#my backup plan was to try to chuck a grenade

[anheliotrope]

Let me explain what happened. I'm going to work through events one by one, ending with the state you see in the screenshot.

I am playing Ironman (basically no saving or loading except as needed to restore the game state after program shutdown).

I am playing on Genius difficulty (4/5, I didn't want to get my ass turned inside out by Superhuman difficulty)

I am besieging the enemy UFO.

I am 90% convinced the map is empty of aliens, save for the UFO.

I carelessly explore the map with the XCOM soldier seen at the bottom.

At 1 TU left, the XCOM soldier makes Line of Sight with an alien.

My reaction: Oh shit, oh fuck, uhhh.

1 TU is not enough for the XCOM soldier to scratch their fucking ass, let alone retreat or fire.

On the next turn that alien is going to turn around and without fail obliterate my soldier.

Nobody else has LOS on the alien and nobody, even if they spent their entire turn's worth of TUs could not possibly move into a position that can allow them to shoot the alien.

I select the XCOM that you see still selected in the screenshot -- Jungo Chiba.

I contort all of my brain muscles to try to find a way to save my beloved anti-xeno legionnaire.

Jungo Chiba has exactly enough moves to face up against the wall on a trajectory towards the alien.

I use ctrl+click to force Jungo to shoot in the direction of the wall in 3x Auto mode.

The first shot destroys a section of yellow-brownish brick wall.

The second shot destroys a section of wooden wall.

The third shot destroys a wooden door and the same shot hits the alien in the side, obliterating them immediately.

I pog so ungraciously and take this ugly ass screenshot.

(I move him one tile away from the hole he just shot for no reason.)

What a fucking legend.

Thank you for your service, Jungo Chiba.

[avid-author-activist]

The Princess Andromeda (2): What Could Possibly Go Wrong? Everything, Apparently

read it here on ao3

chapter 1 is here

I set off at a brisk pace, holding the layout of the ship in my head as we went. We followed a narrow corridor down to the service stairwell. A sixth sense stopped me in my tracks, and I threw an arm across Percy’s chest.

The snarls of a telekhine drifted down the stairwell. “I don’t care what your nose says! The last time you smelled half-blood, it turned out to be a meatloaf sandwich!”

I tried to pinpoint the monster’s voice: maybe the landing above us? In any case, the engine room was floors below. I gestured to the stairs, and we descended as quietly as possible.

My heart was pounding so hard in my chest that I was sure every monster on the ship could hear it.

Next to me, Percy seemed calm, unruffled. He was probably going to come out of this alive. He was practically guranteed to survive until sixteen, when the fate of Olympus would be decided or something. He’d taken on Titans, gods, and basically every monster mythology had to offer. Exploding a cruise ship was just another day on the job for him. Me, on the other hand…

My camp necklace had five beads for five completed summers, from eighth grade through senior year. I had been on exactly zero quests, not counting the missions earlier this summer.

I was enrolled at NYU for the fall semester. My life was about as normal as a demigod’s could get: I had a girlfriend, a little brother, parents. They were strapped for cash, relying on money I made doing repairs when I was home. I tried not to think about how they would feel if I didn’t make it back.

We arrived at the engine room. The doors were bolted shut. I rummaged through my bag for a pair of chain cutters, careful not to jostle the jars of Greek fire. I didn’t want to think about what would happen if one of the jars broke. It probably did not involve getting off this ship alive and preventing the end of Western civilization.

With a sigh of relief, I closed my hand around the handle of the tool. I carefully severed the chains one by one, easing the door open. There was a second where we both held our breath. If an alarm was going to go off, it would be now. Nothing happened.

I grinned and strolled into the heart of the cruise ship.

Wow. I couldn’t help but be impressed. Big yellow turbines the size of grain silos lined one wall. I could only imagine the amount of horsepower it took to keep a cruise ship of this size going. I’d always wanted to build a boat when I was younger, like maybe a flying warship or Greek trireme…

There would be time for that when we survived this war.

