LEVEL 1-1: BREAK-UP BURGER
TWO QUARTERS LATER
KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK!
“Spryte! Are you in there?! Open the door!”
The knocking continued, yet Spryte himself made no move to let the knocker in. Spryte was a little too busy being sprawled out across his couch, the left side of his unshaven face embedded in a half-empty pizza box. A fine trickle of drool was seeping from the corner of his mouth. It was, by all accounts, a horrid sight.
KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK!
“Spryte! Come on, jackass, I know you’re home. Your stupid motorcycle’s in the driveway. SPRYTE!” This was followed by absolutely no response, which in turn was followed by even more aggressive knocking. After another two minutes of this, the person at the door let out an impatient growl. “Spryte, if you don’t open this door in three seconds, I’m breaking it down, and then you’ll have to buy a new door!” Still no response. “FINE!” yelled the person outside. “This door is coming down, then! Here we go.” There was a three second pause, and then a loud and painful slam from the other side of the door. “OW!”
In a fit of frustration, the person outside grabbed hold of the knob and started to rattle it with insane ferocity. “SPRYTE, OPEN THE GODDAMN-”
He abruptly stopped speaking when the doorknob turned an inch too far to the right, and the door suddenly stood ajar. Spryte had not opened it; it had been unlocked the entire time. This gave the man at the door some cause for concern. Cautiously, he peeked his head inside.
“...Spryte?” he gulped.
Spryte Plummer lived in a very luxurious house, thanks to all of the winnings and endorsement money he’d garnered through the AFC. The white-tiled front foyer opened all the way up to the floor above, with a set of wide stairs providing access to the second floor in the middle of it all. To the right, a doorway led to a stately dining room that gave off the air of a room seldom used. On the left was a wide archway that opened into the living room, and it was there that the knocker discovered Spryte asleep on the couch.
The man who had just forcibly entered Spryte’s home was his best friend, Nester Nolan. Nester had an average build and was usually very sharply dressed, even when the occasion didn’t necessarily call for it. Today was no exception: his long arms were sheathed in a dark blazer, his legs encased in designer jeans. This was all topped off by a mane of red hair so vivid that if Nester went walking through high wind, it would appear from afar as if his head was on fire.
“Oh, god,” Nester grunted with disgust when he saw Spryte.
Instead of waking his friend up right away (if all of that pounding and slamming hadn’t done the trick, he wasn’t sure what he could do at this point), Nester took a look around the room. His nose wrinkled; there were dirty plates, crushed cans, and boxes of uneaten food lying almost everywhere. The big screen TV (which hung from the wall opposite the couch) was still on; some cheesy fantasy program was currently playing, featuring a long-haired blond Adonis fighting his way through hordes of skeletons and zombies, all on a laughable special effects budget. The show cut for a commercial, and Nester was about to turn away when he heard an all-too-familiar voice emanate from the TV speakers.
There, on the screen, was Spryte. He was perched atop his trademark motorcycle, wearing his signature blue and white jacket. Around his neck was a long gold chain that ended with a diamond-encrusted bit-symbol. A pair of green-tinted sunglasses sat on his nose. Hovering around Spryte were four girls in what could only generously be described as bathing suits.
“Yo yo yo!” Spryte crowed, staring down the camera lens. “Spryte Plummer here, gettin’ my freak on before a big fight! How do I stay so cool when the pressure’s hot? With Fizz’d, yo!”
One of the scantily-clad girls walked over carrying a sterling silver tray, upon which was set an open, ice-cold can of Fizz’d soft drink. “It’s the only soft drink I ever put in my body!” Spryte continued, after taking a generous gulp. “And it’s got all the great taste, sugar, and electrolytes that a healthy champion needs to stay focused!”
Another one of the bikini girls wrapped her arms around Spryte’s neck. “Your love for Fizz’d makes me attracted to you, Spryte!”
Spryte grinned and winked at the camera. “You’re damn right!”
The shot switched to a close-up of a can of Fizz’d, with a voiced-over announcer saying, “Fizz’d soft drink. The soft drink of a new generation.”
