by Yuli Ban
Maria shook her head and shrugged. "Can't say. We're still at six stars. The best thing to do is to just keep fighting until we're able to get back to base."
"Maybe we shouldn't stop there," Ana said. "They're prolly gonna be looking for us at our old stop, so we should try somewhere else."
"No, that's ludicrous. Besides, that's our safe house."
Olga added, "Yeah, I'm gonna go with Anastasia on this one. We really should find a new place to lay low."
Maria put her foot down. "No! We're going back to the safe house, and that's final!"
"I'm gonna go with Ana."
They all aboutfaced. What stood before them was Alex's limp body, arms stretched out like a zombie and eyes fastened shut. However, he flopped all around as he walked, ambling as if he had just learned what walking was supposed to be and wanted to show everyone. The marionette motion wrought several actions that would have otherwise popped out his bones, such as squatting after a step, stretching out his leg to walk, and waving his hands around blindly.
"He is seriously starting to creep me out," said Tatiana as she fiddled with her hair. Alex fell right onto Olga, drooling and moaning as the girl struggled to keep him steady. As she realized that she had been chosen to carry him, she lifted him up and over her shoulder, only for his hands to repeatedly smack into her face and ears to the point that she nearly dropped him onto Ana and had to feel the cartilage in her earlobe to make sure it was not broken.
Maria smirked. "This is just the aftereffects of El Sexorcisto." She turned to face her comrades. "It's how I know Mya made the right choice. It all seems odd, but… everything’s in its right place.”
“Easy for you to say,” Olga groaned.
Maria eyed the half-track. “Alright then, ladies. Shall we put an end to this once and for all?”
My Only Friend, The End…
“Even my unconscious body hates elves!” I wanted to laugh, but Olga started to pout. Her face wore many weird shadows in the darkness with the only light splashing off from the lamp. That light smacked her like my body, because it really did sound funny in my head. Olga carrying me and my floppy arms hitting her over and over again, taking such special preference for her ears that I made them soar. Also, she gave me some potato chips, so I had to be nice.
She pushed out her lip and said, “I knew it! I knew you were conscious during the entire thing, you liar!”
I backed up and snickered. “No, no, I really wasn’t! Honest! Seriously, the story freaks me out just as much as it did you. I don’t wanna imagine why my body was moving on its own.”
“I already told you,” Maria said with a flick of her hand. “It’s the after effects of El Sexorcisto. Your body is spasming like crazy, so you’re making loads of unconscious movements that cause you to do things while you’re asleep.”
“About that— if an orgasm actually lasted an hour, wouldn’t that just cause severe damage?”
“You’re in a video game, sweetheart.”
“And funny as hell, it’s seriously the most horrible thing I can think of. I don’t wanna be in here, especially because of weird crap like all this. I’m not used to video game physics.”
Ana grabbed a mixtape, shoved it into a cassette player hiding in a lightless section of the room, and began bobbing her head before any music started. She said, “While we’re still waiting for the storm to pass, why not check out some tunes? This is a band called Acidberry.” She tossed me the cassette box and added, “And when it clears, we can resume.”
I laid back and said, “I mean, if my options include going wherever I wanna go whenever I wanna go there, I guess we can slow down and enjoy the moment.” I pulled Ana closer. “I bet you were super badass manning that half-track.”
Ana rubbed the back of her head. I scratched her ears again and then her chin, which she lifted so I could get a better angle. “I guess you could say that.”
“But what I don’t get is what was so damn amaz—"
When I heard Acidberry, my Millennial side wasn’t interested. That was fucking Boomer Rock dressed up as something new and exciting. I wanted to scream at them, “The future is now, old man,” no matter how socially stunted such an act would be. Because good lord, those riffs and the bluesy swing? I could already see the bald-ass sixty-something greyhair in a Margaritaville t-shirt holding his Les Paul like he’s Jimi Hendrix or Eric Clapton.
But the girls liked it enough, so I lifted a brow and looked away. I’m a child of cool, br00tal metal like Slipknot.
