Meetup IRL Pt. 01

"Marry me, Gideon."

"I ju-..." He choked a little in his own spit as he gasped, before stammering. "W-w-w-what?"

"Marry me!" She said again, like it was just a normal thing. "We'll get special buffs if we quest together while married, and we can find the other and teleport to their location if one of us starts early or late." Oh, of course...Gods...he felt like an idiot.

"Uh, well then...y-yeah, let's...get married."

"Awesome! Let's do it before next week's guild meet up!" she said, happily.

"Y-yeah. Let's do it then...Um, okay. I'm gonna log off now, I'll see you next week, Rhia."

"Oh... Umm, wait! Hey, so...do you wanna maybe meet up IRL this weekend? All the other guys play in different cities, and we're the only two who live near each other. It seems like a waste not to put a face to each other's name and voice, especially since we're in the same city. I think it would be really cool, what about you?"

"O-oh! S-s-sure!" He stammered.

"Sweet! Let's meet up this Saturday in the square outside town hall! I'll meet you at say, about 2pm?"

"Y-yeah! That sounds good to me."

"Perfect, I'll DM you my number just in case we need to talk before then, okay?"

"Sure thing!"

"Oh, and uhmm, one more thing...I...Well done, Giddy!" She blurted out before her mic popped as she logged off.

That was a little odd...She always seemed to say that to him nowadays. After a quest, or a good fight. He didn't really mind it though. It was nice to be appreciated, if only for how helpful he was.

'OMG! We're were going to meet her in real life!' He thought to himself as he took down her number from his messages.

He couldn't wait! This was going to be a dream come true!

--

This was a mistake...

He sat on a concrete step just outside town hall as he waited for Rhiannon to arrive at their specified meeting time. He checked his watch again.

1:55pm.

He'd been there since 1:20, nervous and excited for their meet up at first, but as time had gone on, his elation had turned to anxiety as he people watched, hoping to see her through the crowd of people around him.

It wasn't that he was worried about her, per say. No, as he watched the people bustling around him he started to become acutely aware of the futa/male couples walking around together. The futa were all tall and beautiful, and the men were either small and pretty, or tall and handsome. Rhia was a futanari in real life, just as she was in game, so he already had some idea of what to expect, and although she knew he was a guy, he was worried she would be disappointed when she saw him.

For lack of a better term, he had always considered himself...dumpy. He was a child of non-empire parents, his mother and father just a normal man and woman, who'd emigrated to the Empire for work when he was child. He'd grown up here, gone through high school here and vocational training here, but despite the particular education and 'training' he'd received like all the other boys, he'd always been found by those around him to be somewhat lacking.

Less than half of the boys who'd started the senior year with him had actually been around to complete it with him, being Bound by various futa before graduation. The rest had become 'free males' like him, but even less had made it through the 3 years of vocational school. He'd heard that some guys needed to be compelled into relationships with futa, but he'd never had that problem, being attracted to their stunning physiques and personalities for as long as he could remember, to the point where he never really seemed to fantasise about settling down with a normal woman. Despite all his hard work in school and in his personal life, though, no futa, or woman for that matter, had ever seemed to glance him way.

Not that he didn't understand why, of course. Futa were usually attracted to the small, effeminate men who were more susceptible to the transformative effects of their 'special sauce'. Even as he sat there in the step he saw half a dozen futa/male couples walking together, their petite pretty boys practically hanging them as they led them along, either by the hand or on a leash attached to their collars. He even saw some female/male and futa/male couples where the guy was taller and more masculine. Women who preferred less sapphic relationships, and even some futa, seemed to like men who were more ruggedly handsome, to either be dominated by, or to dominate for more 'exciting' conquests.

Gideon was somewhere in the grey area between those two groups, of middling height and build. His face could only be described by himself as...unexceptional. Not that he was 'ugly' persay, he just didn't have either the cute or handsome looks that futa seemed to go for. He was decidedly, and painfully, average.

He was also a little softer in the body, in part due to his job as a line cook for a local restaurant. He loved to eat and he knew how to cook, a deadly combination. Despite all the exercise and diets of pre-packaged 'futa-milk' he partook of, he could never seem to slim down his body enough for him to even be a 'butter-face' for even a random horny futa.