This was quickly followed by another cut of Spryte holding the can up next to his face. “Get Fizz’d tonight, bee-otch!”
Having had quite enough, Nester reached over and shut the television off. He continued looking around the place, brushing aside piles of trash whenever he came across them. On a small table at the far end of the room, he noticed a blinking red light: it was Spryte’s answering machine. A digital number 1 could be seen on the screen next to the light. A little hesitantly, Nester pressed the playback button.
“You have...one...new message,” said the machine. When the message began, the voice that played through the machine’s speaker was instantly recognizable to Nester.
“Spryte? It’s me. Look, can you please just pick up the phone? We’re both adults here, we should talk to each other like adults. I know I owe you an explanation, but...ignoring me is only going to make this worse.” There was an audible sigh. “You know where to reach me.” The machine beeped, and the message ended.
That was Pixel’s voice. Nester shook his head sadly and walked over to the coffee table, just a few feet away from where Spryte lay. Among the soiled napkins, dirty dishes, beer cans, and crumpled magazines that occupied the table, Nester could see a small, rectangular object made out of what appeared to be translucent blue glass. It was familiar enough that he could tell what it was after only a glance. To amuse himself, he picked it up and read it.
The object in question was Spryte’s ID card.
By law, every citizen of Arcadia was required to keep their ID cards on (or near) their person at all times. The cards created themselves the moment a person was born –updating themselves whenever necessary -and were to be kept with their recipients for the rest of their lives. Children under 15 were usually expected to let their parents hold their cards for them until they were old enough for the responsibility themselves; turning 15 and earning that privilege was sort of a rite of passage in Arcadia.
Both sides of an ID card contained all the information there was to know about the person that it belonged to. The front contained basic stats, while the back featured a much longer, mini-biography of its holder. Nester, of course, did not read the latter part of Spryte’s card; reading someone’s mini-biography without their expressed permission was considered unforgivably rude. There could be personal information there that Spryte would definitely prefer to keep to himself. Nester only read the front side of Spryte’s card, which (at the moment) looked like this:
SPRYTE PLUMMER Lv. 18 (Unemployed) AGE: 25 BIRTHPLACE: Coinopolis RELATIONSHIP STATUS: Single Player SEX: M CONDITION: Asleep BITS: 0 HP: 140/192 MP: None EXPERIENCE POINTS: 42,031 XP TO NEXT LEVEL: 95,000 ENERGY: 3 HYGIENE: 1 SELF-ESTEEM: 0 COOLNESS: 2 VULNERABILITY: 7 MOTIVATION: 0
Much like license plates, ID cards allowed for a fair deal of customization. You could pick from a variety of shapes, though most people (Spryte included) stuck with the basic rectangular template. The colour of the card itself and the colour of the bar your name appeared in could also be altered. Spryte’s card was royal blue, while his name rested within a bright red bar. The most popular form of customization, though, became available about seven years ago: the icon. Or, as it was more widely known, the “card tattoo”.
To the left of your name, you could add a small picture of anything that struck your fancy. The Arcadia Iconography Database had a list of over 600,000 icons to choose from. They varied from things like anchors and peace signs to classic cars or logos from cult TV shows. The infamous “middle finger” icon tended to be quite popular with immature frat boys, to the point where the programmers in charge had contemplated removing that icon from their list altogether. The colour of an icon could also be customized however one saw fit. For his own “card tattoo”, Spryte had chosen a stark white silhouette of a graceful falcon in mid-flight.
Nester frowned and dropped the ID card back onto the coffee table. He tried calling his friend’s name a few more times, but it didn’t do any good. Growing impatient, Nester found an empty beer can amid the piles of trash and promptly whipped it at Spryte’s head.
With a loud grunt of surprise, Spryte sat up. From its spot on the table, Spryte’s ID card let off a very faint chime as his CONDITION changed from ‘Asleep’ to ‘Active’.
“Well, look what the cat puked up!” Nester huffed, placing his hands on his hips. “I’ve been calling you for days! What’s the matter with you?!”
“Oh,” Spryte groaned. He smacked his lips and rubbed his bleary eyes. “Hi, Nester.”