The other wall was lined with computer terminals and pressure gauges, manned by a single telekhine. Percy sliced him from shoulder to hip, and he exploded into yellow powder.

“One down,” I said, wiping the monster dust from my forehead. It was caked with my own sweat, forming a thick yellow goo. Gross. “About five thousand to go.”

I surreptitiously wiped my hand on my cargo shorts and handed Percy a jar of Greek fire and a roll of duct tape. “Slap those on the console. I’ll get the turbines.”

It was humid and hot in the control room. It wasn’t as bad as the forges at camp, but it was warm enough that both of us were drenched in sweat in no time. My fingers were slipping as I taped the jars to the turbines. More than once, I fumbled the jars, which would’ve been very bad for us if I hadn’t caught them before they hit the floor.

There were two turbines left when I heard the pounding of feet on the stairs outside, getting louder by the second. I blanched, thinking about the number of monsters that could be headed this way right now. There was no way we could hold them all off. Percy met my eyes, wiping the sweat from his face. “How much longer?” he asked.

I shook my head. “Too long,” I said around the roll of duct tape, fixing the second-to-last jar of fire in place. “I still have to wire the receiver and prime the charges. Ten more minutes at least.”

Percy seemed to come to a decision. “I’ll distract them. Meet you at the rendezvous point.”

I straightened, looking him in the face. Percy Jackson was maybe the best fighter I’d ever met, but even he couldn’t take on a shipful of five thousand monsters at once. “Percy–”

“Wish me luck.” He uncapped Riptide and unlatched the door.

“Good luck,” I sighed, and he disappeared outside. I heard telekhine yelps and snarls, then the swish of Percy’s blade as he cut them apart.

Part of me—the part that wondered if this was the last time I’d see him alive—wanted to dart outside and help him. Then I took a deep breath. Percy was doing this for me so that I could finish the job. I couldn’t let him down.

I attached the last jar of Greek fire to the last turbine. I pulled the receiver out of my bag and began wiring the circuit. My mind focused until there was nothing but the job in front of me. There was a cruise ship that needed blowing up. I was the one that was going to blow it up. That was all.

My hands flew, priming the explosives and setting the timer. Then I paused. The original plan had been to set it for five minutes so we could escape before the boat exploded.

I looked at my watch; the LED face read 10:29 PM. How long had it been since Percy had left? Five minutes? Seven? If he had been captured, neither of us would be getting off this ship alive.

I took a deep breath and set the timer to zero. When Kronos discovered the explosives, it would be far too late. I could detonate them at any time. Besides, if we were captured and the ship exploded, it wouldn’t matter to us.

Either way, we would be dead.

I finished wiring the receiver and packed everything up in my bag, minus the Greek fire. I took a deep breath and unlatched the door. All I had to do was make it to the rendezvous point—the helipad on the bow of the Princess Andromeda. What could go wrong?

Footsteps—many, many footsteps—echoed from the corridor to the right. I was faced with a split-second decision: engage them in front of the engine room, or take my chances with the hallway to the left, which was the way we had come. Think! I have to think.

This was the second large wave of monsters that had come this way within fifteen minutes. That couldn’t possibly be a coincidence.

Somehow, Kronos knew we were here.

Either Percy had been captured and let something slip… or someone had told them that we would be here. A spy. A spy at camp.

Our entire mission had been compromised, and I had to find Percy and get out of here as soon as possible, hopefully detonating the explosives along the way.

I desperately wracked my brains for a way out of the situation. If the monsters checked the engine room, they would disable the explosives, and our mission would fail. New York would fall, and Olympus would follow. I couldn’t let that happen.

So.... if I wanted them to avoid the engine room, I had to create a diversion. Then I had to convince them the explosives hadn’t been set yet, so they wouldn’t come to check. A plan began to take shape in my mind—a stupid, crazy plan, but it was the only one I had.

