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Two teenage brothers discover that their new game is quite real. |
| One: Meet the Boys “Alright. Let the tank go in first and grab his attention. Be sure to let him build up some hate before you engage.” “I already hate the tank, he’s a jerk.” “Thank you Woot for that enlightening bit of information. Now. As I was saying…” “Lee-e-e-e-e-roy!” Roxxor's shout was greeted by mixed giggles and moans. "Roxxor, that’s getting a bit old. Now, as I was saying…” Woot took off his headset and pushed back from his chair to grab a can of pop from the refrigerator under the shelves next to computer desk. Or as his mother would call it, his high-tech pigsty. The drink he wanted didn’t seem to be on the top shelf where it belonged. He sighed explosively and lurched out of his chair and knelt down in front of the short fridge like a worshipper at the idol of the caffeine gods, and tried again to find his soda. It didn’t help. The liquid caffeine just wasn’t there. “Roxxor?! Did you take my last Coke?” His older brother was at a desk at the far end of the basement room they called the office (in Mother-speak, the high-tech god-forsaken pit of deepest hell). His chat headset hung on his head so that the mic was in front of his mouth, picking up the sounds of his eating and the occasional belch. His stereo headset was layered over the top of that so that the music could be loud enough to drown out the sound of their guild-master and quest leader Eric the Dull. His name wasn’t really Eric the Dull, well it was Eric, but he didn’t call himself “the Dull.” The music blaring from Roxxor’s headphones, preventing him from hearing his brother, was probably at least partly to blame for what happened next. The other part was most likely due to the worn out and smelly tennis shoe that careened off the back of his chair, causing Roxxor to leap an amazing three inches into the air. Woot’s laughter was cut short by the screams of anguish coming from his own headset back on his desk, and the roar of teenage fury coming from his older brother. Woot looked at his computer monitor and saw an image of absolute horror. Roxxor’s warrior character in the game was running full speed through a room full of angry ogres, and had managed to irritate them all. As Woot watched, the mighty Roxxor (the game version) fell to his knees in his death throes. Just then, Roxxor landed on him in the real world. Woot’s brother may have been older, but he was also smaller by a few inches and several pounds. So the flying assault didn’t have the impact it would have had if their positions had been reversed. The two boys were a study in opposites. Woot, born Donald Sinclair and called Donny by their parents, was fifteen years old and stood six foot two inches when he could stand without his brother piling on top of him. He was also a bit on the portly side. Well, a bit more than a bit. Fact was, Woot was fat. He was heavy enough that he considered how he moved before he did anything, yet not so heavy that he couldn’t get around and even enjoy some physical activities like walking through the mall to the computer store and the game shop. Roxxor, on the other hand, at seventeen years was only five feet nine inches tall and very slender. People would call Ronald Sinclair skinny if it weren’t for his fiery temper. Oh yes, the brothers were really Ronny and Donny to their parents, which probably explains their deep need for nicknames. Roxxor’s character in game was dead, and so was the rest of their group. Apparently, the lone charge had drawn the response of every ogre in the dungeon, and when they had finished smacking down Roxxor, they turned their displeasure on the rest of the team. The others were too shocked by Roxxor’s move to respond at first, but then total mayhem had broken out as some team members tried to save Roxxor by charging in after him, and others tried to get free of the chaos by backing away right into the path of a wandering patrol. It was the screams of frustration and chagrin coming from the chat headset that had drawn their attention back to the game. “Uh oh… Now you’ve done it,” said Roxxor. He got up and stamped over to his desk. Woot listened as he got up and dusted himself off. “No, I don’t know what happened guys. Must have been a lag spike in our network connection. No, I wasn’t seriously pulling a Leeroy. C’mon, you know I wouldn’t get everyone killed to make a joke.” Just as Woot got back to his seat and started to run his character’s ghost back to the dungeon to resurrect, their guildmates started logging off in disgust. He put his headset back on in time to hear Eric lecturing Roxxor about their (he was apparently including Woot in the