Right now, it's 4:53 pm. I get out at 5:00 pm, just like everyone else on this team. Most of them have families to go home to. Dave has two kids and a wife who packs his lunches. Jordan has a husband that she goes out with. Hell, Shane has a cat to get back home and feed. I don't have any of that. Instead of kids coming home or cats scratching my furniture, my apartment stays dark when I leave it. A hollowed-out rock in the roaring stream of the city.
You might think I'd be lonely with that arrangement. Or sad. Maybe it is sad. But I've never sat with the sadness for too long. I've always found something to do.
4:56 pm.
I bounce my leg under the desk. I want to start packing up early. Gather up my empty lunch bag and start shutting my computer down. Unfortunately, our floor manager, Beth, has mistaken our silent cubicles for merciless sweatshops. Last month, a new hire made the mistake of gathering up her purse at 4:58 pm and Beth went nuclear on her. Jessie is still here, but she gets shaky around 4:50 pm and doesn't touch her purse until 5:00 pm on the dot.
4:58 pm.
Normally I don't care when I leave. Whether I leave at 5:00 pm, 5:02 pm, or even 4:30 pm, I come home to the same thing. Dark apartment, quick round on the stationary bike, crockpot dinner for one, play a video game, and go to sleep.
But not tonight. Tonight is going to be different. I got the email confirming it this morning. My card has been charged and the game is downloading onto my VR set as of 10:23 am.
4:59 pm.
My journey into Proventia begins tonight.
Home is a shadowy modern one-bedroom in a middling part of town. My neighbors are other well-scrubbed professionals with similar jobs and lives to mine. But I don't think we're the same sorts of people. I hear their footsteps on the stairs all the time. Going out to dinner, bringing dates and friends home. Having lives.
I have my life. They have theirs.
A light is blinking on my Omniview headset. I check the app on my phone and read over the notifications:
- 10:23 pm - Heroes of Proventia installing
- 10:29 pm - Message from $+3!/
- 2:46 pm - Download Complete!
- 2:47 pm - Message from $+3!/ deleted.
I frown at it. I didn't know you could even have special characters in your username. "Probably a glitch," I mumble to no one. No one responds and it's so loud.
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I hop on my bike and let YouTube run wild. Game lore dumps and those instructive ASMR videos. After an hour, I get my dinner (a pork shoulder that will feed me all weekend) and eat it while I scroll social media. Worldly horrors and shitty politicians sandwiched between gym ads and updates from people I knew in high school. I hit the shower next. Hot water and rose-scented soap scours the day off me.
When I get out, the mirror reflects me back to myself. I look good. Tired, but good. My brown eyes are no smaller for the bags under them. My hair is long, brown as my eyes, cut into the same choppy style I prefer for my game characters. Average build, maybe a little chestier than others. I could pull someone if I wanted to… I just don't want to.
Why would I want to?
If I pulled someone, got married, had kids, that would make me responsible for them. I would have to care for them. Make lunches and wipe noses. Split bills and have weekends taken up by what someone else wants to do. I would have to care for someone, and I don't mind that at all. But there's no guarantee that they will ever care for me the same way.
Call gaming lonely. Call it sad. But I know how much a party member cares for me. It's quantified in heart levels and demonstrated in cutscenes you can't get without a heart level over six. I don't ever have to guess or worry about whether they like me back and I would rather have the certainty.
Nevermind, I think, turning away from the mirror. Nevermind, as I throw on my pajamas. It's game time.
My headset is a sleek, white visor with a single white dot LED to indicate notifications, which you can pull up on a phone, a desktop computer, or in the headset itself. Lightweight and comfortable, the Omniview boasts a 10-hour battery life and top-range graphics. Not quite the best model; the X-49 has a suit that provides limb tracking and force feedback. Instead of putting on a weird compression suit, I grab a controller, settle onto my couch, and slip the headset over my eyes. I press a button and the machine purrs to life. The screen flickers and flashes the logo at me. I navigate to the new game, almost breathless.
Heroes of Proventia. I helped to crowdfund this two years ago. A fully immersive RPG with dating simulator elements. You, the protagonist, join a team of adventurers as their healer. However a prophecy has dictated that a healer will provide the leadership and strategy that will destroy the Dark Lord Heratus. As the party gets closer to each other, they get stronger. The player gets to romance one (or some, or all) of the party members, which makes them even more powerful. I've been waiting for this game for years and now, now, I'm pushing the start button on it.
The screen goes black. A tiny fairy twirls in the bottom-right corner of my vision. Then a low rumble hums around my ears as my heart pounds in my chest. A scene melts into view: Being led by my tied arms towards a bloody altar with a golden cage around my head. A demon waits by the altar, grinning with teeth the size of shoeboxes while he menacingly hefts a bloody axe.
The audio drops. A blooping noise interrupts the sweeping violins. In the top right corner, a box saying "Message from $+3!/" appears. This time, I catch the first part of the message: "@=+$i^/5e"
I shaek it off as I kneel at the altar, ready to be beheaded. A priest with a prominent nose leans over me. The candlelight shines on his sallow skin with a texture you know would feel like oil and Vaseline.
"You," he rasps. "We're lucky to have caught you. I--"
Bl-oop! $+3!/ has sent a message.
I snarl and pause the game. I open the message, fully ready to block this weird glitch. My screen goes black. The whirring in my headset suddenly stops as it shuts off. When I reach my hand-- my suddenly heavy hand-- up to start the machine again, I swipe empty air as my eyes shut.