Private - The First Dive | Page 2

Vince heard the THUNK of the bolt being released, and nearly jumped out of his boots when the bolt landed not in the rat, but about a foot away from his right foot. "Oi! Shoot him not me!" Vince quipped as he dodged another angry swing of the rats tail. The thick, hairless rope of coiled muscle was more like a flail than a tail, and Vince didn't want to get punked by a rat on day one. He hadn't managed to use his...he assumed that was Illusion magic, again. To be truthful, he had no idea how he'd done it to begin with. So he was doing it oldschool.

Just like darksouls my dude. He thought to himself. Circle strafe to the left, watch for attacks, dodge, and then punish them on the recovery frames

He wasn't sure HOW useful any of that would be, but he'd yet to be hit once, and he'd nailed the rat all of one time. The thing was quick, and not one to leave a lot of openings. The best he could hope for now was for Ray to suddenly figure out how to use a crossbow, and hope that the second layer of attacks would open enough of a gap for him to stick a sword through it.

 

"Come on, come on, come on," the silver-haired woman muttered to herself, fumbling another bolt from the quiver on her back. It made complete sense that she would struggle in the beginning, considering her stats were still sitting at at a big, fat zero. At the same time, she had figured the game's mechanics would help her a little. Hell, Ray had never shot a crossbow in real-life, but she figured it would be easier than what she attempted in-game. "I should have just used a sword." It was damn hard to screw that up.

She lifted the crossbow, took aim best she could, and let fly. Again, the projectile whizzed toward the enemy, but lodged itself in a tuft of grass two feet away. Close, but they were not talking horse shoes or hand grenades here. Rayleigh screwed her face up in an expression of pure disgust.

"Alright, I can't shoot," she stated dryly. "And there's nothing that these stupid voices can do to help me. I guess I'll just -"

There was a sudden scratching at the back of her consciousness. It was a sensation unlike any she had ever felt, and a jolt raced through her body. Sucking in a breath, Ray cautiously focused on the feeling, letting down her guard just the slightest bit.

Suddenly, there was something else, someone else, in her head with her.

And her hands began to glow a faint, crystal blue. Vincent's hands, she realized with mixed fascination and horror, did the same.

 

Oh neat, my hands are glowing.

The thought clicked in Vincent's head for a moment as he sidestepped another flail like bat of the tail. Why though? He glanced to Ray, who was floundering and failing with her crossbow to make another shot, so he would have to get creative. I need to get this...illusion shit under control. He mused to himself as he attempted to strike another swing, and the rat managed to get away from him.

God dammit, I'm getting sick of this level one clown.

He scrunched his face up and dodged several attacks as he planned his...plan of attack. He wasn't fast enough to style on the rat fast enough, he needed a way to get a solid hit, he needed an opening. He really needed a distraction. He focused really hard, squinting ever so slightly, and forced himself to visualize lunging to the left and sweeping at the rat with his blade. He took a deep breath, and let the idea fly, sure enough a phantasm variant of him lunged forward and did just that. Seizing on the moment he went left and tried to sweep at the rat.

The creature didn't see it coming. On instinct it went for the shadow on the right, not realizing the true Vince was on the left. Its tail sailed through the shadow, dispelling it instantly. In response, Vincent's blade found purchase in its flank and sliced down it with grace as he stepped past the rat and wheeled on it to see how his hit had treated the creature.

 

The rat gave a great shudder, seemingly more stunned by the attack than inured. Its beady eyes stared blankly in no particular direction, and it swayed, struggling to keep its tiny feet beneath it. It wobbled, but without the grace or innocence of a newborn foal, and more like a drunken fool. Were Ray in a better mood, she might have found the situation comical.

Instead, all she could do was give a satisfied sneer as the rat lurched for the final time, and crumpled to a heap on the lush grass. She was pleased the mob was dead, and that they would no longer have to deal with it. That much, she could celebrate. But there was a lingering sense of annoyance and frustration that paled the victory.

Vincent had done all of the work. What had she done? Make his hands glow? At the mere thought, Ray scoffed. A hand raked through her long, white hair with more force than necessary. And when Vince finally strolled back to her, she could not even summon that smirk again.

“Nice job,” she told him, attempting to appear encouraging, but falling flat; her voice sounded tiny and emotionless to her own ears. Then, heaving a sigh, she held her hands out in a gesture of confused exasperation. “I don’t know what I did wrong. I couldn’t get the damn thing to fire straight.” Her blue eyes narrowed with accidental accusation. “But you didn’t have any problem at all.”

