“Gaming has changed a small amount since then.” He hands me a controller. “This should be interesting.”
We spend a few minutes while I learn the “delicate intricacies” of his controllers. His words, not mine, and then Finn clicks the flashing “play game" button.
Little by little a green land emerges on my television. A random assortment of loading bars scroll across the bottom as each piece of this new puzzle is put together. First grass, then trees, a mountain in the distance, a stream to our side. The graphics are minimalistic and we see it all in a top down view. Buildings load last, the roofs of most cover the insides, but a few allow us to see the interior floorplan. Finn fills me in on public and private spaces within the large multiple player online game.
Two characters are dumped in this new land as the final words scroll across the bottom of the screen. “Reticulating splines?” I question the final load bar.
Finn shrugs off my question. “It’s kind of an inside joke to the gaming world.” Characters in various forms of medieval dress mill around us. There are people in long robes, and a few with what I guess are elf ears. “All of these people walking around are other people playing the game right now, so be careful of where you walk. The Internet makes some people into power hungry warlords.”
I laugh once at his comment, but when he doesn’t return my humor, I wonder if Internet warlords aren’t a joking matter. The tavern and blacksmith shops around us lead me to believe we’re in a town center, but the number of people is daunting. “All these people are playing this game right now?” I question unsure I understood him.
“This is one server. Jetson. The boys and I play on the Beta server, but we’re pretty far ahead. I thought we could start a new game together.”
The fact Finn wants to build a new home from scratch on a new server excites me. I can’t pinpoint why, but it feels as if he’s making an investment in me. Whoever thought I, Aspen Adams, would get gushy romantic over a video game? But, I can't ignore how my heart raced when he spoke the words.
A few of the heavily armored players have stopped along the cobblestone roadway we stand on. Their bodies form a circle around us.
“Assholes,” Finn sneers beside me. “Here give me your controller.”
“What? Why?” I question even as I hand him the device.
Finn’s fingers begin to strike buttons. Soon an image of a game character fills the screen. She has long dark brown hair, but the most noticeable part is the large breasts she’s barely covered with a tiny black bikini.
“Is this what I look like in the game?” I go to take back my controller. My character is hot. No wonder they were looking. I’d look too. I've never cursed my B-cups before, but I’d take her boobs any day.
Finn covers up the online, but hotter equivalent of me before he hands me back the controller. My new blue dress sweeps to the ground and has long sleeves which drape almost touching the ground.
“Well that’s no fun,” I huff. Obviously, a bunch of horny men developed this game if that’s the standard uniform for a new woman character.
Finn kisses the side of my neck and his arms reach around me again. His outstretched arms hold a remote in front of me. He leads his character through the cobblestone street to some unknown destination and I follow.
A shadow falls on our partially constructed wooden home as Finn’s character places another corner block. I step out from the tree I was cutting down and move my controls to survey the sky. Overhead, a dragon circles our area, and his dark green outstretched wings shadow those beneath him. A puff of fire shoots from his nose and the noise of burning embers sounds from my television.
Finn ignores the creature and continues to place blocks on our makeshift house. I turn my head back to him. “Um, Finn. Should we be concerned with the big dragon?”
His fingers continue to tap buttons on the controller. “No, dragons make a circular flight pattern and pass each player on a thirty minute rotation. They won’t engage unless hit first or if the establishment is a level four or higher and hasn't had destruction within fifty-two game hours.”
He doesn’t even drop his head to look at me. I understand zilch of what Finn’s said, but he said it with such confidence I trust him and go back to my tree. The game’s graphics are basic and pixilated, but the options seem to be endless as Finn describes all the things the guys have done on the server they use.
“We’ll get this house built for shelter and then we can find some caves and search for useful resources, maybe a treasure chest.” Finn pushes his legs together squeezing me as I sit between them.
A panicked thought slips past my lips as the visual flashes through my mind. “Will there be dragons in these caves?”
“Rarely, but don’t worry, we’ll rush them,” he answers calmly.
It doesn’t help reduce my apprehension. “You do realize I have no idea what that means right?”
Finn laughs at my naivety and presses another small kiss to my neck, the breath trailing down my collarbone. “It’s a type of combat. We’ll use speed and surprise to race in and conquer anything before they realize we’re there. We’ll rush them.” He chuckles to himself again and then bites my ear lobe lightly. "Kind of like what I’m doing to you.”
“Is that so?” I nudge his shoulder with my own. “You’re working on the sneak attack against me?”
His legs press up against mine again, tighter this time. “Yeah, you won’t even know I’m in here until it’s too late.” His controller taps on my chest above my heart twice before he casually resumes playing the game like he didn’t just throw my world for a loop.
I don’t even know what to do with that, so I ignore it and try to change to subject to a safer one even as my heart beats erratically from where the controller touched me. “Why are all these games based in medieval eras with dragons and swords and shit?" I look back to Finn as I ask my question.
His forehead tightens and Finn eyes me as if I’ve lost my mind. “Because swords and dragons are cool, Aspen.”
