Cure for the Common Universe

by Christian McKay Heidicker

  “Meeki,” Fezzik said, “your avatar’s name was ‘mekillyoulongtime.’ ”

  Meeki rolled her eyes and then pointed in my face. “I’m gay. So don’t flirt with me.”

  “Uh . . .” I scowled. “Don’t worry.”

  The Nest door opened, and Command led the electric warlock into the room. He didn’t look dead anymore, but he didn’t look not dead either. No way could he look that terrible because of a gamer hangover.

  The small kid next to me leapt up, creaked open another chair, and set it down to my left. The electric warlock slumped into it. Meeki and the other girl scooted over to give him and his sunken eyes some space.

  “Greetings, new player!” Fezzik said. “What are we going to call you on this adventure?”

  The kid held his head up from his legs and gurgled something that sounded like “Zxzord.”

  “Heh. Okay.” Fezzik gestured to the dark-skinned girl with the bright white hair. “Next, meet our mystic elf.”

  The girl set down her cross-stitch and shook her white hair so it partially covered her face. Then she quickly tucked it back behind her ear again, like hiding her face was a thing she was trying not to do anymore. She was one of those eternally gloomy-looking people, like someone had left her out in the rain and all her happy had seeped away.

  “My name is Aurora. I’m a third tier. . . . I don’t want to talk about video games today.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Fezzik said. “What would you like to talk about?”

  Aurora tucked the other side of her hair behind an ear. “It’s pleasant not to stare at a computer screen anymore. I . . . see things. Like, flies are adorable. Have you noticed? They clean themselves like kittens.” She mimicked the action. “They lick their legs and then wipe off their big spotty eyes. It’s amazing. Their proboscises are like tiny little gummy straws . . .”

  Her voice was so floaty, it went straight in one ear and out the other. I studied the Nest’s half wall, which had been tagged with video game references, some of which had been painted over. Through the paint, I could still see the silhouette of a Super Mario question mark block and the Triforce from Zelda, but “the cake is a lie” and “praise the sun” hadn’t been painted over at all. I wondered if G-man eliminated obvious references but thought the last two were about healthy eating and outdoor fitness.

  “I could watch flies for hours,” Aurora said.

  Meeki pointed at me again. “She has a boyfriend.”

  Again I scowled. Why was this girl such an asshole?

  “Soup?” Fezzik said.

  The squirrely kid fidgeted in the chair next to me, eager to tell his story. He seemed so genuinely wholesome, I was surprised he didn’t have a flower bud growing out of the top of his head.

  “I’m Soup, and I’m a first tier,” he said, way too close to my face. “My stepbrother got me into video games. He liked scary stuff like The Last of Us and Dark Souls, except I didn’t, ’cause they’re too scary, but I like all video games, so it didn’t really matter. I used to have to do things for him so that he’d let me watch him play, like get him drinks or take off his shoes and stuff, but then he died, and then I could play as much video games as I wanted.”

  Before my heart even had a chance to flutter, Soup continued. “I like the 3DS. I like Harvest Moon and Animal Crossing, but my favorite is Nintendogs ’cause my parents won’t let me have a real puppy.” Soup’s eyes shifted from happy to a sad glisten. “But then they said I didn’t play outside enough and they took my 3DS away . . . and they let my poodle, Minus, starve to death. You kinda look like my stepbrother.”

  Soup stared at me like I was supposed to say something to that. I opened my mouth, but then he perked up and jumped onto his knees.

  “My favorite part of Video Horizons is all of it. It’s like one big Animal Crossing. That’s why even though I’ve been here for a month and a week, I’m still only a first tier. I don’t even want any points. I wish it was my first day. No, first minute! First second!”

  “Heel, Soup,” Fezzik said, chuckling.

  He hooked Soup’s shirt collar and pulled him back into his seat. I squinted away a headache. I’d been listening to the kid for two minutes and already felt like I’d had too many energy drinks.

  “Miles,” Fezzik said, “remember these faces. Your guildmates will help you earn points so you can return to the outside world where your real adventure will begin.”

