Matt Cavanaugh (palehorses) wrote in we_float, @ 2010-06-26 23:41:00 |
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Current music: | "Enter The Ninja" :: Die Antwoord |
My life is like a video game, one life on the mic
Who: Matt Cavanaugh and Ganesh Surendar
When: Friday, June 22, 2096
Where: The Nameless V-Club
What: In which, Matt and Ganesh make dick jokes, Ganesh gets splattered with blood, Matt almost loses it, and they run like scared little girls. Also, there's a lot of background violence.
Rating/Warnings: R, thank you. Momentary but descriptive graphic violence and several instances of it. Also, there's a chainsaw murderer.
Status: Log, Complete
The place that the two men entered was a small, dark room. Ganesh didn't recognize it- he had been in cyberspace before but on legitimate means. The Clubs were something new to him, the stuff of myth and monster. The fact that he was standing at the edge of the labyrinth, in a skin not his own, made the back of his neck tingle, his mouth sour as he looked down at his hands.
His fingers were now long and delicate, so pale that he could see blue veins spiderwebbed just under the surface. A couple of freckles spattered his wrists and he looked at them, feeling strangely alien despite the fact that he had taken this form to fit in.
He looked up at Matt, that confusion still clear in the brown eyes that were the only thing left of him in this avatar. A hand reached up, brushing a pale strand of hair away from his face as he straightened a newly muscular body and said, finding a grin, "I should've been nicer to Alec," as he looked pointedly down at his trousers.
"Wow," Matt said with a grin. "Ten fucking seconds and we're already onto dick jokes? Not sure that's going to go over well here."
It covered some of the tension: the only thing familiar about Matt's body was the color of his skin, which was the same ghostly-pale. The rest of it, though - if he thought about it very long, it gave him a headache, so he tried not to, but fuck, the kind of man he was apparently pretending to be was probably expected to know things about weight lifting. Weights, and reps, and things Matt had never, ever, ever been curious about in his life.
He sighed, though, and said "The sooner we're done, the sooner we can go home. And I, for one, have a hot date with a bottle of nail polish after this."
"It's odd," Ganesh said, holding up his hand. "I never wanted to be anything other than myself in games. This... it's wrong." He felt strange saying that and stopped himself before he could continue.
He walked forward, his hand pressing against the wall that was barely visible. "There's a door here but we'll have to feel it. It's not easy to find." His fingers were clumsy, stumbling against the smoothness, and his feet echoed the motion, his mind clearly not adapted to the figure that he had taken on.
"This's a fucking lie," Matt said in agreement, and the snarled undertone made his thoughts on that perfectly clear.
He mirrored Ganesh's movements on the other wall, his fingers a bit more dextrous - they were closer to the length of his own fingers - but it seemed like good practice. "You figure that everyone here staggers around like this at first? Or are we gonna fucking scream 'Narc!' to anyone who looks?"
In his experience, avatars were almost always the virtual version of the real person. This was one of the rare cases in which a false face was a requirement. He supposed there were people who virtualised a false face from the moment they started coming into the gap, but he didn't think it was too many people.
"I don't know," Ganesh admitted. "Most of my friends have been jokers and yes, they didn't take their own bodies." He sighed as his hands found a catch. "But... the place to which we're going- you don't want to wear your real face."
The wall swung open as his thumb brushed the catch, revealing a long, narrow hallway.
"In for a fucking penny," Matt said, with another sigh. He entered the hallway first, on the theory that someone had to go first. The walls were largely blank, but something about them was unsettling, and he couldn't decide if it was the darkness or the slightly odd proportions to the hall. He'd heard of ways to build in aversions to places people shouldn't be, even in the virtual world - he hadn't given that credence before, because how the fuck could you embed an aversion into code, but maybe he should have.
He was almost to the end of the hall before the quality of the room changed. When they'd first entered the hall, it looked like it went nowhere, but with five steps to go before he would've walked into a blank wall, the sense of space changed subtly, and he realised that he was walking toward a dimly-lit room. If his body's reaction was anything to judge on, it was a large room, too - bigger than he'd expected.
Another step and he started to hear noise - not ones he liked. But it wasn't until he stepped to the threshold, automatically moving to one side to let Ganesh stand beside him that he let out a barely audible "Holy fuck."