lecture even though he hadn’t been at the keyboard when the debacle happened) lack of serious focus during guild events. Figures. They’d both heard that lecture a number of times from their previous two guilds in this game, and others in the past when playing other online games. They’d even heard variations on this theme from their parents and teachers outside of games. No focus, never serious about what was most important. Problem with that was that Woot wasn’t really sure what really was important. And who could expect him to be serious about what’s important if you didn’t know what was important in the first place? Roxxor was making “talk to the hand” gestures in time with Eric’s lecture. Woot would have found this funny if he weren’t so mad at Roxxor himself. A distant part of himself tried to draw attention to itself by pushing the guilt button in Woot’s brain, but Woot’s conscious mind kidney punched the miscreant and shoved him back into the darkness at the back of the mind. This same place occupied by memos about taking out the trash and picking up bread at the store, and even a lone reminder about a history report due by the end of the week. In other words, a place where Woot never went. Fifteen year old males aren’t very good at genuine self awareness. The only thing that Roxxor could focus on was staring at girls, or at certain parts of girls anyway. Whenever Woot tried to stare at girls with his brother, it made him uncomfortable. The discomfort had less to do with odd feelings inside various parts of his teenage, hormone-driven body, and much more to do with the fact that his brother was embarrassing to be around when he was staring at girls. He drooled. “Boys? It’s almost time for bed,” their mother called from the top of the stairs. That was as far down as she would normally come into their territory. “Ronny, you still need to take out the trash. It’s garbage day tomorrow you know.” Woot started to laugh at him, but their mother cut him off before he could do more than take a deep breath. “Donny, don’t forget to gather up the cans for the recycle.” “Yes Mom,” they chorused. Roxxor grabbed the garbage can next to the refrigerator and started up the stairs to the kitchen. He gave Woot a quick shove as he went by. “Loser.” “Dork,” Woot replied, pushing his brother back. Woot grabbed the empty recycle bin and sighed. There were a lot of cans ready for recycle. The only problem was that none of them ever seemed to make it over to the recycle bin. He started grabbing cans from his desk, moving toward Roxxor’s end of the basement as he went. Sure enough, he found several Coke cans mixed in with Roxxor’s preferred Dr. Pepper cans. Woot shuddered. He didn’t know how anyone could drink anything other than Coke. It was too horrible to contemplate. He made a mental note to bring down another case of Coke from the pantry. And another note to buy a padlock for the fridge. Roxxor was already done with his chore of taking out the nightly trash. Of course, he was probably still outside near the hedge where there was a tiny view of Erica Henderson’s bedroom window. Erica lived next door, though it might as well have been miles away for all that she ever noticed the boys. Her attention was reserved for Bobby Tyler, All State running back at the local high school, and sometimes for other popular boys that might make Bobby jealous enough to pay more attention to her. Still, Roxxor tried to catch a view of her every night, provided it wasn’t raining too hard. Woot had tried once, but found that his neck got sore from the weird angle you had to stand in to get a line of sight through the hedge, past the black walnut tree in the Henderson’s yard, and up to Erica’s window. And of course, the Henderson’s dog would bark furiously every time Woot got close to the hedge. He didn’t bark at Roxxor for some odd reason, only Woot. It just wasn’t fair, Woot told himself and the Universe in general. Woot walked outside to the side of the house where the family kept their trash and recycle cans during the week, taking care to move as quietly as possible. Sure enough, he could just barely make out the shape of his brother crouched beside the hedge. He seemed to be reaching through the hedge and talking to someone at the same time. Woot moved closer to hear. “That’s a good boy Oscar, there ya go. Does my buddy Oscar like his bacon slices?” Bacon slices? That creep! No wonder the dog never objected to Roxxor coming over to the hedge. He’d been getting a nightly snack courtesy of Roxxor. Woot crept closer, until he was directly behind his brother. “BOOGA BOOGA!” Woot shouted as loud as he could a mere two feet behind his brother. Once again, Roxxor went airborne. This time, instead of