carl@fire

What the heck's even going on. Carl thrust his spear into the air one more time. "Open your eyes!" he shouted, the best vague statement he could come up with under the circumstances. He turned around and dropped back into his seat, chucking his spear back into his inventory as he spun, and then hit the steam pedal once more.

The car accelerated with a sudden jerk, its apparently magically-strengthened tires instantly reaching a high speed due to the steam engine's lack of a gearbox.

"The gates have already been closed!" the loud voice shouted. "Leniency may yet be granted if you surrender!"

Carl sped down the not-clear street, forced to maintain a much slower speed than he'd achieved previously due to the large number of stalls and booths placed seemingly at random throughout the road. "What's going on?" he shouted.

"It must be my mother!" Mina shouted back. "She's discovered that I intend to leave the city! Those steamcars belong to the royal guard! We should be faster than them, but if the gates have been sealed, there's no way out of the city!"

Carl scowled, feeling his anger rising once more. Alright, so this is some bullshit. Her mom still wants to mess with her? After the shit that she's been through today? Are you fucking serious, lady? A thought occurred to him as he narrowly avoided a steamcar that had come from a side street and tried to block him, grabbing Mina around the shoulders with his right arm to prevent her from being thrown out of the car as he made a sharp turn. "Wait," he called, "you're a princess here?"

"I thought you said you knew?" she said, her head pulled close to his.

Oh. I guess… Yeah, I can see how she might've misunderstood that. "No, that was something else!" he yelled, again swerving deftly around a pair of cars which had parked in the middle of the road in an attempt to create a barricade, holding the princess tightly to his side because her incredibly fast, magic-and-steam-powered car didn't have any freaking seatbelts.

"Fourth princess of the Charus Kingdom, Isemeine Charus," Mina said, her breath tickling his ear. "You truly were unaware?"

"Stop, or we will be forced to shoot you!" shouted the man's voice, now much farther away and quieter as a result of Carl's expert maneuvering.

"Not a clue!" Carl said honestly. That really puts a lot of things in perspective. He continued driving along the wall-adjacent road as fast as he could manage with how he had to constantly swerve and avoid various obstacles. Don't worry, Mina, I'm gonna get you out of here, princess or not.

"We must come up with a plan to escape!" Mina, the princess, said next to his ear. "The main gate is just up ahead. Can you cut through it with your spear?"

"Probably?" Carl called back without thinking about it too deeply. Wishing I'd spent more time testing it now. Also pretty glad it's a spear after all this time wondering about it. "Maybe we shouldn't wait for the gate, though?"

"What?"

"I mean, there's gonna be tons of—Let me just try it." Carl started slowing the car just as the first bullet dinked off his left shoulder. "Ah, shit, this is gonna be annoying," he muttered. He put his knee under the wheel to steer without needing his hands—known to some as a Pro Gamer Move—and pulled his spear out of his inventory with his left hand while his right arm continued to hold Mina tight so she wouldn't fall out the other side of the car.

Another bullet hit the back of his neck harmlessly, but it barely registered as his thoughts sharpened to focus on a singular task.

The car finally slowed enough for Carl. "Keep your head down!" he shouted as he moved his arm from around her and dove out of the still-moving car. I gotta work on my combat rolls. That's way harder than it looks. He stood up after a moment, then charged at the wall with the point of his spear in front of him.

As expected, this was another case of failed physics interactions. The spear sank right in.

Carl didn't spare it a second thought. He pulled back, then thrust as hard as he could, causing a huge chunk of the wall to explode outwards as more bullets struck him and either fell to the ground or remained embedded in his suit. He repeated the motion a few times in quick succession, widening the gap. But there was still a problem.

Shit. Can't drive a car over this; the base of the wall's still here. He held the spear pointed out through the opening as he considered his options. What I really needed was like, some kinda explosion or something when I—

A drop of water fell from the tip of the spear, followed by a sudden geyser of water that rushed outwards from the tip with such force and in such volume that it knocked him over backwards. What the—

"Perfect! Get in!" Mina's voice called from behind.

Carl struggled back to his feet, glancing at the wall before he turned around.

The hole he'd made had quadrupled in size, and a huge furrow in the ground stretched out as far as he could see beyond the wall. His eyes widened.

A large-looking bullet struck his nose before falling to the ground, breaking him out of his state of awe.

"Remain where you are!" shouted the voice.

Carl looked back the way they'd come, spotting a cavalcade of cars a block away. He threw his maybe-really-powerful spear into his inventory as he dashed for a couple steps around to the passenger side of the car, since Mina had taken the driver's seat and pulled the vehicle up to the spot just behind him.

The car sprang into motion as soon as he'd set both feet inside. He jerked back from the sudden g-force, managing to sit down rather than be flung out the back. The car sped through the hole in the wall and along the path he'd somehow created with the power of his fishing spear, then veered off it after a short ways heading towards a road off in the distance.

Carl grinned widely, pumping his fist in the air. Yes! I got her out of that stupid city!

Mina turned to him as she drove along the empty field, her face flushed and bright with excitement. "We've done it!" she shouted. "We've ma—"

Her head exploded in a shower of blood and gore that splattered all over him.

