A crowd gathered around me, and they appeared to be a friendly bunch after all, far from the demonic cult I had initially imagined.
"Yes, I am her. I... just wanted to surprise you, but now you've gone and told everybody. But it's all good. You'll get a surprise from me much sooner."
I couldn't believe the words coming out of my mouth. I was just speaking the way any famous person on eBunnee would speak. It didn't feel natural at all, but I needed to give them what they expected.
Clad only in a towel and sporting a Hot Face Emoji mask with stains all over his face and body, another person inquired, "So, where's your Cosmic Lunar Vixen towel? Why aren't you flaunting that badass outfit?"
I paused for a moment, searching for the right words, before finally saying, "I... I gave it to someone... a-another fan on my way here."
"Oh!" they all chorused in unison, appearing satisfied with my response and nodding in approval.
I broke eye contact when I realised that if I gave the towel away to a fan, I would be stark naked right now. Thankfully, none of them came to that realisation.
Some husky bloke stumbled forward, boasting a full beard and enormous fox-like ears, decked out with flashy gold studs and jingling golden chains. I reckoned he'd gotten some pre-burp jitters, but who could say for sure? "Lila, burp... I am, burp... your biggest... belch, burp..." he started up again. "Lily, I burp... am... burp, belch."
Before he could have another go at speaking, I quipped, "Hey there, Mister..." "Mister what?" I pondered. After a moment's contemplation, I repeated the word "Mister" again and finished off with, "Nice to meet you!"
"The... belch! is all mine... hiccup," the weird guy replied.
"Yes. It is all yours... y-you can keep it." I walked away, hoping to interact with some other fans to get away from him.
Many fans just wanted to take selfies with me so they could show all their friends and family members that they had seen me in person, until a girl asked for an autograph. Since I was famous, particularly for the Cosmic Lunar Vixen towel, which had become a recent fashion icon, it was only natural that this was what the person wanted me to sign. The problem was, she was still wearing it, and she couldn't exactly take it off for me to sign. There was also the issue of me not knowing how to hold a pen or having an autograph. I'd never had to write anything before; I did all my writing by touch-tapping on whatever device I was using.
"I-I don't really have an autograph. I've n-never held a pen before. I... I've never n-needed to. I don't really have an autograph." I realised I had just repeated myself but didn't care.
The girl, her bust pushed towards me for an autograph, looked profoundly sad as she said, "I'm just not good enough for your fan club, am I? You don't want to sign it because you don't want me in your club. I don't fit in anywhere. It feels like nobody ever wants me." Her words quivered as tears welled up in her eyes.
I was quite familiar with this act—a person pretending to cry to get what they wanted. And it was quite transparent; she just wanted this autograph of mine to resell at some auction. I was glad nothing else of hers was this transparent, as I quickly glanced away from her towel-covered bust.
Ashlyn bumped into me, her shades concealing her face and her gaze fixed solely on me. She whispered into the side of my ear, "What do you think you're doing? Lily, sign the towel! You really need to learn how to treat your fans better than this!"
"But... but she... wants me to..." I reluctantly confessed, "I've never held a pen before. I never needed to, and I don't have an... an autograph."
Ashlyn shook her head disapprovingly and deftly retrieved a cosmetic bag filled with her tricks. She skilfully sifted through its contents, retrieving a miniature keyring featuring her own image and placing it into her separate bag. Amidst her selections, she also extracted a small tub of green slime, cautioning, "This is for eating; avoid using it for anything else." With that, she handed me the bag containing the remaining items.
I hesitantly extended my hand to accept it, gripping the bag delicately with just two fingers, as though I were handling something hazardous, like a bomb or a container of corrosive chemicals that might harm my skin.
"What on earth are you doing, holding my precious makeup bag in such a peculiar manner? It's a collection of my most exquisite cosmetics, you know! Surely, Starrling, you can find something among these elegant items to grace an autograph with. Perhaps use this lipstick to bestow upon her your personal kiss print... but please, do present her with
S O M E T H I N G! Don't leave your fans just lingering like dried food clinging to a homeless man's beard.