The room was filled with bodies thrashing so hard that it was difficult to tell where the wave of human flesh ended and the walls, throbbing with light and beat, began. Figures tangled into each other, the hot, rank smell of sweat choking Ganesh's nostrils so heavily he could taste salt in the back of his mouth.
But worse than that was the stage.
It was slick with red. Three men stood on its wooden surface and he heard one of them bellow, "Sacrifice!" The crowd surged forward, shoving Ganesh and Matt with them, chanting the same as hands reached out, clutching for any body not their own.
In absolute horror, he watched as a man was thrust high above the crowd and thrown onto the stage so hard that he slid, the cracking sound of bone echoing into the mumurs of the crowd. He could feel their energy surging with the whimpers of their chosen victim, a hand shoving flat into his back and trying to thrust him towards the front of the stage. He shoved back, fighting his way back over to Matt, his clumsiness not apparent in the mad dance of bloodlust rising all around them.
Matt had fared a little better in the shove, partly because he was further away from the main push, and partly because shock had completely rooted him to the ground and he'd reacted to being pushed by shoving back. When Ganesh got back to him, Matt's eyes were wide with shock, and he looked at the other man with all the arrogance of his assurance that this would be okay, he would be fine with this, gone.
He was most definitely not fine with this.
Oh, it wasn't rubber-room time or something, but ... Jesus. Matt had thought that he was ready for this, but it turned out that you could not actually plan for the horror of - someone deciding to hold up a dripping severed arm, he noted with a horrified detachment. Worse, he could feel the roar of the crowd in the beat of his pulse, and the thought repulsed him even as he tried to remind himself that it had absolutely nothing to do with whether he appreciated blood in quantities like this at all.
"It's too... hot in here," Ganesh said just as a spray of blood splashed him in the face. He felt his stomach roil in response and he choked back the bile, grabbing Matt forcibly and dragging him towards the opposite end of the room. They weren't quite alone- a few participants, looking just as green, were doing the same.
They reached another hallway and Ganesh leaned against the wall, breathing in hard and doing his best not to retch.
"It's your first time, isn't it?" A voice, feminine but only barely, echoed behind them, followed by a click of heels. A woman not much older than a girl walked over to them, looking far too adult for the body that she'd chosen, a denim skirt chafing over the knee, frizzy dark hair striped with brilliant fuchsia. "Don't stay here. The smell of vomit is awful."
With that, she gestured with a short, sharp twitch of her finger for them to follow her.
Matt didn't question her, nor where she'd come from; he simply reversed the grip Ganesh had on him and led the other man after her. He wished that he had something Ganesh could use to get the blood off, but that was a vain hope.
She led them to a room off the hallway - Matt had noted several doors, and he really, really didn't want to think about what they might normally be for. He was, however, grateful for the fact that it was quiet, well soundproofed, and hummed from the sound of air conditioning. Also, that there were chairs.
"That was a surprise," he finally said, sitting. She sat with them, looking entirely unruffled by the whole thing, and he couldn't help but think that they'd made a serious faux pas even though she didn't seem to be judging them. "Thanks for the tip." He debated giving a name, but he wasn't entirely sure of the protocol.
"Tyler," she said. "The name's Tyler and I'm a fixer. Not a fence. Not a bodyguard. I fix shit, mostly people. N00bs." She looked at Ganesh, disgusted. He was rubbing the blood off with his sleeve. Her step brisk, she tugged off the sweater she was wearing over her tanktop and threw it at him. "Get that off. You puke in here, you go directly to jail, do not pass go, do not collect 200 whatever the hell you came in for- you got that?"
"Jail?"
"No, dumbass. That part was a joke." It hadn't sounded like it. Ganesh looked at Matt, then back at Tyler, saying nothing as he mopped up the blood. "Look. This is serious shit and you two are walking around like you just put those avatars on yesterday." She eyeballed them. "You didn't- did you?" Before either could say anything, Tyler kept going, her speech just as rapid as it had been. Even Ganesh, used to quick talkers, was having difficulty following her. "This is the deal. You pay me in credits. I help you out. Show you how to use those, tell you where to go, where not to go. You don't pay me, well, you saw what it's like out there."
