carl@fire

The young woman was now fixated on a men's tasseled dress shoe, frowning deeply at it.

Carl leaned in close, having to bend down some distance to speak privately to someone whose head didn't even reach his shoulder. "Hey," he said quietly.

The young woman whirled around, clearly surprised that he'd snuck up on her. She clenched the shoe tightly between her hands.

Don't worry, I don't want your shoe. "You're the first person I'm asking about this, but…" I have to know. "Don't get upset or anything—I just got here—but everyone around here seems so into it." He raised his brows to emphasize his point, deliberately avoiding using the term in case it was Against The Rules. "Is it some kinda law or something?"

The young woman frowned, in confusion, turning her head slightly to the side. "I'm not sure I understand," she said, her voice equally quiet.

Huh, she's got kind of a cute voice. Tasteful gear, too. Not all gaudy and extreme like those weirdos outside—especially the ones with the collars. What's up with that, anyway? Some kinda in-game BDSM club around here or something? In the no-kids-allowed starter zone? Is that… You can't do that in the game, can you? I'd ask someone in Engineering, but that'd be kinda weird and inappropriate. Guess I can just search online when I get out. Can't imagine that info would be hard to find.

But for now I really just wanna know… Eh, I guess I should just put it all out there now that I already broke character so obviously. "C'mon," he said, looking back to make sure Ingrid—the very focused, in character shoemaker—wasn't about to return unexpectedly before bringing out all the details he could remember in as much detail as he could manage to make his point clear, "you know what I mean. Is it some kinda city culture thing? The whole 'Good Sir' this and that, the weird people with the naked other people on leashes around here, all that 'Praise the Goddess!' and whatnot, and that devilspawn this, and long-eared devil that—obviously just talking about elves—"

The young woman's eyes had gone wide, and she quickly reached up and pressed her hand over his mouth, shushing him at the same time as she looked around. "Have you lost your mind?" she hissed. "You can't speak like that so openly!"

Carl frowned. Is it really some kinda rule that everyone has to role-play all the time? I don't remember seeing that anywhere. Definitely not in any of our advertising. Probably.

The hand lowered from his mouth after a moment. "No more of that here," she said, giving him a serious look. "You could—"

"But don't you ever get tired of it?" Carl asked. "I guess… I mean, maybe you're always acting like this, but it's kinda tough for me to get used to as someone who just got here."

The young woman let out a sigh and stared down at the men's boot in her hands. Her expression tightened. "I…" She hesitated. "I do think about it sometimes," she allowed. "Certainly there's a few things that I think could stand to be changed." Her face changed to a slight grimace, and she looked down at herself. "For one, I'd actually prefer to wear this sort of thing more often. It's just so much more me." She looked up at him. "It's a bit odd, I know, but surely you understand what I mean."

There had been a number of very subtle details to pick up on, but nobody was more detail-oriented than Carl. He reviewed them briefly in his head, focusing on the major points:

• She was the only not-in-uniform woman he'd seen who wore masculine clothes.

• She complained about how she didn't get to wear them often enough, and she'd blushed when she was caught checking out the fetish-style heels.

• Those very same heels had been the only time she'd looked at a shoe or boot that was even remotely close to her own size—and she seemed to be browsing them more out of absent-minded habit than any real regard for what her character could wear.

• And, most importantly, New Era's playerbase still tended to skew male overall, which meant that it was probable at least some of the female avatars he'd seen that afternoon were not female in real life.

Yes, Carl understood exactly what she—probably actually he—meant, and he was especially proud of himself for being broad-minded enough to ignore the female character's pretty face and focus on the details. I wonder if Bobby ever has problems like this. Her character's a guy; does she ever wanna wear dresses or whatever in-game? Not sure I've ever heard her mention it specifically before, but I think she's mentioned crafting dresses? I guess there's still some stigma attached there even if she's really a girl, huh. This is just the opposite of that, though. Poor guy. Role-playing as a girl all the time must be a lot worse than I've had it. But at least he can relate in being tired of it.

He nodded, suddenly feeling like he'd found a fellow sufferer. "I do," he said. "Don't worry, though, your secret's safe with me." He mimed locking his lips shut and throwing away the key.

The young woman—who was most likely not a young woman, or even female at all in real life—smiled a little as she—he—leaned in a bit closer. "And do you know what else?"

Carl made a decision at that moment. I have to respect this man's role-play. He's clearly invested a lot into the character from the fact that he can come to the most expensive shoemaker in the city, and he even had spot-on reactions when he—she—was still in character. Don't want to make it any more difficult than it already must be.

"I'd rather just spend my time reading books and tinkering with machines," the very female young woman said, the green eyes of her in-game avatar seeming to sparkle. "Did you know I…" She hesitated again, then seemed to push through it. "I built my own magic-steam hybrid engine! I think it's the first of its kind!"

Yup. Not being sexist, but, statistically speaking, STEM is still only up to about twenty five percent women in engineering tracks these days, even after that big lawsuit way back in the early twenties that forced a country-wide crackdown on in-classroom toxicity. Carl raised his eyebrows and pressed his lips together, nodding his approval. "That sounds pretty cool," he said.

"Well, no, it's quite hot, actually," she said, giggling a little.

Carl chuckled, rolling his eyes at the pun. "Yeah, I guess it'd have to be to boil the water and create enough pressure." That's a solid dad joke.

The young woman's eyes widened. "You know how a steam engine works?"

Why wouldn't I know how a steam engine works? This must be some older guy who thinks I'm a kid. "Of course I do. I had to take a thermodynamics class in—"

"You know of thermodynamics?!" the young woman shouted, practically bouncing up and down with excitement.

