The story introduction begins, and I scramble for the remote to turn it down. Naturally, as soon as it’s ten seconds in, it’s so quiet that I have to crank the volume up again. Before long, we’re dropped into the game, wandering around mashing buttons to figure out the controls. It quickly becomes engrossing exploring the terrain, even if I have no idea what the hell I’m supposed to be looking for.
“Bottom left is a radar,” she points out, biting back a smile. “Head for the large dot.”
Getting back on track, I make it halfway there before I’m hit by a Jeep.
More careful this time, I make it to where her avatar is waiting, following right behind her as she leads us through a dark building. “What are we looking for?”
“We’re clearing the area,” she explains with an abundance of patience. “People in armor are on our team, and if you see any weird looking aliens, shoot them. After we kill them all, the next area unlocks, and we do it again in different terrains until we beat the entire game.”
“Alright, I can handle that.”
Five dead alien grunts later, my gun clicks empty, and I get shot in the head with a laser gun. “What the hell?! Where am I supposed to buy more bullets?”
Shoulders shaking with silent laughter, she explains, “Sorry, I thought you were only lost on the directive. Run over corpses to pick up any ammo they dropped, or you can change out your gun for a different one by switching with any of the CPUs on our team.”
While waiting to respawn, I turn to her with a sigh. “How are you so good at this already?”
Attention rapt on the screen, she shrugs. “I actually watched the intro while you were busy playing with the volume? And I’m definitely not good, I’ve died eight times already. Each time I’m killed, though, I learn something. We can’t jump from too high up or we die, but can handle the drop from a roof. So the next time I ran out of ammo, I jumped off the building and ran away until I found another gun and came back.”
I can’t say whether or not I enjoy the actual game, but without a shadow of a doubt, I love watching Amara play, and continue to do so from the corner of my eye. She’s completely engrossed in it to the point anyone could walk in behind us and she wouldn’t even notice. My chest tightens as I replay her words from the hallway, and realize... she really does trust us. Otherwise she’d never risk letting her guard down like this.
We make it another hour before she reaches the point she’s too frustrated with the level we can’t seem to beat and pauses it with a growl. Setting her controller down on the floor, she rolls her shoulders. “Fuck that troll. Maybe there’s a rocket launcher hiding somewhere we have to find to take it out?”
I save and quit the game before she gets even more pissed off at losing all of her progress. “I didn’t realize you’d be so bloodthirsty.”
“I can’t kick anyone’s ass in real life, of course I love the satisfaction of virtually blowing up people twice my size,” she admits easily. “I’m more pissed off that I can’t figure this out, though. There has to be something obvious that I’m missing.” Sliding out my phone, she claps a hand over the screen to stop me. “Don’t you dare Google it, you cheater. When I win this damn game, it’s going to be because I earned it.”
Chuckling, I tuck it away again. “Alright, alright. We’ll play fair if it means that much to you.”
Satisfied I’m not going to go behind her back, she rises to her feet, stretching out her stiff muscles from sitting so long. “I feel guilty spending the last few days slacking off. Is there an extra laptop lying around here somewhere? I can at least take care of the things Raiden was having the three of us work on before shit hit the fan. He was already running himself ragged before plotting to murder half the country in my honor.”
And there’s the reason I’m not completely convinced that we should add sex into the mix yet. She’s gone from panic attacks at merely the thought of Malcolm finding her, to flippantly joking about what had her a sobbing mess only a few days ago.
“Carina is still holding down the fort, and I’ll talk to him about what Kodi and I can do to help. We both know that Raiden would vastly prefer you take some more time to acclimate and get comfortable here instead of working right now.”
She sighs. “Heisbound and determined that I fall in love with Khalida and want to stay forever.”
“And how’s that going so far?”
She purses her lips, choosing her words carefully. “Today was weird, but... in a good way. Carina was clearly on a mission to convince me it’s the best place on earth, though, and I don’t doubt that she only showed me the things that were in line with her agenda. Nowhere is perfect. Hell, Jack’s proof of that. Until I find the seedy underbelly and have the full picture, I don’t think I’ll be able to accept that those two aren’t conspiring to hide some dirty secret to trick me into signing over my soul, you know?”
With a dip of my head as I contemplate her sentiment, I pray this idea won’t blow up in my face and tentatively suggest, “I'm sure Raiden will be wondering how today went as well. Maybe you should fill him in?”
Biting her bottom lip, she asks, “If he was worried, why hasn’t he even sent me a text to ask?”
“Because he's trying his damndest not to pressure or guilt you into staying here permanently, even if he really hopes you’ll choose to.”
Rising to her feet, she groans, heading for the door. “This has gone on long enough. Try not to get your ass kicked by Kodi while I’m gone.”
