Soo... Hello guys! I, the n00b author, just wanted to tell you that... The "real" adventure will probably start around chapter 2 or 3. This is more like a background... So, uh, the tags weren't put randomly.
...Please take care of me. *bows*
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"There's no way in hell I'm gonna enter one of those, Phil!"
As soon as those words escaped my mouth, my damned brother Phil showed me the most pitying face I've ever seen in my lifetime.
"Even if you look at me in that way, I'm still not gonna enter those things, absolutely N-O-T."
I also folded my arms into an X shape before me, as to highlight the importance of subject in question... Which led my brother to look away from me, while sighing and shrugging.
"You're laaame, Dan. For realsies. It was you who got me into these kinda games, right? So why are YOU the one backing down at the last minute? Do you even have any balls?"
He grinned smugly as he said this, and a rush of heat came to my reddening face, so I couldn't help but starting to shout to prove my point better.
"I do have balls, you moron! I'm just saying that these stupid things are dangerous! What if you get stuck inside?! Or there's an error and you can't exit?! Or if there's a blackout?! You know I hate dark and cramped spaces, you big, fat, stupid, small-dicked idiot!"
Phil certainly didn't expect my outburst, seeing that he instantly rage-blushed and started shouting in response.
"My dick is not small, you ball-less jerk!"
"Small dick!"
"No balls!"
"Shut up!"
"No, you shut up!"
"Daniel, Philip!"
...Uh oh. When your parents start calling you by your full name, then you can expect only one thing... Trouble.
"Is this the way you kids should behave? In a public place, even?! You're already 12 and 11 years old, for God's sake! Stop fighting and start growing up!"
Me and Phil were too busy fighting to notice that Mom and Dad came closer to us... And our poor ears paid the price. Yes, this was Mom's favourite punishment: she liked pulling our ears until we learned our lesson. And it hurt. Badly.
Thinking about this, me and Phil looked at each other: there was no need for words. It was time for a truce.
"We're sorry, Mom!"
"Yeah, we're really sorry!"
As our tone was sincere(and tears were starting to form in our eyes), Mom finally let us go.
"Hmpf. I hope you'll soon stop being so childish... Unless you want your ears to become like Dumbo's of course."
We then turned around, while massaging our ears to relieve the pain, and a beautiful woman with long, blonde hair, green eyes, a fair face and a graceful figure gave us a mischievous smile, which made her look even younger than what she seemed. She was what a normal kid would call "Mother", or "Mom", or "Mama". Just sayin'. A rather weird thing, instead, was that sometimes she spoke to us like this, more like a friend than a mother. Unfortunately, we brothers were smart kids, even with the constant fighting, and we more or less knew the reason why: she must've felt somewhat... guilty? about not being able to behave like a "normal" mother would. She always, always tried her best for us, but we often feared that she would feel inferior towards other mothers... Because she couldn't use her legs. To be more precise, hers were really weak, so she was constricted to a wheelchair most of the time, and she had to use crutches when she needed to walk. Maybe it was just us, maybe we were overly worried about her... She never seemed sad, and a smile was what greeted us everyday, from morning to night. But, after all, a mother can't show her sadness in front of her children, right?
Yes, we loved our mother very much. The only problem was that we didn't know a good way to convey this to her.
"Come on, Eloise, they're just kids..."
A man, also known as "Dad" by us, spoke to our mother from behind her, since he was the one who pushed her wheelchair around (we weren't as tall yet, duh). He was a tall man, with a robust build and a smart face, eyes that often sparkled with interest and curiosity about the matters of the world, brownish hair and brown eyes. He also wore glasses, which made him look a bit cooler.
If someone who didn't know them saw them for their first time, they could be surprised at the scene: Dad vaguely looked like a strong and commanding man, if you looked at him from the right point of view, while Mom certainly gave out the feeling of a frail and elegant woman. Even more so if you knew that Dad was half-English and half-German, while Mom was half-French and half-Italian. Truly, we were crossbreeds through and through.
But reality was quite different from that image: both of them were kind and caring parents; Dad worked at a "global healthcare company that researches and develops a broad range of innovative products in three primary areas of pharmaceuticals, vaccines and consumer healthcare", as its slogan said, while Mom... Well... Years ago she worked as a secretary at a local hospital, even if her legs were already quite weak because of her genetic disease... But now she was a cheerful housewife, and was searching for a job she could do while at home. Also, they were still passionate about each other, even after 22 years of marriage and an unmentionable number of quarrels... And I guess I should say that most of the times it was Mom who wore the pants in the family, anyway.
"But Erik, dear! Every time we leave them by themselves, it's always fighting, fighting and fighting! If we leave them alone, they're never gonna learn!"
And by saying this, she glared at us again, making us tremble a little bit and put our hands over where she pinched us earlier.
"Eloise, we came here to look at which capsules we should buy, didn't we? We can leave the discussion for when we're home."
In response, Mom crossed her arms and made a pouty face, so Dad turned to us.
"So, you little devils, what is the problem? You didn't find what you were looking for?"
"It's not that, Dad, it's just Dan being lame. He--"
"I'm not lame!"
"--He says he doesn't want one because he's scared. If that's not lame, then I don't know how should I call him--"
"I'm. Not. Lame!!!"