“Oh, hi, Nester?!’ ‘Oh, hi, Nester?!!?’ You disappear off the face of the earth for weeks and all you have to say for yourself is ‘Oh, hi, Nester?!’ That’s rich, you know that? That’s freaking beautiful.”
“What time is it?” slurred Spryte. “Is...is this Thursday?”
“It’s Sunday. One-fifteen in the afternoon. And you’re an asshole. Why haven’t you returned any of my calls? Or any of Pixel’s, for that matter?”
Spryte scowled. “I don’t want to talk to her.”
“Uh...clearly, you do. Otherwise you wouldn’t have vanished the night she left you standing on your own in the ring.” Nester took a deep, long breath; he’d obviously been anxious to say this for a while. “Where did you go, man?”
Spryte just looked confused. “Go? I didn’t go anywhere. I’ve been here.”
Raising an eyebrow, Nester pointed down at the floor. “...Here?”
“Yeah.”
“In this house? In this room? Here?”
“That’s what ‘here’ means, Nester.”
“...you do know that it’s been two quarters since your fight with Gobalsky, right?”
“Mm-hmm.” Spryte picked up the can Nester had hit him with and tipped it down over his open mouth. His lips curled with disappointment when not a single drop emerged.
“You mean to tell me,” Nester fumed, speaking deliberately slowly, “that you’ve spent the last two whole quarters –that’s sixty days, mind you –holed up in this room all by yourself?” When Spryte nodded in the affirmative, Nester swallowed his rage for a moment and managed to sputter, “What have you been doing for food? You can’t cook worth a damn!”
“Take-out,” Spryte replied, as if the answer should have been obvious. And it really should have, since the room was peppered with so many pizza boxes, chicken buckets, and delivery bags that the place had acquired an entirely unique stench consisting of several combinations of herbs, spices, and seasonings. As if suddenly remembering he had food nearby, Spryte dislodged a slice of the half-eaten pepperoni pizza he had only moments ago been sleeping on and took a small bite. He gestured with his chin towards the box. “Do you want some?”
“No. Are you joking? That had your face in it.” Nester started to inspect the leavings of Spryte’s older take-out meals. “So, some of these...leftovers are almost sixty days old?” He chanced a look into a white box adorned with red foreign characters before quickly recoiling in disgust. “Oh, Jesus. This beef and broccoli is moving.”
Spryte took another bite of the pizza, yanking one of his hairs off of the hardened cheese before he did so. “What do you want, Nester?”
Nester spun around to face him, speaking with rapidity. “Oh, I’m sorry. Did I come at a bad time? Were you busy with...with matters of your own? What’re you, in the middle of an equation? How stupid do you think I am? You’ve been wallowing, Spryte!”
“I have not been wallowing.”
“You have so been...you’re wallowing right now! Look at this space around you! This is what wallowing is, Spryte! You know when pigs roll around in dirt for a bit, and then they dig a trench in the mud and just lie around, not doing shit? That’s called ‘wallowing’!”
No response came from Spryte, so the fuming Nester jabbed an index finger toward the coffee table. “What the hell is up with your ID card? It said you were unemployed. It should say ‘11th Level Androidimal Fighter’. Why does it say ‘Unemployed’?”
For the first time that day, Spryte stood up. “I quit.”
“Excuse me?!”
“I quit. I’m not an Androidimal Fighter anymore.”
“Okay...ever since we’ve been little, you’ve had one-” Nester held up a finger. “-one aspiration: to fight in the AFC. If you-”
“You heard what I said that night after the championship match,” Spryte interrupted. “I told Pixel that I couldn’t imagine continuing on in the AFC without her by my side. And guess what?” He glanced to his left and right. “She’s gone! Ergo, I am no longer competing in the Androidimal Fighting League. End of story. Goodbye.”
Without uttering a word, Nester stomped back over to the answering machine and hit the PLAYBACK button.
“Sunday...11:07...a.m.” said the machine.