a mere three inches out of a chair, the height was much more impressive. Roxxor’s legs were coiled like springs beneath him as he fed the neighbor’s dog. As they released their tension, Roxxor was propelled up and slightly forward, turning as he rose to confront the horrible beast he was certain was behind him ready to pounce. Later, Woot would always remember that sight as a thing of perfect beauty. His brother shooting up into the air, turning and twisting, snagging and ripping. It only wanted to be played back in slow motion with some Strauss waltz music played for the scene to be academy award quality. Even as Woot lay on the ground in helpless laughter, he carefully observed several things. Even though the events happened quickly, he could still remember each one precisely. First, of course, was Roxxor’s ascent, turning and twisting, and crashing hard against the hedge. Next was the ripping sound, which had of course puzzled Woot at the time. Next was the commotion of Oscar yelping in fright and scrambling away as fast as four paws could move his watermelon-shaped body. And finally, the best part, was Erica Henderson throwing open her curtains to see what was happening to her beloved Oscar. She was standing there, arms stretched out to either side holding the curtains wide open, like Moses parting the Red Sea. Of course, Moses was a dude, he was old when he parted the Red Sea, and he never had a body like that in Woot’s weirdest dreams. Otherwise, exactly the same. Later, Woot would think about that incident and he would remember Erica as a goddess in flowing white robes surrounded by light and billowing mist, rather than as she actually was in a loose white t-shirt and blue pajama bottoms with yellow ducks on them. Roxxor had landed facing Woot and was winding up to hit him when he saw the look of total adoration on his brother’s face. Turning once more toward the Henderson’s yard he saw Erica in the window and stopped dead. This was how Woot discovered what the ripping sound had been. Apparently, when he crashed against the hedge, Roxxor had torn the seat of his pants. Now Woot had gone from the ecstacy of seeing Erica in her pajamas to the agony of staring at his brother’s tightie whities revealed by a seven-inch tear down his butt. He was still staring, alternating between the agony and the ecstasy, when Erica pushed open her window to yell down at them. “What are you freaks doing to my dog?” Although Woot would later try to describe the sound of her voice as angelic, Roxxor more accurately summed it up as sounding like “one totally pissed off chick.” Erica didn’t wait for their reply, but shut the window and pulled the curtains back into place. Both boys stared helplessly at her window as though hoping for an encore, but her curtains stayed closed. The long silence was broken when Woot sighed like someone rousing from a pleasant dream. Roxxor seemed to remember that his brother was beside him at about the same time. “Dude, that was uncool,” Roxxor told his brother quietly. “You’ve ruined my viewing pleasure for the night.” “Well… I am sorry about that. If only you weren’t such a dick I wouldn’t feel this overwhelming urge to mess with you.” Roxxor paused and seemed to think about that for almost 15 seconds. “Nah,” he responded, “You’d do it anyway so why bother.” “No. Me? Why would you think that?” Roxxor slapped his brother on the shoulder and turned to go back inside the house. He did not tell Roxxor about the rip in his pants. Woot found himself alone in a strange forest, looking for something. He had no idea what he was looking for at the moment, nor why he was in a forest. There were no real forests anywhere near the small town of Granite Basin where they lived. If only he could find… whatever it was he was looking for. “Ah,” he said to himself, “I’m dreaming.” “How do you know you’re dreaming?” The voice was female and quite shapely. Or rather, Woot imagined that it was the kind of voice that would be possessed by a very shapely woman. He looked around carefully but couldn’t see the source of the voice. He decided to ignore it since it was only a dream. “Owwwww!” Woot howled and grabbed the back of his head and began dancing in a small circle around the acorn on the ground that was the apparent source of the pain in the back of his head. “You dance well. And that was for ignoring me,” the voice said with a trace of laughter. Woot still couldn’t see where the voice was coming from. At the sound of someone clearing their throat delicately, Woot turned and found an older man facing him across the clearing. The man was dressed like a mage or a cleric from one of the games that Woot and his brother played so obsessively, with long white hair and