G-Bitez: Hangover

Stephen didn't want to wake up. The weather outside was typical Canada winter, all snow and frost and biting cold, and all he wanted to do was curl up in his big comfy bed and hibernate. The only problem was that Noodle wasn't there to share it, but he could take or leave that as long as it meant he didn't have to leave the bed. And, on top of that, he had a throbbing headache that, he suspected, might have had something to do with last night's celebrations.

But for some reason, breathing through his nose was a problem. So he had to get up to fix that, and that meant getting out of bed. For some reason, his antlers felt rather heavy, and it took a bit more effort to lift his head off of the pillow than it usually did, making him grunt as he hauled himself upright. As far as he knew, they'd never grown as heavy as this - in fact, as he pawed sleepily as his own face, he was pretty sure they didn't rustle, either...

And that was when the clown nose fell off.

"What?" he asked, still half-awake and very confused.

It was to be the start to a very long morning indeed. 

 ------

When Stephen walked into the living room, tinsel and baubles still dangling from his antlers, the other Gorillaz burst out laughing - well, two of them, at least.

"Look out, lads," hooted Murdoc from where he lay slumped across the sofa. "'Ere comes bloody Rudolph the Red-Faced Reindeer!"

"Soddin' 'ell," guffawed 2D over a mug of coffee, "you fink we shouldn't bovver with a tree next year an' just decorate 'im?" Even Russel, mild-mannered as he was, had to cover his mouth with one massive hand to stifle the chuckles that he couldn't hold back.

Stephen, however, was far from being in the mood for such ribbing.

"You can shut up, for a start," he growled, pointing at 2D. "You look like a tree that's had it's leaves stolen, and you," he went on, pointing at the still-laughing Murdoc, "look like the grandma that got run over by a reindeer."

The comparisons were not in-accurate to make - for some reason, 2D had elected to come to the room in only his boxers, the majority of his skinny body exposed to the frigid air in the cabin. Murdoc, meanwhile, resembled a cartoon traffic accident, with bandages and sicking-plaster dotting his body and bruises on his green-tinted skin. In fact, the only one who hadn't woken up in a state of indignity seemed to be Russel, although all looked disheveled and hung-over.

"An' I suppose ya think yer clever, Rudolph?" Murdoc retorted. "Spendin' 'alf the night buttin' 'eads with some bloke wot fancied Noodle and wuz twice yer size?

Russel, at this moment, felt it prudent to chip in. "At least he didn't try flirting with the other girls at the party, Muds. Some of whom, I might add, were his immediate or distant family."

2D gagged at this notion. Murdoc merely glared.

"And it might have helped your case," groused Stephen as he reached for the coffee pot, "if you hadn't referred to my grandma as 'that bitch'."

"...That's who that was?!" Murdoc's eyes bugged out of his head. "She looked like some taxidermist's fukken' fever dream!"

"Yes, and she's also nine foot tall and can crack stone with her bare hands. What did you think was going to happen?!"

Murdoc didn't like this conversation, because it couldn't be solved with a witty comeback or telling someone to sod off. So he turned to 2D instead, resorting to his other favourite tactic of avoiding taking the blame for something - changing the subject altogether.

"An' wot 'appened to your clothes, face-ache?" he demanded, pointing at the near-naked blunet.

2D shrugged. "Threw up on 'em, didn't I? Wendigo ale is fukkin' strong stuff."

"...but then why didn't you put them in the wash?" was the confused reply from Russel.

"Because some drunk bird with moose antlers nicked 'em."

"Nicked em?" Murdoc made a face like he'd found cat poo in his slippers. "Wot would she want wi' yer puke-stained clothes?"

"I dunno. Said she need them for... posterity? I wuz blitzed at the time, so I thought she meant she wuz takin' 'em to the cleaners."

Stephen groaned into his coffee cup. "That would be my cousin Angelina. She's... weird.  Uncle Keme doesn't like to talk about her much."

A long pause.

"...so, in summary," Murdoc spoke up at last, sitting up (albiet painfully). "I got the shit kicked out of me by a grandma. Face-ache was sick and got his clothes nicked by a crazy cusion with a fetish. Steph here let Noodle dress 'im up as Rudolph after beatin' up some bloke mackin' on 'er. No bloody idea what Noods wuz doin' in the meantime. And Russ was...?"

"Ferryin' you assholes to bed before you broke something," was the grouchy reply.

"Right. So, all-in-all, a typical Christmas Eve."

"What," groaned Stephen as he nursed his throbbing head, "was typical about that?"