He rubbed his hands on his jeans as he looked back down at his watch again.

2pm.

He scanned the crown for her. they'd texted back and forth a little over the week, confirming the place and time of their meet up, and organising how they'd recognise each other. She would be wearing a black bomber jacket with blue jeans and red high tops, and he would be wearing a blue cap and button up shirt with the 'Dragons & Dungeoneering' logo on them.

His eyes finished scanning the crowd around him and he lowered his head again, sighing quietly to himself. Still nothing.

What would she think when she saw him, he wondered? His elvish avatar was the embodiment of everything he wished he was in heal life. Thin, cute, and desirable. He could only imagine a look of confusion, followed swiftly by disillusionment and disappointment, when she saw how differently he looked from his game character.

Minutes slowly ticked by as he periodically glanced up to check out anyone who came near him, and the longer he waited, the more he was sure that this was all a big mistake. What was he thinking? Rhia was expecting some pretty little thing, not some uninteresting bump on a log like him. She might have been looking to meet up as friends, but would she even care anymore once she got a look at him?

Worst case scenario she was looking for a little 'fun', thinking she they could have some time together in a love hotel of something. He didn't look forward to the crushing regret that he would see on her face when she realised the mistake she'd made. It was something he'd seen more than once when he'd tried online and blind dating services.

Yeah...this was definitely a mistake.

He checked his watch yet again.

2:35pm.

She was more than half an hour late now. He double checked his phone, too, but saw nothing. Not that that was anything new for him. No messages to say she was running late, or she needed a rain cheque and had to cancel. His mind began to wander to the worst possible scenarios.

Oh gods, had she already seen him? Had she seen what he really looked like and been so turned off that she'd just noped right out of there? Would he come back online in a couple days to find she'd left the guild and blocked him, or that he'd been removed from it at her request? A hundred anxiety riddled situations played out in his head as he sat there, each one more painful that the last.

He...he should just go.

Even if she'd already come and gone, even if she was really running late and hadn't seen him yet. He should spare her the indignity of coming all this way only to be met with...him. Maybe luck was on his side? Maybe her phone had died and they would miss each other in the crowd and they could keep their online friendship going without her having the knowledge of who he really was.

He swallowed a lump in his throat, un-shed tears standing in his eyes, as he made his mind up. This was what he got for getting his hopes up. This is what he got for thinking someone like her would ever be interested in someone like him, either as a friend or something more. That anyone would, really. He swallowed his melancholy, just like all the other times he'd been reminded of his worthlessness, and stood up as he checked his phone again for the train times. If he left now, he could probably just make the next one, which would get him home at arou-

Suddenly, he felt a large hand on his shoulder as someone stepped up from behind him. He looked backwards as he jumped forward, startled at the sudden touch, craning his neck up to look into a pair of beautiful, large eyes before turning his head back down coquettishly.

"Giddy?" A familiar, friendly voice asked.

As much as he didn't look like his avatar, she did.

It was as if Rhiannon the barbarian had stepped out of the game itself and decided to walk among them in modern, and decidedly more modest, clothes. Nearly 7 feet tall and shredded, Rhiannon stood there, wearing her black bomber, ripped black jeans and white shoes, as promised. Even her hair was accurate to the character. Jet black with scattered braids, and a bold streak of vibrant red that ran down from the right side of her head. Her features were strong and beautiful, her body powerful and shapely.

A warrior goddess.

Seeing how stunning she was in the real world only made him feel worse, though, and he felt his stomach flip as he prepared himself for the worst, the look of distain he would see when he acknowledged her. Maybe...he could plead ignorance? Say she was mistaken and he was someone else. Maybe he could still save them both the indignity of...him.

"That is you, isn't it Giddy?" The nickname she'd called him for a couple years now made his heart flutter in his chest whenever he heard it.

Hearing her say it now, in front of him for real, made it want to explode from his chest as he felt his face flush hot in a stomach churning combination of excitement and embarrassment.