The unfairness of it all turned her original awe at the game to disgust, and she nearly threw her crossbow at the trunk of the nearest tree.

 

“Ray, I used to LARP all the time.” He replied with raised eyebrows. “You remember? You saw my chainmail in my room that one time and I explained and you just called me a dork?” She was not thrilled, he could tell simply from her facial expressions alone. How surreal, this game is capable of perfect mimicry of facial expressions He mused to himself. “Plus its all those years playing dark souls put into practice, strafe left and don’t let the baddies thwap you.”


He shot her a trademark Vincent Cain smile, or, he liked to think it was trademarked, the U.S patent and Trademark Office hadn’t gotten back to him. “I took a simple weapon, you? Shooting is hard, shooting a crossbow? Harder. You gotta crank that think and like do some weird latchy thing, then you gotta aim” The whole time Vincent was comically pantomiming the process in which he really had no idea what he was doing, he’d never fired a crossbow once, not a real one anyways, he had that one time at uncle Tony’s ranch, but he was pretty sure that thing was more like an automatic boar killing machine and not a crossbow. “But imagine the payoff! You could totally fuck up some rats with good practice, and not have to worry about tanking any hits!” He couldn’t tell if he was helping or hurting, but he felt like if he didn’t commit if would make him seem insincere or worse, like he was making fun of her.


“Maybe there’s something in the menus to help? I can’t imagine an MMO like this would make you have to learn how to shoot a crossbow by yourself”

 

And then he flashed her that winning smile. It was an expression that held such warmth, such light, that the sun could not even hold the metaphorical candle to it. Rayleigh did not melt, per se. A lesser woman might have, would have, but she had seen this expression before. She had built her defenses against it. So rather than being reduced to a puddle at his feet, she merely felt it strip away the armor of turbulent emotion that she wore like a second skin.

“Yeah,” she replied simply. “Maybe.” Ray was grateful that he had suggested the menu, because summoning it allowed her to shift her attention away from his face. She flicked through it for a while, aimless, hopeless. Though she and Vince had bonded over all things nerdy - they had met at an anime club, afterall - she had very little experience with video games; those she had played were mostly first-person shooters. While it was true that she had watched Vince play through a few RPGs, she spent most of the time teasing him about his dragon fighting, silly spells, and scantily-clad companions. Nothing she had done, or seen, had prepared her for Terrasphere. She was lost and drifting, anchored only by her Player Two. Not that she would let him know that.

She paused, a cool breeze rustling the leaves and her hair. The sensation seemed to draw her back from her musings, and nudge her back into the present with the gentlest of caresses. Had she always allowed herself to get lost in thought so easily? It felt like her mind spent most of its time in Terrasphere floating a million miles away. Maybe that’s why I can’t even shoot a crossbow.

Ray dismissed her menu, and finally glanced back to Vincent. His smile had waned, thankfully, into a more manageable expression. “So,” she began, “is this the part where we find the beginner quests?” Turning, she scanned their surroundings. Then, pointing at a worn trail in the earth, she said, “This looks promising. Maybe follow this until we find some kind of town?” She had little experience with games, so she was mostly talking out her ass, but it felt better than having no plan at all. “Maybe I can’t really use my abilities until we start gaining points. Or experience, or whatever. And aren’t quests a good way to do that?”

 

Vince nodded along when she decided to speak again. She seemed to be buried into her menu for an awfully long time. He sorta wished he could read over her shoulder, help point her along or something like that. They were two types of gamers, Ray was more of the shooty tooty player who could whoop Vince in every shooter they'd ever played. Vince was the classic RPG man, who could get lost in a story and the mechanics with relative ease. However, it looked like once she had finished her dive into the menus, and rose to the metaphorical surface, she said something rather astute.

"Yeah! I just looked at it, and it seems like I have some mastery points just from slaying the rat! We could either grind out rats, or we can do quests, I think. I don't see any of the usual quest marker shenanigans that come at the start of a game like this..." he taped on his chin lightly. "If that trail leads us to town we can surely find some NPC's and chat them up for quests and the like. In most MMO's questing is one of the best ways to go about leveling. They usually involve you doing things that you normally do when you grind, but once you hit some arbitrary marker you get a bunch of EXP and loot dumped on you."

Without thinking he reached out and grabbed her hand. "Lets go! We only have so much time and we have to move in real time it seems! I want to get our claws sunk into the game before you have to log off tonight!" He started down the road at a surprisingly fast pace with Ray dragging behind him. "And if we see any rats we should stop and kick them in the ass to practice using our skills and the like!"

