The tournament starts pretty quickly after that, and we get matched into our first round brackets. I get matched with this weasley emo kid named James. His Robin falls to me easily, and I’m onto round 2.

Anja is much less lucky. She’s matched up with Pedro in the first round. He claims that he's never played the game before and has only played Melee, but I think that's bullshit personally. Right when they were starting, someone bumped into her from behind, causing her to startle and pause the game.

“Pausing, that’s a forfeit,” Pedro says without hesitation.

“I didn’t mean to!” Anja says defensively.

“Come on, man!” I say. “Didn’t you see that dude bump her?”

“Okay… we’ll let it slide,” Pedro relents. “Unpause and we’ll finish the match.”

Anja nods seriously, and does just that.

Anja’s playing as Sheik, who now has been mercifully separated from Zelda, while Pedro picks Marth. Anja switches to Sonic for the second round. Anja does pretty good, all things considered. While she lost both rounds, she at least put up a fight and made it close.

Lily, who’s sticking to her tried and true Samus main, loses her first round and is out of the tournament with Anja. Nathan’s Pikachu gets past the first round, but then gets crushed by Eric’s Diddy Kong in round 2. I’m already the only person left in the tournament from our group…

I manage to get into the semifinals, but I’m up against Eric next, who just sent Pedro out of the tournament in a seriously hype match. Some guys, including Nathan, get bored and start playing some game called Undertale on one of the lab computers. Lily starts one up to play Halo: Combat Evolved. Wait a minute… how did they get that on a school computer?

As expected, I eventually lose to Eric, but at least I got 1/3!

“Nice playing, man!” Eric congratulates afterwards. “You should come back next year!”

“Maybe,” I say, shaking his hand.

Realizing for the first time that I really freaking hate Diddy Kong, I look around the room, unsure of what to do now.

“Hey Nova! Come over here!” I hear Nathan say from the other side of the room.

I go to him. He’s sitting at a computer relatively by himself now, playing some kind of Touhou fighting game. Wait, how did they get that on a school computer???

“Wanna play some with me?”

“Sure,” I say. “Idk what this is, but it’d probably be good to take a break from Smash Bros. after all that.”

I pull up a chair to my side of the keyboard and look through the character selection. Boo, no Sanae! Oh well. I pick a cute looking one I don’t recognize named Sumireko and we start playing. Nathan chooses Marisa.

“So, Lily said that you’re dating Anja now?” he asks.

“Yeah,” I say.

“How did that happen?” he asks.

“I asked her out, and she said yes,” I explain.

“I figured that bit out,” he says, sighing. “You haven’t changed much, huh?”

“I think I’ve changed a lot, actually,” I respond.

“But you’re still a smartass.”

“Hey! Not true. I’m more of a smartass now than I used to be!”

He laughs. “Man, I missed you.”

We battle it out. This game is more like a normal fighting game than Smash Bros. I’ve never played it before, so I just press random buttons to see what wacky things my witch girl can do against the other witch girl. Touhou is a weird franchise.

“I just wasn’t expecting you to get a girlfriend so soon,” he admits. “Did Lily set you guys up?”

“No,” I say.

“Really? How’d you guys meet?”

“Lily is the reason we met,” I say. “She told me she had a cousin in the town I was moving to. But we didn’t start dating until a month ago.”

“Maybe I should just ask out Silvia,” he laments. “But… what if she says no?”

“You’re still going on about her?” I ask. Silvia was the same girl he was obsessed with last year!

“Shut up,” he grunts. “Look, I’m just wondering how you got a hot gamer girl as a girlfriend. It’s not fair.”

“I wonder that too,” I say. “You could try asking her, she’d probably…”

Suddenly it hits me. Wait, where’s Anja?

I look around the room. I don’t see her.

“Sorry. I better go find her,” I say.

“Whaaat?” he says incredulously. “Bros before hoes, man.”

“Says who?” I ask.

“Says the bro code.”

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“Fuck the bro code!”

He shakes his head, disappointed. “You’re gay.”

“So what if I am?”

He chuckles. “Alright.”

I slide and shimmy my way through the crowd and back into the hallway. I look up and down it, but don’t see her anywhere. Damn, I don’t know where to look in this school!

I go to my phone and yank Skype open.

whered u go?

Anja: I told you not to leave me alone.

I’m in the cafeteria.

be right there

Damn it. I start looking around frantically for the cafeteria. Is she okay? What happened?

Luckily I guess the right direction and find it quickly. The cafeteria here is… boring looking. Ours is kinda round, with a stage near the front for when someone has to make an announcement, and it opens up to the nearby hallways. This cafeteria is just a big rectangle.

The tables have already been put up for the day. She’s just slumped over on one of the white walls on her phone.

I run to her and plead, “Anja! I’m sorry!”

She looks up at me and puts her phone away. ‘There’s a reason I told you to stay with me. Please make an effort to remember next time I tell you something like that.”

“I’m sorry…” I say again, feeling close to tears.

She hugs me tightly, and I hug her the same way back.

“What happened?” I ask. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” she says. Her eyes narrow angrily. “I didn’t really feel safe. I know one of those guys kept looking at my ass.”

“I, uh… I’ll punch him for you!” I offer.

“I don’t want you to punch anyone!” she snaps at me.

“Waaah! Okay, I won’t punch anyone. Sorry,” I say meekly.

