“Okay, everybody back?”

“Nemesis here.” Jake had just sat down and put his headset back on. The team had taken a ten minute break to allow everyone to use the bathroom, grab sodas, food, smokes—whatever. The last two hours had gone by fast, but as the adrenaline wore off from the previous encounter everyone needed a stretch.

As the others sounded off they began taking stock of their situation. The current run was a marathon event, several missions one after the other, all of which had to be completed in order in the same run. If anyone ‘died’ or dropped connection, they were out for the rest of the campaign. That’s why they’d scheduled this game—it was imperative the entire team be there from start to finish. There were no breaks between events, no trips to the base—it was do or die, so to speak.

The premise was simple; a series of thefts caused the team to begin chasing down the bad guys, a group looking for ultimate power over science by using magic. It sounded strange to say it out loud, but in the context of the game it made perfect sense. As both powerful scientific tools and magical artifacts were stolen, the team had to go after each one, all the while piecing together the clues that would lead them to the final battle and the revelation of the main villain. They’d run through half a dozen theft missions with relative ease, but they were all battered and worn down. Aura had done what she could to bolster their health and defenses, and the break had afforded them a little bit more recovery time, but none of them were a hundred percent going into the climatic final battle. Which was the point, of course.

Jake took a deep breath and rolled his shoulders, settling in for more fun and action.

“Here’s the plan,” Robert said. “I ran this a while back with a different toon, so I have an idea of what we’re up against.”

“Did you win it?” AJ interjected in his quiet tone.

A chuckle. “Uh, no. We got wiped. But it was close until the very end.”

“Oh,” came Micah’s chuckled reply. “As long as you got close before you got wiped.”

Jake laughed. This kind of banter was common before a big mission. They needed it to relax a little, get their focus back. It was easy to forget that it was just a game sometimes.

“So lay it on us, fearless leader.” Micah again.

“Okay, here’s the way this is going to go.” Robert began talking, slowly taking on the cadence and affectations of his character. He outlined a series of running battles, outlining the approximate number of enemies, their varying strengths, how many leaders they would encounter, and the amount of time they had to move from one encounter to another. In basic terms it was like many missions; take too long to complete one phase and more enemies would show up to grind you down, lessening your chances to complete the next phase. In this event, though, moving through each phase was they key to success. Dally too long and you would begin losing teammates. Lose more than two and there was virtually no chance of success against the event’s main villain. Jake listened attentively to the entire spiel.

“Specific plans?” he prompted.

“Aura will give us an endurance boost at the beginning of each phase. It should recharge fast enough to keep us going all the way through. Save the healing for when it’s really needed. I’ll take point, soak up the damage. Wylde works with me to winnow the little guys, Morningstar uses ranged attacks to zero in on the leaders, and Nemesis plays back-up. Nem, you’ll need to make sure Morningstar’s free to work on leaders, but pay special attention to Aura. Keep them from her at all costs. We’ll need her for the last bit, so it’s important no one gets through.”

“No one will,” Jake assured him. Any of the villains that got by Centurion and Wylde would likely be damaged anyway, making them easy targets. The trick would be dancing around enough to keep them completely away from Aura and Morningstar, but that’s the sort of action he liked. He ran through his inventory and checked his hot keys. All his favorite weapons and gadgets were ready, and he made note of which ones would run out first. It was entirely possible that he’d be down to hand-to-hand at the end of it all, but that was okay. If it got them to the end it’d be worth it. Only a few teams had ever finished the Chaos run. He’d be damned if they failed because of him.

Centurion wrapped it up and everyone gave last minute updates on their characters, throwing out ideas and strategies and tactics, but it was all just chitchat to get them focused.

Two hours ago they’d started the run. They worked through each and every mission so far, gathering clues to the final battle. It came down to three choices – an old church in the heart of the city, a warehouse laboratory near the docks, or an abandoned military base on an island. Only Micah thought the warehouse was the way to go. Almost everyone else, Jake included, voted for the island. So to the island they went, and now they had to fight their way to the Big Bad.

A tone sounded and Jake checked his chat box.

Whisper: Ready for this?

Jake smiled.

Nemesis: As ready as I’ll get.
Whisper: You going to keep me safe?
Nemesis: I live for nothing else.
Whisper: mmhmm

Jake chuckled as he felt the anxiety drain away. Now he was ready.

* * * * *

“Fuck me.”

“Tempting, but no.”

“I didn’t think I was going to make it.”

“I didn’t think you were going to make it, either.”

“I’m pissed you made it. Lost me five bucks. Pay you later, Nem.”

There was general chuckling on the speakers. They’d just fought their way through hell, one incredible—and incredibly long-- run through hundreds of soldiers, dozens of leaders and more than one nasty surprise. Just about every one of them had almost died at least once. If not for the quick ministrations of Aura they surely would have. Nemesis had even had to burn through several healing capsules of his own.

“Nice cover fire, ‘Star.”

“Thanks, Nem. Pretty decent action, yourself.”

“Props to Aura. Excellent buffering, lady.”

There was a chorus of agreements.

Bing. Chat.

Whisper: They’re going to make me blush.
Nemesis: Didn’t know you could do that.
Whisper: When appropriate

“What’s next?”

Jake returned his attention to the team.

“Well,” Robert/Centurion replied. “This is just a really long hall. Shouldn’t be any bad guys but we’ll go carefully. At the end will be a big circular room with a dimensional gateway. There’s a control pylon that one of us will have to activate. At the same time, someone else has to work the computer and a third person has to work the magic gems. The last two people are needed to work two keypads on the gate itself. It takes all five working in sync to do it, but it’s not that hard. Once the gate is open the bad guys flood through. We have to fight through them and into the gateway to defeat the Big Bad. If he gets through to our side, we lose.”

