Fighting games had always been Andrew's thing; he seemed to have a natural acuity for them. He saw one with a hippie chick standing by it, tie-dye, tote bag, the works. She seemed to be adjusting something in her bag, though, rather than actually playing.
He walked up to her. "Hey," he said.
"Hey," she said, not looking up from her bag.
"You playing?"
Now she looked up. "I was. Just thinking of heading out. Why?"
"Well, I was hoping to play."
"Have you ever played this game before?" she asked.
"No," he said.
Her response to that was a smile that somehow made Andrew shiver. "Well, let's go together then."
He shrugged. "Sure, why not?"
There were a lot of characters to choose from, but Andrew couldn't help but notice that absent were the usual macho martial-arts types. Instead, it seemed to be mostly fantasy creatures - faeries, nagas, nymphs - and almost all of them sexy women, with a few androgynous-looking men thrown in.
"Is this from a franchise?" asked Andrew. The girl didn't answer, only choosing a purple-skinned demoness in form-fitting armor. He chose a sexy witch.
She was clearly more experienced than he was, but his natural talent for these games kept him afloat. He wasn't exactly playing with strategy, but he wasn't exactly button-mashing either, rather fumbling in the dark for what seemed to work. Before long, he had gained the upper hand on her, and, barely, won the first round.
As the second round began, he could hear her hyperventilating next to him; she was getting way into this. When he brought her down to half her health bar with over three-quarters his remaining, she literally screamed out loud. She seemed to go on tilt then, just mashing buttons, and went down the rest of the way easily.
"FINISH HER!" the narrator boomed, a combination coming up on screen. "Wait!" the girl yelled, reaching across the console, but Andrew had pressed the buttons before her protest even registered. By some trick of the light, her arm seemed to... change color...? as she withdrew it. On the screen, the witch towered over the demoness, arcs of magical energy flowing into her body as she cowered. She shrank down to ankle height on the witch and froze in place, after which the witch held her new trophy up to the camera.
"Well, that was fun," Andrew said. "Better luck n..." he paused, realizing the girl was no longer there. Down on the ground lay her clothes and her tote bag. On a hunch, he reached into her clothes, where he found a little doll of the demoness, wearing the same terrified expression from the game.