[Jaese - Start]

"Melanie?” Jaese asked, turning to his partner whom was sitting beside him in the driver's seat of their squad car.

“Yep.” Chris replied.

“Stephanie?” He continued.

“Stephanie.”

“Okay, okay, what about Christina then?” Jaese asked.

“Hmm, which Christina?” Chris replied as his brows furrowed.

“Blake, the one working dispatch this month.”

“Oh yeah, definitely.” Chris grinned.

“Shut up, you’re really saying you’ve been with half our department?” Jaese asked with skepticism.

“That’s what I’m saying.” Chris bragged.

“I don’t believe you.” Jaese sighed, turning his head away to gaze forward through the windshield at an empty city road in front of them, with tall buildings all around them and a clear night sky above. Their police car was currently parked out front of a coffee shop.

“Come now, it isn’t so hard. All you have to do is talk to them. You’re handsome enough, they’d probably go for you.” Chris shrugged.

“Eh, I’m more of a one woman type of guy.” Jaese responded.

“You’re more of a no woman type of guy.” Chris retorted.

“I just haven’t me-”

“All units, we’ve got a 10-33 at the QO Bank on main, possible robbery in progress, requesting two officers to check it out.” A woman’s voice transmitted over their police radio. Jaese and Chris both glanced at each other for a moment, then Chris reached forward to grab the police radio’s microphone, but stopped when he heard another voice.

“10-4, unit 7 heading.” A man’s voice spoke.

“We should start heading in that direction just in case.” Chris suggested Jaese as he started up the engine.

“You really think someone is robbing the bank? Do people even still rob banks?” Jaese asked with a raised brow.

“Guess we’ll find out.” Chris shrugged.

“Wasn’t that Christina on the radio just now?” Jaese asked.

“Yep.” Chris smirked, moving out of park and heading down the road in the direction of the bank.

“Isn’t it weird to work with her now? I mean, uncomfortable and what not?” Jaese asked.

“Listen, you’re putting way too much thought into it. It’s not as complicated as all those movies make it out to b-”

“We’ve got a 2-11 in progress, shots fired, suspect is armed with a strange weapon!” A man shouted over the radio.

“Guess people do still rob banks.” Chris said as he and Jaese fixed their eyes on the street in front of them and the vehicle picked up speed. “All units, we’ve got a 2-11 in progress at the QO Bank on main, one suspect confirmed armed, shots fired. Code 3.”

“I regret complaining that night shift is always boring.” Chris joked as he grabbed the microphone of their police radio. “Unit 10 en-route.” He said into it. Jaese then flicked on the squad car’s sirens and the blue and red lights on the roof of the car began flashing and wailing throughout the sleeping city around them. Their car sped through the streets, turning onto main where they were joined by a second police car driving beside them.

“Hey, what is that? Do you see that?” Jaese pointed out the windshield, looking up toward the sky. In the glow of the street lights they were driving past they could spot small white flakes of snow fluttering down towards the ground.

“Is that snow?” Chris said in disbelief.

“It is...” Jaese mumbled with wide eyes.

“It’s the end of April, isn’t it?” Chris asked.

“It is...”

“There’s not a single cloud in the sky, right?” Chris went on, leaning forward in his seat to get a better view of the clear night sky as Jaese did the same, then looked at the sidewalks and pavement to see a thin white layer of snow forming on the ground.

“Dispatch, there’s something weird going on, we’ve got snow all over the ground on main around the QO Bank.” Jaese said into the radio after grabbing the microphone.

“10-9 Unit 10, did you say there’s snow?”

“Yes, snow.” Jaese replied as their car came up on the QO Bank. Another police car was already stopped out front of it with lights flashing. Chris slammed the brakes to stop their car right next to the already parked car, as the third police vehicle driving with them stopped on its other side, creating a 3-car wall in front of the bank’s entrance. Jaese and Chris both un-holstered their guns and got out of the vehicle, quickly moving to the side of their car opposite the bank to use it for cover, as the other officers did the same.

Now six, they ducked behind their cars and turned to the first responders.

“What's the situation?” Chris asked.

“He shot something at us as he was going in, didn’t sound like a gun though. He said we’d better be gone when he came back out or we’d regret it.” The first responding officer said, motioning to a broken car door window above his head as he knelt down.