"Okay, fine," I muttered. What can I even do with lipstick? I know some people put their own personal kiss print on autographs when signing a personal card, but this is just a freaking towel the woman is wearing. Imagine having to sign over 10,000 of these things. Your lips would pucker up into a permanent duck pose. I prepared to hold the lipstick in a manner that resembled an ancient swordsman engaging in a sword battle. Then I realised, just like with a pen, that I had never used a stick of lipstick before, and I had absolutely no clue how to hold it steadily to apply it to myself. Then it dawned on me: people usually had a mirror to assist them when applying lipstick.
The woman was still holding the towel with her bust area right in my face, her expression shifting to impatience as she grew eager to move on. Long gone were all the pseudo tears, as if she suddenly remembered her pet mole rat needed feeding back home. The fan attempted to force crying but squinted her eyes; yet it was absolutely, 100% not working.
What hit her hardest was the 'fan' showing signs of disinterest in her. So, I spontaneously grabbed a part of the towel below her upper area and started smudging my name on it, beginning with the letter 'L,' then forgetting how to spell the rest of my name and experiencing a momentary pause. "L then E?" I thought. I tried to write an 'E' and then smacked my forehead. My name is spelt "L-I-L-L-Y," not "Lelly" or whatever I was spelling. By smacking my forehead, I realised I'd just splattered a lot of red lipstick goo all over it.
Ashlyn, with her eyes fixed on me like a hawk despite her wearing shades, was piercing into my soul with her disapproval.
Fine... I just gave up and drew a smiley face on the fan's autograph towel instead, like a child with finger paint, smudging the lipstick all over the towel and getting my hands absolutely covered in it.
Surprisingly, the 'fan' seemed very pleased with it and then asked, "Could you sign my phone as well?"
What? I thought to myself. Do they really want all this red mass of lipstick goo all over their phone screen as well?
Ashlyn stepped forward and said, "Sorry, Starrling, only one autograph per person."
"Starrling!? Huh?" a voice from the back shouted out.
Another fan shouted, "It's Ashlyn Starr! Ashlyn in the flesh."
"No, she is quite clearly wearing clothes," I said. Why did I just shout that? I shook my head in dismay, even though it was October.
All the fans, who were once devoted to the fox-girl towel-wearing Lillian had shifted their attention to Ashlyn, leaving Lillian behind in an instant. They were now going wild for Ashlyn, like a horde of ravenous zombies. Perhaps my use of the word 'flesh' triggered their inner zombie hunger.
"Time to leave," Ashlyn declared, urging Lillian to quicken her pace and move along.
"But...but," I said as she grabbed me by the hand and ran as fast as she could in her sleek leather pumps. "Aren't they your devoted fans? They are all cheering your name! Shouldn't you also treat your fans well?"
"I already told you before, they are not StarrGazers; they are all 'eww' and 'yuck.'"
"Oh, okay."
Eliza and Larisa materialised by our sides, like ethereal apparitions. Eliza donned a smug expression, which I would rather not know the source of.
Larisa exclaimed, "Yikes! Look at all those towel people," with both Eliza and Lillian sharing similar expressions.
Ashlyn paced even faster and said, "Would you three hurry up? There's a ghost cat we need to see! We don't have all day!"
"No way!" I thought to myself. Can this be real life? Are we genuinely on the verge of encountering the ghost cat? After enduring all these frustrating delays and time-wasting, I started to lose hope it would ever come to pass. Yet here we were, teetering on the edge of an exhilarating climax, on the cusp of an encounter with this enigmatic feline apparition!
Ashlyn exclaimed, seemingly out of thin air, "Oh dear, I've just noticed the time. The train is scheduled to leave in a mere five minutes, and it's located over ten miles away. It appears rather improbable that we'll reach it, especially with that pursuing horde of blackholers coming at us. How I wish we could slow down our pace so I could check my alerts, but then I might be swallowed up whole."
"So, no ghost cat now? Please don't play with my emotions like this; my heart can't endure much more." Sobs of sadness began to well up inside Lillian.
Larisa, not liking to see Lillian upset, said, "Which way is the train station?"