"Typical Murdoc, at least," grumbled Russ, casting one of his patenty 'angry sleepy bear' looks at the band's bassist. "Same story every year - gets pissed out of his mind, ends up in the emergency wing somehow. When he's not summoning demons to do all the decorating, that is."

"At least they put 'em up quicker than you ever could," snapped back Murdoc, eyes narrowing.

"Skulls and pentagrams," snarled Russel, crunching his toast in a fist, "are not in the spirit of Christmas!"

"Oh, and what do you know? You think Art Deco is Christmassy!"

"Listen here, you little shit-"

Before the argument could blossom into angry fisticuffs, Noodle reappeared from a corner, giving poor 2D a terrible fright, and pushed a wrapped gift into Stephen's hands. Surprised by the sudden action, the Wendigo opened his mouth to protest, but was cut off by the guitarist's own, and there was a prolonged silence where any chance to ask questions was pointedly ignored.

"I figured you'd like a reward for letting me decorate you," purred Noodle, once she'd broken away. "So I snuck out whilst Murdoc was making a spectacle of himself."

Stephen smiled, hangover forgotten. "Well, there's that mystery solved."

This was the signal for everyone to remember that yes, it was Christmas.

-------

One dinner later, whilst everyone else was lying around belching and licking their fingers, Stephen sat in his bedroom and unwrapped Noodle's gift. He'd saved it for last, and wanted to do it in private, mostly because the others had made all kinds of remarks when he'd unveiled Dirk's gift in the form of a six-foot-tall chocolate fountain. The last thing he needed was Murdoc's ugly laughter ringing in his ears for the second time that evening - honestly, the ideas people got into their heads.

He had to wonder, though, as he prised the box open and tipped it up, what sort of a gift required sneaking out of a party in order to obtain. He knew the Gorillaz weren't big on Christmas shopping overall, and thus pretty much relied on Amazon for their gift deliveries. So the notion that one of them even bothered to do it the old-fashioned way was a little-

The locket fell into his lap with a gentle thud.

Stephen stared.

Then he tossed the box aside and picked it up, the chain draping over his skinny fingers like a thread of liquid silver. It took some effort to undo the catch without breaking it, but when he did eventually pry it open, he couldn't hold back the gasp at what he saw. On the one side was a photo of a certain Japanese woman, smiling up at him beneath messy hair that had been trapped under a racing helmet for about an hour or two, looking more contented and happy than he'd ever remembered seeing her. And, engraved into the other side...

Aishiteru, Stephen-kun.
- Noodle-chan <3

Stephen blinked several times, although if that was because tears were forming or he needed to be sure he was seeing this, he wasn't sure.


Then he glanced up at the sound of gentle footfalls approaching him.

"I'm not very good at saying these things," Noodle said, softly. "It's hard to be, after all I had to go through - El Mañana, Plastic Beach, Majuu... You start to forget how to be honest with your own feelings, after a while."

A faint smile crossed Stephen's face. "I'm glad you didn't forget."

"It still wasn't easy." The woman sat down beside him, the mattress depressing beneath her weight. "I thought to myself 'Noodle, you're twenty-six. You're a constant tabloid magnet, you live with a Satanic psychopath and you've seen more death and horror than a child your age has any right to see. What would something like this prove?' But then..."

She trailed off, uncertaintly scribed across her face.

"I started using the racing as a substitute, trying to get the old spark of life back but never quite reaching it. I thought I could feel human again if I just found something I really enjoyed, something that got my blood pumping, like the music used to do before it all went sour. But all it amounted to was a momentary high, like cheap whiskey, and then I'd-"

"It does prove something."

Noodle looked up, surprised at the interruption. Stephen clicked the locket shut, then reached over and took her hands in his.

"The fact that you can still make a gesture like this... It proves that, after everything you've been through, you are still human. You never let go of what made you special, even when 2D had given up and Murdoc decided that being an utter misanthrope was his new normal." Blue eyes met cartoony black, and something passed between them that had no name, and possibly didn't even need one.

"And that's what I really like about you, Noodle."

A smirk. "Apart from my thighs, you mean?"

Stephen went very red, but grinned back. "Eh, make that joint first place."

Another musical laugh, and then a pair of arms wound about him as a body pressed into his own, snuggling into him like a giant skinny teddy bear. Caught off guard, Stephen very nearly let Noodle's weight overbalance him, before returning the embrace as she shuffled her way into his lap. Burying his face into messy black hair, the Canadian youth let one hand rub gently up and down the Japanese woman's back, letting closeness and warmth say all the things that spoken words couldn't quite convey properly.

Well... except for one thing.

"Aishiteru, Noodle-chan," he whispered.

Noodle smiled warmly against his chest.

"Arigato, Stephen-kun."