Trapped in a Game Pt. 06

"I'm sorry," she panted, though the satisfied grin on her face looked anything but apologetic.

I gave her a little nod, letting her know it was okay, so she took my hand, much more gently this time, and we set off again through the winding labyrinth that was apparently, my house.

"How long have we been married now?" I asked.

"Ten years. Why?"

"I dunno. It seems like if we're still a couple of horny teenagers," I answered, and Serra smirked.

"Oh, Joshie. That just might be the sweetest thing you ever said to me," she answered.

I cast a questioning glance at her, and she shrugged.

"What? Isn't that just the kind of marriage that you always wanted?" she asked, and I bit my lip as I processed the thought.

Was it really?

I mean, I remember wanting my marriage to not suck and fall apart like things did with Tracy, but I can't really remember ever thinking to myself that I wanted my marriage to be anything in particular, really.

In that moment, though, I did have to admit.

This was indeed more than I could have ever asked for...

"Josh, what're you-"

I pulled up to a sudden halt, and Serra stopped in her tracks as soon as she caught the look in my eye.

Wasn't this just... too surreal?

"What's wrong?"

"It's nothing," I quickly answered, trying my best to shake my unease away, but as soon as the thought occurred to me, I knew it wouldn't easily go away.

Here I was, married to this 'perfect' girl... the kind that would never even give me a second look; living in a luxuriously large house, with a beautiful daughter who was as talented as she was well behaved and just adorably sweet. Living a life where I could want for nothing.

This was every single thing that I could have wanted, wasn't it?

Everything I could have ever dreamed?

The second it occurred to me, something felt... off.

I tried to shake the doubt from my mind, but even as we continued on, I knew Serra could still tell that something was wrong.

We didn't talk again until we got to our destination, which was a room down the corridor from our bedroom on the upper floor of the house.

"Is this like a game room?" I asked, and Serra scoffed.

"Officially? This room is called 'the study'. But- I mean, I am a professional gamer. So, game room, study, work room. I dunno, it's all a little bit of all of the above. By the way, we have an actual game room down stairs- more, family game things like board games and that kinda thing. But it's ~awesome~, if you wanna check it out later."

I took a look around the room that we were in.

There were about four chairs in the centre of the room.

Kind of like recliners, but there were these metallic sheets of metal on either side of the head rest, and silvery plates embedded into the material placed systematically along the back rest and arm rests.

I glanced about the room, but there was nothing that even looked vaguely like a traditional computer screen, confirming what I'd already suspected.

"Is the game we're gonna play..."

"Virtual? Yeah. Hate to break it to ya, but that's like... all games now," Serra added, before continuing, "here. Have a seat."

I swallowed uncomfortably, but Serra took my hand, then gave it a little reassuring squeeze.

"You don't have to worry. Ever since... you know, back then, games go through a rigorous amount of testing to make sure there's nothing in the code that can trap us in there... or hurt us, even."

I nodded, figuring that it was indeed natural to expect that nothing like that could ever happen again, but as I took a seat in the chair as Serra had requested, I could feel my heart beat quicken in my chest.

"I promise, everything will be fine," Serra continued, giving my hand a little squeeze.

She let go of me, then began to adjust my chair- I'm not certain if it was to make me more comfortable, or if this was part of the 'set-up' procedure to engage whatever virtual reality thing we were about to dive into, but when she was done, I felt comfortable, but still a little unnerved.

"What are we gonna play?" I asked, trying to get my mind off of it.

"Half-life three."

"Seriously?"

She laughed.

"Nope. Not even in the year of our lord, twenty thirty-two, is there a half-life three."

I shot Serra a disapproving stare, and she giggled.

That's not the sort of thing you joke with a gamer about!

"The game's called 'War of Ilyasova' or Ilya."

"What is it? A MOBA?"

"Kind of. Let's just say that genre isn't what you might remember. This is a bit like a battle royale, but instead of guns you have abilities and magic."

"Interesting," I responded, as Serra got into a chair beside me.

"You're not gonna freak out or anything, right?" Serra asked.

Her tone was surprisingly genuine, making me chuckle as I gave a little nod.

"I'm fine, I think. Do I usually freak out?"

"Not usually, but once is enough to make someone worry for a lifetime."

"Hm. I see. So, I've freaked out at least once, I take it."

