“Oh, shove it.” I grumbled, squeezing the gun tighter. “Wouldn’t need you to save me if this fucking gun worked properly.”
“Hey, I know damn well that thing works. Serviced it myself.” Her chest puffed up as she shot another robot. “Only a bad gamer blames her tools.”
“If it’s so great, then you try it.” I grumbled, swinging the crosshair across the screen again, overshooting my target.
Not wasting a second, Spencer dropped her gun and stepped in behind me. Her character was taking tons of damage, but she ignored their cries, wrapping her arms around me as shereached for the gun. “The problem is that you’re panicking. Don’t swing it like this….”
She shook our hands around, making the crosshair dance across the screen. “Subtle motions are your friend. She’s a sensitive beast.”
Snapping our wrists just a few degrees to the left, Spencer’s fingers squeezed over mine to pull the trigger, mowing down a new crop of robots against a background of explosions. “Got it?”
“Yep…” I swallowed hard as she stepped back to her station and got back to work.
Her touch had done anything but calm me. Maybe it was just the adrenaline of the game, or maybe I’d hit my head after she picked me up at the bar, but all I could think about was the warmth of her arms wrapped around me and what it would take to feel that again.
I cleared my throat and tried to recenter as the tinny voice cut in again: “Hasta la vista, baby.”
We’d reached a small reprieve in the onslaught. To my shock, my character was still surprisingly high on health. Spencer’s not so much.
Exhaling through pursed lips, I cocked an eyebrow at her. “Kind of intense for a childhood favorite. Your parents were okay with you playing this kind of stuff?”
Spencer shrugged as she corrected me. “My mom wasn’t around much to keep an eye on what I got up to.”
I nodded, trying to hide the shock from my face. “I know what that’s like. My mom was always too busy with her stupid boyfriends to bother raising me. But I spent less time at the arcade and more at the library, I guess.”
“That sounds hard.” Spencer glanced at me as the next level started up. “I feel lucky that my momwantedto be around. It was just life that kind of got in the way there.”
“Work?” I asked, lifting my gun back up to the screen.
Nodding, Spencer took one last glance at me. “Among other things.”
A round of crackly gun fire rang out from the machine. Now, mini airplanes had been added to our host of enemies. My aim was getting better, but not quickly enough to keep up with the onslaught. Spencer was taking hits faster than we could knock out robots.
I tried to keep my eyes on our attackers as her energy bar crept lower and lower. But there was nothing I could do to save her. After a few valiant minutes of fighting, bold red text flashed across her side of the screen as the digital man made the call. “Terminated!”
“Shit!” She threw her hands in the air.
“What do I?—?”
“Keep shooting!” She cried before I could loosen my grip on my gun.
I squeezed the gun tighter, heart racing as more enemies approached me and more upgrades became available. I flicked my eyes to her side of the screen where a countdown urged her to put in another coin. “Spencer! Tap back in!”
“No way!” She stepped closer, watching over my shoulder. “You’ve got this.”
Just as her countdown hit zero, the level began to shake. New music crept in, discordant synthy tones announcing the beginning of the boss battle.
“Spencer!” My jaw dropped as a hulking metal monstrosity wheeled across the back of the screen and began shooting me with balls of light.
Spencer was jumping up and down now. “Shoot! Shoot!”
With Spencer’s coaching, I took aim, alternating between the oncoming attacks and the behemoth itself. My energy bar was taking heavy hits, a flashing red “danger” sign floating just above it. But I didn’t dare let up with Spencer watching.
Soon, the robot lost its head, then its arms, and then its ability to fight back entirely. Spencer gripped my shoulders. “Come on, Bunny! Bring it home!”
Vibrating with excitement, I squeezed hard on the trigger, shooting at the robot’s base until —
WHOOSH!
