His friend Madison shows up

AN: This is inspired by and starts out a little similar to sacchito22's branch, but it'll diverge pretty quickly.

I knocked on John's door again with a huff. Damnit Johnny, you text me out of the blue, make me walk all the way over here on my short legs, then make me knock on the door three times.

The door swung open. John's bratty little sister glared down at me as much as she could with all of three extra inches of height. I don't let it bother me too much, at my level of vertically challenged I had to build up a serious tolerance.

Chloe snorted at me. "Johnny! Your weirdo girlfriend is here!" She shouted up the staircase and let me in.

'Weirdo', that's the best you got? I rolled my eyes and let it go. "Nice to see you too, brat."

She ignored me and flopped herself back on the couch with her phone in her face.

My boots made satisfying clomping noises on the old stairs, despite the thick layer of carpet. A nervous John poked his head out of his room and beckoned to me.

"Madison! You have to see this shit!" He ducked back in without so much as a hello. Typical. Why was I friends with the dork again?

John's room was a haphazard shrine to all things nerdy. Posters of Star Wars and Warhammer, Marvel and DC, even Stormlight Archive and and Dragonlance. He had several dozen figurines and models of every Character imaginable. A whole wall of novels and manga and comics.

Oh yeah, this is why I'm friends with him. I could name everything in here. And the rest of our little town are mostly assholes.

The one oddity in the room was the pink and silver toy ray gun he held out like it was a pissed-off snake. He seemed jittery, eyes wild and face sweaty.

"...John? Are you okay, dude?" Was he on ****? I sure hope not, the one time we got ahold of some weed he nearly had a panic attack. "This better be something mind-blowing." For some reason, that made him laugh like a madman. I crossed my arms beneath my boobs and waited for him to wear himself out.

He's lucky he's cute when he gets excited...

His eyes locked on to mine and he held out the raygun. What I thought was a toy flashed a brilliant pink.