First. Kill any monsters that were coming to check the engine room right now. I unhooked a Greek fire grenade from my utility belt. Yanked out the pin. Took a second to think about how stupid I was being: if the corridor caves in, I’m doomed.

Before I could do any more second-guessing, I chucked the grenade into the horde of monsters rounding the corner, shut my eyes, and clapped my hands over my ears.

The resulting blast shook the floor, but the walls seemed to contain the shock wave well enough. I cautiously opened my eyes, ready to finish off the survivors. There were none. The walls weren’t even scorched, and any leftover monster dust had been totally incinerated.

I blew out a breath, trying to calm my racing heart. Next step, I told myself. What’s the next step?

Second. Convince Kronos’s minions I was heading towards the engine room and hadn’t set the explosives yet. Backtrack. Find fake explosives.

I turned and ran down the left-hand corridor, retracing my steps back up the dingy stairwell where we had first heard the telekhines. I heard noise from the flight above me, and I instantly spun around and pretended to be heading downstairs.

Two dracaenae snake women slithered around the corner and spotted me. “What issss thissss?” one hissed. Her forked tongue flickered. “An enemy demigod?”

“Yup, that’s me,” I said automatically, my brain running on autopilot. Stupid.

They made their way down the stairs, every step making an audible thud and causing their armor to clank. It would’ve been funny if I wasn’t stuck on a cruise ship with five thousand monsters and only one demigod for backup.

“For Kronossss,” one hissed, jabbing at me with a spear. I sidestepped and lunged, slicing it to dust with my sword. Then I turned and sprinted down the stairwell, leaving the other one to raise the alarm.

Next step. Fake explosives. Where was I supposed going to find fake explosives on a golden cruise ship?

Glass jars. The kitchens. I swore, trying to remember where the kitchens were as I ran. My armor and bag clanked loud enough to raise Hades. With my luck, I’d attract another horde of monsters by stumbling around like a bull in a china shop.

I skidded around a corner and almost ran straight into a Cyclopes. It froze when it saw me, a hotdog halfway to its mouth. Before it could react, I stabbed it through the eye and sent it back to Tartarus.

I darted into the kitchen, sword at the ready. There was no one else in there, possibly because it was nearly eleven o’clock. Or maybe most of the monsters on this ship ate something else—like demigod.

I rummaged through the kitchen pantry, past packages of Froot Loops and Double Stuf Oreos. Please, I prayed. Please let there be something useful.

Finally, in the very back, I unearthed a dozen jars of peach preserves, in pristine condition, as if they’d been waiting for this very moment. Was it divine intervention, or was it the fact that Greek monsters liked preservatives instead of preserved fruit? I sent a quick prayer of thanks to my father anyway.

Right outside the kitchen, the hallway forked again. I knew the left corridor would lead to the engine room—where a third horde of monsters was probably heading—and almost certain capture and death. If I went back there, I wouldn't be able to make it off the ship before detonation. I would go down with the Princess Andromeda.

The other corridor… if I took it, maybe I would be able to escape detection. I could make it to the rendezvous point with Percy, and we coud get away and detonate the charges from a distance.

A choice. I have a choice.

No, I didn’t. Not really. If I ran, Kronos would find and dismantle the charges. Our only hope for success lay in me getting down to the engine room before the third wave of minions came to investigate.

Deep down, I knew I would never be able to chicken out. I had committed to this mission. It was my responsibility to see it through to the end.

I took a second to catch my breath, making sure my watch was set to the detonator. I fastened it more securely around my wrist—it would be just my luck to have it slip off in the next fifteen minutes. I glanced at the image of Silena in my pocket one last time. If everything went to plan… I would never see her smile again. I’m sorry, Lena.

An ice-cold clarity settled over my mind. For the ruse to work, the enemy had to see me creeping towards the engine room. I would be captured, and after that, there would be no way off this ship. I would detonate the charges, and then… I would die.

Don’t get me wrong. A part of me was freaking out. I was, not to be cliché, too young to die. I wanted to go to college, drive my brother to football practice every day, and major in political science. Maybe start my own crafting business on the side.

