The Best of Both Worlds

"Come on, you'll love it, man," David said for the third time.

Aidan rolled his eyes for the third time. "This is still a terrible idea. Stop trying to help me get over Megan, OK? I promise, I'm fine, and even if I wasn't, this wouldn't help."

"Fuck Megan," David pointed in his face as they turned the corner off the avenue, to the side street where the party supposedly would be. "I mean, forget about fucking Megan. Whatever. You're over her. I'd be bringing you to this party if you were married just to be my wingman. And if you just

happen

to hit it off with some sweet lady, well, you can thank me later."

"I don't know why you expect me to hit it off with someone here. You know this party isn't my kind of thing."

"Oh, well, I'm sorry you can't turn off your art major brain for one night, but the holiday is big enough to be more than one thing. I know you like the horror stuff, but there's nothing wrong with the sexy side too."

It was an old argument between them. They had known each other for three years, since freshman year. David was a political science major and Aidan was in film studies. Aidan loved horror movies - the psychology, the cinematography, the history tracing back from

Scream

to Hammer Horror to Frankenstein to the 19

th

-century Gothic fiction it was based on.

However, he was indifferent at best to the cheap skimpy knockoff costumes of cartoon or video game characters. Unfortunately, that seemed to be David's favorite kind.

"Dave, you know there's plenty of porn out there, right?" Aidan asked. "I can get porn. If you want to see Princess Peach upskirt photos, I assure you we can find them online. It's called Rule 34."

"Sure, online, but at this party there will be actual women. Who might want you to get that pink skirt off them!" Dave said with a wide grin, scratching his scalp.

His green wig looked itchy. He was dressed up as Beetlejuice, with a nylon striped suit and green wig. He had put black circles around his eyes but hadn't bothered with the white paint.

"Well, maybe not you tonight," Dave said. "I told you, you should have worn the mask. But maybe you can get someone's number."

"I hate wearing rubber masks like that. And if they can't appreciate a man with an actual Freddy Krueger makeup job, are they even worth my time?" he answered sarcastically.

"Yeah, but if you hit it off with someone - I'm just saying

if

- you can take a mask off. You think anyone's going to want to touch you with that makeup on?"

Aidan sighed. He was tempted to keep arguing, but they had arrived at the address. He drew up short.

I have to admit the location fits the occasion

, he thought.

The house was Victorian -

no, Romanesque Revival

, Aidan thought, drawing on a paper he wrote about the movie

Clue

. The grass and bushes in the small lawn were overgrown. Ivy was growing up a corner of the house. He couldn't see too much of the condition of the house other than that because the nearest working street light was so far away, but there was a parapet that definitely had bricks missing. He almost started looking for a chain-link fence and "Abandoned property" notices, but there were lights on in two ground-floor windows.

"See? This is the kind of place you'd want to be tonight, right?" David said, sweeping his arms in a grand gesture.

"Well, since my shots are up to date..." Aidan grumbled.

They climbed the steps. The front porch creaked, and not in an eerie way, just with the sound of a loose nail. The door was ajar, though, and they clearly weren't the first people there.

"All right!" David said. A dark, empty hallway led in front of them, but rooms to both sides had activity. To the left, at least a dozen people dancing, a strobe light, and "Thriller;" to the right, a smaller group chatting, lit by three or four dim lights around the room, with brighter lights in a room beyond. The dining room and kitchen, Aidan assumed.

"Let's get drinks!" David said. He led them to the right, bobbing to the beat of the music. They wove between wings, fins, foam swords, and other props, and filled red plastic cups from the keg on the counter.

Dave greeted Stan, another classmate. Aidan made the barest small talk, but mostly studied his surroundings. It lived down to his expectations. He gave the Ghostbuster with the cardboard proton pack points for trying, and had to admit the alien abductee costume - an inflatable green bug-eyed alien attached to a man's back, as if he was perpetually being carried off by the alien - was funny.

Beyond that? He saw a pirate that could have been Captain Hook without the hook or Jack Sparrow without the hair, beard, or makeup. A man in a leather jacket, white t-shirt, and Wolverine claws up his sleeves, and a mop of unkempt blond hair. Two women in red leotards with devil horns. One had matching wings and the other had a cloven tail. He appreciated the curves of the one with the tail and how tightly the leotard fit her, but didn't think it would go well if he said so.