  I did look at their faces: Meeki, Aurora, Soup, and the electric warlock, whose head still hadn’t left his hands. Hell, my dad thought I had a problem? I never ate so much that I couldn’t leave the house, or cracked a family member in the skull with a Wiimote, or bemoaned the death of a digital dog more than a real human being. The only thing I was guilty of was being turned down by girls too many times and not wanting to spend time with my shitty stepmom or controlling father.

  I might have played more video games than most, but at least I’d had a good reason. Unfortunately, that was probably what everyone in that circle thought about themselves.

  “Miles,” Fezzik said, “do you want to tell us the tale of how you came to Video Horizons?”

  Aurora and Soup turned to me.

  “My name is, um . . . Miles Prower. I’ve been a gamer my entire life, but I’ve been playing Arcadia for about two years.” Fezzik gave a grunt of acknowledgment. “Sometimes as much as, uh, five hours a day. But I’m done with that now. Because . . . well . . .”

  I studied my guildmates. The non-player characters who would help me escape. If I could make it out of there in time for my date, then I could show G-man, my dad, and all of the girls at my school that I wasn’t like these weirdo gamer inmates. That I actually did deserve to go out with someone as lovely as Serena.

  “I need to get out of here as soon as possible,” I said. “See, I made a girl laugh for the first time today. My stepmom asked me to wash her Xterra, so I went to the car wash, and I met this cute girl there. Apparently some dickhead had sprayed her with one of the, um, sprayers, so . . .”

  I told them the story. Or, at least, a version of the story.

  When I finished, Meeki looked up from her cross-stitch and gave me a poisonous look. “So, what, your princess is in another castle, and you gotta go save her?”

  What the hell? Did Meeki have to eat someone’s heart every day in order to survive or something?

  “It wasn’t like that,” I said. “She was interesting . . . and interested. And she wasn’t wearing a pink dress.”

  Soup laughed. A little too hard.

  Meeki crossed her arms tight and narrowed her eyes.

  “And what was this fair maiden’s name?” Fezzik asked.

  Meeki cleared her throat. “We don’t know if she’s fair or a maiden.”

  Fezzik chuckled uncomfortably.

  “Uh . . .” I thought about patient confidentiality. I thought about my exaggerated story of how she and I had met. I thought about how she had drawn me in. . . .

  “Her name was Gravity,” I said.

  Meeki snorted.

  “Gravity,” Fezzik said. “Excellent. Thanks for sharing, Miles.”

  He didn’t say anything about trying to get me out of there as quickly as possible so that I could get to my date. Instead he tried to nudge some life into the electric warlock. “Greetings, Zxzord! I think that’s what you said your name was. Heh-heh. Would you like to share the tale of what brought you to Video Horizons?”

  Zxzord rubbed his face like he was just waking up. He wiped his nose, cleared his throat, and spoke for the first time. “Heroin.”

  Meeki laughed so hard, it made Soup jump. The sound made Zxzord cradle his head again. Meeki’s laughter trailed off. In the ensuing silence Zxzord dropped his hands and took in our shocked expressions with raw eyes. He spoke in his undead warlock voice. “Every time I went into my room to shoot up, I told my parents I was playing video games.” He sniffed. “So they sent me here.”

  Everyone in the circle shifted their
limbs, as if one of his frayed wire tattoos could lash out and electrocute us. Holy shit. While we’d all chased digital dragons, Zxzord had actually been chasing the dragon.

  “Maybe Mario mushrooms are a gateway drug,” Meeki said, and snorted.

  Zxzord pressed his palms into his eyes. “I don’t know why more people don’t just kill themselves.”

  Fezzik grew red and made a sound like a Wookiee. “Heh-heh. Sounds like someone needs a health potion! Um, uh, let’s get you to G-man’s office, shall we?”

  He helped Zxzord to his feet while the Fury Burds dispersed around the Nest. Meeki worked the punching bag, Aurora continued cross-stitching what looked like a dog with leprosy, and Soup whipped sheets off two of the bunks.

  Again, I stood there like an idiot.

  “Hey, Miles,” Meeki said. “You want me to grab you some cross-stitching materials so you can start earning points?”

  “Oh, um, that would be great,” I said.

  “Too bad. I’m not your slave.” She hit the punching bag again.

  Fezzik poked his head back into the room. “Fury Burds mayor?”

  “Yeah?” Soup said.

  “Would you give Miles the tour?”

