[MATCH BEGINS IN 30 SECONDS]
The message flashed across the top of Owen’s monitor. Everything felt three steps to the left of normal. He was at a gaming desktop, but not his own. He was playing UMDK, but without any of his gear. He was queued up with Nintendo Femicom, but not as Witchofthew3st. The nagging sensation of “almost”s and “nearly”s was throwing him off. Behind his monitor, Owen could see Deacon and Sarah sitting next to each other on the other side of the computer. Sarah occasionally seemed confused, but each time hesitation crossed her face, Deacon would lean over to whisper sometime towards her. He seemed to answer her questions whenever he did so. Owen wondered just how much UMDK she had even played. Castle had mentioned that Sarah was sort of being brought along for the ride by Deacon, so it was possible she was a newer player.
Owen took his spot towards one of the side doors of the spawn room. They were on offense for this match, something which would traditionally be more suited to Owen’s own build than Aoife’s. A sniper on offense was something that people would traditionally scold you for, but Owen knew just how talented she was with her rifle. Without any of his equipment, his usual run and gun playstyle would be a lot harder to accomplish.
[xXKillsectorXx: Whos running default loadout? ths shit isn’t just a quickplay]
[Dreeednn: yea equip your shit pls]
[Nintendo Femicom: You can still get kills with starter gear]
[xXKillsectorXx: you can get MORE kills with actual guns]
[Dreeednn: bro put it on the match is starting]
[PertinentHorse: Account got hacked, so I’m working with a new account sry]
Owen was glad that the team had decided to communicate over the team chat in the match. It was better than the alternative of speaking when the other team is just a few feet away. Letting the enemy team know that someone on your team had starter equipment is probably for the best.
While looking down the row of teammates sitting in front of monitors, he could see the frustrated expressions of people as they read his message. The only thing saving Owen from a series of toxic messages was the fact that the match was starting in a few seconds. The side door of spawn would usually let him get a quick rollout to attempt to drop behind enemy lines and pick a healer off. Without the usual speed, Owen would have to see how well his plan would hold up.
Just before the doors opened and he left spawn, Femicom’s avatar performed a quick wave emote towards PertinentHorse. It was her way of wishing him luck before each match when they played together. Since they communicated over the in-game chat rather than any sort of voice chat, small gestures and emotes towards one another were their way of “talking” in the moments where they couldn’t afford to type a message.
Owen emoted back to Aoife, and started to sprint out of the spawn room. He was severely lacking in any of the powerful augments to his kit. Most notably was the significantly slower movement speed of Horse when contrasted with Witch. If you placed the footage of the two character’s gameplay side by side it would look like two entirely different video games. The lumbering grunts and sounds of his character running into the fray reminded him of exactly why this type of character was not for him. If he wanted to slug around as a cardboard cutout of a military character he would play Call of Duty.
The noises of the first team fight reverberated through the small side corridor that Owen had taken to move behind the enemy team. With the two teams already clashing, Owen would have the perfect opportunity to drop behind the enemy team to flank without fear of being preemptively caught. As he neared the backlines of the enemy team, he saw the kill feed light up with one of their own. Wr4th had eliminated their tank. Since they were down 5v6, the team fight already looked unfavorable. With Owen lurking behind the enemy team, it was really more of a 4v6 at the current moment. The smart choice would be to draw back and wait for the frontline fighter that had designated himself as a tank to push up front in the next fight.
Owen waited behind the enemy team as the kill feed lit up with another death on the team. Followed by another. Wr4th, with buffs from Sarah6258 behind him, was shredding through all of the frontline fighters on the team. He would be Owen’s first target. The pocket healer of Sarah needed to go first, however, as the fight would never favor Owen unless they were both lacking healers to make the difference. When enough of the allied team respawned, Owen finally moved up and into position to leap out and attempt to kill Sarah before she or Deacon would have a chance to react.