She takes a deep breath. “You know, it’s not always easy being a girl in a gaming space. It’s generally seen as a boy's thing. And, well, some of those boys don’t have the best social skills…”

“Gaming isn’t a boys thing!” I argue. “What about Nintendogs and Cooking Mama and stuff like that? Hell, most Nintendo games are pretty unisex. When Sakurai made the first Kirby game, it designed it to appeal to both boys and girls.”

“Well Nova, games marketed specifically for girls are a pretty recent development,” Anja counters. “Notice that both of your examples were on the DS. Not many games like that existed prior to that console generation. And yeah, girls can just play any video game anyway, but… that doesn’t change the cultural impression most people have. Look, the point is… I was just a little nervous being there on my own. Make sure you listen to me.”

“I will, Anja.” I say. “And I won’t look at your ass anymore either.”

“Wh- Nova! You’re my boyfriend!” she says, laughing. “I don’t care if you do it.”

“Oh, right,” I say stupidly.

“But you should never stare at some random person,” she says. “Look, I know he’s your friend, but… I’ve never gotten a good feeling from Nathan.”

“Really?” I ask. “Wait, have you met him before that one time at the mall?”

“He was at one of Lily’s birthday parties before,” she explains. “And he, uh…”

“Lily invited HIM but not ME?” I ask incredulously. “What gives? I could’ve met you and we could’ve gotten our romance started way earlier!”

Anja snickers. “You’re missing the point… but that’s okay. Let’s go find Lily and see if she’s ready to go home yet.”

----------------------------------------

I tactically wait for the episode we’re on to end. The episode was about the main character, Steven, “fusing” with one of his female friends. Which is a big deal or something.

“So Zoe. Why did everyone freak out when they fused?” I ask. “Don’t people do that all the time in this show?”

“Not humans,” Zoe explains. “Only gems can. But… because Steven is half-gem, half-human, I guess he can.”

“Ah,” I say. “Anyway, Zoe… while it’s on commercial break. I can tell that you’re not doing well.”

She nods solemnly.

“I mean. I get it. I'm worried about Mom and Dad too,” I explain. “Of course, I'm... the reason we're separated right now. So, I'm sorry about that. But like I said. They were gonna do that anyway. So... really I just wish I didn't act like that for the last time we saw them until... this all blows over.”

“I'm not upset with you,” she tells me softly. She hangs her head. “I just can’t help but to feel like I lost everything all over again.”

Oohhh... yeah.

“Well, that's why we have to win,” I say.

Zoe doesn’t say anything at first. She just stares blankly at whatever dumb commercial this. “We shouldn't have to fight people just to get our parents back,” she finally says. “I don't like fighting.”

“Mmm. Well right now, it's fight or get eradicated,” I say honestly. “Yeah, it's terrible. We should live in a world where we can just do whatever without being bothered.

“Yeah,” she says plainly.

“You know. I used to think this was all kinda fun. No, really,” I admit. “All this Metaverse stuff. A fun little adventure. And then... when you got involved, it became stressful.”

She gives me an annoyed look. “Really?” she questions.

“Yeah. I thought you were too innocent to... go fight against shadows and whatnot. You still are, I guess,” I explain.

“Not hardly anymore. I've been doing it. I've gone to scary places with you. And... without you, too,” she argues.

“Well, yeah. I just mean... Uuugh. I have sort of a confession. I do like fighting. When we beat something down... I feel good.”

Her eyes go wide. “Oh…”

“Yeah. That's what I mean by ‘innocent,’” I say. “You're not like me.”

“But... at least in the Metaverse, nobody's real,” she says nervously. “So maybe that's okay.”

“That’s what I thought at first too,” I say. I turn away from her. “And then, someone in the real world died. Granted, a truly horrible person. But still.”

“She deserved a second chance,” Zoe says firmly.

“Well, it didn't exactly help anyone that she died. She never got to properly turn herself in and explain everything in full detail. Now look at how everyone treats Kevin. Because none of them know what happened. None of them know what she was like.”

Zoe doesn’t say anything to that.

Feeling unsatisfied, I say, “...But here’s the thing. We can say all of this now because we changed her heart. What if we couldn't do that? If we didn’t have this power? What would we do about someone like her?”

Zoe starts biting her lip a bit. “Well… we couldn't let her hurt anyone else. So… she should go to prison.”

“Yeah,” I agree. “But what if there's no time. She's about to rape someone. Now or never.”

“Then... maybe there’d be a way we could restrain or distract her, long enough for help to come,” she suggests innocently.

I think on this for a moment. “You see, Zoe. This is what I mean. You're... always gonna look for some other way. I... don't know if I'd be able to have that restraint. When I'm mad, or... scared... it's like I just see red.”

I sigh. “God damn it. I was supposed to be cheering you up. But I only talked about my own problems.”

She smiles at me. “No, it's okay. I do feel better. You reminded me that I need to have hope. And... I think I understand you better.”

“Not sure if that's good or bad,” I say.

She leans over and puts her head on me. “It’s good. Trust me.”

“I don't know if I should actually be considered the leader of this group… as much as I hate saying it,” I admit. “When I lose my shit… I don’t make good decisions.”

“It's definitely not me either,” Zoe says. “I'm not assertive like you.” She picks her head back and looks back at the TV, on which the next episode is playing. “If only we could fuse, like Steven and Connie,” she comments wistfully. “Then we'd be a perfect gem.”

“Hmm... so you want to fuse with me, huh?” I remark, smirking. “Noted.”