“Was it just one?” Jaese asked.

“As far as I can tell, yeah.”

“He just walked in through the front door? How’s he planning to get away with this?” Jaese asked.

“No idea, better question is what the hell is with all this snow.” Another officer replied, brushing the snow off of his shoulder

“Hah.” A high pitched voice shouted out, coming from the broken glass doors of the bank. “Not only did you not listen, you brought friends.” Hearing him speak, Chris carefully poked his head up over the hood of their car to get a good look at him. The man was wearing all black, his face hidden underneath a black hooded cloak. He was carrying a thick long pole in one hand, and a large suitcase in the other. Seeing this, Chris lifted his gun up over the hood of the car and pointed it at the man, as all other officers followed suit.

“This is the ECPD, put the pole and the case down and put your hands behind your head.” Chris shouted.

“How about you put your guns down and walk away?” He replied, his voice scratching as he spoke.

“I don’t know what you have for a weapon, but we’ve got 6 loaded firearms pointed directly at you. If you do not comply we will use deadly force. I’ll ask you one more time. Put the pole and the case down, and put your hands behind your head now!” Chris shouted, as more snow began to gather on the ground around them.

“You expect me to be afraid of your guns? Do you know who I am!?” The man shouted, and a sudden powerful gust of wind shot outward from him pushing all the snow in the air away from him, while simultaneously shattering all glass windows nearby, causing the officers to flinch and duck back down behind their vehicles.

“I don’t know what’s going on but I’m getting a really bad vibe from this guy.” Jaese said anxiously to the other officers.

“I say we take him out and ask questions later.” Another officer suggested.

“Agreed.” A second joined in. Chris glanced at Jaese who gently shook his head in disagreement, which caused Chris to release a nervous sigh.

“Alright on three. One, two, three!” Chris shouted, and 5 of the six officers stood up from behind their cars with their guns pointed at the cloaked man, though Jaese did not. They all immediately opened fire on him, the sound of gunfire filling the streets as the bullets flew through the air, hitting the cloaked man.

Once their magazines were empty, they were met with a dark glare of glowing red eyes from a completely unharmed man.

“You really shot at me? ME? Of ALL PEOPLE!? You need to learn your place! Kavricida!” He screeched, and there was a sudden flash of blue light before 5 small objects shot through the air, each connecting to the 5 officers and knocking them backward off their feet. Jaese watched in horror as Chris fell to the ground with a sharp chunk of ice lodged into his chest, glancing briefly at the other officers to see chunks of ice stuck in their foreheads, necks, and hearts, seeming to all die instantly.

As Chris hit the ground he locked eyes with Jaese and saw the fear in his eyes. Jaese prepared to lunge forward to help his partner, but Chris lifted his hand to signal him to not move, causing Jaese to freeze in place.

“Insects.” The cloaked man spoke, Jaese hearing him from the other side of the car. He then heard a loud crackling sound and the snow all around them suddenly vanished, as did the ice lodged into the officers, and warm air returned to the area around them. It was completely silent, save for the ringing bank alarm still echoing off the city buildings around them. Jaese remained still, listening for any sound of the cloaked man, until finally he got the courage to turn his head slowly and peak through the door window of his squad car to see what the man was doing, but to his surprise he was gone. Not a trace of the cloaked man remained.

The instant Jaese saw this he dove to Chris and applied pressure to the wound in his chest as blood began to soak into his police uniform, grabbing his radio with his free hand.

“Officers down, I repeat officers down at the QO bank, suspect gone, I need multiple ambulances now! 5 officers are down!” Jaese panicked, looking directly into Chris’s eyes. He was blinking, but seemed out of breath and unable to speak. “NOW GOD DAMN IT!” Jaese shouted as he heard the faint sound of sirens approaching in the distance.

[Darith - Start]

“Get on my level!” Ryan shouted as he pressed the buttons on his controller furiously, sitting on a large brown sofa next to his friends Darith and Jacob.