Serra looked away, an uncomfortable look on her face, so I took her hand.

"It's fine. If I do get a little freaked out though, what do I do?"

"You can jump right out. Just think about it and you're out," she replied, taking a quick glance at the time on her phone. "I'm sorry, I'd give you more of a tutorial but we woke up late and the stream is pre-scheduled. If you wanna back out, I understand."

"It's fine. I'm kinda more worried about spending time alone with anyone besides you right now."

Serra swallowed uncomfortably, then nodded.

"I promise, I'll answer every question you've got as soon as this is done."

I took her hand and gave it a little squeeze, and she gave me one final nod.

"Ready?" she asked, and I nodded in response.

"As ready as I'll ever-"

"Activate!" she yelled, and I felt the ground swept out from under me as we landed, on our feet, on what appeared to be a large stage.

Standing next to me was Serra, her avatar looking remarkably similar to the avatar she'd used in the game, thought I noted with some amusement that she'd toned down her bust size significantly since then, and added more than a few touches that made the bouncy pink haired avatar seem a lot more like she did in real life.

As I took the scene in, I noticed that several more virtual avatars were appearing beside us, forming a semi-circle, with a similar semi-circle being formed on the opposite side of the stage.

"Jesus, can you ever show up on time?"

I jumped as a voice spoke seemingly in my head, and Serra let out a sigh then waved her hand, and I jumped again as a man appeared beside her.

He appeared to be no older than we were, though the voice, you might say, did not match his appearance at all.

"I'm here, the stream didn't start, and look at that, no fire," she remarked, gesturing at the general area.

"You're not just some random streamer, Serra. You really need to start taking this more seriously. Who are you even teaming up with?"

"Oh relax, it's an off-season random lobby day."

The man took a look around, before turning back to Serra.

"Josh? Just Josh? Are you fucking kidding me?" he exclaimed, and Serra let out another sigh.

"It'll be fine, it's not like there's any..." her words trailed off, and I followed her gaze across the stage as the final player on what I assumed to be the opposite team connected to the game.

'TonyTiger,' his nametag read, and I looked over at Serra who was now fidgeting a little.

"Oh, for fuck's sake," the man exclaimed, turning angrily back to Serra. "Disconnect now."

"What? Hell no, if I run from a match up with Tony, he'll post about it before this game even starts."

"If you lose it'll be re-played on every highlight reel for a month! Disconnect, Serra!"

"Ugh, it's a non-league random match up. Fucking chill."

"Hey Serra," the player called at her, from over on the other side of the stage.

Serra waved her hand, and the man in front of her vanished into a stream of pixels, and she used some other gesture, bringing Tony's avatar closer to her.

"Hey Tony. Fancy drawing you for my first game of the day."

"Oo, making excuses already, are we?"

"I'm not eighteen anymore, Tony. A girl needs a little warm up before locking heads with one of you, young, talented, new generation pros."

I smirked as Serra stretched a little to emphasize her point, knowing full well that her virtual body required no such warm-up.

"I don't see anyone on your team today... don't tell me you've fallen out with them again."

"Hey now, Joshie's right here. If you're disrespectful to him, you'll hurt his feelings you know."

I thought about opening up the system interface, just as I would if I'd been playing the game, and to my surprise a series of option appeared before me, one of which was to join the private chat between Serra and Tony.

"Hey," I offered, and Tony studied me for a moment.

"Well, well. If it ain't the hubby. My apologies, I forget that you're officially part the team sometimes."

I nodded, and Serra shot me a thankful look.

"Well, looks like everyone's ready to go. See you on the other side!"

Serra gestured, taking my hand just as we were swept up again, this time landing on, what appeared to be a jungle of some sort, but with only the players who were on our side of the stage.

"So, who was that?"

"Oh, just the second rank Ilya player in the world right now."

I chuckled as she waved it away like it was just another irrelevant detail.

"Holy shit, GamerGodSerra. You're the GamerGodSerra, aren't you?"

"The one and only," she responded, striking a pose, and I rolled my eyes as she seamlessly reverted to her gamer persona.

"Dude, we're gonna f'king beat TonyTiger!" the guy exclaimed, and his friend let out a sigh.

"Is anyone else from TeamFury here?" the second player asked, and Serra shot me a quick look before shaking her head.

