing him off the stairs with the pressure he applies on the bundle, in hopes to make it fit in Roger's trousers.
It doesn't help.
Only half fits in the band of his trousers and Roger just pulls his sweater down as far as it will go, at a loss for alternatives.
That effectively stops Crystal from closing his belt again.
Thus, they're standing next to the stairs, Roger with his back against the wall and Crystal with his hands on the belt of Roger's now dangerously low hanging trousers when a strange man rounds the corner below them and continues marching right to them.
Roger's brain is still fuzzy with alcohol and he can only think of one solution to 'cover' their situation...
"Kiss me," he says.
"Come on then!" urges Roger, impatiently and anxious.
Crystal finally understands and slams their lips together.
It could have been a genius move if they hadn't been recognized.
"Roger Taylor? From Queen?" the stranger asks, clearly not caring about their business.
Feverishly, Roger pulls Crystals head to his own, glueing their lips together.
"Hey!" says the man, raising his voice.
Seeing as this can only end in an unwanted scene, Crystal breaks away from Roger.
"Robbie, babe, come to my room?" he croons, ignoring the stranger and quickly fixing Roger's belt now he has let go of his sweater.
Roger nods and off they are, practically running.
Crystal is eternally grateful for his decision not to close the door as they can literally fall inside and kick the door closed without delay due to a lock.
"Rog, what the hell? What if he goes to the newspapers?" asks Crystal, not understanding why Roger came up with that 'solution'.
"He won't, I think."
Roger pauses and tilts his head to the side. "Did you see Fred's reaction though?" he asks in return.
The grin returns on Crystal's face. "Yeah, priceless. He looked like a scared girl!" he hiccups before they break into the giggles once more.
It is only a quarter, a huge fit of laughter and the discarding of both sheets after they came back into the room that they finally manage to drink the beers Crystal fetched earlier.
"Say, Rog, how in hell did you think of this ghost game so quickly?" asks Crystal, sipping from his drink.
Roger shrugs.
"Dunno, really. Just happened."