"It's, well, it's positioned to the north-east of the Raven Arena. If you're facing the arena, with it on your left, you'd head north, then a tad to the north-east, continue forward, and eventually turn east," Lillian uttered, seemingly knowledgeable about the Raven Arena but not so much about giving clear directions.
"Thank you! Teehee! Muahaha! Nyahaha! That makes perfect sense!" Larisa exclaimed, bubbling with excitement.
"Much better than using the GPS on the phone, I guess. What a useless piece of tech that is," Lillian added.
The black-hole zombie crew was getting closer. Donning just towels significantly limited their movement; otherwise, they would have caught up with the girls right away. Some tried to increase the pace, but it caused their towels to loosen, so they had to periodically stop to readjust. Many were struggling to see far ahead, squinting due to too much screen time. They relied on navigation apps to get around the city.
"Turn 90 degrees, strut forward with two steps, and swing your feet to the left. Pivot your feet to the left by 34 degrees. Walk forward four doggo steps," the AI bot assistant delivered a set of instructions in a monotone voice. The horde followed each directive with surprising precision, creating a scene that resembled a choreographed dance rather than practical directions.
Ashlyn tapped on her phone rapidly, each beep resembling Morse code, perhaps translating to a secret message like, 'SOS—Send Over Snacks.' "Okay, status update updated." She had graciously inscribed on her eBunnee page that she was en route to the... oh my starrs!" She hesitated before finishing the sentence after reading what she had actually written. "... The Swamps of Heart-ling Forest. I intended to choose a supermarket as the destination I was heading to, but alas, the autocomplete had other plans."
The AI assistant bot updated accordingly, with the horde of fools going off to the swamp.
Eliza, the sole attentive one amidst Larisa and Lillian's divergent conversation, remarked, "Don't they have... eyes?! Or a brain?" Her gaze followed the horde of people as they veered off in the entirely opposite direction from where the girls were.
"Time to go, go, go! Weeeeee~!" Larisa shouted excitedly, enveloping all three girls in her expansive, ghostly forcefield. Gripping them tightly, she zoomed towards the train station using the directions they had just received.
During the ghost travel, Lillian experienced a unique perspective. Instead of merely witnessing the surroundings, she felt a rush of memories flooding back—playing at the beach as a child, celebrating her first birthday party, even recalling the odd discovery of a two-year-old pink carton of milk turning yellow and green. Despite its initial off-putting appearance, she couldn't resist the temptation to sniff it, only to find it smelt like wax and wasn't as repulsive as expected. The recollection extended to her first encounter with fire, where the mesmerising flames tempted her to touch them. A cascade of memories engulfed her, each scene etched with a nostalgic glow.
As the journey continued, memories of Lillian beating the first level in a video game triggered a wave of happiness and bliss she hadn't felt in a long time. Meeting Larisa was the only thing that came close to making her feel this way. The experience became a moment of profound joy amid the chaotic adventure.
They swiftly reached the train station, and Larisa came to a standstill, letting the protective forcefield down and allowing the three of them to regain their composure. It didn't even strike Eliza or Ashlyn as unusual; it was like a taxi ride they had taken numerous times already. To everyone's amusement, Lillian and Eliza's hair appeared as though a bomb had detonated on top of their heads. The two shared a glance and burst into giggles before turning their attention to Ashlyn. Ashlyn's flawlessness raised eyebrows, with not even a single hair out of place or any of her makeup smudged in the slightest. Perhaps her hair was genuinely a product of CGI black magic, after all.
Ashlyn nonchalantly spoke up, "Server error 43."
"What?!" they all asked in unison.
"Server error 43!"
Lillian, eager for praise for Larisa's amazing ability to bring them all here, prodded with the comment, "We're here at the train station! Larisa got us here within mere seconds! Isn't she just amazing?"
"Lily, Starrling, that was merely five minutes ago. Could you possibly move on? We have more pressing matters to attend to at the moment, such as my phone's connection going awry," she reiterated, emphasising, "Server error 43!" one more time just to drive it home.
"I think... you should find the other 42 errors," Eliza muttered.
"No! Her speed space travel caused it, and the zombie horde was already dealt with by moi," Ashlyn retorted.
Eliza tried her best to comfort her. "Ashlyn, breathe slowly. You'll get your connection back in no time."