If I hit the big red button on my watch, all of those dreams would go up in a giant plume of Greek fire. There wouldn’t even be a body for my parents to bury.

I blinked away sudden tears.

But if I didn’t do this, I would still die. If this ship made it to New York, it wouldn’t matter if I survived tonight. The Titans would take Olympus. All of Western Civilization would crumble within a week.

I had to do this.

[ill-skillsgard]

Phoenix Rising, Part 2 - Valter Skarsgård

Title: Phoenix Rising

Description: The struggle for domination is paved with deceit and destructive lust as two enemies battle it out for control night after night.

Warning: 18+ swearing/mentions of rape/violence/femdom/DDLG leanings

Part 1

Monday came quickly and I had occupied my weekend with going out with friends and having late night drinks. I had been playing far too many video games and figured it was best for me to take a break and try to be social in preparation for my new job. I made the trip out to the next town over and joined a group of high school friends for trivia in a well-known bar in the heart of downtown. It was nice to see all the people I had grown up with but as I sat in a booth trying to think of the answer to some oddly obscure trivia question I thought to myself that I would be having so much more fun if I had just picked up a bottle of wine for myself and spent the night on my couch in front of my console. Shaking my head, I tried to dismiss the unknown fact that I was becoming an addict when it came to gaming. I thought about playing Agents of Carnage all night and one of my girlfriends noticed that I had been uncharacteristically quiet. "You feeling all right, Nix?" She asked. I shook out of my reverie and smiled at her before taking a long overdue sip of my Tom Collins. "Yeah, I'm okay." "You seem like you're not all here." "I know. I'm nervous about starting my new job tomorrow." "Why? You were like made for that job." "I know but I'm just worried. I haven't had a retail job in a long time and it's a weird environment. It's practically all guys there." "That might be fun though. All guys, huh?" She elbowed me playfully. "All guys that still live in their parents' basements," I giggled. I felt the haze of social fatigue descend on me quickly. All of my friends were downing and ordering more drinks, laughing and reminiscing about good times while I sat there and finished the same drink I had started the night with. Halfway through the second round of trivia was when I decided that I wanted to leave and go home to bed. When I looked around me nobody was paying me any mind so I finished the last sip of my drink, set the glass down on the coaster and excused myself. On my way home I felt bad for leaving without saying goodbye but at the same time it felt like such a relief to get away from all the pressure of socializing. Smirking at my own irony, I realized that I really was starting to become as reclusive as the people I had looked down on. There was a guilty weight attached to my ankles as I walked into my apartment, dropped my bag, kicked off my shoes and sat down on my couch with my controller in hand. The little beep that my console made when it turned on was the tiniest reminder that I was becoming less of the social butterfly I once was and more of a sequestered outsider. I didn't want to continue thinking about it and as I logged in and saw a message in my inbox, I forgot all about my guilt by the way my heart skipped a beat.

Come on Pussycat. Play with me. Without bothering to reply, I logged onto Agents of Carnage and just as I had predicted, he was already on and at number 2 on the leaderboard. I smirked as it looked like he had been practicing extra hard for when I finally decided to do a rematch. I was feeling brave and sent him a challenge request and while I waited for his response, I turned on the mic on my headset.

