bambicaymaz

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     “Yeah! Or… ya know, it’s a city.”

     “Maybe we will somewhere where you aren’t paying me for a service.”

    “I hope we do.”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     “Oh. Yeah. I forget that shit.”

     “No problem, anyway. I’m Vaughn.”

    “Vaughn.  It was nice to meet you.”

    “Maybe I’ll see you next time.”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     “Nice. I’ll save it under your name; what’s on file. It’ll be stored for whenever you guys come in and wanna play it. If you keep it longer, they’ll charge you monthly.”

     “They take your payment out at the desk.”

    “Great.”

    “Thank you for all your help, uh— sorry.  I don’t think I caught your name.”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     More amusement in the way Bambi spoke louder, as if Vaughn was actually in the sky and she needed to speak up enough to be heard. Vaughn confirmed through the speaker, and Bambi’s surroundings slowly disappeared — blackness, then the room fading into sight before the helmet lifted automatically off Bambi’s head.      “Wanna go with that one?”

    The real world came back into view and a giant smile was plastered across Bambi’s face.  “Definitely.  He’ll love it.  I love it.  I honestly might come back again to play it myself.”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     Bambi’s repeated laughter elicited one of her own, her expression contorting with contained amusement as she watched the screens in front of her.

     “Yeah. You got it.” Vaughn increased the speed of the smaller blobs, allowing them to leap into the air and bounce off the walls, cutting through an orange colored sky.

    Everything was moving faster now, and the blobs were bouncing around, making it harder for her to get them.  There were no arms to catch with, just her body and... her mouth.  She opened it as wide as she could, trying to catch them that way and let out another delighted shriek as she swallowed one whole.  It was weird.  Like eating a giant tapioca pearl, but without any taste to it.

    The game continued on, and each fork in the pathway she came to sent a flip through her stomach.  She wasn’t sure if there was any rhyme or reason to which way she was supposed to go and she was having too much fun not caring to actually try to figure it out.  So far so good, though, until suddenly everything turned black and she felt like she was free-falling through the air.  She landed with a thud, her squishy slime body reducing the impact.  Or maybe it was just that the game didn’t have a feature where she could feel hurt.     Suddenly she was back at the beginning of the game, restarted after her blobby death.  “Okay,” she called.  “I think I’m done now!”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     The helmet came down over Bambi’s head, turning black as the woman was deposited into a peaceful field. V’s voice echoed through the bright blue sky, “A door will appear on the other side of the tree when it’s ready.” Then she left the woman to explore until a green door eventually appeared, connected to nothing but the grass below.       Once she’d pass through, she’d be met with walls made of stacked, colored blocks to create a large maze, those small blobs Vaughn had mentioned earlier leaping around the environment. It wasn’t anything too interesting; another puzzle game that she assumed wouldn’t cause any distress, so she settled back, listening for any warning sounds and peeking up from her own game every so often to make sure everything was in check.

    The field was lovely.  Lush and green and unlike anything she’d find out in the desert.  She thought it might be a nice place to visit if it were real.  And maybe a nice place to visit virtually, too, after a bad week.  Because even though she knew it was simulated, it still felt real.  The blades of grass were soft between her fingers — she imagined how fun it would be to run through it barefoot — and a gentle breeze came through that rustled the leaves of the tree and lifted her hair from the back of her neck.

    Her eyes wandered around the sky, the field, and then made her way to the other side of the tree.  A green door was waiting for her and for a moment, she felt a little sad about leaving.  But the slime creature sounded fun, and she reached out to open the door.     The game looked familiar — something sort of like what she’d seen Jordana’s brother playing on his little handheld device one day when he’d had to come in for an appointment.  She looked down at herself and her body was gone, replaced by a blob of slime that had her laughing instantly.  There were no legs on it, but she moved forward all the same when she tried to.  Another laugh as she picked up speed, and then an excited shriek when she saw her first smaller blob.  Her blobby body glided over it, absorbing the misshapen slime.     There were more of them, leading her farther into the game, down different pathways.  It was easy, and childish, but it was fun.

    “Can we make it more challenging somehow?  Maybe up the stakes?  Go down the wrong pathway and game over, or something?”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     “Uh,” V chuckled, “I guess it depends on what you find scary. This is a kid’s, like, puzzle game so… you’re just a colored blob that goes around gobbling up smaller blobs. Do you want it to be scary?”

    “No!  No.  That sounds good as it is.”

    “I’m ready.”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     Vaughn approached Bambi, attaching white, sticky nodes along her arms and to her temples before returning her seat. 

     “It’s gonna start off basic. A field. Something nice and pretty while the programming gets kicked up. Then you can just walk forward whenever your ready; or I guess if you change your mind. Then you’ll be hanging around a little longer. I’ll be with you the whole time, able to hear and see everything, so if there’s something uncomfortable, let me know A.S.A.P so I can adjust or pull you out, if that’s what you want.”

    “Got it.”

    “Uh... is the slime creature thing scary at all?”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     Vaughn laughed with a nod, “Yeah. Same. Maybe you’ll like this shit more than you think.”

     “Go ahead and take a seat. Lemme just get stuff set up and you can take a walk around while I get it together. If you wanna take a piss or anything, it’s right back there.”