"Nope, and uh, guys, he's kinda new," she continued, indicating towards me, "so be ni-"

"Oh, fuck me, a noob? We're doomed," the man exclaimed, and Serra shot him an icy glare.

"Relax. He's a Dynasty War player, I'm sure he'll pick it up in no time. Now I'm playing 'Lady of Silence', and he's gonna play 'Prophet'. You all can pick whatever the hell you want, as long as I get two tanks, two disruptors, and at least one support.

The guy nodded, and as we separated from the main group, Serra opened up a private channel for us to talk.

"Okay, you're a quick learner, but we've got like, eighty seconds, so this will have to be quick. You've got five lives, if you lose them all you get knocked out. Every time a player gets knocked out, the players on the other team get a little stronger. You get even stronger if you've contributed the most kills towards that player's lost lives."

"Not the kind of game I thought this was gonna be, but okay."

"You'll be fine. Now, taking hits really hurt. You can take about five hits on average before you die, so try not to get hit. You're pretty good at dodging, but there are abilities that can disrupt that, so watch out for those."

"Hits bad, dodge good. Got it."

"Okay, your abilities are- Oh you have got to be kidding me! Hey jackass, did I not just say he's playing Prophet?"

I spun around as Serra turned off the private channel between us mid-sentence and quickly spotted a player, a dark cloak and black mask on what was an otherwise ordinary looking avatar.

"What? I've been playing prophet all morning? Not like he picked it yet."

"For fuck's sake!" Serra exclaimed.

"We are so letting you die," one of the other players commented.

"Jeez, just let him play lance or something," the guy replied, but his suggestion did little to quell Serra's fury.

"Actually, I was gonna play Lance," another player interjected, but his words trailed off as Serra shot him an icy glare.

"Quick, pick lance," she muttered under her breath at me.

"Okay. I pick Lance," I offered, and to my surprise my avatar quickly warped, as a shiny blue lance with a silvery blade appeared in my hand, and my avatars outfit changed to a blue suit of armour.

"Aw, man," the player complained, but a sharp look from Serra quickly shut him up.

"Okay, you're slow but you hit like a truck. You've got one skill, which is basically just to charge up your lance thingie, and throw it really hard. Range is insane, but it's so slow it almost never hits anyone."

I let out a sigh.

"Got it."

"Sorry. Prophet was a lot like the tempest class you played. That was why I wanted you to-"

"It's fine. I know how gamers can be," I replied, with a dismissive wave of the hand.

"Are you gonna pick Lady of Silence still?" one of the players asked.

"Yeah. Gotta pick it at the last minute or Tony'll go Goblin Archer to counter me."

"You got a back-up in case-"

"Kid, I've got eight heroes off the top of my head that'll fit this team and that I can play. And I mean play."

"Right. I forgot who I was talking to."

The player blew into his hands nervously, and I chuckled a little, realizing that this match probably meant a lot more to the other players in here than it did to me.

Better give it my best shot, I thought.

"Okay, there's two more things you need to know. The map is a maze randomly picked from a fixed pool of options, but they all have five bases for each team. Each base has three outposts which the other team can steal. You need to steal all three outposts before you can steal the base, but if you steal three bases, you also win the game."

"Huh... multiple victory types. Got it."

"Yeah, there's one more. If a player gets a kill majority on five players from the opposing team, then you also win."

"Jeez. That sounds... difficult."

"Yeah, that's the least common victory type."

"Okay. Anything else?"

"Uhh, not that I can think of."

"Get ready!" one of the other players shouted, and Serra rolled her eyes.

"Lady of Silence," she chanted, and I watched intently as her avatar donned what appeared to be a nun's habit, complete with a headpiece and bandages wrapped around the lower parts of her face, covering her nose and mouth.

I couldn't help but smirk at the look.

"Bite me."

"Very nun-like," I retorted, and Serra quickly lifted her middle finger in response.

I noted the little countdown timer on the edge of my field of vision hit zero, and then suddenly we were swept up and placed down in a new jungle like environment.

"Nice," Serra clapped her hands together, rubbing them in anticipation. "Zero, paradox, create two teams. Create a roaming base defence, and Lance-"

Serra aimed her gaze at me, snapping me to attention.

"-you'll roam/snipe, and back up the two teams."