He didn’t have much to work with, only utilizing the basic starter assault rifle, but with one of the starter abilities, [Frag Blast], he would be able to zero Sarah before much could happen. [Frag Blast] might seem like a basic ability at first, resembling a regular frag grenade in any standard shooter. Like every other ability within ULTRA MEGA DEATH KILLER, there was a layer of depth beyond “throw and pray”. You could actually shoot the [Frag Blast] mid air in order to preemptively detonate it, although there was a damage reduction to prevent insta-killing targets by tossing it out and detonating it immediately. A good way to prevent that was to let the full explosion damage occur by waiting out the timer. The timer would not start until it first hits the ground, meaning walls and other surfaces were fine if they were not surfaces that a character could walk on.
Owen needed the [Frag Blast] to detonate quickly upon reaching Sarah to ensure she had as little time as possible to escape. The very moment that his team began their second team fight, Owen moved to begin his flank route. It had been quite a while since he had to use this tech, but he primed the [Frag Blast] in his hand as he approached the back lines. He would need to activate the timer on the floor while still maintaining enough forward momentum that it would land and roll just underneath Sarah. With a wishful prayer, Owen slammed the [Frag Blast] down onto the ground at an angle and watched it soar and skid across the ground towards Sarah6258 and Wr4th. As it rolled, he switched to his sidearm, a pistol which for most would seem like a less effective option than his assault rifle. Owen knew that as long as there were no unaccounted for abilities, Sarah would be left with just enough health that a single headshot would take her out cleanly. The assault rifle would require more shots to land, and with less accuracy than his basic pistol, Owen knew he’d have an easier time landing a single good shot than spraying and praying that a couple hit home.
A raucous explosion signaled the moment for Owen to let loose a single shot into Sarah’s avatar. The internal celebration inside of Owen was quickly crushed by a familiar tintinnabulating sound. The jingle and wave of green light that washed across Sarah6258’s body. [Guardian’s Blessing] was a meta augment, with huge benefits and huge downsides. When a player would reach 0 health, [Guardian’s Blessing] will interject and restore 50% of the player’s maximum health before deactivating. The second chance augment had a long cooldown, a full two minutes, but the tradeoff was that once every two minutes you were at a massive advantage in an engagement. It was frequently used on support characters in order to prevent a single well placed headshot from a sniper from completely turning the tides of a fight. Owen shouldn’t have been so surprised to see it in all honesty.
This situation had presented itself time and time again for Owen, and it had a simple solution. His trusty shotgun could easily put down a half health healer, meaning he would just have to-
“Shit!” Owen let out a whispered reprimand of himself upon realizing that his primary weapon was not his standard shotgun. With a starter rifle in hand, Owen figured he would do the best he could manage, and started to unload the entire magazine towards Sarah, hoping he could secure the elimination before Wr4th turned around.
Sarah knew exactly what to do in case of a flanker, and tried to make her way forwards towards the other members of their team to get away from Owen. Owen’s spray of bullets netted a couple of hitmarkers, but not enough to manage the kill before Wr4th rotated to the backlines to deal with him. Owen could only hope that the rest of the team could push up using the advantage that he provided. As Wr4th lept in front of Sarah, Owen ducked back into the nearest cover. He had seen from the previous game that Wr4th liked to use a hand cannon, a modified [Rancor] that increased its headshot damage for each consecutive headshot landed within a time frame. It started out weak, but after landing one or two headshots, it became a good hand cannon. After a couple more, it became an utter apocalyptic force of nature wielded in a single hand. Its strength lies in momentum, however. After 8 seconds of not landing a headshot, it loses all stacks of the damage boost.
Owen’s solution to Wr4th? Simply hide for 8 seconds and engage him when his hand cannon returns to its base damage. Owen started to backtrack towards the route he took to flank, but with the nearing audio of footsteps, he could tell that Wr4th was already attempting to chase him down. Wr4th had carried his team in the last match. Owen thought that even if Wr4th followed him through this side path, it would be depriving the enemy team of their strongest source of damage. A win-win, even if he were to lose this gunfight. He just needed to keep him busy enough that his own team could push through, something which seemed considerably more likely when the kill feed lit up depicting that Sarah6258 had been eliminated. It seemed that even though she escaped Owen, her low health made her an easy target to follow up on. One support down, though they likely had another. It was rare to see a team composition with only one supporting character.
