"Excuse me for a moment." I head for the restroom and close myself into a toilet stall to call my house on the cell phone. Someone picks up. I hear the sound and the fury in the background. A pulse rifle and then, "Hello?"

"Who is this?" I ask.

"Who is this?" Trevor says.

"It's me."

"Who's me? Whoa, whoa, hey you bitch, stop shooting me, I'm on the goddamn phone! Hello?"

"Trevor, it's me."

"Oh, hey man. Peter shot me even though I fucking called time out to answer the phone. Stop fucking shooting me, you dick wad!"

In the background I hear Peter: "...then stop running around picking up weapons..."

"Hey, what's up?" Trevor asks, "How's the gay music?"

"We're still at dinner. Becky brought her sister along."

"Man, you are so lucky. That's cool. How come a chick never did something like that for me?"

"It's not like that."

"You need me to come out there are meet you guys? You know, like hook up later for a drink or something? -- Stop fucking shooting me!...I was picking up the minigun because you fucking shot me before when I answered the phone and now I only have a pulse rifle!...so stop fucking shooting me or I'll keep picking shit up! -- So you want me to come out there?"

"No, I'm going to be coming right over after the concert. Her sister's staying with her, so I doubt I'm going to get asked in and even if I did...well, I don't think the evening's going anywhere."

"Okay, but if you want me to come along, just say the word. You could ask her if you could bring your friend along and I could be there in like, I don't know, ten minutes."

"So how's the game?"

"It really rocks. Game of the year, all the way." He tells me about Survivor mode, where everyone's a Marine except one player, who's an alien. When a Marine gets killed, he respawns as an alien. Gradually, the tide turns and the Marines are outnumbered. You score by staying alive as a Marine as long as you can. Cowering in a corner, evading the aliens' pheromone tracking. Holding them back with the biggest weapon you can find. Banding together with the other surviving Marines and covering each other's backs. Watching the walls, the ceilings, all those inscrutable duct openings, the readings on your motion tracker.

"It's just like the movie," Trevor beams, "If I had a nickel for every time someone said 'remember, short controlled bursts' or 'I got movement'."

"How are the weapons?"

"Man, there are some really cool ones. The aliens have these new abilities, too."

"And you can still eat the heads off the humans, right?"

"Yeah, they got that effect with the teeth. Get this, you can be a face hugger."

"No way. What do you do, impregnate your victims?"

"Yeah."

"Then you eat the bodies, right?"

"Yeah, for health."

"Look, don't let anyone leave. I'm going to try to get home as early as possible."

I come out of the stall and there's a man staring at me like I'm some kind of freak. He must have heard stuff about eating human heads, impregnating victims, and not letting anyone leave. "It's this game we play," I start to say, but I figure that just makes it sound worse.

I come back to the table and Becky and her sister are talking about whether Joey and Rachel are going to 'hook up'.

"Who are Joey and Rachel?" I ask politely.

"Friends." The sister says. She doesn't elaborate. She can tell I'm not getting it. "You know, the TV show."

"Oh, right."

After dinner, we wait on the sister to have dessert. Then she wants to swing by a liquor store on the way to the concert. She gets a bottle of vodka and drops it into her purse. After they take our tickets at the gate, the security guard asks to check the girls' purses. She takes the sister's vodka and drops it into a big garbage can of confiscated goods. "See if I fucking care," the sister says, tossing her hair indignantly.

The opening band is playing. They're also pop rock troubadours, but they're from Portugal and this is their first North American tour. We sit and listen, clapping politely after each song. Then the lights come up and we're waiting around for almost an hour while they swap out drum sets and microphones and whatnot.

Becky and her sister are sitting to one side of me. While they're talking to each other, I must look like some loser who came alone. Becky's sister is talking about how romantic Portugal must be.

"I knew this guy from Portugal once," she says, leaning over Becky to tell me, "I wouldn't go out with him because I thought he was Italian."

"What's wrong with Italians?" I ask good-naturedly, but the sister doesn't hear me. She's asking me who I thought was cuter, the lead singer or the bassist.

Why is she asking me that? "Well, I guess it depends," I venture.

"Yeah, I guess it depends on your type," she says, reaching across Becky to jab me in the side. What is she talking about?

The lights go down and the pop rock troubadours come out. Everyone's cheering. Then everyone's standing up. Great. There's going to be standing and sitting, standing and sitting, just like church. I soon realize I'm wrong and there's mainly just standing. All these people paid for perfectly good seats and they're not using them.

"Are you ready to rock?" the singer asks.

The crowd cheers.

"Then you're in the wrong place, because we're here to spread joy and love."

I figure this sort of fake-out isn't a very good way to ingratiate yourself to the crowd. Don't kids at concerts take that whole 'ready to rock' thing seriously? That's like going to a job interview and doing that fake handshake where you put your hand out and then pull it back to smooth your hair after the other person reaches out to shake it. The audience doesn't seem to mind, however. They all love the pop rock troubadours.

"This is a song about opening your heart," the lead singer says and he starts strumming a ballad on his guitar. I zone out.

So you can be a facehugger. You can plant an alien embryo in someone's chest and it'll burst open and then you're a chestburster until you grow into a full grown alien.

"This is a song about not being afraid to love," the lead singer says about their next tune.

In Aliens vs. Predator 2, there's every reason to be afraid. What you can't see will kill you. Aliens can come from anywhere. Predators can cloak. A lot of the levels are dark. You have night vision, but it disables your motion tracker and it runs off a small battery. You also have a shoulder lamp, but usually it won't show you an alien until the last minute, just as he's pouncing at your throat.

"This is a song about how it's okay to be vulnerable," the singer says.

The aliens are very vulnerable. Fast, but vulnerable. They can't take a lot of damage. They rely on stealth and speed.

"Remember to love your neighbor and don't let the world get you down," the singer says after his last song, "Peace out, everyone."

But then there's an encore. The band comes back and does two more interminable songs before we leave. It takes a half hour to get out of the parking lot. Becky's sister is talking about how she knew someone who dated the drummer.

Cont'd