"Got it," I replied, though I was still trying to take a look at the map, which was available in miniature form off to the side of my field of vision.

"I'll handle base assault. Prophet-cunt, you're with me."

The man she'd addressed bit his lip nervously, but nodded without question.

Serra gave me one more look, and I returned the slight concern in her eye with a quick nod for reassurance, and she nodded before heading off into the sparsely populated woods.

"Okay, Golem. Flashpoint. You're with me. Lance... Josh, was it?"

I nodded.

"You can roam between these two points-"

I nodded as little pings on my mini map pointed out where he was indicating.

"Just look out for Jackhammer and RabidRabbit, they might try to catch you straying."

I nodded again, though whether the names he mentioned were players' or characters', I had no clue, but I already had a good feel for what the enemy signals looked like, so I knew what to do if one of them went out of our shared allied vision.

I headed for the midpoint of the two locations the player from earlier had indicated, and soon enough, I could see a fight breaking out between the first team and a larger enemy unit.

"There's five here," a player named 'flappyflap' called out, so I quickly headed to where his group was engaging the enemy team, until-

"Josh, hold up."

"Why? They're bunched there," I replied, pausing in my approach.

"If I know Tony, he's laid a trap to kill outliers heading over in a rush."

"Lance! Where are you man?!"

As I paused, I surveyed the scene.

Tony was nowhere in sight, but I could tell my allies were taking a beating.

Turok14 has been killed by MrStealYoG.

LinWei has been killed by DotDot.

JustCarl has been killed by BBGoon.

"Fucking hell, thanks for the help guys, really."

"Oh relax," Serra replied, "none of their players is stacking kills yet."

"Yeah, and what about the outpost we're about to lose."

"Don't die for an outpost, kiddies. Besides..."

GamerGodSerra has killed UltimateZesser.

GamerGodSerra has killed MFinSpitin.

FreddyMerc has killed F.

"Fucking hell, prophet. If you kill steal me again, I will fucking end you."

"Sorry~!" the player called.

"Starting to feel a little lost here," I said, opening a private channel to Serra.

"Are you freaking out?" she asked.

"No... but, I have no idea what I'm doing."

"Well. You didn't die just now, so I'd say you're doing just fine- uh, just fucking disrupt them, for fuck's sake!"

GamerGodSerra has killed UltimateZesser.

GamerGodSerra has killed RastoSharku.

Christ, she was as much of a monster as ever.

TonyTiger has killed Turok14.

TonyTiger has killed FreddyMerc.

"What were you doing here, Turok?" Serra scolded.

"Helping you! Fuck!"

"Don't need it. Just stick to my fucking plan."

"Hey, Lance. You wanna move some time this century?" someone called.

I noticed the player speaking was waving at me from one of the outposts to my left, and as I watched him, I suddenly noted there was a pretty easy to access path from the enemy side that came right over to that spot.

I charged up one of my lances and threw it in that direction, and as the lance sped off, it illuminated a clouded portion of map, before striking right through three enemy blobs.

I hardly had time to process the hit when Serra and Prophet converged on the spot.

GamerGodSerra has killed DotDot.

GamerGodSerra has killed UltimateZesser.

GamerGodSerra has killed TonyTiger.

"Jesus Christ. Okay, listen to her from now peeps," a voice called, and I smirked.

Despite her rank, they only start listening when she's single-handedly brought them to the cusp of a kills majority victory?

Guess even in the future, some things just never change, huh.

As the game pressed on, I quickly figured out what the ambush spots on the map were, and as I threw my attacks into these areas just as my teammates converged on them, it became clear that the other team was taking a serious beating.

Eventually, Serra's character made its way over to me.

"Not out there 'stacking kills' anymore?" I asked, and she giggled at my awkward use of the game's jargon.

Jeez, I must sound like a fucking grandpa, I thought.

"Naw, I only did that early to make them panic. Tony might have kept a cool head, but his team pretty much just imploded. It's a cruising victory from here. You were fucking amazing, by the way," she said.

She shot me a wink, and as she walked beside me, that girlish sway in her gait, I suddenly felt flustered.

It's probably just the nun's outfit, I thought.

I quickly found myself wondering what she'd look like as a sexy nun, when I noticed a girl; she was petite, her hair long and brown, her cloak trailing in the wind as she ran between some trees in the distance.