“Why would I want to go lower in level!” Darith replied, also pressing buttons furiously, the three were staring intently at a fighting game they were playing using Ryan’s large flat-screen television. The three of them were teenagers in the age range of 16. Darith was on the heavy side wearing plain clothes with short blonde hair. Ryan was the shortest of the bunch with messy black hair that could use some shampoo, and Jacob was much taller and thinner than the other two, but no muscle on his bones could be seen.

“He’s gonna use that cheap combo again, watch out!” Jacob shouted to Darith, as Darith’s health in the game dropped to 10 while Ryan’s was already sitting at 5. Darith moved his character forward to hit Ryan’s, but just as Darith attacked, Ryan jumped his character back out of range of Darith’s, then used a long range attack and hit Darith for 1 health.

“I told you, he just does it over and over.” Jacob replied.

“That’s cheap, using the ranged attack against a melee fighter.”

“It’s all about strategy.” Ryan smirked. Darith tried to attack him again, but Ryan used the same tactic, taking Darith down another point of health, they were now sitting at 5-8 respectively.

“I tried everything man, you can’t hit him when he starts using that jump back ranged attack stuff, that character is OP.” Jacob sighed, seemingly uninterested in the match now. Darith backed his character away and looked closely at the screen, glancing all around at the details of the stage they were fighting on. Darith then dashed around Ryan’s character to the side a few times, forcing Ryan to turn to keep facing him, then Darith charged forward at Ryan a third time.

Using the same tactic, Ryan was able to leap back and hit Darith with a ranged attack, but Darith instantly ran to attack again and again.

“No matter how fast you keep trying to run in, I can keep jumping back, this skill doesn’t have a cooldown.” Ryan said mockingly as he hit Darith a few more times until he was down to 3 health but Darith didn’t let up and kept charging in, getting hit to 2, then 1 health. But just as Ryan was preparing to jump back one last time to finish the job, his retreating skill landed him up against the wall of the stage, canceling his retreat skill to allow Darith to finally land a heavy hit on Ryan, dealing 5 damage and defeating him.

“Ah, damn it! Stupid wall, that’s cheating!” Ryan shouted angrily as the words Victory appeared above Darith’s character.

“It’s all about strategy.” Darith grinned.

“Out played!” Jacob cheered, then raised his hand to high five Darith.

“Hey why are you cheering for him? It’s my house you’re in.” Ryan grumbled at Jacob.

“You’re always using that cheap tactic on me, good to see you get beat for once.” Jacob shrugged.

“I thought you said you don’t play fighting games.” Ryan turned to Darith.

“I don’t, but I used to play ‘em.”

“Used to, psh. Come on let’s rematch, I’ll play serious this time.” Ryan replied as the game returned to a character selection screen. Just then the doorbell of the house rang.

“What are you talking about? You were playing serious.” Jacob replied as Ryan stood up from the couch.

“If you don’t start cheering for me I’ll kick you out!” Ryan shouted at him as he headed towards the front door of his house.

“Whatever, I got next. Who’s ringing your door at 10:00 pm anyway?” Jacob asked.

“Oh no, it’s 10 pm?” Darith replied surprised, shooting up off the couch. “If my mom is back from work before me she’ll kill me.”

“Really, you got a curfew? Does your mom know you’re in high school now and aren’t still a baby?” Jacob replied to him sarcastically.

“He’s still a baby.” Ryan commented as he opened his front door to see another boy standing there with short spiky blond hair and broad shoulders. “Jason? What are you-” Ryan started asking, but before he could finish Jason forced himself in the house past Ryan and shut the door, causing Jacob and Darith to both stop and stare at him. Jason looked nervous, glancing around the room at windows and leaning his back against the door to keep it shut.

“What the hell are you doing?” Ryan asked, startled.

“You guys are alone here? Are your parents here?” Jason asked in an anxious tone.

“Well y-” Ryan started saying, but Jacob spoke up over him.

“Ryan’s dad is upstairs. He's a big muscular guy too. He was in the army, and he has shotguns and a black belt in karate.” Jacob replied confidently.

“I thought his dad was an accountant?” Darith replied to Jacob’s statement, but this got him an annoyed glare from Jacob.

“Listen, I'm not going to start any trouble, you don’t need to get your dad or anything like that.” Jason replied.

“Relax guys he knows my Dad anyway. Why’re you at my house?” Ryan asked him.