what looked suspiciously like pointed ears. Elf most likely, Woot thought. “Young mage, you are summoned to the service of the One Tree. You will find...” “Excuse me,” Woot interrupted. The old elf looked startled by his rudeness. “A couple things. First, I’m not a mage. And second, the only place I get summoned is the principal’s office.” “Indeed,” was the old man’s reply. “Could that be because you rudely interrupt your betters, boy?” “He must be busy, then, if he’s summoned by his betters. Everyone must be better than he is.” The female voice was behind him, and mocking. Pain blossomed in Woot’s head again, and another acorn fell by his feet. The old man looked up over Woot’s shoulder in brief irritation, then back at Woot. Aha, thought Woot, she’s in the tree behind me. Woot stooped and quickly grabbed the acorns at his feet. Rising, he turned and threw them both in the direction the old man had been looking. Woot was rewarded with the sight of a pretty, red haired girl of about his own age sitting on a tree branch looking very startled as two acorns streaked at her. She nimbly doged the first, but the second nut caught her forehead squarely between the eyes. She shrieked and fell backwards out of the tree to be lost from sight in a large bush. Woot smiled. He turned around to find the old man staring at him, and Woot began to feel a bit nervous. The old elf slowly smiled at Woot, and Woot tentatively smiled back. “Brave mage indeed to tumble the Princess of the Elves into a thorn bush. My daughter is not used to being treated so....” “Princess? Your daughter?” Woot gulped and bowed. He was startled when the old elf laughed and replied. “You will do just fine, my boy. Now, as I was saying....” Woot heard the sound of something fiercesome moving in the brush at his back, but kept his attention on the king. “You are to bring a warrior companion and come to the Gateway of Adventure. Frome there you will be met....” Woot heard a roar behind him and spun to find the princess flying through the air at him, her hands outstretched to lock on his throat. She collided with him and knocked him off his feet. Tangled together they rolled down a hill that Woot hadn’t seen before, and into darkness. Woot was awakened by the sound of his clock-radio alarm buzzing at him. He rolled over and smacked the off button, trying to figure out why he’d set it to go off on a Saturday. He rolled onto his back while pondering this and then jerked upright in bed as he realized it wasn’t Saturday, it was Thursday and he had school. He sat up on the edge of the bed, gathering his energy for the monumental effort of going to the shower. Woot stretched and yawned, then stood up and turned to straighten out his bedding to something that might fool his mother into thinking he’d made his bed. He stopped in shock. There on his pillow was a single, reddish-brown acorn. Woot did what any very intelligent 15-year-old male would do. He screamed. Roxxor opened the bedroom door and looked in. “Dude, keep your panties on. What’s the emergency?” Woot’s breathing was slowing, but he still seemed unable to speak. He raised a trembling hand and pointed at the acorn. Roxxor stepped into the room and closed the door behind him. “Hey is that one of the acorns you chucked at that hottie last night?” Roxxor asked with a grin. “It sure looks like it,” Woot answered. “Wait a minute... how do you know about that?” “Oh. I had a dream that you were talking with some old windbag, and there was this hottie up in a tree picking on you. You nailed her pretty good with an acorn, though. I was actually rather proud of you, little brother.” “Doesn’t it strike you as odd that you were in my dream?” “If I were in your dream, yes, it would be odd,” Roxxor said. “But you were in my dream, so it’s ok.” Before Woot could answer that little piece of wisdom, their mother opened the door. “Donny, was that you screaming just now? Ronny? What are you doing to your brother?” Her gaze swept from one to the other as though certain there was some household crime being committed, and uncertain as to how much blame to assign to each son. “Yeah, that was the Wootster alright,” answered Roxxor. “He got up and saw himself in the mirror.” Roxxor made a move to get out the door before Woot could retaliate. “Oh hah-hah, you are so funny,” Woot replied caustically. “Not.” He reached down and grabbed the acorn. Roxxor dashed out the door screaming “No, not the plus-15 acorn of death, anything but that!” “Oh get serious, you two.” Their mother was apparently satisfied that no one was being killed in her house for the moment and walked out making tisking noises as she looked around Woot’s room. |
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