“Spryte? It’s me. Look, can you please just pick up the phone? We’re both adults here, we should talk to each other like adults. I know I owe you an explanation, but...ignoring me is only going to make this worse. You know where to reach me.”
BEEEEP!
Spryte’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t touch my electronics.”
“Spryte...for the good of your health and well-being, you need to sit down with Pixel and hear what she has to say.”
“I already know exactly what she has to say: ‘Sorry, Spryte, but I don’t love you and I never want to marry you!’ There. I just saved myself a trip.”
Never breaking pace, Nester picked up Spryte’s cordless phone and began pressing buttons. Spryte’s face blanched. “Whoa, whoa, what’re you doing?”
“I’m calling her right now. You really want to stop me? Shoot me.”
With all the speed of a cheetah, Spryte leaped over his coffee table, bounded across the room, and reached for the phone. “Nester! No!”
But Nester was already backing away with a determined gleam in his eyes. “I will hit you,” he cautioned when Spryte drew too close. “Good, it’s ringing.”
“Nester, give that back right now!”
“I’m sorry, what?” Nester asked, feigning deafness. “I...I can’t hear you, Spryte, what with this very loud ring tone that’s going off in my ear right now. I...hello, Pixel?”
Swearing loudly, Spryte made a desperate dive for the phone. But Nester was a step too quick; he dashed out of the living room and through the front door, finally coming to a stop out on the driveway next to Spryte’s motorcycle. He saw that Spryte’s garden hose (which was currently connected to the house) was coiled at the far corner of the driveway. He wasted no time reaching down and picking it up.
“Nester?” Pixel’s voice responded on the other end of the phone.
“Yeah, it’s me,” Nester said hurriedly. “Listen, I was just talking to Spryte here, and he said that he really, really wants to meet up with you tonight and talk.”
There was a brief pause as the very confused-sounding Pixel tried to take this all in. “Uh...really? That’s great! But why isn’t he calling me himself?”
At that moment, Spryte came rushing out the front door, his hands outstretched for the phone. Nester calmly squeezed the nozzle on the hose, blasting Spryte with a high-powered jet of icy water. Spryte gasped and sputtered, dropping to the grass.
“Well, he’s actually getting showered right now, as we speak,” Nester told Pixel. “You know Spryte: it takes him a while to get ready! So anyway, how does 6 o’clock sound for you?”
“Okay, that’s actually perfect!” replied Pixel. “Where does he want to meet?”
“Gonna...kill you!” gasped Spryte. Nester responded by squeezing the hose’s nozzle even harder.
“Is the Burger Time on 14th Street okay?”
“Absolutely! Tell him I’ll be there at 6 sharp! Oh, and Nester...thanks so much.”
“It was my pleasure, Pixel.” With a grin, Nester hung up the phone and released the nozzle, cutting off the hose’s flow. A sopping and dripping Spryte lay in the grass, blinking water out of his eyes. “Congratulations, pal. You have a date in less than five hours.”
Spryte responded by leaning over and retching a sizeable amount of water onto the lawn.
L O A D I N G . . .
The Burger Time on 14th Street happened to be packed with families and a great deal of hyperactive children by the time 6 o’clock rolled around. Parents were scurrying to the back counter to order L’il Bite meals for their kids, while the rugrats themselves ran throughout the restaurant, chasing one another with the action figures that came with their food. And some unfortunate soul wearing the oversized costume of the Burger-Meister (Burger Time’s official mascot) pranced around, annoying patrons and providing excellent kicking fodder for the over-excited children.
Amidst all of the chaos, Pixel sat in a booth near the front doors, drumming her fingernails atop the table in front of her. Her feet were bouncing up and down with anxiety. She caught herself sweating and rushed to rectify that problem with one of the bright yellow napkins supplied at every table. It was 6:11 when Spryte finally walked through the doors, looking bleary-eyed and a little paunchier than she remembered. It had obviously been a very rough two quarters.
Spryte sank into the seat across from her and forced a smile. “Uh...hi.”
“Hey, Spryte,” Pixel said, smiling back.
