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"Matthew. Matt, Matt, Mattmatt Mattie-"
"What!?" Matthew finally spun around as well as he could in the crowded hallway, shooting his brother an exasperated look.
Alfred grinned at him, innocent and unrepentant. He looked so strange without his glasses on and wearing dark contacts, nevermind that ridiculous wig. At least his outfit was relatively normal, Bleach's Ichigo was certainly not as strange as some of the others roving around the convention. Even so, Matthew pursed his lips and put his hands on his hips.
"I'm gonna take off for awhile," Alfred said, moving closer to be heard over the general noise of the crowds. "The Pokemon Scramble is set to start soon."
Matthew rolled his eyes, though a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. He could still remember the long ago Christmas morning when their parents had gotten both of them Gameboys, and in some stroke of genius gave Matthew Pokemon Red and Alfred Pokemon Blue. Matthew had played the game on and off, whenever he got bored or Alfred pestered him to breaking. But Alfred had been different, Alfred loved those silly games and had bought almost all of them that had come out since. "You and your Pokemon."
"Hey," Alfred gave him a sly grin and poked Matthew in the ribs. "I'm not the one dressed up as a Digimon character."
Matthew turned red, absently tugging at the corner of his sleeveless turtleneck. "It's ironic!" he protested. "We share a name!"
"Only in the dub," Alfred snickered again, then clapped a hand on Matt's shoulder. "Seriously, will you be alright for awhile?"
Matthew huffed and shrugged his hand off. "I'm six minutes younger than you, not six years. I'll be fine. But don't forget we have that panel later. I'll meet you at four-thirty at the latest."
"Awesome!" Alfred gave him a thumbs up, then turned to make his way down the packed halls of the convention center, attempting to navigate by memory and managing to find where he was going just in time.
For all Matthew's teasing, maybe it was a little dorky that Alfred was twenty-one years old and still played Pokemon on a slow Thursday night (usually when he was ignoring that essay due the next morning). He'd never really let it get to him before, until he stepped into the room assigned for the Pokemon Scramble and found himself surrounded by kids. Even the guys organizing this thing had to be about seventeen, and all of a sudden Alfred felt really, really old. Trying not to feel like everyone was staring at him, he scooted back into a slightly shadowed corner so he could pull out his DS, trying to ignore the squealing of young teenagers all around him.
Really, the Pokemon Scramble was a neat idea. If Alfred had more friends that actually played, he would have tried to arrange something like it on campus. Everyone wrote down their Friend Code on an index card, and then the event organizers put them all in pairs and passed them back out, except you didn't know who you'd been swapped with. You could try and figure it out and make a new friend, or just trade Pokemon and leave it at that. Alfred was beginning to lean toward the second category.
He took an index card from the pile and scribbled down his Friend Code, hoping his handwriting was legible enough. Then he flopped down to sit and booted up his DS, passing the time by poking around in his PC and trying to find the Pokemon he'd gotten ready last week and marked for this event. He wasn't a total dick, and maybe he hadn't scraped together the spare cash to buy Black or White yet but he'd taken the time to breed a really nice Charmander with both Dragon Rush and Metal Claw as egg moves and some really bitching IVs. He just hoped he didn't end up trading it to some snot-nosed pre-teen who wouldn't appreciate that chain breeding was a pain in the ass.
The Scramble, once it got going, went off more or less without a hitch. Alfred tried to divine something about his partner from the handwriting on the card he was given back, but couldn't even tell if the neat block writing was male or female. After a minute he gave up, punching in the code and heading for the Union Room to initiate the trade. As he waited for it to go through he looked up, scanning the room. But everyone had their heads bent over their DS's, there was no way to tell exactly who his partner might be. Alfred sighed, glancing back down.
Wait, what?
He blinked, just to make sure he wasn't seeing things, and called up the menu, and then his Pokemon status pages. Gone was his lovingly bred super-Charmander, and in its place sat a Pikachu. Which would have been disappointing, except the nickname and trainer name were both in Japanese. When he pulled up its attack page, he nearly had a heart attack and it was all he could do to keep from shouting at the top of his lungs that someone had just given him a Japanese Fly-chu.
He scanned the room again. Of course, there was always the off chance that some American brat had imported one of the Japanese games, but...