"Oh! Dude, come on!" Dave said, almost spilling Aidan's beer as he pulled him along.

Aidan yelped, but before he could fight back, he had already found where David was taking him. "Remember Emily and Amber?" he asked.

"Oh, hey. Hi!" Aidan said, hopeful for someone to talk to here rather than David, but his hopes died quickly.

"Aren't their costumes great?" David gushed.

"Yeah, great. Especially Amber's," Aidan said, with a smile he hoped they wouldn't be offended by. Amber giggled, and her bushy mustache got a little looser.

"Seriously? Come on, I mean, no offense, Amber, but you have to admit Emily's is better, right?" David asked.

They looked at him expectantly. Amber was wearing blue overalls with a pillow underneath giving her a jolly belly, a red shirt, a white hat and gloves, and a brown mustache. Emily was wearing a pink frilly strapless dress that ended at her knees, and a small plastic crown.

"No, they're both great. Mario and Princess... Apricot, right?" He hoped David would get his joke, but continued hurriedly in case the girls did too. "Regardless, I'm just saying, I can tell that Amber went a little above and beyond, that's all. Yours is great too, Emily."

"Thanks! Is that makeup?" Emily asked.

"Yeah."

"Dude, come on, we're going to have to have a bet to settle this..." David said, dragging him into the hall again. "They're dressed as a couple! They're two girls! I have a plan to get them to make out with each other, just play along!"

"Jesus Christ..." Aidan shook his head. "Look, do what you want, I'm going to see if there's anyone I know dancing."

Aidan feared the excuse was too flimsy, but Dave didn't argue, returning to the video game characters.

He took a familiar place to the side of the dance floor and eyed the partiers.

Let's see, there's Snow White with a miniskirt instead of a dress, Velma with a cleavage window, a cheerleader... I could be in my dorm on redgifs, and I'd be just as likely to actually get laid. Why did I spend an hour on the bus just to drink Coors Lite while watching this?

Dave, Emily, and Amber came into the dance room. Aidan sidled out to the other side of the main crowd before they saw him.

He had already been in the dining room and kitchen. Stairs went up next to the dining room door. He couldn't see what was up there.

He reconsidered the odds that the house was actually abandoned.

This house is huge but that dining room table couldn't seat more than four people. There isn't much furniture, and it's old, and not the fancy museum sort of old, just old like if no one has had a reason to throw anything away for a very long time

, he thought. The refrigerator in the kitchen and all the lights he had seen so far were fed by extension cords, running along the floor to both rooms from a door down the hall, ajar. He meandered that way to check it out.

The door led to basement stairs, but he didn't get the chance to see more than that before a woman came up them.

She wore a blue bodysuit covering her from the neck down but revealing all her curves, a skull cap with a scale pattern, blue face paint matching the bodysuit and narrow vampire fangs. She was a few inches shorter than Aidan, but walked as if she could trample him. He stepped back out of reflexive politeness. She met his eyes and curled the corners of her lips up as she walked by.

He watched her ass sway in the bodysuit, then shook himself. "Lady Sylvia?" he asked.

She stopped between the stairs and the living room, turned. "Excuse me?"

"Lady Sylvia Marsh," he said, more confidently. "From

The Lair of the White Worm

, right?"

She cocked her head as she took a few steps back to him. "A fan of old movies, I see."

Aidan shrugged. "It's from the 80s. That's not that old."

"Hmmm. A

real

fan." She studied him, ran her hand over his shoulder, down his hand to his gloves with knives on them (blunt, you'd have to get them in someone's eyes to actually do any damage, but actual metal), then clasped it. "Come with me," she said abruptly.

"Okay..." he said as she led him upstairs. She was forceful but unhurried, and of course, why fight back? Isn't this why Dave had brought him here?

"Wait, can we turn a light on?"

"I know where we're going, and you'll be able to see well enough soon," she said, surprisingly clearly despite the fangs.

She led him up the stairs, down the hall past three doors, to a door indistinguishable from the previous, and pulled him inside.

It was the first room of the house that looked lived in. There was a small rug between the couch and two thick upholstered chairs. All other furniture - a dresser, some chairs against the wall, four end tables and a coffee table - was wooden, and it all looked heavy. One light on the wall and three lamps around the room provided plenty of light.

