Like Warm Sun on Nekkid Bottoms - Charles Austen [169]
At this con in particular—one of the larger conventions in the country—two hundred thousand people could pay for admittance on a single Saturday. If only one percent of those dressed up and refused to speak English during their visit, we’re talking two thousand such individuals parading, babbling, and posing for cameras. In a place that’s approximately one square mile, that’s a considerable concentration of ‘unique’. And I suspect the actual percentage of costume-types to be much, much higher.
I mean, just consider the number of subcategories.
Star Trek fans. Star Wars fans. Manga fans—which are multiple and various. Battlestar Galactica fans. Stargate fans. Superhero fans, which in-and-of itself has many subsubcategories like Batman, and his fighting friends, Superman, Wonder Woman, Spiderman, Captain America, the X-Men, and even more obscure characters like Bishop, Moon Knight, Cloak and Dagger, Lobo, Savage Dragon, Mister Monster, and Sammy the Fish Kid. Then here are the fans of old pulp characters like The Shadow, Tarzan, The Spider, The Avenger, and Doc Savage. In addition you’ll find a significant population of Clive Barker fans dressed as specific, or interpreted, characters from his many horror projects such as Hellraiser, Nightbreed, and People Who Eat Things Off The Floor. Beyond horror, there’s ‘The Furries’, a sub category of fantasy fans who like to dress up as incarnations of human-animal hybrids, or just commission nude drawings of them. Foxes, wolves, cats, ferrets, mice, whatever. There are Fans of Harry Potter. Fans of Harry Dresden, fans of Harry Connick Jr., fans of Harry and David, and fans of Harry, Prince of Wales.
On top of that, throw in the professional models paid by the many companies to dress up as their characters in licensing-approved costumes for promotional purposes. The models wear clothing—or Waboombas-like, no clothing—that helps sell whatever it is the company wants pushed: movies, TV shows, comics, figurines, computer games, or even just the ideas for such things.
Now, imagine all these subgroups sprinkled in amongst the regular people, the average ‘joe’, and averager ‘jane’, many of those still displaying colorful T-shirts, hats, and bags of their own to proclaim appreciation of the same, or similar creations, only to a lesser degree.
Mix all this into a soup of brightly colored comics, eye-catching posters, twelve-foot stacks of toys, tables full of original art, obscure videos, collectible statues, collectible cups, collectible everything, struggling artists, struggling writers, struggling actors, professional artists, professional writers, professional sellers, Lou Ferrigno, and women porn stars selling pictures of themselves, nude, and otherwise. Pour it all into avenue after avenue of tables, and booths formed into a maze not unlike the one in the Shining. Make it thick, make it hot, and make it too much to get through in one sitting, and you have an understanding of the fine consommé that is ‘crème de la comic book convention’. Days and days of sumptuous entertainment with tasty fun to be had by all, leaving you sick, sleepy, and uncomfortable once you’ve consumed everything in front of you.
And so, given the situation, and the event at hand, River followed us through the front entrance of the convention center, penis barely covered, testicles dangling in the shadows of minimal strips of cloth, past several fascinated security people, lots of annoyed, and perhaps envious men, and dozens of appreciative women, without incident.
Sophie and Waboombas both had on bits of Waboombas-wear, and got more than their fair share of looks