A sharp burst of pain coursed through Spryte’s body as he realized that Pixel was wearing one of his favourite outfits of hers: a pink tank top underneath a very soft baby blue sweater, accompanied by a pair of blue jeans tied together with a wide pink belt. That sweater was so soft to the touch that he had often contemplated buying several for himself and stitching them together into a blanket. Even now, he had to resist the urge to touch it.
“You look...” Pixel started to say ‘well’, but her voice trailed off. Spryte did not look well at all. She let the word “well” die in her throat and concluded in a quiet voice with the first adjective that came to mind: “...tall.” She silently cursed herself for sounding so stupid as soon as she’d finished speaking.
“I’m hunching right now,” Spryte mumbled. “So that’s not entirely accurate.”
An uncomfortable silence drifted between them, until both of them suddenly spoke up at the same time.
“Spryte, I think-”
“Look, can we-”
They both stopped. Pixel apologized and gestured for Spryte to go ahead. Spryte opened his mouth, but nothing came out. “I...forgot what I was going to say,” he admitted.
“Hiya, folks!”
This incredibly loud exclamation came from the Burger-Meister, who had pranced over to their table and was now leaning in until he was uncomfortably close to them. The unmoving, painted smile plastered across his egg-shaped white face was the stuff of nightmares. “Are you having a yummmmmmmmmmmy old time at Burger Time today?!”
“Yes, we are. Thank you,” Pixel hastily told him, hoping he would leave.
“May I recommend the deep-fried lettuce?! Hyuk hyuk!” chuckled the Burger-Meister. “For a limited time only, it comes with free marinara dipping sauce!”
“That sounds great, thanks,” Pixel said, less politely now. “We’ll order later.”
“Ooooookey-dokey!”
He thankfully left them alone, wandering off in search of other customers to bother and/or horrify. Pixel rolled her eyes. “Explain to me why you wanted to meet here,” she said with a wince.
Spryte quietly fantasized about how great it was going to feel to punch Nester in the kidneys the next time he saw him. “Yeah. I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking,” he intoned. “Do you wanna get out of here?”
“No, don’t bother. Let’s just stay and talk this through, okay?”
“Fine.” Spryte paused, took a deep breath, and asked, “Why don’t you want to marry me?”
“Spryte...when you and I started going out six years ago, things were great. But we were kids. And, even after all this time, I feel like that’s still exactly what we are.”
“We’re both 25, Pixel. We’re adults here.”
Pixel fiddled with her fingers. “Any teenage girl would be happy being the girlfriend of an Androidimal Fighter, and I was no different, but...it got to the point where I felt like that’s all I was.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Everywhere we went, it was, ‘Oh, there goes Spryte Plummer and his girlfriend’, or, ‘Oh, that’s the chick who’s boinking the Androidimal guy’!” She was speaking faster and louder now, apparently relieved to finally be getting these things off her chest. “Everywhere I went, it’s like I was nothing but...your accessory!”
Spryte gave his head a shake. “That’s not the way I saw you.”
“I know, Spryte, I know. But...that’s the way I started seeing me. And I don’t blame you for it at all, it’s just…it’s just how I feel.” She clasped his hands within hers and made the sympathetic face she usually reserved for when she was delivering people a bit of bad news. Spryte didn’t like the look of that face one bit. “I will always care about you, Spryte Plummer. But right now, I’m not sure if the married life…if that married life…is what I want.”
His face turning red, Spryte rebutted with, “Well, what do you want?!”
Pixel proceeded to open and shut her mouth several times; the words just weren’t coming to her the way she’d wanted them to. At long last, she gave up and shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know,” she breathed. “That’s something that I still need to figure out for myself.”
Returning her hand-squeeze with one of his own, Spryte excitedly proclaimed, “That’s fine, honey! We can figure that out together, you and me! I’m not even an Androidimal Fighter anymore! We can start over! We can figure things out! We can...” The look that came over Pixel’s face next made Spryte lose his train of thought. He furrowed his brow. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
“Spryte,” Pixel sighed, her voice devastatingly heavy. “I may have...kinda...met somebody else.”