BANG
A shot rippled through the cramped corridor and hit PertinentHorse in the shoulder. Owen looked to his health bar as he rounded a corner to get some more distance from Wr4th. 150 health remaining. Owen did a few quick calculations in his head as he dived behind a nearby barrel. The average character, unless they were built into a tank role, would have 200 health. It was the “standard” health pool that was modified based on other augments. PertinentHorse instead had a max health of 225 due to the [Ballistic Vest] passive, a very simple and often useless augment. The 75 damage he had taken was from a body shot, which meant that Wr4th had already accumulated a couple of stacks of damage boost onto his [Rancor] hand cannon. Owen wasn’t the most familiar with the modifier, so he made a rough estimate that it was currently at 3 stacks of its damage boost. Wr4th was quickly following after Owen, the steady footsteps resonating through the cramped hallway that led back to his team’s spawn room.
Owen knew he had to have some kind of plan to come after him for so long. Revenge for picking off his pocket healer might have been half of the reason, but it would be incredibly foolish to leave the team fight if he had no way of returning quickly. There were a handful of augments that allowed quick travel, so it was hard to guess which he might be utilizing. Owen knew one thing for certain, however. One more headshot at 75 damage would kill him. The default headshot multiplier in UMDK was 2x, with some unique weapons offering a higher multiplier, and some other weapons having headshots entirely disabled. Worse than an instant death would be Wr4th’s hand cannon gaining another stack of damage boost, jumping up to 90 damage per shot, 180 on a headshot. If he made it back to the team fight with that amount of burst damage, he could quickly turn the tides back into the favor of the enemy team.
Deprive a headshot. That was Owen’s best course of action as he plotted behind a rusted barrel. Even if he died, depriving Wr4th of a headshot should cause him to lose the stacks of his damage boost before he can make it back to his team. As long as the rest of his team performed well, they’d almost certainly have the first point captured.
“Where are you, smurf?” Deacon angrily mumbled at his monitor as he chased after PertinentHorse. Owen was incredibly thankful that for the current moment, Deacon had no idea who was playing PertinentHorse on the other side of the conference table. If he could keep that anonymity, it would be for the best, Owen thought.
Owen pushed out a sigh to calm his nerves as Wr4th rounded the corner. It was time to see if his rather foolish plan would actually work or not. The moment that his enemy turned the corner, Owen stood up from behind the barrel, already spraying a reckless amount of bullets towards Wr4th. Barely all of the bullets had managed to hit, which mattered very little to Owen. The gunfire was the buffer he needed to get into position without taking a bullet of his own to the head. With enough running momentum, Owen triggered a backwards dive into the side wall of the hallway. A backwards dive put his head behind the rest of his limbs, making it difficult to land a headshot while in motion. Wr4th might have been good, but not good enough it seemed. Another damage indicator showed that Owen had been dropped down to 75 health. Another body shot. Deacon cursed behind his monitor, but hesitated to pull the trigger on a follow up shot. He knew just as well as Owen that if his next shot wasn’t a headshot, he would lose the damage stacks of [Rancor] and likely the teamfight as well.
Owen had already emptied the clip of his assault rifle to cover himself as he ran into a dive. Without the time to reload, he instead switched back to his pistol. He didn’t need to kill Wr4th, so much as apply enough threat of death that he would feel urged to take another shot. He clearly wanted to close the distance towards PertinentHorse to make the shot easier to land, but with Owen already firing off a couple of rounds into his chest, it forced him to act. After all, if he died, the stacks of [Rancor] were just as useless. His hand cannon fired, the glowing green light that swirled around the end of the barrel flashing as his shot let loose. Find the original chapter at NovelPing.
[YOU DIED]
[RESPAWNING IN 12… 11…]
Owen leaned back in his seat and let out a relieved sigh. He could see that in the kill feed, there was not a headshot indicator. It had been a body shot.