He tried to meet her gaze as he replied, but was so afraid. What would he see there? Disappointment? Regret? Revulsion? He couldn't help himself, he knew what was going to happen, but he wanted to be seen by her, at least once...even if it was for the last time.

"H-Hi, R-R-Rhia..." He forced himself to look up at her, baring his awful face to her and bracing himself for the worst.

"Ah, thank goodness! I'm sorry I kept you waiting like that." Her apologetic tone matched her face as she brought a hand up and rubbed the back of her head in relief. "Everything just seemed to go wrong for me this morning, I got held up by something for work, the trains were crazy, my phone died...Thank goodness I caught you!"

"Oh...that's alright..." He didn't really know what to say.

She didn't look let down. She really looked...relieved! So it really all was a coincidence?

"So, um...are you...did you...what...what do you want to do? There's a....game store? O-or some good comic places..." He trailed off, realising he had no real plan for what they should do.

Gods, he was hopeless, it was like he was self-sabotaging himself.

"Actually, I'm really hungry!" She smiled and laughed, rubbing her stomach and licking her lips dramatically.

Looking down he could see the vague outlines of her trim, defined abdominals beneath the white shirt. As he beheld the smooth outline of her breasts, and saw the barest hint of her nubs poking out through the thin cotton material, unencumbered by a bra as she obviously was, the slightly darker colouration of her areolas contrasting the surrounding pale flesh. He felt his heart flit suddenly as if it had been replaced by a ball of fluttering butterflies, and felt his eyes drawn lower.

A hot, pulsing twinge erupted from deep within his core as he spied a length running down the inner thigh of her right leg. The protrusion a little difficult to see against her black jeans, but easily more than half a foot long as sprang down from the bloated crotch of her pants. The sight of her futahood bulging so close to him, separated by only a few layers of tightly stretched fabric excited him almost beyond words and splashed away his previous anxieties.

He felt blood flow into his own, lesser organ as it grew stiff in his pants. As subtly as he could, he slowly crossed his hands down in front of himself to try and hide excitement as his cheeks heated even more. He couldn't help it though, she was just so stunning.

"Yea-yeah!" He managed to tear his eyes away from her crotch to look back at her dazzling smile. "Food...food sounds good. Was there anywhere in particular you wanted to eat?"

"Yeah," A slight pink blush coloured her own cheeks as she saw him ogling her package. "I know a great place! Follow me!" She turned as she gestured for him to follow, and they walked off out of the square.

Rhia's recommendation for lunch was burger place. An old hole in the wall, which for all its old and unappealing decor, made up for it by grilling up one mean dang burger. As they talked over the course of meal and a few beers, Gideon actually found himself relaxing a bit, caught up in the excited and enthusiastic energy that seemed to exude from her.

They talked about D&D:Online of course, but also games they enjoyed playing when they were kids, movies, TV shows, and music they liked, and so on. They slew a horde of casual topics until the path of their conversation inevitably came around to what he least wanted to talk about: himself.

She had talked about herself to start off with, and he'd been more than enthused to learn about her life. He learned a bit about her job at one of the biggest marketing firms in the city, if not the Empire. That she had transferred across the pond to be closer to her sister, and a bit more about her family in general, and of course, her interests and dreams. She seemed evasive whenever anything about her sister came up though, not that he was one to point fingers.

A part of him wanted to bare every part of himself to her, too, but the dark shadows of his anxiety kept him in check, making him a rather cagey partner whenever she tried to ask about anything to do with him. Rhia wasn't stupid, and seemed to pick up on his reticence, but seemed okay with leaving it alone for the most part, that was at least until later in the evening.

It was well past 5pm when they left the diner, the pair of them meandering their way through the city streets until they came to one of the long parks that was scattered though the cityscape, and she finally called him out on it.

"Come ooon, Giddy!" She said with an exasperated sigh. "Answer the question properly. You've been dodging my questions since lunch." The latest question she referred to being 'where he wanted to be in a year'. He'd answered with 'alive', but his blithe, noncommittal responses were beginning to bother her a bit.

"Listen," She stopped them on a quiet sidewalk as she squared off in front of him, crossing her arms as she leant down to him slightly in a move reminiscent of when she would perform an intimidation check in the game.