Yet the more I looked around the room, the more I wondered if Slipknot and Acidberry alike would prove too loud to the owners and previous denizens. On the wall were framed albums from Bing Crosby, Doris Day, Dion and the Belmonts, the Crew-Cuts, Howlin’ Wolf, and Frank Sinatra. Movie posters also clinged to the aged grime and paste, announcing of such hits as The Searchers, Rebel Without A Cause, The Ten Commandments, The Bridge on the River Kwai, Rio Bravo, and 12 Angry Men. Half of which I never heard. The other half I’d never seen. It was enough to put a smile on my face just from how much it reminded me of Fallout and Destroy All Humans— this pastiche of 1950s Americana, all there for me to enjoy complete with a harem of beautiful women.
“You didn’t hear the best part, though,” Ana said as she glomped me.
Maria scoffed. I didn’t like the way she scoffed— those types were supposed to be sassy and in control, and yet it broke through her teeth like she had no intention of doing it.
Olga said, “We didn’t want to get to that part, but it’s just something we have to deal with for right now.” And her body drooped. The more depressed they acted, the more anxious I became until I was sure I was starting to feel the onset of malignant hypertension.
“There’s so much that’s wrong that I might as well ask ‘what’s right’, huh?”
Ana nodded weakly at me. “Thing is… I’m dead.”
I blinked. “Uhh…. What?”
She smiled at me like an anime girl. “I’m dead, silly!”
I pursed my lips. “Oh. Well… I hope you get better.”
Then she drooped her arms and pouted. “Aww, you don’t wanna hear ‘bout how I died?”
That was too cute for me and I couldn’t resist even if I was mind controlled by cordyceps. I really didn’t want to hear about how my waifu died. No one does. It hurts that part of you that wants to protect the cute, and it always bothered me to imagine cute things dying. But since she was still standing before me, part of me thought she was simply being silly and decided to take my chance with it.
“Alright, shoot. What happened?”
She clasped her hands in front of her and said, “Well, after we stole the half-track, we were chased by the mech we missed.”
“Wait, how do you just miss a ten-story mech?”
“But luckily,” she went on as my mouth dropped over being ignored, “we were able to find one last panzerfaust rocket in the half-track. Since I was still under the influence, Maria didn’t want to let me fire it.”
“Like I said earlier, this bitch literally managed to miss an open hatch that she stuck her arm down,” Maria growled. “I don’t know how weed gives her such reality warping powers to fuck up so badly. It’s honestly amazing sometimes.”
Ana scowled at her and looked back to me. “So I fired it and scored a direct hit! Yay!” She clapped her paws several times. “But…”
All the girls looked down and I felt a bit of anxiety over the sudden change of atmosphere. Thunder also clapped at the same time. It all felt too serious for this story.
“The wreckage fell on top of the half-track,” Olga said. “We were lucky that the whole damn thing didn’t explode then and there.”
“We may have been saved because Ana absorbed the brunt of the blast,” Tatiana added with a half smirk. She cocked her head towards Ana, who continued to give me an innocent smile.
“I was vaporized!”
My eyes started to get heavy and I felt them water. Yeah, she was standing r
ight there. Yeah, she looked healthy enough to me. But I still felt my heart grow heavy at the thought that she may have suffered such an unfair death. It didn’t seem right. Worse than that: she seemed like she wanted to believe she deserved it. I couldn’t read her mind or anything, so maybe it was just my frustration mixing with her cutesy expression. All of it was too tragic to hear and I wanted to ask so many more questions. But before I could, Maria spoke first.
“We were all horrified, and that was when we decided to come to Amville.”
“B-but, she’s gonna be alright, huh?”
They looked up at me and Ana said, “Oh, of course. I’ll respawn.” Then she chuckled nervously. “I-I mean, I hope. None of us have ever died before, but all the Players respawn, so…”
“S-so, you’re a ghost?”
“Technically,” Maria began, “she’s in spectator mode, so I suppose you could say something like that.”
Ana displayed her shiny leather clothes to me, making damn sure to spin around and flash that plushy butt. “I even got my clothes back automatically! Yeah, when I woke up, I was back at our evil lair and had to run all the way out here.”