“Fuck!” Deacon swore and slammed his palm onto the desk next to his mouse. Despite his outburst, he quickly continued playing, wasting no time at all before activating a teleport ability. Something which Owen watched intently over Aoife’s shoulder as he spectated from his chair. Wr4th had arrived back at the capture point, appearing on the high ground just above the objective. Owen smiled when he recognized the ability. [Vaaya’s Return] was an augment that allowed a player to designate the location where they stood upon activation. Upon reactivation, they would instantly return to that location. It was a good pick for flex roles, since they could choose to pursue targets into unfavorable spots on the map with a get out of jail free card if they overextended. Now that Owen knew another of his augments, he could plan for their next offensive better.
The rest of the team fight only took a few more seconds. In the time that Wr4th was gone, two more of his team had been killed. Even with his return, they were faced with a 3v5 without any support on their side. Aoife made short work of Wr4th, picking him off the high ground with her sniper rifle and turning to Owen with a bright smile after doing so. The final two members of the enemy team died shortly after, and the first objective was captured.
“Hah! First point in a minute? This shit’s gonna be easy.” Aoife’s excitement was unmasked and on display for both Castle and Owen to see.
“If you jinx us Aoife I’m gonna hold it over your head until you’re on your deathbed.” Owen replied, waiting for the respawn timer to complete before rejoining the team at the first captured objective.
“Until? Does that mean you’d forgive me on my deathbed?”
“Sure. Why not?” Owen and Aoife smiled at one another as they positioned themselves for their next push. One final objective, with six minutes on the timer. It should be over quickly.
It was not, in fact, over quickly. As if Deacon had the power of rapid evolution that would give Darwin a heart attack, he seemed to quickly adjust to the prior strategy that Aoife, Owen, and Castle had employed. Team fight after team fight, they struggled to push through the oppressive presence of Wr4th. Each engagement happened in a similar manner. They would start to push up into the heavily fortified objective, Wr4th would land a couple of headshots on the tank players and when the damage boost accumulated to five stacks, his hand cannon became powerful enough that he could one tap the supports, leaving the team in shambles.
The solution was obvious. Remove Wr4th from the equation. Each attempt had failed, however, with Sarah pumping so many heals into him that he was consistently capable of outpacing the damage he was taking with the healing he was receiving. They would need burst damage, and a lot of it. Usually, that was Aoife’s role. With how Sarah consistently pocketed Wr4th, the burst damage of Aoife’s sniper was unable to outpace the healing unless she managed to hit him with one of her active abilities. Something which she had yet to get a decent opening to do. Creating that opening was usually where Witch came in.
“Fuck! We need a distraction, or another kind of burst damage. I can’t get Wr4th out of the way without that.” Aoife held her hand to the bridge of her nose as she waited to respawn. Owen and Aoife’s entire team had just been killed, leaving them to reset and regroup for what was most likely their final push. With a minute on the clock, it was unlikely they had another chance to pull off a full coordinated push.
Owen squirmed awkwardly in his chair next to Aoife as she spoke. She hadn’t said it out loud, but it wasn’t hard to understand what she was implying. The team needed someone to fill a role that wasn’t being filled. With Aoife and Owen acting as the team’s two damage focused characters, it was obvious who was at fault.
It was endlessly frustrating to Owen that he could not fill the role that the team needed in the moment. Even more so that the role was his bread and butter, the niche part that he played in every match as Witchofthew3st. Without any sort of customization, he was stuck as a rather useless character that could only sit back and watch all of the missed openings and opportunities that he could have taken advantage of with his usual kit. PertinentHorse was a failure in all of the ways that Witchofthew3st excelled at. A mocking sort of aggravation that made Owen almost want to walk away from the computer. The only thing that stopped him from pushing away from the desk and getting some fresh air was the determined expression that remained riveted to Aoife’s face. She wanted to win so badly, and Owen wanted to give that to her just as badly as she wanted to win.
Owen just wanted to be comfortable in this character. He wanted an augment that felt familiar, a gun in his character’s hands that felt like an extension of his very will. He wanted a character that didn’t grunt and wince like an oaf.