“So…that would be bad, then?”

“Yes, Wylde. That would be bad.”

“Noted.”

More laughter. Jake started walking Nem down the hall. The others followed suit, the occasional exchange of jokes or strategies keeping them all engaged and in-character.

The room was impressive, much more so than Robert had led them to believe. Once again Jake paused to admire the handiwork of the gamers. It seemed no detail had gone unnoticed, from blinking lights on consoles to slightly dusty conduits overhead. One of the lights was even flickering.

The control pylon was easy to distinguish—a large vaguely pyramid-like affair glowing green in the center of the room. To one side was a standing console not unlike something you’d expect to see in Star Trek. A small disc like a mini-satellite dish was implanted on one side, facing the pylon. To the other side was a wide sconce holding glowing reddish stones—the magic gems. The gateway was wide and arched and covered in what looked like marbled mercury, all silvery and black and constantly rippling. Two keypads were on either side. Various techno-gadgets and mystical-looking accouterments completed the décor.

“Wow,” came AJ’s slow drawl. “It’s like something you’d expect to see on BBC.”

“More like Stargate and Harry Potter had a bastard child,” Micah chimed in.

“Come on, people,” Robert said, keeping us on target. “If the gate activates without us we have almost no chance of doing this.”

Jake took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

“Time to go to work,” he said quietly.

“Yep,” Fortune’s voice. She’d heard him. “Just another day at the office.”

“Wylde, you and me on the keypad. Morningstar on the computer, Nem on the gems, and Aura on the pylon.”

“Kinda spreads us out a bit,” Micah noted, his toon moving to the left. Centurion was already striding to his position. Jake sent Nem to the glowing stones.

“That’s on purpose, I’m sure,” AJ retorted.

“Yeah, that’s part of it.” The Centurion character turned this way and that, making sure everyone else was in position. “Wylde and I will have to try and close the gap, but a bunch of the parademons will come through anyway. Aura, you’ll need to defend yourself at first but Nem and Morningstar should be able to get to you pretty quickly. Same as before, with one difference. On my command we fight our way into the gateway. Aura, that’s where we’ll really need you. Use all your buffs as soon as you can, but you need to siphon energy from the Big Bad. We’ll have to wear him down but he regenerates so fast that if you don’t hurt him a bit we’ll be here all damn night.”

“We’ve already been here all damn night,” Jake quipped.

AJ’s harrumph echoed his thoughts.

“I’d still like to get this done before sunrise,” Robert sent back. “Anyone need a break before we do this?”

“Love one,” Micah replied, just as everyone else said ‘No’. “But, um, I’m good,” he added lamely.

“All right, then,” Robert said. It sounded like he was practically holding his breath. Jake certainly was.

“Do it.”

Everyone tapped the keys and clicked the mouse so that their character played their part. There was a humming as the computer glowed blue and shot a sine wave at the pylon. The gems glowed deep red and a vaporous stream reached the pylon, as well. The pylon itself glowed green and, completely suffused with energy, fired a bright beam at the gate.

“Now, Wylde!”

The two toons closest to the gate began tapping keys, entering the necessary codes to active the portal.

Jake couldn’t breathe. He was ready. He was past ready. He was so past ready he didn’t think he was ready.

Then the screen flickered, went dark.

“What the hell?”

“What the fuck?”

“Hey!”

“Fuck!”

“Um…”

The screen flickered, came back on. Jake was concentrating on the screen. It appeared as if nothing had changed, yet something didn’t look right.

“Guys?”

“Holy shit!”

“Are we dead?”

“What was that?”

“Did we disco?”

“I can’t…”

“…not sure what just….”

“…gonna be pissed if…”

“Hey, guys!” Jake leaned forward, scrutinizing what was in front of him. The beams were all glowing, the gate was rippling, everything seemed perfectly normal. But something was off. Something…

“Holy shit.” He didn’t realize he’d spoken aloud. Not that anyone even heard him.

“…looks okay…”

“…think we’re okay…”

“…about five more seconds…”

“…gonna send a bug report…”

“GUYS!”

The channel fell quiet. “What’s up, Nem?”

“Dude, check out the toons.”

“What?”

“Huh?”

“The toons! Look at our characters! What’s wrong with our characters?”

Again the channel fell silent. Jake couldn’t take his eyes off the screen. Everything seemed clear because everything was clear. Like a television. Like it was live. Like the characters were real people. The game on his computer looked a lot like a television show right about now.

“Holy shit.”

“That’s what I said,” Jake muttered.

“That can’t be…”

“…the weirdest shit I’ve…”

“…the fuck?”

“…so hitting screen capture now…”

“Hey guys, the gate!” Robert’s voice again broke through the chatter. “It’s opening!”

“Fuck!” Jake had almost forgot about the game itself. He tapped a few keys, gearing up for the fight. His toon moved a lot less like a 3D rendering and a lot more like a guy in a suit. He couldn’t get over it.

“Wait, something’s wrong.”

Jake looked at the gate. It brightened, but didn’t stop. The brightness overwhelmed his computer’s resolution. His screen was essentially one white screen.

“Is that supposed to happen?”

“That can’t be good…”

There was a sound, like a distortion in the headset. It got louder and Jake jerked the headset off. The sound continued getting louder, overwhelming his speakers. The light got brighter, too, coming out the screen, blinding him.

The noise, the light, it was overwhelming. He lurched up out of his chair, one arm over his eyes protectively. He took two steps backward, tripped over something. His eyes screwed shut, hands over his ears.

The noise. The light. He couldn’t see, couldn’t hear. Couldn’t think. It hurt. It hurt. He thought was screaming but wasn’t sure. Then…

Nothing.