  Before I could protest, a smile burst across Soup’s face, and he ran up to me.

  “Welcome to V-hab!” he said, throwing wide his arms.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  “Get it?” he said, poking my stomach fat. “V-hab. Like, rehab for video games?”

  “I get it,” I said, brushing his hand away.

  Soup cracked up, sucking in laughter like he was having a seizure.

  “If you need anything, anything at all, just say, ‘Soup, I need . . .’ and then fill in whatever you need.”

  I need a million points, I thought.

  Soup patted my arm. “Don’t worry. Everyone’s a grouchy cow on their first day.” He squeezed my hand. “I’ll make sure nothing bad happens to you while you’re here.”

  Save Point

  After Soup’s exhaustive tour of the Nest (“And this is the thread drawer, where we keep different colors of thread, like yellow and purple and black and . . .”), a woodpecker rattled through the Nest’s speakers, and we all headed to the Feed, a toasty little cafeteria filled with sizzles and good food smells.

  “This is where you can eat,” Soup said.

  “Yeah,” I said. “Got it.”

  Meeki pushed past us and stepped behind the steaming food troughs, slipping on a hairnet and cellophane gloves. The Feed had just about everything, from reheated pizza and Coke to veggie stir-fry and green tea. Hanging above the troughs were two pictures—one of a smiling salad with “1,000” written beneath, the other of a frowning candy bar with a big “0.”

  All I wanted was a chocolate doughnut with sprinkles. Okay, that isn’t all I wanted. I wanted a chocolate doughnut with sprinkles and a Red Bull. I wanted the Wight Knights in my headset screaming inappropriate shit about motorboating my man boobs. I wanted to block out all of Video Horizons and its players and focus on a screen where I could decapitate cowbots, so my brain could just relax a bit.

  “I’ll take the veggie stir-fry.”

  Meeki held out the spoon to me. “You can serve yourself.”

  I didn’t take the spoon. “Aren’t you getting points for doing this?”

  She scowled and slopped veggies onto my plate.

  I took my food to the cook, a squat, hairy man with a stylish apron that made him look like a bearded Fabergé egg. He wore a name tag that read COOKING MAMA. He scratched his beard and stamped my scroll.

  +1,000

  My first points. At this rate I’d be released from V-hab in just under three years.

  While Soup ordered food, I tried to slip away, but someone blocked my path. Scarecrow. The skinny Master Cheef with greasy straw hair.

  “In case it wasn’t clear,” he said, “I think you’re a pile of shit, and I’m going to make you lose at everything you try.”

  I searched his eyes. “Why?”

  He gave a crooked grin. “If I told you, it would spoil the surprise.”

  He patted my cheek and walked away.

  I stayed frozen with my tray, until Soup hooked my arm—“Come on!”—and led me to a table by a window that overlooked the shadowy side of a giant dune.

  “This is the Fury Burds table,” he said.

  “Clearly.”

  We sat, and Soup sort of let his knee fall against mine. I sorta knocked it back. Behind us one of the Sefiroths whispered, “Who would win in a fight? Snake from Metal Gear or a million Pikmin?”

  Aurora sat across from me and Soup with exactly one half of a piece of white toast and a small cup of horchata, which she nibbled and sipped delicately. She must have caught me staring because she said, “I get points for eating anything at all.”

  I glanced at her too-thin arms, then quickly took a bite of Feed food.

  I immediately spit it out.

  “Blech. What the hell is this?”

  Aurora looked toward the kitchen. “The Sefs were on dinner duty. They microwave everything. Even eggs.”

  “Ugh.” Maybe I would lose thirty pounds by Thursday.

  “WIZARD NEEDS FOOD!”

  Fezzik joined our table with a modest amount of food for a guy his size.

  “How’s Zxzord?” Aurora asked.

  “Healing at the Fairy Fountain.” Fezzik nudged me. “That’s what we call the sick bay. They’re going to do some tests to see if he’s faking or not.”

  “Faking a heroin addiction?” I said.

  Fezzik shrugged.

  “I’ll sew him a get-better spell,” Aurora said.

  “That would be nice,” Fezzik said.

  Zxzord had his journey. I had mine.

  “How can I start earning experience points?” I asked.