“You guys are good at games right? You’re all into that nerdy stuff?” Jason replied, glancing briefly at the television across the room to see the fighting game being played on it.

“Yeah, we’re into that nerdy stuff, sorry we can’t all be on the football team.” Jacob snapped back.

“I need your help, I got stuck in this game and all this weird stuff is happening. Look, it’s here on my phone.” Jason said, scrambling into his pockets and pulling out his cell phone after fumbling it a bit. He then held up his cell phone to show a picture of himself on the screen with a health bar below his name, and different statistics listed around it such as strength, agility, intellect, and under status was written ‘afraid, anxious’.

“What’re we looking at exactly?” Ryan asked, raising an eyebrow.

“It’s me, duh. Look! I’m in this game!” Jason shouted at him angrily. “Now help me get out of it before I die!” He shouted at them, sweat rolling down his face.

“Yo, are you on drugs or something man?” Jacob replied, taken back a bit.

“No I’m not on drugs! I need your help, I want you guys to play this game with me to help me win it or whatever!” Jason shouted, and as he did there were two buzzing noises in the room. One came from a backpack that had been tossed on the floor by Ryan when he had gotten home from school, the other came from Jacob’s pocket.

“That’s probably my dad texting me, I gotta take off. You need to get this guy out of your house now though, he’s definitely high on something.” Jacob replied, reaching into his pocket for his phone.

“Yeah, I’m not helping you after you beat me up last year, go find some other nerds to help you with your little cell phone game.” Ryan replied coldly. Jason glared angrily at him, glancing briefly at the other two who only stared back at him like he was crazy, then swung the door open violently.

“Fine, forget you guys!” He shouted, then stepped out the door and slammed it shut.

“What the heck was that about?” Jacob said as he looked at his cell phone. “Aw hell no.” Jacob sighed.

“What?” Ryan asked as Darith started putting on his shoes.

“Look at this, he’s got one of those weird chain-mail game things.” Jacob said as he showed the screen of his phone to the others. The cell phone’s screen had turned completely blue save for a message in the middle. ‘Jason has invited you to join his party in [Broken Realm]. Do you accept?’ the message read, with an accept and decline button. “Of course I don’t accept.” Jacob said and hit decline instantly, returning his phone screen to normal.

“Speaking of cell phones...” Darith mumbled to himself as he started patting his pockets. “Oh man, not only am I going to be late but I left my phone at home.” Darith sighed after being unable to find his phone. “I’ll see you guys tomorrow at school.”

“Later, but we gotta have a rematch, don’t think you won already!” Ryan said as Darith ran out of his house.

“Dude, he did already win though.” Jacob replied to Ryan as the door shut.

Darith ran home as fast as he could, which only took him about 10 minutes. Not because he was particularly fast, he was slow, very out of shape and overweight, but rather because he didn’t live far from Ryan. As he got closer and closer to the house he started going over in his head the excuses he’d use on why he was coming home so late, but none were sounding remotely believable to himself. When he finally got to the front door of the townhouse he was living in he hesitated. Then after taking a deep breath, he turned the door knob and opened it, stepping inside.

“I’m home.” Darith called inside nervously.

“About time.” A girl's voice called back as he heard the turning of wheels across his house, only to see a girl in a wheelchair turn a corner down the hall from him.

“Liana? Where’s mom?” Darith asked as he took his shoes off, feeling slightly relieved.

“She was here, but she got called back to work. Something about a bank robbery and some injured police officers at the hospital. I’m supposed to yell at you for getting home so late and you’re supposed to make sure I take my medicine and make me feel comfortable.” Liana replied, though the last part was said with very little enthusiasm.

“Phew, saved by a bank robbery then.” Darith replied sarcastically. “Well, do you feel comfortable?” He asked.

“Like I was born here.” Liana grumbled back sarcastically. “Oh, also, your mom said to make sure you do your homework.” She added as she turned her wheelchair around and her voice trailed off deeper into the house.

“What are you up to? Did you take your medicine already?” Darith asked as he headed into the living room with Liana to see her staring at the television watching a cartoon.

“Your mom left it on the counter in the kitchen.” She replied, nodding her head in the direction of the kitchen.