She grinned and her teeth were pointed, glinting silver in the light. "They like to sacrifice virgins."
Matt gave her an unpleasant smile of his own. "We pay you, you toss us back to the wolves and walk away carefree and whistling. Doesn't really seem like a fucking compelling argument to me. All you're doing is asking for money before you do exactly the same thing as you said they would."
He resisted the urge to glance over at Ganesh, because that was the weak link in the argument right there. Not that he thought the other man couldn't handle the club once he had his mental feet under him, but the greenness of his avatar's skin suggested that he'd come closer than Matt wanted to think to throwing up.
Not that Matt liked what he'd seen - far from it. There was something terrifyingly raw to the action in the club, and it was different than he'd expected. Violence, blood, death, he'd been prepared for all of it. But that surge of hatred - that had been a surprise.
Still, he was prepared now that they knew the worst, to risk standing on their own feet rather than dealing with this woman. If worst came to it, they logged out and tried a different place, with different faces.
Her laugh was a sharp bark. "Yeah. The difference here is that I know which wolves to toss you to."
"This is blackmail," Ganesh said bluntly.
Tyler's smile was worse than the laugh, a fully knowing look that didn't belong on an avatar as young as the one she'd chosen. "I know. And it's none of the worst of what could happen to you here- pay or don't."
Ganesh hesitated, then said, "How do we know you won't turn us over any road?"
"You don't." Tyler looked at him, then at Matt. "That's what you get in the playground of the mind. It's all fun and games here." She tapped on a wall and slid out a bottle of liquid, a brilliant emerald color. Ganesh paled. It looked exactly like Mnemosyne. "Drinks?"
"Hardly," Matt said with a grin. "As you just said, we can't fucking trust you. And it's kind of a guideline of my life not to negotiate with fucking terrorists. So I think that's our cue to leave." He offered a hand to Ganesh, who'd turned green again at the sight of the drinks - Matt didn't know what that was about and didn't want to, but suspected he needed to - and stood, ready to go as soon as the other man was up.
Ganesh snuck a glance at her as he stood up with Matt's assistance. Her face had shuttered but her eyes were an enemy's.
"Suit yourself," she said, then her lips parted, her tongue forking out just slightly as she said, "Mind the Gap." Her heels were the only thing of her that they heard as she left the room, clacking against a now-metal floor.
"She seems to have a lot of control here." Ganesh said. His hand had released Matt's and was now reaching out for the wall, to see if that had changed as well.
"A big part of why I don't fucking trust her," Matt commented. He wanted a cigarette, badly, but this really wasn't the fucking time for it. "Right. Should we fucking try this again, or do you just want to log out and try again later? I'm kind of really good with either option - one gets the initial shock and connection over with, the other means we know what to expect next time."
He sighed. "I think- I think we need to do a bit more bloody research." Ganesh's eyes fixed on Matt's. "I hadn't expected any of this. I wasn't prepared." His face burned hotter than he remembered feeling it burn before - the physical sensation of the room seemed to have changed with Tyler's exit. It was definitely growing warmer.
"I think we're being gamed," Matt growled. His hands itched, and for a moment he thought it was the heat of the room, but then he realised it wasn't. It was the itch of his power, of something willing itself to be drawn, and the realisation shocked him.
It didn't, however, overcome the rising certainty that killing Tyler was the right thing to do, and the itch was maddening, the power singing through him now, sharp as glass and taut as wire. He couldn't even remember why killing her would be a bad idea, because it was the only right idea he'd had for a very, very long time.
It was either the heat of the room or the heat of his rage that made his fingers slip as he fisted his hands, his body locking down on a scream of hate barely before he could stop himself, but that brought him back, at least partway. He looked at Ganesh with eyes he was barely present in and said "Doorway. Pathway. Now."
Ganesh nodded. The heat was rising still, made worse by a body that didn't feel his own. This body was faster, however, if clumsier, and he ran from the room, Matt on his heels.
It was exhilarating even as it was terrifying. These were lungs that did not need to fill or gasp for air with the speed of his movement, his chest was not stitching in pain. He stumbled and caught his toe on the floor, not because his legs were not built to run but because they were so perfect, in ways that Ganesh had never dreamed of being--for in his dreams, he was always himself.