Vscars accepted your challenge! The screen went dark grey and the little loading icon appeared in the corner. I was nervous but ready and when the game started I heard his voice over my headset. "Oh, hello Pussycat," he greeted me in a cheeky tone that already had my blood pumping. "Hello, fucking annoying guy that won't leave me alone," I replied. "Fancy yourself a hard fuck? Because that's what I'm going to do to you all night long." I squeezed my controller harder as I moved around the board, collecting as many guns, knives, grenades, and bullets as I possibly could. "Let's get one thing straight. I'm playing one game. If I beat you, you better shut the fuck up and leave me alone. If you beat me, well then... You still better shut the fuck up." "No promises." The randomly selected board was one of the ones that I absolutely hated. It provided almost no cover save for a turret tower that posed instant death as soon as somebody climbed up onto it. I made it a point to not resort to such cheap methods of winning but I had a feeling that Vscars had no qualms with cherry-picking instant wins like that. "If you go up that tower with a sniper rifle you're a fucking pussy," I said into the soft black cover of my mic. "I was just going to say that to you, pussycat." "Stop calling me that!" I yelled. "Pussycat, pussycat, pussycat!" "You're annoying as fuck," I said, voice low in my throat. Before he could say anything else to me I spotted him turning a corner. If he was anything like me he would be entering the little stone shack and if I aimed well I knew I could throw a grenade through the window and possibly blow him up in one go. The first time I ripped the pin out of a grenade and chucked it, it bounced off the pane of the window and flew back at me but I dodged it, much to his amusement and my frustration. "Don't blow yourself up, now. Come on, number six," he laughed at me. "Fuck," I grumbled. It was too late for me to execute my plan because not only had he caught on to it, I had also given up my position and the sound of bullets firing in my direction forced me to retreat. If it wasn't for the dry air of my apartment, I would have sat there with my tongue poking out in hard concentration. One of his bullets hit me and took out a quarter of my health. I tried not to make a sound but the way he was teasing me made it hard for me to ignore it. "Fuck you, you fucking...-" "Fuck?" He finished for me. "Yeah. Whatever. Why don't you come out from that shack for once? Is this your strategy? Hiding and waiting for me to come by? I know where you are." "Come and get me then." Huffing, I decided that it wouldn't matter much if he killed me anyway. My rank wouldn't change too much if he beat me. So I switched to a shotgun, made sure it was fully loaded and ran towards the entrance of the shack with it cocked and ready to fire as soon as I saw him. "Psych, wasn't there. Right behind you!" He yelled, making me wince as his voice pounded through my headset and into my ears. "Boom. You're dead."

You Lose!

"Fuck off. I hate this board," I said through clenched teeth. "I knew it was just luck." "No, it wasn't! You're just a pussy that posts up and ambushes people!" "All right well, let's play again. Challenge me!" "No. You challenge me!" "See? You are scared. But that's fine, I'll challenge you only because I'm not afraid I'm going to lose any points!" He laughed hard enough into his mic that it fed back and hurt my ears. "I'm going to ram my dick so far up your little cun-" Then everything in my apartment went black. The TV turned off, the lights turned off and even the fixtures in the hallway were seemingly dead until the backup generator for the building kicked in. I looked around blindly for a moment, the controller still in my grip before I set it down to root around for my cell phone. "What the fuck?" I asked myself, turning on the flashlight application on my phone so I could see better. Trying to avoid stubbing my toes off of all my furniture, I made my way to the balcony and slid open the door. I lived on the fourteenth floor of a high-rise apartment building and the power had seemingly gone out everywhere. I could hear people mumbling on their balconies above and below me about how it looked like everyone's power had gone out. I leaned up against the guardrail and stared down at the ground below. I didn't much care for heights so every time I took a peek over the railing I felt my stomach twist in a knot. "Shit..." The time on my phone said 11:32 PM so I decided instead of staying up and fretting about when the power would come back on, I would go to sleep and deal with the aftermath in the morning when I woke up to get ready to start my new job.