In the corner opposite Alfred, near the door, a young man was quietly closing his DS and tucking it back into his bag, making sure he had all his things as he prepared to slip out. A young Asian man. He looked younger than Alfred, but he was definitely older than the average age of the rest of the room.
Alfred bit his lip in indecision. On the one hand, Matthew was always lecturing him about being more sensitive and not assuming things ('to assume makes an ass out of 'u' and 'me', Al!' was his favourite). Would it be racist to assume the Asian kid was playing the games in Japanese? It was at least stereotypical.
On the other hand, he was kinda cute.
Mind made up, Alfred snapped his DS closed and got to his feet, eyes on the Asian as he slipped out the door. Alfred wasn't far behind, but it wasn't until they'd actually gotten a dozen yards down the hall and Alfred had put his hand on his shoulder that he remembered oh right, conversation required something to talk about. "Um..."
The other young man (he was probably older than Alfred thought, he'd always been terrible at guessing ages) turned at the touch to his shoulder, blinking at Alfred. He was dressed downright tamely for an anime convention; normal black slacks and a white dress shirt that had been tailored so it looked a little battle-worn. He was wearing a metal shackle around one wrist and a pair of glasses frames that Alfred could see were fake, they didn't have any lenses in them. He wasn't even wearing a wig, it didn't look like, he'd just ruffled some gel through his hair except for- wait, those were little horns poking up through his hair, just about the length of Alfred's thumb. That was almost cute.
"Um," Alfred scrambled for something, anything. "The Pokemon thing, god this is going to sound terrible, but I think you might have been my partner. The Pokemon I got had a nickname in Japanese..." he trailed off and silently kicked himself. Knowing his luck this kid was Korean or something and was going to take major offense.
But to Alfred's surprise and relief, he didn't, he just smiled quietly. "Yes, that's right. You're the one who sent the Charmander?"
Alfred grinned, wide and giddy in relief. "Yeah, that was me! I just wanted to, y'know, say thanks. I mean, a Fly-chu, that's fucking generous!"
He shook his head with another quiet smile. "Not at all. If you're patient you can get plenty of them, it's just a time consuming process."
"Guess so," Alfred beamed, and then because the curiosity was killing him, "Hey, who're you dressed as? I don't recognize the costume..."
"Ah," he looked down at himself, then back up at Alfred. "The character is Kishi Kyousuke, from Yozakura Quartet. I don't think many English-speakers have heard of it."
"That's too bad," Alfred tilted his head to the side, making a mental note to look that manga up later. "Sometimes those are the best."
The other boy blinked at him, as though he hadn't expected to hear those sentiments. "...Yes, I think so too."
"Alfred!"
Alfred yelped as his brother plowed into his side, nearly knocking him completely over. "Ow! Mattie, seriously, what the hell-"
"You're late," Matthew huffed, eying him from under the spiky bangs of his wig. "You said you'd meet me at the food court half an hour ago, and now we're going to be late for the Bleach panel if we don't run!"
Oh right. The Bleach panel. That they were running.
Oops.
He turned back to his trading partner in a mild panic. "Hey, I gotta go, it was really nice to meet you though! I'm Alfred, by the way!"
And I really, really hope I run into you again, he didn't add, because you're cute and you seem smart and you didn't laugh at me for fangirling over a flying Pikachu and I'd really like to get to know you better.
"Kiku," the other boy said, quiet voice almost lost in the crowd noise. But before Matthew could pull Alfred away, Kiku retrieved a small note pad from his bag and scribbled something on it, then tore off the page and pressed it into Alfred's hand with a small smile. "Here. Thank you for the Charmander, I'll use it well." And before Alfred could say anything else, he'd disappeared.
Alfred bit back his disappointment, clutching at the note and letting Matthew drag him, still huffing about idiot twins and deadlines. He was hoping that Kiku had just given him a Friend Code, or if he was really lucky an email or a blog or something.
But Alfred was wrong.
Later that evening, back in their hotel room while Matthew was in the shower, Alfred fished the note carefully out from where he'd tucked it in a pocket and smoothed it out. It wasn't a Friend Code or an email or a web address.
It was a phone number.
Alfred's heart skipped a beat, and he smiled.