3 Match 3
"This doesn't seem so bad," Youji said, chewing on the last of his apple core. "I've played this kind of game before. I had a friend who was super into games. We need to go fight something weaker than us and get some armor and stuff!"
"It's not that kind of game," Ziggy said, apple in his pocket. "This is serious. I don't know how you got here, but I need to find Yui." He was also being very careful not to look at the man walking next to him, with so much energy in his step. That was a well he couldn't fall into until he was sure Yui was safe.
"Are you having babies with this girl or something?" Youji asked, finishing off the very core of his apple.
Ziggy's eyes widened, blush brightening his cheeks. "Yui is my friend! My best friend! I just want to make sure she's safe. Don't make it disgusting!"
"So babies are disgusting? How old are you? Ten? You sound like a ten year old." Youji made a face, stuck out his tongue.
"And you sound like an asshole! FML! I'm stuck in a game centered purgatory with an asshole!" Over Youji's shoulder Ziggy saw a flash of dark brown, kind of round and big, furry, and whatever it was, it was moving towards them.
"I bet if your 'friend' said things like that to you, you'd eat it up. You have no self-esteem!"
Ziggy barely heard what the guy was saying. That big furry brown thing was coming right at them for sure.
"And you listen like shit! You just check out like you can't even deal with the world. Sometimes I think the only thing you really love is your notebook!"
"Bear!"
"What does that even mean? Is that some poetic metaphor?"
Ziggy had never been out of the city, except for one summer camp for foster kids and that had been just like the city, except with mosquitoes. He'd read some stories about bears though and apparently they had claws like swords and played with their food like a cat did. He did not want to be tossed in the air like a mouse! This was no time for poetry! "BEAAARRRRRR!"
"Ziggy! Speak in sentences!"
Not that he could speak in sentences at that moment. He grabbed Youji's shoulders and spun him around, screaming the word bear again but drawn out and twisted around like it was a roller coaster. Half way through, Youji joined in with him. It was indeed a great big grizzly bear. The noise was not scaring it away.
Youji shifted into a fighting stance. "Stay behind me! We can't outrun it!"
"ARE YOU INSANE!?" Ziggy screamed so loudly that it made his chest hurt. They hadn't tried to outrun it yet! What if they could out run it! For the very faintest of seconds he thought of running and leaving his partner to do what he wanted, but leaving he idiot to his own game just, he just couldn't.
Ziggy turned in circles, hyperventilating, and trying to think up some viable plan. Puzzle. "I want the puzzle now!" He said the words like they were a chant, a prayer, an incantation that could not be denied, and suddenly a bunch of jeweled toned colored hearts appeared in front of him, a three match game the size of a forty inch TV, with a helpful side screen of the approaching bear.
There was a ten second timer at the top and a goal of fifteen red hearts. "I can do this," Ziggy said, grimacing, teeth clenched.
"That's right!" Youji growled. "We can take it together. You stay right behind me though!"
The puzzle wasn't hard. Three match puzzles weren't really his thing, but he understood them. While the hearts seemed like projections, translucent, each heart felt solid enough. Each one was about the size of his palm. After the first match, it was first nature. As he made the last match that completed the puzzle, the bear roared, close enough to make his own screams sound like a weak little kitten. Instinct was an excellent gift. As the last matched hearts turned to glitter, a portal opened up and Ziggy grabbed his partner by the collar of his armor and dragged them both through. The bear's claws only caught the top of Youji's head and a bit of cheek.
Head wounds bleed a lot. Blood ran down Youji's face, under his armor-vest. The bright red of Youi's blood was the only color in the new world they were in. Everything else, including their avatars, was in black and white. "What the fuck, dude! I could have taken him!"
Ziggy rolled his eyes. "Taken him up the ass maybe! I think he was more interested in getting you in his mouth and not in the euphemistic sense. Sit down. You're bleeding all over the place."
"I'm not bleeding! You're bleeding. Men don't bleed!"
"Yeah," Ziggy said, rolling his eyes. "Well, it's a good thing that I'm an elf and you're a paladin maybe? I don't think that's a race, but whatever you are, you're bleeding. Take your vest thing off, will you?" He dug through the bag hanging from his belt as he spoke. Like a good game, his inventory was in there and it was much bigger on the inside than it looked. Inside he found bandages, a packet of power labeled 'heal' that looked like a vitamin C powder pack, and a first aid kit that he hoped was also bigger on the inside than on the out.
By this time, Youji had his armor-vest off and was leaning back on his hands, chin tucked forward like he knew exactly how beautiful he was. And he was, really was, very beautiful. His abs looked like a he'd never had a cookie in his life, powerful, lined, those little ridges on his hips right above his low hanging pants, and Ziggy was deeply grateful that his own clothes were loose and those leather pants on Youji weren't any lower. He reminded himself he was in love with Yui and while he wasn't good enough for her, maybe somehow he could be.
Youji smiled at him. "Are you going to take care of me?"
All the blood dropped out of Ziggy's brain like a falling elevator. Thud. "I am going to provide you first aid," Ziggy said, head too light to elaborate further. "Stay here. I hear running water and I'm going to go get some."
"I'll wait right here for you," Youji said, full of innuendo.
"Great," Ziggy said, head making a small sharp bob of a nod. He should be looking for Yui! Instead he was burning some strange guy's abs into his brain for all time. Maybe he really was gay.
As he moved towards the sound of the running water, it gave him a chance to clear his head and scout this new level a little bit. It was far from the green rolling fields of the last level. This place was all gothic cathedral with literal cemeteries outside the windows. It felt like they'd traded a bear for a coven of vampires. This place couldn't be this gothic and not have some vampires around here somewhere. Great. It was going to be great.
The water turned out to be coming from a fountain in the foyer, so holy water maybe. Ziggy filled up his bowl and the two canteens he found in his bag of holding. He wasn't Catholic, but he dipped his fingers into the water and made what he thought might be a good sign of the cross, like they do in movies. "So! God, if you could watch over Yui for me please. She's a good person and her parents love her. Please make sure she gets home safe." He made what he thought was the sign of the cross again and said, "Amen."
It was a game. Praying worked in games, sometimes.
Youji was right where he'd left him. Ziggy pulled out a washcloth and was going to wipe away the blood, but then just set it down so that Youji could clean himself up. Taking a step back, he dug through the bag of holding, mostly just to keep his eyes off the sexy man sitting on the cathedral floor. "So do you look like this in real life?"
"Oh no, I'm skinny, short, and I hate my body. This body is the best I've felt in my whole life."
"Well," Ziggy said, looking up, eyebrows drawing down. The guy had just seemed so at home in that avatar that Ziggy had thought it was the guy's real body, or close. "Why don't you work out more or something?"
"I tried that. It's just not that easy. I don't want to talk about it."
"Yeah. Okay. Here's a packet marked heal and some water," Ziggy handed both over. "Are you in pain at all? We have to be careful. If we die, we die, you know?"
"It's worth it though. This is the first time I've ever really felt alive."
"Great, glad to hear it," Ziggy said. This guy was not Yui, was not Yui. He needed to stop looking at those pretty golden eyes too.