    “Thank you.”

    Bambi decided a trip to the bathroom couldn’t hurt and as she washed her hands, she examined herself in the mirror.  What would she look like as a slime creature?  Like herself, but with a slimy body?  Would she just be a blob?  Would she be able to feel her own slime?  She kinda hoped so.     Back in the other room and Bambi took a seat where she’d been directed earlier, letting her eyes wander around as she waited for everything to be ready.

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     Vaughn didn’t comment on how the other woman didn’t look old enough to have even finished a medical internship, let alone have surgery as her most fortified hub of knowledge, seeing how often it’d been coming up; but V ran into all sorts of types, with all sorts of stories, and she didn’t really care enough to judge or inquire. Try-hards were always the easiest to please, anyway, which only made her work easier. And if she was a bragger… well, then, fuck, guess she’d just have to bitch to Ramon later.

     “They all work the same, anyway,” she shrugged, quickly reading over the texts before giving back the phone, “No need to apologize. Part of the job. Not everyone can be a gamer nerd — and speaking of… looks like your options are being some sort of slime creature, shooting demonic bunnies, or scaling some artfully designed mountains.”

    “Slime creature!  Definitely a slime creature.”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     “This can’t be the first time you’ve heard of them?” Vaughn asked, curiosity piqued, scooting her chair closer to Bambi to gesture at the other woman’s phone so she could see the ideas.

    “I’ve only ever used simulations for studying.  Practicing surgical procedures or triaging trauma patients, that sort of thing.”

    “Clearly I’m not very familiar with it in a fun, non-educational setting.”  She passed her phone over.  “I apologize for my naivety, but really appreciate your patience so far!”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     Vaughn offered her a light-hearted smile and a nod in response to her being on time, though her focus remained on the monitors… until Bambi spoke, causing V to face her once more.

     “Get him something?” Confusion made her features go lax before realization struck and her lips were curving with amusement as she settled back in her chair, laying her arms on the rests. Total newbie. “So like I said, it’s first come, first serve. I can take a look at the shit he likes and we can talk about what sort of simulation he might want, but we don’t like… make games? It’s… you know… simulations. He’d have to come in here, we prop ‘em up in that chair over there,” she nodded toward the recliner, “and then we drop you in for… whatever you want really. Either way, I can totally set you up with one of these rides and you can see how you like it. I can load it into a file for him and when he comes in, the programmer will already know what he’s lookin’ for.”

    “Right.  Of course.  Sorry.  Surgery, I know.  Gaming and simulations, not so much.”

    “Let’s do what you said, if you don’t mind.  Look at he likes and talk about a good simulation.  And then I will... try it out, and report back to his sister!”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     “Oh. Gross.”

     “Meeting? What?” Vaughn ignored her hand, distracted by the comment as her gaze dropped to her watch, frowning slightly, “It’s first come, first serve, babe. They just hook ya up with the first programmer available.” She snorted lightly, rolling her eyes as she spun to face the center screen, “Claire probably thought you were cute and wanted to mess with ya, ‘specially if you seem like the nervous type. Don’t be. This is essentially, like, your playground.” She tapped on the polished black surface that served as a keyboard — outlines highlighting red when her fingertips made contact — windows popping up in front of her with the information Bambi would’ve given at the front desk. “So? What’cha lookin’ for?”

    “Claire.  That’s who I talked to, yeah.  I’m sorry for the confusion.  At least I’m not too early, though!  Just... right on time.”

    “Right, well... I’m not completely sure.  A co-worker of mine has a brother who’s into gaming and his birthday is soon, so she was hoping to get him something fun.  I guess she’s not much into gaming so she had no idea where to start, which is why I offered to come in her place.  Not that I really have any idea how this works, either, but I thought it’d be fun to try!”  She pulled up the texts from Jordana and held it out to the programmer.  “These are the games her brother has liked most.  Do you have anything similar I could try out?”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     “Hopefully that’s, uh, not a regular thing for ya.”

    “I work in the medical field, so pretty regular.  But it’s the worst when you don’t realize and you walk around with someone else’s, uh... excrements on you.  Worse still when no one bothers to tell you.”

    “Thank you for letting me know.”  She stuck out her hand to the brunette.  “I’m Bambi, by the way.  I think I’m a little early for our meeting.  Being late makes me anxious.”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     “Uh…” Vaughn leaned closer, narrowing her eyes at the fabric, “Yellow? Green? I dunno.” 

     “At least there aren’t chunks?”

    “Oh, good.  I was worried I’d sat in vomit, but I’m pretty sure it’s just paint.”

    “No bodily fluid stains for me today!”

[bambicaymaz]

vaughnmallick​.

     “You have a stain on your ass.”

    “No!  I do?”

    “What color is it?”  She craned her neck, trying to look behind her for the stain, but she couldn’t move her head far enough to see anything.

[bambicaymaz]

jettmaverick​.

     “Alright…” He gave her another once over, meeting her gaze with a nod, “Thanks again. Guess I’ll see ya in a couple days.”

    “It was nice to formally meet you!  Please tell Loralie I said hello.”

    “Bye, Jett.”