Chapter 1
1
R eclining back in my gaming chair, I rolled my ankles in slow circles as I browsed through the new Lesath Legends in-game armour that had just dropped. As I was equipping my character with a new shield, I heard the front door slam, and a minute later, my flatmate, Connor, was poking his head around my bedroom door.
“Alright? What you up to? I’m gonna be recording for my channel for the next couple of hours, then I have a Twitch stream at nine.”
That was Connor-speak for “do not disturb me while I work on my online content.” It was the main reason we made good flatmates. That, and the fact we were both studying for a computing degree. Connor was so different from me—confident and outgoing, but he needed peace and quiet to make his content. When he’d discovered my love for endless hours of gaming when I wasn’t occupied with my uni work, he’d asked if I wanted to split the rent with him on a flat he’d found close to campus. I’d already resigned myself to living alone or having to share a house with strangers, as I’d done in my first year of uni, so his offer had come as a complete surprise. But when he’d promised me he was serious, I’d happily accepted.
“I’ll just be here gaming, anyway.” Stretching my legs out with a groan, I continued. “I don’t want to move for the next few hours. Dance practice killed me today.”
Shaking his head, Connor grinned at me. “You brought it all on yourself, bro. Who combines a computing major with a dance minor? Only you. Take me, for example. A far more sensible combination of visual communication and computing.” He shook his head. “Then again, you get to hang out with hot dancers. Maybe I could get an intro sometime. If they’re hot and single, send them my way.”
“Yeah…maybe.” It wasn’t that I didn’t want him to meet my dance friends. It was just that I only had two I could really call friends, and both were in relationships. Connor knew I was shy and struggled with anything social or being in the spotlight, but I felt a bit…humiliated, I guess, that we were drawing closer to the end of the second year of our degrees, and I’d made friends with a grand total of two people on my dance course. It was more or less the same story with my computing major—I had Connor and another friend called Niall, who I usually teamed up with for group projects, but there wasn’t anyone else I properly hung out with.
I wished I could be normal.
Connor nodded, rapping his knuckles on the door frame as he straightened up. “Don’t even worry about it. I’m gonna go and get set up. If you get hungry later, there’s still some of that pizza in the fridge. I only had a couple of slices for lunch.”
“Thanks.” I smiled at him, grateful that he understood and always seemed to know when to back off. “Good luck with your things.”
“You too. Have fun killing monsters. Y’know, you could get a decent Twitch following if you live-streamed your games, make some money out of it.”
“Not happening.”
“It was worth a try.”
I winced. “Sorry.” Every now and then, he’d try to get me to do something outside of my comfort zone, rarely succeeding, but he didn’t give up or take offence when I said no.
He grinned at me. “You know I’m gonna keep trying.” With a salute, he disappeared, and I settled myself at my desk, ready to play Lesath Legends .
A message popped up in the chat window, and a smile spread across my face. Hammerhead was online.
HAMMERHEAD:
Want to play duos? See if we can get the limited-edition chest
I tapped out a reply.
VIKING:
You read my mind. Give me 5 to set up
HAMMERHEAD:
K. Mics?
Hammerhead was good about giving me what I needed, and if I wasn’t feeling up to talking through the mics, he never complained but happily stuck to the chat window. It was a less effective way of communicating since we had to pause what we were doing to type out a reply, but sometimes I needed the silence. I found myself needing it less and less lately, though. To my surprise, we’d clicked from the minute we’d met, and that never happened to me. Yet now, I counted Hammerhead among my handful of genuine friends.
We had a level of anonymity, thanks to our gaming personas, but I felt secure enough around him to share bits of information about myself in and around our conversations about the game. We hadn’t gone too deep, and we hadn’t shared anything personally identifiable, but he knew the basics about me, other than the fact I was studying for a minor in dance. I wasn’t sure why I hadn’t yet shared that particular piece of information with him. It might have had something to do with the fact that everyone always seemed surprised and confused when they found out I was studying a creative arts subject alongside a technical major. My own dad had told me several times it was “weird” for me to be studying dance, and his words had stuck in my mind.
Back to Hammerhead. I knew he was a guy, a second-year student like me, studying for a degree in engineering. Other than gaming, he played for his uni football team. He came across as a patient, easy-going guy, and sometimes I wished I could meet him in person, although I’d probably ruin it with my anxiety and lifelong habit of overthinking every single thing.
Speaking of my anxiety… While I hadn’t shared my real-life struggles with Hammerhead, he’d come up with a unique way to try and push me out of my comfort zone online.
In real life, Connor and Niall were mostly about the direct route, asking me to do things outright. My dance friend JJ was like my hype man, encouraging me until I somehow believed I was capable of things I’d normally be too afraid to do. But online, I had Hammerhead, and he had a different approach to pushing me out of my comfort zone.
He dared me.
For example—the first time we’d spoken through our mics. I’d been hesitant, ridiculously nervous about crossing a boundary, but he’d made it into a dare, complete with a reward—a rare in-game armour. I’d somehow found myself stepping up, and just like that, we’d started talking and never really stopped.
Shaking myself out of my thoughts, I returned my attention to my PC monitor as I replied.
VIKING:
Yes to mics
Slipping into my online persona, whereI could be a confident badass warrior—something I’d never achieve in reality—I switched on my microphone.
Shy, anxious Leo was gone…for now, and Viking was ready to play.