I folded my arms and sat back down. “You know, when you were telling me that story, it sounded like you were a bunch of badasses. But in retrospect, it all sounds like we got our asses kicked.”
“Oh, absolutely,” Tatiana said. “That’s why we’re here, laying low. But listen.” She leaned in as Ana backed away. “Olga's got a guy.”
I turned to Olga, and she nodded silently. “It’s true. The plan was to go to him ASAP.”
“When we get properly rested, we'll move out again, but for right now we need to lay low.”
I shook my head. “But what about getting Sam? Isn’t that what you wanted to do?”
Maria folded her arms. “It is. But there’s a lot that we’re gonna hafta prepare for. What you’ve done, I can only consider it to be the prologue of a larger story. For us, though, this is only a new chapter.”
Ana walked away, but before she left into the bathroom, she said, “I’m going to leave spec mode for now. I don’t know if I’ll pop back in over at the lair or not, but I figured I’d get some rest.” She stretched, yawned, and mewed. “And in the meantime, you can get comfy with my sisters.”
I reached out to her. “But I wanna get comfy with you!”
“Can’t. Sleepy.” She shut the door. Her shadow darkened the gap at the bottom for several seconds until it vanished. When I walked over to open the door, she was nowhere to be found.
I jumped and turned back to see those bruised elf-ears. “Sorry, Alex. These things happen sometimes.”
I clenched my fists, tugged at my hair, and exploded, “Can you at least turn off that awful music? Jesus Christ, that sounds so old!”
Maria rolled her hand, strolled over to the boom box, and switched it off. Thankfully, that archaic rock and roll was silenced and I no longer felt embarrassed. Damn, even the rain and thunder sounded better than that Boomer-lovin’ crap. “Anyway, I know you’re probably aching to get started on another fight immediately. However, there’s a damn good reason why I want you to slow down and wait. The six stars are still active. What’s more, Sam is undoubtedly furious over us killing Scumlord and suddenly disappearing off the map. Not to mention that he’s likely growing anxious over the possibility of the appearance of another El Sexorcisto. So for right now, we’re going to have to not draw any attention to ourselves. Our wanted level will go down naturally. Until then, we have to lay low. You hear me?”
“But Mya knew…”
“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”
I felt emo urges begin to tug at me. “But you said that Sam knew I was coming all along. Why bother hiding? He probably already knows I’m still alive.”
Olga bounced and said, “Hey, just wanna say, I’m totally up for frying up some delicious elven dishes! Maybe it’ll calm us all down.”
Maria smiled and said, “Sure. You can do that.” Then she nodded towards Tatiana and said, “You’re also a talented cook. Why not join her?”
Tatiana saluted and said, “With pleasure, Ms. D.”
“Hey.” Right as they turned to walk off, they both stared at me. I grabbed the leg of my jeans and forced myself to not be such a coward. “By the way. Olga?”
Her ears perked. “Yes?”
I rolled my head and sighed because it sounded as soppy in real life as it did in my head. “I’m sorry for being so bitchy. I don’t actually hate elves that much,” I lied.
She smiled and said, “Don’t sweat it. Man. I won’t hold it against ya.”
Both ran off to the mini-kitchen, and I was alone with the succubus for the first time since we met. She sat tenderly at the edge of the bed and said, “I know what I said. The truth is that there’s a lot more going on than you’re probably aware of. Things have been getting out of hand, and we need you to mend a few broken storylines.”
“But I don’t even know what my own story is about!”
She grabbed my cheeks and filled my mouth with her tongue. I didn’t mind it, even if it was random. She tasted like Hell, and Hell is very sweet.
When she pulled away, she said, “Just rest and relax, Alex. This chapter is over.”
“It can’t be over. There’s still so much I’ve gotta know. Like how you know Mya and Myles.”
She just doesn’t sound natural when she giggles. “Well, I guess I’ll drop it on you now. Just so we can have a little something to dwell on over the smell of food.”