Carl blinked. "Yes?" he said, suddenly uncertain. Does that count as breaking character somehow?

The young woman carelessly tossed the large men's boot back up on the shelf and ran her hands up through her hair in a rough manner. She then began to pace a little, running her thumb over her chin as though used to stroking a goatee or beard. "What an incredibly fortuitous…" she began to mumble as she slipped back into her character. Abruptly she stopped and looked back up at him. "You are Carl, are you not?"

Carl blinked again, feeling caught out by the sudden change in topic. How does she… Oh. Yeah, probably some forum thread about the ultranoob running around the city carrying his weapon in the no-weapon parts and not wearing shoes. Gah, I can't believe I never read up on anything before I logged in, even if was just to fish. Should've known Roger would do something like this and planned ahead just in case I ever had to actually play the game totally against my will with no other choice. He nodded.

She ran her index finger up and diagonally over her lips, as though she were now stroking a mustache. "And I presume you know who I am already?" she asked after a moment.

He shrugged. "Yeah, I've got a pretty good idea."

"I suppose it'd be difficult not to," she said with a sigh. "Very well, you may call me," she paused for a moment, "Mina."

She's got pretty good naming sense. I like it. Carl stuck his hand out. "Nice to meet you, Mina."

Mina grasped his hand in hers, her smaller hand feeling slightly damp, obviously from the stress of having just revealed herself to someone else. "It's quite nice to meet you, too, Carl."

"Add friend," Carl muttered. He saw Mina's lips move ever-so-slightly as well. Wow, so that's how a pro does it? I guess I can probably be even quieter with game system stuff.

"Added friend: Isemeine Charus," proclaimed the system's androgynous voice.

Whoa, now that's a cool name! What the heck, why can't I just use that? I guess it's kinda long, huh. Like how Madhavaditya goes by Adi. I should probably cut him a break next week after he spent so much time scraping that porn malware off the accounting systems…

Mina seemed to be in no rush to release her half of the handshake, instead staring at their joined hands.

Carl ruminated on the success of the IT department's second-in-command for a short while before he grew annoyed. Gah, I really wish I could stop thinking about work for a little while. I just can't get away from it. He pulled his hand back from his new in-game friend's. "Well," he began, "do you—"

"Alright, I got it," Ingrid called.

Carl looked over to the counter.

The shoemaker slapped a piece of paper down on the wood. "This what you want?"

Carl looked back to Mina, shrugged, then ambled over to the counter. On it was a piece of paper with an extraordinarily-detailed diagram of a boot with two sets of size notations at every possible point. The laces were sketched in for effect, and it did seem like it would be quite durable and comfortable to Carl's clueless eyes.

He looked back up at Ingrid. "Looks like it," he said. Oops, gotta get back in character.

"Black or brown or some other color?"

"Black or—Black will do."

Mina appeared at his side, also staring down at the boot diagram.

"Her Highness approves, too?" Ingrid asked, her voice filled with sarcasm.

"They do seem quite nice," Mina said with a smile. "I've been enjoying the ones you made for me the last time I was here."

Ingrid grinned wryly. "Better be. I took my time with those. 'Specially with how much you paid."

"Worth every coin," Mina said.

That sounds like a pretty strong vote of confidence if I've ever heard one. Not that it really matters; I just want some freaking shoes.

"Hm." Ingrid looked at Carl as though taking stock. "It's not really something I do, but I'll give you a little discount. Thirty thousand."

Mina's expression grew slightly worried next to him.

Look, I might be a noob, but at least I'm a noob with cash. "That sounds fair," Carl said, not wanting to haggle with the supposed best boot-crafter around. I still have no idea how much coins are worth. So confusing not having more denominations! I should ask Mina. It'll be great to have a friend to ask all the dumb questions to.

"Great," said Ingrid. "I'll bump you up a bit in the queue, too. Should be ready…" She paused, seeming to be doing some sort of mental arithmetic. "Eight days."

Carl stared. I guess it's not a game skill, is it. He sighed. Really can't imagine I'd be able to get stuck here for that long, but I guess it can't hurt, just to be safe. "Alright."

"Payment up front," she said, holding her hand out.

The Director of IT grew confused. There's no way I can fit that many coins in her hand. "Um, do you have a big bucket or something?"

Ingrid let out an exasperated sigh and rolled her eyes. "Every one of you, I swear by the Goddess…" she grumbled as she moved to the side and disappeared from view. She returned a moment later with a good-sized metal bucket. "This big enough for your ego?"

She's kinda mean. Best shoemaker or not, in character or not, we're all just playing this game. No need to be a dick about it. And it's a starter zone, darn it! Why the heck is everyone here so annoying?

Carl stuck his right arm into the bucket on the counter, muttering the keywords "Inventory" and "Withdraw coins" in quick succession.

"How many coins will you withdraw?"

"Thirty thousand coins," he said, staring directly into Ingrid's eyes. After a moment, a torrent of coins spilled out of his inventory, directed by his hand at the bottom of the bucket. He brought his hand up with haste as the bucket quickly filled and then overflowed onto the counter, coins spilling everywhere as the system paid out the totality of his withdrawal over the standard one-point-five seconds.

Ingrid stared.

Mina stared, too.

You gotta be kidding me. That counts as breaking character? How the heck are you supposed to pay for anything in this—

"I was just expecting a writ of payment," Ingrid said, absently picking up a coin and holding it up in front of her face.

Carl sighed deeply. He turned to his new friend, Mina, unable to muster even the slightest will to get back into character. "Anywhere around here that sells coffee?"