Chapter 8
Tyson
Something feels cold against my back, but something else feels warm against my chest. I breathe in deeply and open my eyes. It’s kind of dark, and I don’t remember turning the light off in my room. I also don’t remember falling asleep in the first place. My eyes adjust slowly, and I freeze up.
I’m not in my room.
And Rohan Chandra is on top of me, his lithe body pressed into mine, one of my arms is wrapped around his waist.
Looking down at his sleeping figure has me thinking he feels good like this when he’s unable to use his mouth. I’ve never been this close to him. And the way this outfit fits him like a second skin makes my throat run dry.
“Shit,” I gasp, gathering my thoughts.
“Mmm, sorry, I think I fell asleep,” Rohan groans, shifting against my body. We’re both still lying on the cold ground. His breathing starts shallow, but it speeds up as he adjusts and comes to.
“Tyson! What the fuck are you doing!?” he shouts, scrambling off of me.
“Where the fuck are we!?” Rohan’s eyes shift around the tomb, panic seeping through his voice.
“I don’t know,” I say, scanning our surroundings, which look a lot like the cave we were leveling in all night. “I think we’re in the game.”
“The what!?”
“The game. Understory,” I say dryly.
“Tyson, was beating me not enough? You had to pull this childish fucking shit on me?” He says, standing up, something I should probably do as well.
I rise and push my cloak back. “You think I’m playing a prank on you?”
“Well, how else could you explain this shit?!”
“It’s hilarious. You think I care about you enough to go out of my way to somehow get into your apartment and take you to a cave and dress you up like a fucking character from a game?
” I shake my head, dusting my clothes off with my hands.
I summon my sword so I can get us the fuck out of here, then preferably away from Rohan.
“Where are you going?”
“Back to town, obviously.”
“Tyson, seriously. What’s going on?” he mutters, and the worry in his voice makes me turn toward him. My pulse quickens when I see his face, brows furrowed, and he’s shifting on his feet a little.
“I’m not pranking you, Rohan.”
“Okay, so where are we?” he says quietly.
“I told you, I think we’re in the game.”
He stares at me for a while, just blinking slowly as if his mind is trying to catch up to what I’m telling him. I think he’s starting to believe me. I can see his breath catch when the monsters below us screech as they spot us on the ledge. Slashing my sword, I jump down and clear the map for us.
“Come on, we need to get out of here,” I shout from below him.
Thankfully, he just nods and follows my lead with no further argument. I don’t have the time for his shit right now. I need to figure out what the fuck is going on. How we ended up here.
We make it back to the entrance, and my eyes squint a little as we come into the light of day.
“Maybe this is a dream,” Rohan whispers behind me. “That’s the only thing that makes sense, right?”
“Maybe. But then that would mean you dream about me.” I chuckle. And of course this enrages him again, because oh boy, can he never take a fucking joke.
“I do not fucking dream about you. So yeah, actually, maybe it’s not a dream after all!” he spits out. “Also…” he starts, looking up my gamer tag.
“What?”
“You’re… Zero?” he says, biting his lip.
“You’re right, it’s not a dream, this is a nightmare,” I say, walking in the direction of the town.
“Yeah, it definitely has to be!”
“No, it is,” I say firmly.
“Wait, did you know who I was this entire time? Are you fucking with me, Tyson?” Rohan asks, pulling me by my arm to face him.
“I didn’t know.”
“Yes, you did!” he snaps. “What are the odds?”
“Listen, I’m not doing this back-and-forth shit with you right now, Chandra.”
“I don’t believe you!” he yells at me.
“Okay, so don’t!” I snap back, returning the same energy. We’re stuck in a fucking game, and he wants to argue with me over bullshit as usual. He’s so stubborn it makes my fucking skin crawl sometimes.
What am I going to do with him?
Shit.
I can’t believe they’re the same people.
I actually only figured out I had been talking to Rohan the entire time after switching to voice chat.
There’s no way I would mistake the way he speaks, though I was shocked by how coy he was being, how sweet he was.
Maybe I got a little addicted to that side of him.
I don’t know. But I can’t tell him that. He’s always had a short fuse with me.
No need to make this all worse than it already is.
Rohan sets off stomping in the other direction, away from me.
I don’t even bother trying to stop him. Because, thank God, I won’t have to hear his fucking mouth while I try to understand this.
I watch as he hacks his lance through the monsters on the map, but as he gets further away, I notice my HP bar dipping drastically.
I’ve never seen this before, and it’s definitely not a feature of the game.
My eyes widen.
“Rohan!” I yell across the field. “Rohan!”
I know he can fucking hear me. He gets a little further away before I start to run after him, quick dashing towards his retreating form. When I get close enough, I grab him and pull him into me.
“What the fuck are you doing!?” he says, thrashing against me and pushing me away.
“I don’t think we can go far from each other without losing HP.”
“What are you talking about? You just made that up!”
“I didn’t. Check your health, dumbass.”
He pauses for a bit before looking at me again, his lip thin as he confirms what I’m trying to tell him.
“This can’t be happening.” He groans, looking at the ground.
“Look, let’s just get back to town so we can figure this out,” I say. “Please. It’s going to get dark soon.”
Rohan looks up at me, he seems so much smaller right now, with me looking down at him.
The field is quiet, safe for the monsters grazing a ways from us.
He nods silently, and I exhale. Finally, maybe he’ll chill out long enough for me to get us back.
The monsters are a lot more difficult to take on at night.
“Did you really not know?” he whispers as we trudge through the map.
“I really didn’t, Ro.”
His footsteps skip a little as he walks alongside me.
“Okay,” he breathes.