  Fezzik chuckled. “No need to start grinding yet, adventurer. If this were a video game, you’d still be in the first town. But that reminds me. You do get five thousand experience points just for showing up to guild therapy. Let me just get out my Buster Sword. . . .” He took my scroll and unholstered a stamp from his belt. “FIVE THOUSAND XP!” His voice thundered through the Feed, and he stamped my smiley face column.

  “Great,” I said, tallying the wet numbers on my scroll—6,000 points.

  I felt a swipe across my jeans and looked down to find Soup laying a napkin on my lap.

  “In case you get messy,” he said.

  I did not murder him.

  “Tomorrow is Monday,” Fezzik said, “so you can earn lots of XP playing sports in the Coliseum.”

  And I thought my butt had clenched when Command had wanted to give me a cavity search. Never in the history of words has there been a more terrifying phrase than “sports in the Coliseum.”

  “I know how ya feel,” Fezzik said, chuckling at what must have been my horrified expression. “Most exercise I ever got as a gamer was when I accidentally dropped my remote under the couch. Heh-heh.”

  Aurora’s horchata cup echoed a giggle.

  “Sports?” I said. “Do I have to?”

  “Depends on how fast you want out of here.” Fezzik held his spork aloft and bellowed, “Any player willing to brave sweat and sulfur must simply pluck up a sword . . .”

  He explained that every day, players could test their non-gaming prowess in different types of tournaments. Mondays were dedicated to sports: baseball, basketball, tennis, and other words that made my manhood shrink. Tuesdays were team-based puzzle solving. Wednesday was a kart race. Thursday would be devoted to a big paintball tournament. And Friday was a sand-castle-building competition.

  “We’re gonna build a castle right up to the freaking sky!” Soup said, throwing his hands toward the ceiling.

  I would not be there for sand castle Friday.

  I would not be there for sand castle Friday.

  Fezzik continued, “In each of the competitions, players can earn two hundred and fifty thousand points for first place,
two hundred thousand for second, and a hundred and fifty thousand for third.”

  So yes. In order to be out of there by Thursday, I would have to sports. And not just sports. Even while earning points from classes and extracurricular activities, I’d still have to medal in all the tournaments.

  I dropped my spork onto my unfinished stir-fry and rubbed my face. Soup rubbed my back.

  “Don’t do that,” I said.

  His rubbing turned into small pats.

  Aurora stamped up toast crumbs with her pinky finger and ate them one by one.

  “Is everyone here pretty bad at sports?” I asked, scanning the scrawny and round faces in the cafeteria. “I mean, they’d have to be, right?”

  “Not the Master Cheefs,” Fezzik said, scooping up peas. “Some of those kids got hooked on video games only after they got a sports-related injury or broke up with someone.”

  I scowled and choked down my veggies and wondered why I had never taken Casey’s advice and exercised at home: push-ups, jumping jacks, jog every once in a while? Hell, why not at least do a few curls with the game controller while playing The Binding of Isaac? Because I’d never thought I’d find myself in a position where going on a date with a beautiful girl would hinge on performing well in a sporting event. That’s why.

  I thought about running and throwing and catching and all the things I despised. I thought about burning lungs and burning desires. I thought about Gravity.

  “Guess I’m playing sports tomorrow,” I said.

  “Quest accepted!” Fezzik said.

  My heart started to beat no, no, NO, NO.

  “I’m gonna go before I throw up all over the table,” I said.

  Before I could stand, Soup grabbed my food tray. “I got it! No problem. It’s no problem. I used to do chores for a town of little animals all the time. It’s no problem.”

  While Soup cleared my tray, I snuck out of the Feed and took the long way around the rectangular hallway so I wouldn’t have to see him again. The eastern half of the building was dark, the only light the green glow of the exit. As the hum of the Feed faded behind me, I heard tinkering.

  I followed the echo to a slimy mop trail, which led to the backside of a janitor hunched in the far corner. His mop was propped against an open grate, and he was peering inside a wall vent, which was large enough for him to fit inside. Vapor from an e-cigarette coiled around his ponytail and ass crack as he mumbled. “They get points for doing a crap job cleaning up this place. Do I get a raise for cleaning up after them? No, I do not. Come on, you piece of . . .”