She shut the door behind him with a click, strode to the couch, and turned to evaluate him. "There are over 20 guests here, and you, dear boy, are the only one alone. Why is that?"

"Wow, that's blunt," he said. When she didn't respond, he continued, "Maybe I was dancing with friends and just needed a break."

"No, you weren't," she spoke casually but decisively, as confident of that as of the weather.

He raised his arms, let them flop down in exasperation. "Maybe this isn't my kind of party, OK? Is there anything wrong with that?"

She pursed her lips. "I don't remember inviting you. You entered freely anyway. Is there something wrong with this gathering?"

That drew him up short. "It's your party? Sorry, no offense. My friend David said he was invited by a grad student he knew and I could come along."

"Ah, yes. I know David. Any friend of David's. But if the party is so disappointing, then why did you come?"

He swallowed. "It's fine. Really. It's just not for me. I mean, I love scary stuff, I love Halloween, but I just don't love how most of these costumes are just cheap jokes. I mean, you saw Mario and the princess down there, right? What's scary about that?"

"Ah. A horror purist. But can't something be both? Scary and sexy at the same time?"

"Sure," he said by reflex. She raised her arms questioningly. He studied her. Her outfit certainly qualified. If he couldn't see the seam around her neck and wrists and fabric bunching at her elbows, he'd be sure it was all body paint. Well, body paint with strategic scaly pasties covering the nipples of her full breasts and her pubic area.

He did a double take. She had scales where pubic hair would be, but also had a rounded slit clearly visible where they trailed off. "Yeah, that is an amazing costume," he said. Her met her eyes again. She seemed to know which part he had been studying. He blushed.

"Would you like a closer look?" She strode toward him, weaving her hips back and forth. He struggled to meet her eyes while also watching the slit between her legs appear and disappear.

She put a hand on his shoulder with a surprising amount of weight to it. "Like what you see, Freddy?"

"Yeah," he whispered. He couldn't help focusing on a detail that seemed important but he couldn't tell why.

It's amazing how well she talks with those fangs in her mouth

. He stepped back, held out his hand, tried to return to normal social conventions, and said in a louder voice, "Actually, my name's Aidan."

She took his hand gracefully despite his gloves. "Call me Carmen."

He floundered for something to say and backed up a step to give her space. "That is a great costume, Carmen," he started.

Asshole! Commenting on a costume isn't normal when it's a costume like that!

"I mean, it must have been a ton of work. Or cost a ton. Whatever."

"Thank you," she said, following him in a circle. "I was a mermaid last year, and you can imagine that was a hassle. I was Elizabeth Bathory before that. It's my favorite costume and was the life of the party, but one shouldn't overuse them, you know?"

He was puzzled.

Elizabeth Bathory? The Hungarian noblewoman accused of bathing in the blood of hundreds of virgins, allegedly an inspiration for Dracula? What would a costume of that look like?

He tried to remember if he had ever seen a picture of Bathory. He tried to figure out how he'd tell a costume of one specific noblewoman from a generic princess.

Unless the costume was just her naked, covered in blood...

"Yes, I think you get the idea. Scary and sexy," she said.

"Are you a virgin?" She asked abruptly.

"Yes," he replied. He was surprised he didn't lie about that. He had done so dozens of times, but this time it didn't occur to him until it was too late, like the truth came out his mouth from somewhere other than his brain. "I mean, technically, I guess. I had a girlfriend but her parents were pretty strict, so we've experimented a lot, but we didn't, you know, go all the way and..."

"A technical virgin. The best kind," she said with a smile. "You'll be of use to me, Aidan. Two or three others downstairs may be as well, but because you were alone, you'll be of use to me. Because you're a virgin, your service will be particularly appreciated. And because you're such a fan of horror, of scares and being scared, I'll give you a choice."

She put her hand on his shoulder, and again she felt much heavier, more solid than her slight frame would explain.

"Would you like to experience many more scares on a wide variety over years to come, and maybe even have a few more encounters that are both scary and sexy at the same time? To have a chance at the best of both worlds again?"

He wanted to say no. He wanted to leave. He couldn't count how many red flags she was displaying. He thought about how to politely say no and explain that horror movies were just a fad he'd probably grow out of. But his mind seized on the phrase "years to come."