He slammed against a thickly jammed group of people as they tried to force their way out. An arm jabbed at his head, swiping it and he was surprised to feel the shudder of pain at his cheek. But he didn't stop, running as long as he could see Matt just behind. They didn't know this place and it was getting hotter by the moment.
As his head craned back, he could see why. The stage was in flames- or part of it was. One person.
As that stranger's screams broke the air, Ganesh almost wished they'd accepted Tyler's offer.
Ganesh hesitated slightly - a hitch to his step as he looked to the stage, and Matt had had entirely too much of this place. But as he reached out to push Ganesh back to the task at hand - which Matt recalled as "leaving" - someone touched him. Later, he didn't even think it was a blow or an attempt to stop him, but in the moment, frayed nerves didn't care, and Matt swung at the person, teeth bared in a feral growl.
His fist connected, a solid blow that he felt all the way up his arm, but he wasn't entirely sure that the person he'd hit had gotten the message. Matt took one look at the guy's face, and grabbed Ganesh again. "Now we have company. Run!"
And company- Ganesh saw to his absolute horror- had a chainsaw.
This was a nightmare, and one that was fueled by nothing that he knew or understood. Even as he ran, his mind was trying to process what he was seeing- to give the nihilism context. A spray of blood and bone coated his vision as the man stalked behind them, mowing through the crowd.
"It's not real," he heard Tyler's voice say behind him. "And you can have that tip for free."
The spray stopped with a gunshot, not the kind that Ganesh was used to from the vid but an older, brusque fire. She stood there, the man who had been chasing them downed, with a thin line of smoke still cooling from an aged pair of revolvers. And then the crowd closed in on her, swallowing her whole to the sound of wild bullets.
He didn't turn back again until he hit the door and even then, it was only to be certain that Matt was still with him.
Matt couldn't get through the door fast enough. There was too much inside the club that he couldn't process yet, and all he could think was that he wanted very badly to be away from this place, this aspect of himself.
He slammed the door shut behind himself, and tried for a level tone when he said "I think next time we find a different club." It couldn't be uncommon for n00bs to run like that, but it wasn't going to help them if they were recognised as the ones who freaked out but still came back. "But right now, I really want a drink." It was said with vehemence and determination, and Matt finally started to relax a little - not so much mentally as physically, starting to uncoil from the precipice his rage had put him on. They weren't out yet, but being on this side of the door helped. "You all right? As can be fucking expected?"
Then he remembered - if they could find the exit, so could anyone else.
And it was like his thought had summoned something - he wasn't sure what, but when it hit the door, it sounded loud.
"Yes." Ganesh didn't look back but kept walking for the other door. His fingers began scanning the wall again, finding the crack in it even as the opposite entrance continued to rattle. His avatar wasn't sweating- despite the fact that he desperately felt it inside.
A harsh push and the entrance came opening, pale white light flooding in and revealing a tunnel to which the end couldn't be seen. "Let's go back."
"Yeah," Matt said carefully, trying to avoid worrying about the thing behind the other door.
He stepped through the next doorway and felt himself come back to reality; the avatar disappeared as he passed the threshold, and it felt infinitely fucking better.
He lit a cigarette and said "Right. We should - fuck." What they should do was get some rest, do some fucking research, practise moving in the avatars - or in new ones - and none of that was anything Matt wanted to say.
Instead, he looked at Ganesh and said "Want to get totally shitfaced and forget that just happened? I'm in favour of that."
"Yes." Ganesh sighed. "I've got some Ebola Cola in a locker in the server room. How strong is your stomach lining?" He stood up, looking at Matt for only a moment before looking down at his arm. He was still rubbing it as if the blood remained. "I could go for a shower."
It wasn't real. He wondered if Matt had heard Tyler's parting words. Was it truly the gift that she'd meant? Or was thinking of the world as something that didn't exist allow a moral boundary to be crossed? Or remove them altogether?
"Real or not," Matt said with a shudder, "it felt very fucking real." His voice was thoughtful, and he'd looked away from Ganesh to say it; when he looked back, his voice was more definite. "My stomach lining's impenetrable anyway, but after that, you'd better believe it is. Take your shower, I want one, and bring your cola. I'll bring the Jack."