 

"Whoa, whoa, hang on!"

But the words were weak, airy, and far from persuasive. Rayleigh spoke them with the same resolve as an alcoholic refusing another drink. She knew it was a bad idea allowing Vincent to literally drag her down the well-worn path. That did a lot to undermine her reputation as a strong, independent woman. She could walk by herself, thank-you-very-much. Besides, Ray had found that avoiding physical contact with her male counterpart was normally the best course of action. Even sitting next to him at anime club meetings had caused a chorus of whispers, and a myriad of raised eyebrows, compelling her to remind everyone that they were NOT dating.

But this was Terrasphere. She was a tall, white-haired beauty, not the short blonde kid with a flat chest and a boyish haircut. No one would recognize her. No one would have to know. And if she were honest with herself, the sensation of her hand in his was not so bad.

And they did not encounter any more rats.

Vincent slowed when he noticed a farmer pacing along the side of the path. The scenery had transformed, morphing from massive, wild trees to smaller, more orderly orchards. On the other side of a fence, Ray saw that these trees were heavy with fruit. The massive apples, sparkling red in the sun, and larger than her clenched fist, were bending the branches they dangled from.

"This looks promising," Ray commented. Then, to the concerned man, she said, "Hello, is there something we could do for you?"

"Why yes, thank you! My apples are ready to be picked, but all of my workers are sick with the same stomach pains! Bad meat at dinner last night, I imagine. But I cannot waste even a day! Will you help me?"

​

 

Fuck yeah, a fetch quest!

Vince couldn't even believe he was thinking that honestly, normally this sort of quest was boring tedium that required a labored amount of mouse-clicks and many an angry night killing a caffeine buzz while trying to get those god damn boars to drop their thirtieth god damn tusk.

But nay! This was a deep dive MMO with real feel technology! And he was joined by his favorite player two, who he hadn't been able to play with in a long while. He was so excited he'd forgotten he was still holding her hand, in fact, wait...

I'm holding her hand? The thought seemed to echo in his head for a moment before he quickly retracted his from hers, in a way he hoped would be low key enough not to cause a big deal, but definitely not low key enough to go without notice.

"Well of course we'll help you sir!" Vince replied smiling. "Can't let these bad boys sit for too long!" He didn't even register he was speaking for the two of them. "Show me what you want done and I'll get it done"

 

The farmer's relief was palpable, his leathery face relaxing the moment Vince offered to help. He grabbed for Vincent's hand, the one which had just dropped Rayleigh's, and gave it a solid pump. He thanked the player over and over, glancing toward the white-haired woman as he did so. As Vince had answered for both, the NPC assumed both would be partaking. That was fine - it was not as if Ray would have denied him anyway. Though she had a stubborn streak a mile wide, and was far from a bleeding heart, she was not one to abandon someone in need. Besides, it was a game, and this was one sure-fire way to level up, right?

The old man led the way, and Ray flanked him as they entered the orchard. It truly did appear as if the apples were going to snap the branches right off. He explained that he simply needed the fruits taken from the trees, and deposited into the barrels that stood every dozen paces or so. "Easy enough," Ray commented, giving the man a smile. "How much do we need to do?"

"As much as you can, I suppose."

He scratched his head, as if confused by the question. Ray had read somewhere that the NPCs did not understand the concept of games, or objectives, or how-much-work-was-necessary-to-get-a-reward. So she merely nodded. When the man left with a final thank you, she turned to her friend.

"I guess this is easy enough for us." Then she took a few steps up the nearest ladder.​

 

It was amazing how surprisingly fun even the simplest of tasks could be. The mere act of walking around in the virtual world was a miracle of science, it made even the more mundane of things incredibly exciting. It also let Vincent think, something he enjoyed doing. Simple tasks let him get out of his own head so to speak, he wasn't lying on his couch with some dumb looking visor strapped to his face, nor was he in the game picking apples. He was...lost in his own thoughts. He'd long since perfected the art of the autopilot, at first it was a survival mechanism from highschool and college lectures, then he'd refined the practice while doing the dishes at one of his many part time jobs he'd taken to squirrel away his own money.