~*~

I got the jitters when I entered the store and made my way through an aisle stacked with cases upon cases of old school video games. In the back of the store, I could hear some voices chattering and laughing and then all went silent when the people who had been talking spotted me. The guy who had interviewed me was standing there with two others. One guy, I had never seen before and the other was the blond that I had spotted as I was leaving my interview a couple of days ago. They all stared at me and I felt like shriveling into myself and blowing away. "Hey, you're Nix?" The unfamiliar man asked me, extending his hand for a shake. "Yeah, that's me," I said matter-of-factly as I shook his hand. "I'm Riley and you already met Kyle. I'm the manager so you guys will be training with me." I looked at the blond that stood taller than all of us and he looked at me. Riley then realized that he and I didn't know each other at all and broke the silence that was falling quickly and heavily over us. "Nix, this is is Valter. Valter, Nix. We usually never have two people starting at the same time so you guys can be little buddies or whatever." "Cool," Valter said, giving me a casual nod and a smile. I offered a small simper but didn't say much else as we were taken through the whole store and shown where our lockers were, where to take breaks and all of the other ins and outs of the store. It was a small building and we shared a parking lot with a convenience store, a head shop and a hair salon. Besides the aisles of video games and collectibles, there wasn't too much else to the store beside the back rooms and Riley's office where I had been interviewed. The locker room doubled as a break room where we could sit and eat lunch if we chose and once all three of us were in there I noticed how tiny of a room it was. Valter towered over me in close proximity as Riley showed us which lockers were ours. "So you guys can use these to put whatever inside. Yours will be side-by-side. All I ask is that you don't bring anything illegal in here and you keep them clean. No leaving food to rot like some people have in the past." "Ah, that sucks. I was definitely going to bring my rotten tuna sandwiches to work," Valter joked. I didn't quite laugh at his joke as Riley did. I just simply stared up at him. He definitely wasn't from the city. He had a notable accent in his voice that was hard for me to place. I wanted to ask him where he was from but I didn't want to interrupt Riley or appear as though my mind was anywhere besides present. I was curious though and hoped it would come up in conversation so that I didn't have to ask him myself. There was something about Valter that made me wary. He had an innocent enough looking face but his height combined with the mystery behind his accent made me think extra hard about him and when I thought extra hard about somebody I knew that a new habit was taking form. I shook my head but found myself watching him again after a minute had gone by. I wanted to hear him speak again so I could try to determine where exactly he was from. "So. That's the basic run around of the store. Now I assume both of you already have a fair knowledge of the products we carry, right?" "Yes," I answered. "Good. Now it's pop-quiz time! Don't worry though, it's nothing major. I just want to see how well you guys know your video games. Now... What came first, Sega Saturn or Sega Master system?" "Sega Saturn!" I blurted and then turned red when both Riley and Valter looked at me with startlement. "That's right. What year was the master system released?" "Ah, crap. Um, mid-eighties?" Valter inquired. "Hm," Riley pondered. "I'll give that one to you, Valter. It was nineteen eighty-six. Now you're both tied." "Oh, I didn't know this was a competition," I pointed out. Riley laughed, "it's not but I kind of like where this is going. So... what system was the first Pokemon game released for?" "That's easy, original Gameboy," I scoffed. "Correct! Now... Oh. Hang on one second, there's a customer at the front of the store. You two stay here and uh... Look around. Familiarize yourself with where everything is, all right? I'll be right back." The ringing of the front door did sound, indicating that somebody had walked through the front door. I looked around and took a few steps over to a cabinet that was home to a treasure trove of retro video games that were older than me and still in their original boxes. Gawking at the sheer nostalgic value of them all I drifted away from thoughts of the present and started thinking about going home and playing all of the old games I had in my collection. "You're an old-school gamer?" I turned and saw Valter pretending like he was looking at something fascinating but I knew it couldn't be all that attention-stealing because he was striking up a conversation with me. I shrugged my shoulders first before answering, "I guess so. I have a pretty fair collection. To be honest, I bought most of the games I own from here." "Me too," He replied. "Oh... Cool. You're from around here?" I asked. "Not originally, no," he answered. "I could tell." "What gave it away? My accent, I bet?" He laughed. Mirroring his chuckle, I replied, "it could also be the blond hair and your height but... Definitely the accent. I feel like I've heard it before." He nodded. "Sweden." "Wow," I mused. "Long way from home." "I've lived here a while now." "All right, all right, all right!" Riley gathered our attention. I kind of liked Riley upon our first day training with him. He was a video game geek but not someone that would rub it in your face. There was a pepper of attitude in him lined with humor and he was good at cutting silences and diminishing awkward conversation. By the end of the day, it had seemed like no time had passed at all since he had both Valter and me laughing almost the whole time. I was thankful for that because I found it hard to open up to new people most of the time. Nine o'clock rolled around and after Riley showed us how to properly close up the store he stopped us outside of doors. "So guys. Any questions? I know you're off the clock now but if you need to know anything, feel free to ask now." Valter and I looked at each other and shrugged before I piped up, "I mean, I'm good for now. I'm sure tomorrow I'll have tonnes more questions." "Yeah, dude. Thanks for today," Valter reached out and bumped fists with Riley. "Not a problem guys. Oh! One more thing. Every last Friday of every month we have a gaming party or tournament. After hours, at my place. Every new employee is bound by blood to come." "Funny," Valter laughed. "I don't remember signing anything in blood." "I don't take blood contracts lightly," I added. "Don't worry. We'll extract it from you eventually. So... Next week. Friday night. I know it's pretty new but if you guys don't come I'll take it as a personal slight." "Sure, man. I'll definitely be there. What do you guys play?" Valter asked. "It's different every time. Sometimes Smash Brothers, sometimes Call of Duty. One time we just sat around playing Dungeons and Dragons until three in the morning. You never know. Shit can get a little crazy." Valter smiled, showing teeth and all. "Cool. I'll be there for sure." Riley then looked at me as I fiddled with my car keys in one hand. "And what about you, Madame? Fancy yourself a little D 'n D?" It was too early for me to tell whether I truly wanted to hang out at a strangers house so I thought of the most ambiguous answer I possibly could. "Maybe. If you're playing Smash Bros you can consider your asses already kicked." Valter's eyes went wide and his full lips pulled up into an amused grin. "Feisty! Now I think you have to come." I rolled my eyes at him as I started taking steps backward towards my car. "Gentleman," I bid them farewell. Once I got home I was relieved to find that the power was finally back on and I could make dinner without having to light a dozen candles. I was also thankful that I could sit down after a long day on my feet and play but when I logged on I found a bunch of messages in my inbox. I scoffed before I even opened it and saw they were all from Vscars.