[xXKillsectorXx: GGs everyone. Would have been nice to play a 6v6 instead of a 5v6]
[Dreeednn: we got a noob that wanted to compete in esports what a joke]
[Nintendo Femicom: bitch when the game is actually over. One more push]
Owen moved his character towards the objective alongside the rest of the team, a bubbling guilt rising in his throat. He wanted to defend himself, but there was practically nothing to hold onto. They were right to be upset, PertinentHorse had a low amount of damage and eliminations across the board. It felt like he had been dropped into elementary school and started failing classes that he knew he could pass in an instant if he just had the tools. If he just had Witch.
The final push started off similar to the last few with a direct push down the center aisle towards the objective. His last attempts at sticking with the team to provide a steady stream of damage had done very little to help. Owen decided that he might as well try to flank once more. Ever since his first flank on the first objective, they had prepared themselves for his side routes. A practiced strategy, even with the incorrect tools, might still be preferable than his previous approach.
It was no surprise that the enemy team had put someone into position to dissuade an ambush. Owen ran directly into a member of the enemy team guarding the left side approach. A loud boom accompanied a red flash of blood across his screen. Owen ducked behind cover, the flashing HUD notifying him of his dangerously low health. A pulsing 53 at the top of his screen made him almost want to curl up into a fetal position on his chair. Another hit and he was likely dead, out of the fight for what was certainly the last opportunity they had. Aoife would be crushed and possibly embarrassed to have brought along such a detrimental player. All because of a lucky shot from an enemy player with a [Grunz].
“A Grunz…” A hopeful glimmer in Owen’s eyes accompanied a growing smile across his face. The [Grunz] was a double barreled, superheated shotgun in UMDK. It was an obvious homage to the Super Shotgun from Doom, with its own twist of flaming divots along the form of the shotgun. Owen hadn’t been using it recently, but it was a staple for him when he first began playing the game six months ago. It was an absolute powerhouse of a shotgun, boasting the highest base damage of any of the game's shotguns, with the obvious drawback of being a double barreled shotgun that needed to be reloaded after two shots. Really, it was after every shot. An experienced player knew to almost exclusively use the alternate fire which shot both shells simultaneously. You’d either hit, and wipe most enemies out in a single shot, or you’d miss and die before you had a chance to reload. Owen knew he could wreak havoc with that shotgun, if he could only get his hands on it.
Most players didn’t bother with picking up an enemy’s gun in UMDK, due to the nature of augments and builds. You could snatch up an enemy's gun when they died, but without a kit that was curated around that weapon, you were usually better off sticking with your own that you most likely had augments and attachments that fit your overall build. PertinentHorse was a blank slate, the most basic and neutral build you could imagine. No gun would fit into the augments better than another. But a shotgun in Owen’s hands, might as well be a build in and of itself. All Owen had to do was kill the enemy without taking another hit from the [Grunz].
Having played with the [Grunz], Owen knew exactly what to do against it. Provoke a reload. After the enemy fired another shot, he would need to reload. The damage that Owen had taken was enough of an indicator that he had only fired one of the two shells, rather than using the alternate fire. One shot. One miss. That was all he needed.
An assault rifle sprung out from behind cover to take the entire force of the shotgun shell. The pellets rattled the side of the rifle and sent it flying across the room. The enemy player realized with horror that the rifle he had fired at had not been attached to any player. Without a need for a primary anymore, Owen had tossed his own rifle out from behind cover to draw the final shot from the other player. The signature CHUNK of the shotgun cracking opening and ejecting the empty shells signaled Owen to turn the corner and fire a series of rounds into the enemy’s head. The player, along with Owen’s old favorite shotgun, tumbled to the ground in a heap.
PertinentHorse’s elimination of an enemy flashed across the kill feed. The enemy team would know exactly where he was if they weren’t already occupied with another gunfight. He needed to act fast. Picking up the shotgun, he reloaded the gun with the remaining ammo that it contained. More than enough to get him through this fight. With a familiar feeling gun in his avatar’s hands, the idea of contributing to the team finally felt like it was within reach. He needed Wr4th out of the fight. To do that, he would need Sarah out of the fight.