"The whole point of us meeting up IRL was to hang out a bit and see who we are, outside the game. Come one, we're friends, right? At least, I'd like to think so." Her eyes locked his into their gaze, an inescapable force that he almost wanted to be stuck in forever, but one that also held a look of anxiety itself. What did this goddess have to be anxious about?

"I don't know how you feel, but the reason I invited you out...was because I didn't just want that to be an 'in-game' friendship anymore. I wanted to get to know the real you. So, please, throw me a bone and tell me about the 'you' in real life. What makes you tick? What do you like and dislike? What do you want out of life?"

"Sorry, I...sorry...I don't...really know what you'd want to hear about me. I'm not...really very interesting." He felt his lower lip tremble as tears began forming in his eyes. He tore his eyes from hers, casting his face down to hide his pitiful looking face from hers.

"I don't care that you're not the most interesting person on the planet." She said softly as her arms relaxed and hung to her sides. "Like I said, I wanted to meet you. So would you humour me and let me get to know my 'fiancée'? Unless...Oh, gosh, unless you really don't want to. Ah, jeez, I'm sorry, I didn't even consider your feelings in this, did I? I just assumed you felt the same as me. We can call it here if you want to go home or something."

"No!" As much as he hated talking about himself, he didn't want this to end yet. He didn't want her to leave. He had to bite the bullet. "G-go on...ask me whatever. I-I'll...I'll answer anything you want." And he did.

She asked him about his work, his hobbies outside of the game, how fulfilled he felt, his dreams for the future, his thoughts on music and art and politics. They walked along beside each other, laughing, debating, and digressing as he finally began to share a part of the real him.

The last time had checked his watch it was 7:30. They'd been walking around for a while since then, slowly making loops around the park as the sun had set behind the tall buildings of steel and glass. Their path was lit as lamps interspersed throughout the park came to life, illuminating the pair as they continued talking.

"So...How about your love life?" She finally asked as they strolled down one of the central paths, tall bushy trees and dense foliage pressing in from both sides and almost creating their own private world.

Gideon's stroll slowed to a stop on the bitumen path, Rhia's long legs continuing for a couple steps before she noticed his absence beside her, stopped and turned to look at him questioningly. His head hung as he stood there silently for a few moments, then he turned and sat down on a nearby bench, slumping and pulling the brim of his cap down low to cover his face.

"What love life?" His quiet reply bitter on his tongue.

She came over and sat down beside him, close, but not so much as to crowd him.

"Sorry if I hit a nerve or something. Did you have a break up recently, or...?" she asked, her tone curious but empathetic.

"No...No breakup."

"Oh...then, it's been a while? You know it's okay to have dry spells. A couple years ago I-"

"No...No dry spell..."

"Oh...ummm. I don't understand...are you...seeing someone then?"

"No, I'm not-...I've...I've never 'seen anyone'...I've never...I've never been in a relationship, okay?"

"Come on, I find that hard to believe." She said with a small, friendly sounding chuckle.

He knew she was probably just trying to be supportive, but the thought of her pitying him just made it sting all the more.

"Please don't do that." He said flatly.

"Do what?" She asked, sounding genuinely surprised.

"That. Pandering to me, everyone I know talks down to me and gives me platitudes about, 'you'll find the right one, and 'there's plenty of fish in the sea'."

"How do you know they're pandering and not just trying to be supportive?"

"Because, I just-!...I...Come on Rhia, don't pretend that you can't see what I look like." He pulled his cap lower as hot tears fell down his cheeks in shame and embarrassment.

"I do, Giddy! Looks aren't everything y-" She broke off mid-sentence, already cringing as she regretted what she'd said.

"Wow..." His eyes went as dead as his voice. "Thanks..."

"No! I'm sorry, that didn't come out right!"

"Come one Rhia..." He groaned through silent sobs that ere now wracking his chest. "Just...just look at me..."

"I am." Her voice was insistent

"No!" He stood up and faced her, his anxiety turning to frustration and boiling over. "I mean really look at me!" He gestured to himself aggressively as he stood in front of her, finally showing his red, tear streaked face.