u seriously rage quit? Weak.

Come back, pussycat?

I STG if I see you in the lobby I'm never going to stop challenging you.

RUDE!

Appalled by the messages I had received from him, I decided to at least cover my ass and reply with why I had seemingly quit the game out of nowhere. 

Sorry, my power went out. Let's rematch? It felt strange to be asking him to play with me since he had proven to be the most infantile, annoying opponent I had ever crossed paths with besides the ten-year-old boys that played online. But there was something intriguing about one of the top players on the board wanting to fight me over and over again. It gave me a sense of worth that I knew was just a silly construct in my mind although, it still felt good that somebody that everyone knew about was giving me attention. I logged onto Agents of Carnage and saw that he had been recently active. Before I knew it, I was receiving a challenge notification.

Vscars wants to challenge you! Accept? Deny? Pressing down instantly on the A button, I accepted the challenge and waited eagerly as I watched the Agents of Carnage load screen. As soon as the screen lit back up I was transported into the immersive world that was my newest favourite game. "Oh, hello pussycat. Come to get fucked by me some more?" I adjusted my mic in front of my mouth, squirmed into a more comfortable position on my couch and clutched my controller, readying myself with a grin on my face that nobody could see. "Suck my fucking clit. You're going to die." He laughed heartily into his microphone, "we'll see. Wouldn't want your power to go out again, huh?" "That was a freak of nature," I defended myself. "Doesn't matter to me, you're the one who lost points. You're no longer number six." "Fuck," I whispered even though I knew he could still hear every word that I said. "Not for long, dickhead. Let's dance." He made those insufferable kissing noises at me and as much as I despised them, it enraged me and I knew that I had to do all I could to hold a win over him. I couldn't plummet further down the leaderboard. I had worked so hard to get up to where I was. So I got comfortable and prepared myself for a long night of screaming at my television screen.