“Right.” Darith replied, heading to the kitchen to grab the pills and a glass of water for Liana. He then returned to Liana’s side and held out the pills for her to take in her right hand, her left arm unable to move as it was in a cast. She took the pills from Darith and threw them back into her throat as Darith handed her the glass of water. Without taking her eyes off the television she put the glass of water to her mouth and poured until she made a big gulp sound.

“Good?” Darith asked as he took the glass from her.

“Yup.” She replied. “So why are you so late? What were you doing today?” Liana asked.

“Showing Ryan how to play T-Fighter.” Darith grinned.

“Was he any good?” Liana asked.

“He was using that cheap kiting strategy, so no.” Darith said as he sat down on a black couch beside Liana’s wheelchair. “Ready to start where we left off?” Darith asked as he grabbed the television remote off of the coffee table in the center of the living room to change the video input of the TV to his video game, grabbing the game controller next.

“Are you kidding? I’ve been waiting all day!” Liana said excitedly. “We need to get those last diamonds so we can open the final gate in ruins, I still think it's going to be a trap though.”

“Whoa whoa, no spoilers, you didn’t read any game guides while I was at school, did you?”

“No, but it’s pretty obvious that those good guys are going to betray you!” Liana replied enthusiastically, her eyes lighting up as she stared at the starting screen of a video game appeared on the television.

“Remember, if my mom asks, you were helping me with my homework.” Darith said.

“Of course.” Liana smiled. The two of them then focused in on the game, Liana giving Darith tips and advice to solve the puzzles as Darith controlled the character. The two of them had a routine of playing games together like this for over a year now since Darith’s mom had started bringing Liana home from the hospital where she worked.

Liana was paralyzed from the waist down, and her left arm had been crushed and made unusable in a car accident. She had long silky brown hair and dark brown eyes, but several very bad burn marks on the left side of her face. Among these things, she had also lost her parents in the accident, and without any close relatives tried suicide a few times until she got close to Darith’s mom.

When Darith met Liana he had to resist staring at the burn marks on her face, but he got past it after he let Liana watch him play a few games and saw how interested she was in them. Her treatment required her to stay in hospital care very often and she had no close relatives, so Darith’s mom took it upon herself to convince Children’s Aid workers to let her take care of Liana, and help her get out of the hospital whenever she could. Despite Liana being 3 years younger than Darith, they got along perfectly fine.

The two of them played late into the night, until around 2AM when Liana fell asleep in her chair right beside Darith, who did the same shortly after on the couch. It wasn’t until 7:15 am that morning that Darith awoke to the sound of the front door opening. He could hear the sound of his mom’s keys jingling in her hands to which his alertness level heightened and he realized he had to quickly turn off his game and the television. He shot up off the couch and hit all the power buttons just as Darith’s mom turned the corner into the living room to look at them.

“Oh don’t tell me you were up all night playing video games.” His mom sighed disappointedly.

“N-no, of course not, we did homework and then watched a bit of TV.” Darith replied nervously.

“Whatever, I’m too exhausted to scold. You’re late for school, and I’m going to pass out for a few precious hours of sleep.” His Mother, Kristen, replied.

“W-wait, what happened? Liana said something about a robbery and police officers?” Darith asked as his mom walked sleepily towards the couch he had just been sleeping on and fell face forward into it.

“4 dead officers, one critical, and one rambling about snow. Go to school and let me sleep.” She grumbled, her voice muffled by the pillow, her face was now buried in.

“Okay.” Darith said, glancing around for his backpack, grabbing it and then slipping his shoes back on to head out.

“Have a good day. Oh and take your damn cell phone with you. No point in even having one if you won’t carry it with you.” She shouted just as Darith was about to head out the door.

“Oh, right.” He stopped, quickly grabbing his phone that was resting on an end table near the door. “Bye mom!” Darith shouted before closing the door. He let out a loud yawn and stretched his hands way up over his head with phone still in hand, but as he did he caught a brief glimpse of a blue screen on his cell phone. Curling his brow in curiosity he moved the phone back down to eye level to see a message.

Alert!: Player Jason has invited you to join his party in The Broken Realm. Do you accept?

Accept Decline

“... What the hell?” Darith said to himself.