Owen took a quick look out on the objective from the side room that his flank offered. Across the capture point, nestled behind cover, was Sarah6258 with Wr4th perched on top of a collapsed pillar firing away at the tanks of Owen’s team. He needed to get close in order to make a difference. If he could make it to Sarah alive, he’d be able to take her out quickly. The problem was her [Guardian’s Blessing] keeping Owen from one tapping her. He would need someone else to follow up on his attack to fully capitalize. This chapter was copied from g.com without permission.
“Can you follow up on Sarah if I get her out of position?” Owen leaned over to Aoife’s ear to whisper. Though she made no verbal response, she turned to Owen and gave him a quick nod. He’d just have to put her trust in her that she’d be able to follow up when needed. In all of the uncertainties within his plan, none of them lied with Aoife’s abilities. Owen was confident that she’d be able to accomplish her side of the plan.
It was time for Owen to utilize the last of his augments, and perhaps the most situational. [Flak Jacket] was as boring an augment as the other starters and largely served as a buffer augment for beginners while they learned the game. It reduced all explosion damage received by 50%, but reduced all self explosion damage by 90%. While it was intended to help newer players not kill themselves with their own [Frag Blast], more experienced players utilized the low self damage to perform grenade jumps by propelling themselves with the initial explosion and using the momentum to travel distances faster than most abilities would allow. It was not the best combination on offer when other augments could accomplish the same thing without using up two different augment slots. Regardless, it was a helpful combo for Owen since he was stuck with only starter equipment on this account.
It had been some time since he had performed a grenade hop, but without any time to practice it first, Owen primed the [Frag Blast] and started to count. “5…” Owen muttered to himself as the [Frag Blast] impacted the ground and activated. “4…” He backed away from the grenade in order to get the running momentum needed. “3…” Owen took a deep breath to stop the shaking in his hands. “2…” He pushed his character forwards, taking a leap as he neared the [Frag Blast]. “1…” Owen held the crouch button to put PertinentHorse into a mid air slide just before the explosion occurred.
BOOM
The blast sent PertinentHorse flying across the capture objective in a mid air slide. The initial force propelled him most of the way before he neared the ground. With proper timing, and the muscle memory from slide hopping in every game he played as Witch, he timed an additional slide hop as he hit the ground to preserve his forward momentum and take him the rest of the way towards Sarah. As he approached, he clicked the melee button on his keyboard and watched as PertinentHorse’s foot collided with Sarah6258 and pushed her backwards out of the cover that she hid in. Just after his character’s melee animation concluded he fired both rounds simultaneously into Sarah, triggering her [Guardian’s Blessing] with a flash of light.
Her second chance was short-lived. Aoife had already triggered her own [Gravity Sling] augment, a movement ability that would allow a player to slingshot themself in a direction. Aoife had always loved the ability for its utility not only for getting her onto high ground, but its quick activation to allow her to escape enemies if she was being dived. In this instance, Aoife had used the [Gravity Sling] to throw herself in the sky and fire a round from her sniper rifle directly into Sarah’s chest. A headshot wasn’t necessary when the [Guardian’s Blessing] restored her to only 100 health.
Owen and Aoife both nearly jumped out of their seats in excitement as their coordinated attack unfurled perfectly before their eyes. It was the upset that they needed. A 6v6 had quickly turned into a 6v4 in their favor. Without Sarah, they only needed to focus on Wr4th. In a sudden uproar from the spectating students behind Owen and Aoife, the final teamfight turned into a cacophony of abilities suddening firing off in succession. No one had any reason to save their cooldowns any longer, so the rapid fire of abilities after one another became an overwhelming sight. In the next few seconds, the kill feed depicted yet another enemy team member killed. Shortly after, Wr4th claimed two kills for his own team, one being a support player from Owen’s team.
A 4v3 now.
Owen had already reloaded and took the fight to the closest enemy, the enemy team’s second and final support. Without much to defend himself with, Owen triggered the alternate fire on the [Grunz] and sent the support flying against the nearby wall.
4v2.