Slowly, Spryte removed his hands from hers and placed them back where they’d been a moment ago. His eyes were wide; a lump in his throat began bobbing up and down uncontrollably. From within his pocket, his ID card let off another soft chime, indicating that his CONDITION had switched from ‘Active’ to ‘Paralyzed’. Spryte cleared his throat. “Um...come again?”
“It’s been so long since you and I…and it’s nothing serious yet, but...”
“You’re seeing someone behind my back?!” wailed Spryte.
Pixel became instantly defensive. “Oh, please! Don’t make me out to be the bad guy here! I didn’t hear a word out of you since the fight, and not for lack of trying, either! You ignored me when I came to the door! You never answered my calls! You never responded to my messages! You never even showed your face! Two straight quarters, I went without so much as a peep, Spryte! That’s enough to declare any relationship legally dead!”
As stubborn as he tended to be, Spryte couldn’t help but understand that she had a point. But that still didn’t mean he had to like it. Pouting like an angry child, Spryte folded his arms and let his eyes wander around the restaurant. “That’s just wonderful,” he said, trying his best to sound as nonchalant as possible (it wasn’t working). “That’s spectacular.”
“I know it sucks to hear things like this, Spryte, but I’d rather you hear it from me first.”
Still grimacing, Spryte muttered, “And who the hell is this guy?”
Looking a tad embarrassed, Pixel shrank into her seat a little bit before answering. “His name’s Harry,” she stated. “I met him on Arcadia Online.”
“You met an INTERNET GUY?!!?”
“Spryte, please! Lower your voice!”
Spryte tried taking a deep breath to calm himself down. It only worked a little bit. “And, what, pray tell, does...Harry...do?”
“Well, he’s an explorer, actually,” Pixel said. “He’s from River City. We only met online two weeks ago, but...he’s coming into town on Tuesday, and-”
“You know what? I don’t need to know the rest,” Spryte muttered, holding up his hands.
“It’s nothing serious yet, Spryte. At all,” she assured him. “Harry’s just a nice, intelligent guy who I enjoy talking to. He’s seen a lot of the world and I find him very interesting.”
“I...own an atlas,” Spryte grumbled. “I’ve read it. That’s pretty much seeing the world, too.”
“Spryte, back up for a second,” Pixel said. “What do you mean, you’re not an Androidimal Fighter anymore?”
“I quit the league.”
“Why on earth would you do that?!”
He glowered at her. “Because everything I said in the ring that night is 100% true.”
Pixel lowered her head sadly; she understood very well what he meant. “I am so, truly sorry for hurting you, Spryte,” she whispered. “Really. I am. But...this whole love and marriage business...this isn’t something that can just be taken lightly. At least, not by me.” She touched his cheek with the palm of one smooth hand. “And right now, I don’t think you understand that.” Pixel rose from her seat, towering over Spryte. “I’ll always care about you. That’s never going to change. But first I need to figure out what I want.” She smiled down at him, a smile he didn’t return. “Go back to the AFC, Spryte. You’re amazing at it. And...take care of yourself, okay?”
She stood there for another few seconds, waiting for a response from him. But none came. So, with one last squeeze of his shoulder, Pixel turned and walked out the front doors of the Burger Time. And just like that, she was gone.
Off in the corner of the restaurant, two shadowy figures sat hunched over an order of fries. They had been watching Spryte and Pixel’s verbal exchange with great interest. Once Pixel walked out, one of these figures turned to the other and whispered, “What do you think?”
The other figure replied with a wide sneer, “I think she’ll be perfect.”
Spryte continued sitting alone at the booth, his hands resting idly in his lap. He stared ahead into space, contemplating a great many things at once. A million thoughts suddenly sprang to the forefront of his mind, thoughts of things he should have said to Pixel before she left. The clouded vision of his in-the-moment anxiety suddenly gave way to the 20/20 perfection of hindsight. If only he could…
With a loud exclamation, the Burger-Meister popped up behind Spryte, scaring the living daylights out of him. “UH-OH! Looks like we’ve got a frowner in the house!” the terrifying mascot bellowed for everyone in the restaurant to hear. “Somebody get this fella a value combo, STAT!”