Carl stared. "What the fuck," he whispered, his mouth remaining open. His breath caught, and he was suddenly unable to move. A sharp, stabbing pain filled his chest.

A bullet bounced off his head, then a second, followed by a third.

She's…dead?

Carl couldn't come to terms with it. The girl he'd spend the entire afternoon with, talking to, drinking coffee with, rescuing from a panic attack and the biggest jackass he'd ever personally met, giving driving lessons to, eating meat skewers with…

He looked down at the blood gushing from the stump where her head had been. The top of one of her vertebrae rose up over it.

That same, fragile girl who'd been so terrified, so afraid to stand up for herself despite her brilliant mind, the one who'd giggled at his dumb dad jokes, who'd sat with him through that bizarre sex auction and then had taken command of it in order to finally get some sort of vengeance on everyone here who seemed determined to ruin her life…

The adorable, blonde girl whose hair he'd casually ruffled when she'd done a good job…

Carl raised a hand to his head, wiping off chunks of hard and soft Mina that covered the left side of his face.

And then he breathed a sigh of relief. Of course, it's just a game. He sagged back in his seat for a moment as a wave of relief unlike any other he'd ever felt coursed through him. Wow. Holy fuck that was scary. Fuck!

He took stock of the current situation and the small, previously-unnoticed status window that covered part of his view as the car continued to careen across the field.

Isemeine Charus has gone offline.

"Dismiss," he murmured quickly. His first step was to slide the headless corpse closer to him, then switch places with it. He held it uncomfortably to his side while he regained control of the vehicle and accelerated.

Of course they'd try to kill her. If they get the body back to the city then she'll respawn there. Shit, I should've thought of that. He breathed out another sigh of relief. I think that was the scariest thing that's ever happened to me. Jesus, I got really caught up in the moment there. I thought she was actually dead. She must've logged out right at the same time too.

He floored it and jumped the car down over the small ridge on the side of the cobblestone road, then sped off. Gonna be a longer run back, but don't worry, Mina. I won't let 'em take you.

A few minutes passed. Actually kinda annoyed the more I think about it. No way a head's gonna completely explode like that. Totally unrealistic.

He glanced behind him to check how he was doing, but clearly none of the pursuers were able to keep up, because there were no other cars or people in sight. Good thing we took those potions earlier or I'd be kinda screwed. Sun's just about down and the moon isn't very bright. No street lights, either.

He sped along the road for a while longer, trying not to think about how wet the right side of his body was getting or what was causing that to happen. Doesn't matter. I can at least do this much for you, even if I can't help outside the game. Yeah, over my—

Carl's vision went white, then black, then all the colors simultaneously.

A screeching sounded in his ears, then a void of noise, then all the sounds he'd ever heard.

He smelled so many scents simultaneously that it was as though he was smelling nothing at all.

The pain of every injury he'd ever experienced came back at once, as did the pleasures of all his more intimate moments.

Carl Weathers blinked, and the confines of his office came into blurry view.

"You okay?" asked John, standing over him and holding the plain, black brain link headband in his hands.

Carl groaned, taking a decidedly longer blink.

"Heard that's a bit traumatic," the older security guard said, sounding apologetic. "I came up to check on you since you said Sammy's got her big game tonight, and I know how wrapped up you get in your work. Didn't think I'd catch you fishing though."

"Thanks," Carl said, trying to make sense of reality. He looked around at the off white drywall of his office walls, then down to his desk where he had a row of photos lined up under a row of computer monitors. "Uh, what time is it?"

"Seven twenty," said John.

Carl picked his glasses up from where he'd set them on his desk and slowly put them on. The room came into focus along with John, the security guard who was staffing the front desk until around nine o'clock that night. The same John he'd chatted with on his way down to the mail room that afternoon, which now seemed like weeks ago. "Seven twenty," he repeated. "And it's Friday night," he said slowly.

"You sure you're all right?" John said, looking concerned. "All those warnings say not to take 'em off people unless it's an emergency, but—"

Carl pressed his fingers to his eyes, trying to make a head stop exploding in front of him over and over. "Yeah, I'm good," he said. What happened? Is Mina…

Reality pressed down on him. "Ah, man, John, you're a lifesaver," he said when he realized what had happened. Mina's probably gonna log back on soon, and she should be able to run back to her body before anyone catches up with how far I made it and how fast you go in ghost form. Mission accomplished. Man, what a mindfuck.

He shook his head again and returned his focus back to real life. "Thanks, really," he said as thoughts related to his new focus began to pour in. I… I guess I can make it to Sammy's game after all? And I can see Bobby. And Annie. I need to see Annie.

Carl stood up. He was finally coming to grips with his existence.

He was wearing a button-down shirt and jeans. And sneakers on his feet.

He wore glasses.

He was the Director of IT at Fire Entertainment, but that was only a job.

The database synchronization didn't need him to supervise it; that was the purpose of all the scripts he'd written. Scripts that were completely flawless, because of course they were: he'd written them, and he'd even triple-checked them. Then he'd had Madhavaditya peer review them, because he understood that mistakes could happen to anyone.

Carl had a family that he needed to be with.