Wr4th retaliated by activating one of his abilities, one that Owen had rarely seen in play. It was uncommon enough that Owen didn’t even know the name of the ability. It seemed to allow Wr4th temporary flight as he hovered above the capture objective and fired down at the nearby enemies. From the health bar displayed above Wr4th’s head, it seemed that he had also been granted additional shield health during his ability. With a swing of his arm, he moved his [Rancor] into position to headshot the final support player. It was the kind of accuracy that was so good it made it look easy to land such precise shots.
3v2.
Aoife reminded Owen just how helpful she was to have on a team. When Owen only glanced an enemy with his alternate fire, he was left open during the reload. Before the other player could even react however, Aoife had sent him to the respawn screen with a shot to the side of his head.
3v1.
A very… well, wrathful Wr4th, was left hovering above the objective as the final member of his team. Without a clear shot on Aoife, and Castle nowhere to be seen, Wr4th turned his attention to Owen and fired shot after shot from his winged form. The volley of bullets plinked away at Owen’s head, falling uselessly to the ground as they impacted a shimmering blue bubble that surrounded PertinentHorse. The [Prismatic Aegis] had to have come from Castle. It was a tank’s ability, and one that Owen had seen them use multiple times through the match so far. Deacon was just as confused as Owen was that Castle had managed to get into a position to extend the ability towards Owen without being seen by Wr4th. A question that Owen desperately wanted to ask about when the match concluded.
If ever there was a time to strike, it was now. Owen and Aoife fired up at the floating form of Wr4th, stripping him of the shield health and plucking him from the sky. The game’s timer hit zero as Castle reappeared from seemingly nowhere alongside Owen. The game moved into an overtime bar that allowed the offensive team to still capture the point as long as one member remained in the boundaries of the objective. It was easy for one of the three remaining members of their team to stay on the point as they picked off the stragglers that respawned and rushed in to desperately kill the remaining three players.
Without a coordinated effort from the team, the point was captured, resulting in the satisfying splash of [VICTORY!] text to sprawl across the screen.
“Fuck yeah!” Aoife leapt up from her chair and pumped her fist into the air. Although Owen felt just as much rush of adrenaline, he opted to remain seated, watching Aoife’s excited celebration of their victory. Owen felt a warmth crawl across his cheeks as he watched her perform a victory dance that was either well improvised or endlessly rehearsed. Her passion and drive was utterly infectious. It was like she had so much determination to reach her goals that the excess spilled out into every nearby person. Owen wanted to win because Aoife wanted to win. It sounded like a shallow reason the more he thought about it, but he knew that deep down it really wasn’t. He truly felt the passion to succeed in their tryouts because Aoife wanted to play on an esports team with him. When Owen looked at the mirthful woman that reached down to pull him up from his chair, letting her down felt like the worst thing in the world.
“-and that’s game! I’ve seen more than enough to make my decision! Unfortunately I have a lot to consider, and I think you’d wring my neck out if I made you sit around here until I settle on a decision. Go on back to your dorms. I’ll send out texts tomorrow to give you the results!” Richie’s loud voice filled every square inch of the room, making sure everyone heard what he had to say. The anticipation of needing to wait to get the results was already forming a gruesome knot in Owen’s gut.
“Who the fuck was the default?” A very furious Deacon had finally stood up from his seat on the other side of the conference table.
“We should probably evacuate before we have to deal with some gamer rage.” Aoife gently tugged on Owen’s arm as she started to backpedal towards the door of the room. Owen had no reason to stay, and let himself get whisked away back into the student union. When they had made a comfortable amount of distance from the converted meeting room, Aoife let out a triumphant laugh. “Holy shit that was fun! That’s the kind of rush I only ever get when I play with my other friend.”
Owen felt himself recoil at her words. If she was speaking about Witchofthew3st with such a big smile on her face, she had clearly not been back to her computer yet to read the message. “It was fun, I’ll give you that. I just wish I wasn’t such a detriment.”
“Oh come on! You were great! Good enough to deserve some ice cream as a treat!”
“Ice cream? When it’s this cold out?”
“Why not?”
“It’s already gonna be freezing outside, why would we want ice cream?”
“Because I’m paying, and no sane person would turn down free ice cream.”
“...fair enough.”
“Hell yeah, I’ve been craving some Frisky Frogs.”