Right as she said that, I heard sizzling. It wasn’t the rain— this one came from the mini-kitchen, but it was just out of view thanks to a bend in the room. Why a motel would have mini-kitchens in the rooms escaped me, but I didn’t want to end the book complaining. What’s more, I got a good whiff of some oniony aroma. If nothing else, I’d be satisfied with sniffing sautéing onions.
I rubbed my mouth and stared at some red stain along my forearm. Then I gave Maria a stink eye and tried to finger how and why she wore lipstick when her skin was already pure crimson. Again, I betrayed my desire to bitch in lieu of doing some actual discovery.
She said, “Mya and I have been friends for years now. She was the one who formed the Wytches Crue in the first place. Myles was also one of the first lays I’ve ever had in the game.”
“Hmph. So you’ve gotten around.”
“Oh yes. Not at all like Ana. I’m fairly certain you took her virginity last night.”
My eyes boggled. “You’ve got to be kidding me. There’s no way she was a virgin.”
But her eyes were too sweet to belong to a liar and she said, “Maybe I’m wrong, but I doubt she ever had fun that way before.”
“But what’s all this about an evil lair and…”
She gave me a bemused stare and went, “Evil lair?”
“That’s what she called it.”
Maria crossed her arms, and those ultra-breasts of hers looked like they were started to get bruised from being in the way of her brooding. She said, “Hmm. Maybe that was just her quirky way of looking at it.”
“She’s not actually going to die for good, is she?”
Our eyes met and I didn’t like her like of an expression. It felt too unsure on her, the one who otherwise acted as a squad leader and general-in-training. I felt logic leave me in lieu of a bit of emotion, but I pressed it away with a cocksure smirk. “I bet she’s gonna fully respawn at any time.”
Maria cocked her head. “Probably. I don’t know permadeath works in this world, so I don’t think Anastasia would be in spectator mode if she weren’t going to respawn.” And we sat in silence between sizzles, one of rain hitting the roof and the other of onions and potatoes frying in a pan. “Mya was the one who told me first.”
“Hmm?”
“That we’re in a video game. Before, I never questioned it. I never imagined my reality was fabricated.”
I had to keep my eyes off her breasts and force myself to st
are into the sides of her empty demon eyes. For whatever reason, this came easy. The tonal shift helped.
“You think my sister wanted me to come into the game for your sake, maybe?”
Quickly, she nodded. “Christ, no. It’s nothing to do with any one of us. From the sounds of it, she wasn’t actually ready to send you here in the first place.”
“Yeah…” I stared down. For the first time since yesterday, I dwelled on that awful image. The worst moment in my life by some distance. But I didn’t want to mope or drown in wangst. Wangst is for the emos. It was too soon for me to become an emo. No, I had to take my problems and edgy history head on. “I never could’ve imagined any of this was possible. Not at our level of technology. She must have been working on this for years.”
“What I don’t get is how she could have spent so much time on it without the Hurricanes shutting it down. Was it a project for them?”
I shook my head. “Hell no. Mya would never work for them. She always told me she was working on something crazy, but she never said what it was, and I guess…” Something turned over in the frying pan, bringing a loud hiss that ejaculated the sexiest aroma to ever tickle my nose. If that wasn’t more onions and meat, I’d be sad.
Maria ran her knuckles across my chin and pat my cheek. “I really do apologize for your loss. It’s terrible to hear of the fate of two friends.”
“It’s… it’s nothing.” It wasn’t nothing at all, but I had to keep myself composed. How much of a wuss I’d look like if I lost myself in front of her! And there it went, there it went, I was starting to have a harder and harder time keeping my tear ducts closed. I blinked and hit my thigh. “Damn it, I just wish I knew why here. Why this game. Everything’s just been a clusterfuck.”
She ran her hands across my arm, and I felt tinges of pressure from my muscles. All of it felt familiar and I was reminded of the horrendous pain of the night before. Though I was functioning well enough, my body was still recovering and feeling the jitters. Not only that but I was also starting to become aware of some cold aches that made me want to sit in front of a heater on full blast. I felt like liquid crap on some level, and the aches just hadn’t caught up to me yet.