"Okay, okay, calm down. No need to shout, okay? And, Phil, you shouldn't be so harsh on your brother, everyone has got something they can't deal with. How would you feel if he made fun of you for something you're scared of? Wouldn't that feel bad?"
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Dad tried to reason with Phil, but while one could see that on his face the seed of doubt began growing, mine was a bit harder to decipher: I was feeling a mixture of feelings, ranging from a "I-don't-want-to-be-pitied" feeling of anger, to a "I-want-to-crawl-into-a-hole-and-disappear" feeling of embarassment.
But when my brother later gave me his apology, I could understand from his gestures that it wasn't out of pity, or because he got forced to do it by our parents, but he truly felt he was in the wrong... So, I didn't mind being the bigger man and forgiving him. Heh, being mature really suited me. I wonder, if I kept behaving this maturely, would we be giving Mom less troubles? I guess that if so, compromising wouldn't be so bad after all. Especially when we were going to get a present from our parents... Oh, sweet joy!
Soon after, we started checking out the various products.
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In our whole trip home, I was holding my VR headset tight in my arms, almost hugging it; during the twenty minutes that separated us from our home, that one box was more important than my brother's life. Well... More important than my brother's life AND a box of rare and unusual goods, like old and precious games for example. Usually those fetch for a lot, while brothers and sisters' lives aren't worth much, and my present was just that important. In the end, we once again compromised: Phil really wanted one specific capsule, but since it was very expensive(and I would be left with nothing afterwards), we decided on another, cheaper capsule, and with the remaining money we bought this very headset.
It was simply... Beautiful. Wonderful. With one of this and a VR game, you'd feel like you were right into the game, literally speaking: a sensation so sweet for us gamers, that everything else would pale in comparison. Of course, it wasn't anything like the capsules, which enabled a full-body dive; thankfully it didn't need a controller or a keyboard, since with the helmet came a serie of components that, attached to the various part of the body, would more or less do the work a capsule would do(only a lot, lot weaker and not as perfect), but... A capsule was still the best choice: the commands that one's brain normally transmits to one's body through the nervous system would be then "copied" and "translated" by the machine to the game, with the result that if you "gave" the command to walk, you'd stay still in your capsule, but you'd be walking inside the game. The wonders of technology!
Everything started three years or something ago, with the "breakthrough invention of the century". Yes, when the first actually playable VR game ever made finally came out, it was hailed as such: produced by a world-wide renowed company, it soon became an important milestone of humankind's history.
VR. Virtual Reality. The physical representation of a human's body and senses, down to the most little detail, into a game. The possibilities were, of course, infinite: Virtual Reality was already being used in the military and medical fields, but the advent of this game brought became a true revolution. First of all, it was a MMORPG: as the popularity of such games instantly increased a million-fold and many were content with this, many people were still dubious and unsatisfied, but nonetheless the hype was at it MAX. Also, through the creations of TV channels, blogs, forums, video channels, even gadgets and such, its fame was unrivaled, and would stay so in the years to come. Speaking of videos, one in particular had a great effect on the game's popularity: long story short, it was about a white-haired, katana-wielding girl who brutally murdered a great multitude of users. As in, human users. And she clearly enjoyed it.
Now, we may never know that girl's identity: the game provided a fully-customizable character creation, so it could've been a fat, stinky 30-man that had nothing better to do in life, for all I cared. But the result was the same: a limitless number of people got charmed by the video, and subsequently got hooked on the game. Probably to them the video had a deep meaning; probably they took it as "this is also an example of what you could do here". Probably. To me, instead, it had the opposite effect: I felt disgusted by it. I mean, there was so much blood! And I almost could feel the pain the players must've felt. Yuck. It just steeled my resolve to not play it. Is it that strange to think so?
As my brother said, it was me who got him to like RPG games, so it shouldn't be a wonder if I said I loved them. But... Because of my claustrophobia, which made me fear dark and cramped spaces, I couldn't enter one of those capsules for dear life. So, well... Even if I was actually jealous of my brother, who could play it freely, I unwantingly made my decision not to play it. Or at least, to play it after I got cured. In the meantime, I'd play other games.
In fact, it wasn't the only VR game available: at first it might've been so, but the world didn't stand still and watch for much longer; many other games came out since then, and while some were clearly copycats, fakes who tried to leech on its success, many others were interesting and new. It was clearly the age of VR, and soon the curiosity towards this new "world" won over many parents' stubborness... And a newfound, incredible surge of money was spent on VR machines by families all around the world. And of course, one such family was ours.
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"So, are you guys excited yet?"
Do you even need to ask?!
...Is what we wanted to tell Dad, who was standing before us with a big smile on his face.
A week passed since we went to buy the capsule, and since it was too big to be brought at home, we had to order it and wait for it to get sent to our house. But the big day finally came.
"And what do you think you should be saying now, mmh?"
Mom was sitting down on a couch, near the capsule that was waiting for us to be configured; we cheerfully shouted a "Thanks Mom! Thanks Dad!" and proceeded to hug and kiss and snuggle ourselves against our parents, filled to the brim with excitement and thankfulness.
"Good, good. So, what are we waiting for? Let's start this up!"
"Yes!"
Oh boy! It's the first time since forever that I've been feeling this restless!