The breeze was nice and cool, keeping the bright and shiny sun from becoming unpleasant for the two as they went about their work. Vince's movements were quick, precise, and efficient. He managed to grab and fill both arms to the brim with apples before scampering down the ladder with no hands, making a stop to the barrel, and then repeating his work. He'd occasionally steal a glance over to Rayleigh and watch her work for a bit, observing her new form and how it moved. Her legs were a lot longer, and it almost changed the entire way he was used to watching her move. He found himself struggling with the dissonance in his head. This was his friend Rayleigh, but at the same time not. There were two women in his head, the short blonde woman he'd met playing videogames, and the buxom silver haired woman before him. They talked the same, they tried to walk the same, their face had the same resting expression and ticks, but at the same time he felt...odd looking at her.

Perhaps it was a simple unease. The form she'd opted to take was...hot to say the least. He used to be able to interact with Ray solely because she wasn't this gorgeous girl who made his palms sweaty and his words turn to mush as they tried to escape his mouth. She was comfortable, easy to talk to, easy to hang out with one on one. Perhaps that was the problem, it was the same Ray but with a different look. She had boobs now, and maybe that was throwing him off. It could also be this nagging sense of betrayal he seemed to feel, like somehow he was like friend cheating on her with another Ray. Maybe it was their choice of activity, this seemed like a rather idyllic date sort of thing? He couldn't tell. Perhaps it was better to get back in his head? To stop thinking and just focus on doing for once. Yeah that was a good idea, he'd focus more on what he was doin-

FWIP

His foot slid past the rung he needed to step on, and he felt his body lurch forward. Normally he would simply have caught himself, you know, with his arms. Except they were full with someone else's livelihood and he didn't want to fuck that up. Instead he did the only thing that honestly made sense at the moment, and that was to lean backwards and take the proverbial "L" in order to save some apples. He sucked in a breath and WHAP, landed on his back, the previously inhaled air knocked out of him with a grunt.

 

Either fate favored her, or the universe just really hated Vince. Regardless, in the exact moment that the boy began his unplanned dismount of the ladder, Ray turned to ask him a question. She saw him fall, and then splat, in all of his glory. Apples rolled like a child's plaything from his arms, traveling a foot or so in all directions before settling in the thick grass. Surprisingly, the fruit looked unharmed. Or, maybe not surprisingly. The force of the fall had been absorbed entirely by Vincent's broad back.

Concern and humor struck each other like two warring armies, each powerful, each determined to take control of her. In the end, the latter won out. In a few easy strides (made possible by her much taller frame), the young woman stood over her friend. Hovering directly over his head, she did have to glance over her generous bosom to meet his eye. There's a problem I've never, ever, in a million years, had before. When her glacier blue eyes finally found his, her pale face was split by a wide grin.

"So," she drawled, "tell me how that pain simulator is working for you." Her grin turned devilish as she added, "I figured we'd test it out in combat or something, but falling off a ladder in a noob-level gathering quest gets the job done just as well, I guess."

 

"You know..." Vince managed to grunt as he sucked in breath. "I was wondering why the apples were in season, but it appears like it was fall after all..." In his head he felt the need to roll onto his side, to get up and stop being a wuss, but instead he was stuck with Ray towering over him, lost in her eyes for a moment. God damnit Ray that's really not fair, you made your avatar super hot. He shook his head, breaking the spell she seemed to have cast over him and quickly rolled over onto his stomach and stood up in one swift motion.

This was bad.

He was used to making an ass out of himself in front of her, it was almost inevitable. He'd become a pro at rolling with the punches, but now she had him off guard, his footwork was off a bit. "As for the pain receptors well, lets just say that it definitely felt like I fell off a ladder, maybe a little too close to that." He fiddled with his UI a bit. "I might wanna opt into turning that down because boy howdy did that not feel good." He quickly began regathering his hopefully unbruised apples with all the grace and speed he could muster, trying to keep his mind from wandering and thinking about her new boobs, or those eyes.

"How long do you reckon we should fiddle with this quest?"

 

Ray didn’t want to encourage him, or his terrible, terrible pun. But she simply could not stop herself, and the grin broke out across her pale face, moving all the way to her bright blue eyes.

“I’m enjoying the quest,” she informed him in a matter-of-fact way. “But being such an easy quest, I’m surprised it tripped you up so badly.” Her eyes flashed devilishly. “The guy made it sound so easy, and you fell for it.”

Rayleigh stooped to retrieve a couple of the apples Vince had lost hold of. After giving them a quick inspection, she tossed them into bin. “I don’t imagine we’ll need to do many more,” she told him. “And what else do we have to do?”

She didn’t want to throw herself back into combat, and fail again. And spending time with him was really, really nice. But she couldn’t tell him that.