If I say yes, she won't take out a knife and slash my throat, or kill me any other way! Or make me a zombie or mindless thrall or anything like that! Maybe she'll just drink my blood and let me go, or just give me a scare and have a laugh at my expense!

"Yes."

"Excellent," she said. "I'm not taking part in those encounters myself, you understand. But you'll have the chance." And with that, she reared her head back, bared her fangs again, and lunged at his neck.

He yelped. There was a terrible burning sting in his neck, followed by a cold feeling, followed by nothing at all. He could feel nothing but his heart racing and wondered when it would stop.

He was surprised to find how long it took. He had expected that he would die within seconds of her revealing her real fangs - or stinger, or ovipositor, or dagger, or runes glowing in the air; there were many kinds of monsters, but from the perspective of only-technical-virgins in his position, it didn't usually matter - but except for numbness in his neck, he felt fine.

He felt great, in fact. He was increasingly aware of two other sensations: first, her full breasts pressing against his chest, and second, his dick straining against his pants. Whatever she was doing to him, apparently it left enough blood for a massive erection.

"Um," he said, pushing back against her. This had absolutely no impact on her attachment to his neck, but feeling the smooth curves of her hips in his hands increased his arousal further.

She finally pulled back. "Ahhhh," she sighed with pleasure, and he saw dark blood on her fangs. She leered at him.

She glanced at his hands on her hips and he wondered if she was mad, but before he could react, she pushed him back and grabbed the front of his sweater with one hand, pulling it away from him and up. With one unbelievably sharp fingernail on the other hand she cut it down the middle. She repeated the process with his undershirt, then smoothly unsnapped and unzipped his jeans.

He shrugged out of his ruined sweater and shirt and let his jeans and underwear fall. Whatever the crazy beautiful monster wanted to happen clearly would, so he might as well make it easy. His erection stood up rigid at an angle; she could mount him right here if he could hold her up.

She didn't test his strength. Instead she pushed him back again and to the side, maneuvering him onto the couch. He dropped, dazed, reeling, feeling the blood loss for the first time. His erection was still solid, though. She started stroking it and he gasped.

She put one foot on the couch next to him, resting her free hand on her knee, her thigh right by his head, her scaly slit right in front of her face. He got a closer look at it than he had before and couldn't believe how realistic it looked, except for the bumpy scales, mostly above it but some below and all around.

He glanced at the wrist of the hand on her knee. The seam of the bodysuit he had noticed earlier. On a closer look, it was very thin and frayed, ragged. Like the costume had unaccountably more wear and tear there than anywhere else, or like it was an actual reptile's skin being shed, or like the scales were actually part of her and the seam was just rigid collodion meant to look like a disguise.

"Hmmm," she moaned. She released his erection, now slick with precum, fingered the slit between her legs, not a design on a costume but her actual cunt, ready and waiting for a cock like his.

"Wait! Are you sure..." he stopped.

Elizabeth Bathory supposedly sacrificed virgins, so if she wants to fuck me, I'm safe. But if she's a horror movie monster, a virgin is probably safer. But the monsters don't usually fuck the victims themselves...

"Hah. Your blood is mine either way, boy," she replied. "I decided that when I took you upstairs. I'm just taking your virginity because it's fun." With that, she lowered her leg, kneeled on the couch straddling him, lined her cunt up with his engorged member, and leaned down, taking him into her.

"Ow!" he was surprised that it hurt. He had read that was sometimes a problem for uncircumcised men like himself.

She smiled at his reaction, showing fangs again. She bucked her hips back and forth slowly, balancing on the couch with supreme control, making his cock probe her cunt at every possible angle.

He breathed slowly but deeply. She bucked her hips again, faster, settling into a steady rhythm. She leaned down and put her mouth on his neck again. He rested his hands on her hips and kissed her neck and shoulder but she didn't react, just kept bucking her hips on his cock and doing something to his neck.

As soon as she had fully taken him into her the pain had ended and it felt good. He felt pressure on his neck and wondered what else he should feel, what that numbing effect was hiding, but he couldn't bring himself to care too much. He was truly fucking her, or maybe being fucked by her. He had had his share of handjobs and blowjobs and fingered his girlfriend now and then, but this was the first time he had had his cock inside a tight canal of flesh meant for the purpose. He was dizzy, and he wasn't sure it was just the blood loss.