“We’re gonna take a break, y’all. Don’t think I need to explain why, right?”

The chat feed is a hotbed of “debate” over the little mini-drama they just witnessed. I forgot to cut the feed when everything went to hell, and now they think they get to have opinions. Dammit.

Despite myself, I skim the responses. Our witnesses are split pretty evenly on the subject. Some, most of them strangers, are solidly on Winston’s side. They’re more concerned with how he’d pulled off the “prank” than if he should have. It’s likely they want to recreate the tactic on the megaserver.

Others, most of them channel regulars, are concerned about Ms. She might be prickly, but dissolving into tears and hysterics isn’t like her. More and more, people are calling for Henry to shed light on the issue. But the man’s handle, SKYLINEBLUE, doesn’t appear. If he’s been watching, he hasn’t indicated his presence. Which is equally unlike him.

Of course, with Ms this upset, it makes sense for him to skip. Still, the thought eats at me. I can’t remember the last time I saw his handle in chat, actually. A few days ago? Maybe a week?

I replace the livestream with a hastily edited cut of the final Ale Run, excising the parts after Jenga fell, and lean back in my gaming chair. Let them analyze that for a while.

With that taken care of, and the raw footage from the others’ feeds downloading onto my hard drive, it’s time for a smoke break. I’m supposed to be quitting, but fuck it.

I grab my pack from the desk corner, pocket a lighter, and tromp onto my matchbox apartment’s equally tiny balcony. Houston is muggy and hot even in the dead of night, and the candle I keep to ward off mosquitos probably doesn’t help as much as I’d like to believe. Regardless, I lean on the railing and breath in noxious, wonderful tobacco. Slowly, I relax muscle by muscle.

Until my phone rings.

The vibration just below my temple is still a new, strange sensation. I had concerns upgrading to the subcutaneous communicator, but the efficiency outweighed relatively small discomforts. Besides, I have other body mods. Like the neural implants, I’ll get used to it soon enough. And thanks to those implants I already know who’s calling.

“So, that’s it then?”

Robert sighs. “That’s it. Closed out the account for good measure.”

“Fucking end of an era.”

He hums agreement. The pause that follows is rich with things unsaid; as always seems to be the case between us these days. Has been for the past few years. I still prefer it to the decade of silence preceding my entrance to DUSKFALL.

Eventually, since he seems hesitant to broach a subject—any subject—I say, “T-Minus two hours. We’re still meeting in Constantyne, yeah?”

DUSKFALL is peppered with pre-fabricated areas: dungeons, NPC farms, villages, and cities, etcetera. Most are small, but there’s a few outliers. Constantyne is one; a city worthy of the title located on the easternmost edges of the map. It’s also the only one close to Robert’s preferred location for The Welcome Wagon.

Why he wants to rebuild that thing on a PVP server I don’t know, but he’s been keen on the idea since the announcement. And with Winston adding defensive modifications maybe it’ll work.

I frown, recalling Winston’s repugnant attitude from earlier. Though I can’t entirely blame him for what happened, I have to admit he was being a grade-A asshole about the whole thing. Maybe Rob or Ms owed us an explanation, but that wasn’t any way to ask for one.

“No,” says Robert, startling me out of my reverie.

“What?”

“I don’t think that’s such a great idea.”

Rather than jumping on a response, I first take a long drag off my cigarette. “Okay. Why’s that?”

“Don’t get upset—”

“I’m not. Just a question, dude.”

Rob cracks another beer can. I clutch the railing, fingers digging into the wood until my knuckles show white. One or two beers during a party is fine. I’d even joked about it earlier. But that’s the seventh tab I’ve heard tonight, and he doesn’t seem to be slowing down.

The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them. “You eat anything tonight, or are we back to a liquid diet?”

“Don’t think that’s your business.”

“Not my business? Rob… do I need to—” This time I catch myself. I want to ask if I should drive down but Rob lives seven hours away in the middle of the goddamn Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Even if I had a car, or if a rental shop was open this late, there’s also my streaming schedule to maintain. I can’t just call off work and expect my boss to deal. My “boss” is a bunch of gamers with attention spans like sieves.

“Right,” I say, “It’s not my business. How’s mom?”

“That’s subtle.” He scoffs. “I’m fine, Melissa. Shit. Justin. Whatever. Damn.”

My heart sinks as Rob continues to curse under his breath. He’s trying. I know he’s trying. Sometimes, like right now, that just makes it worse.

“It’s okay,” I say several times before he calms down. That’s the beer talking; the overreaction, not the slip. Rob still hasn’t worked my dead name from his vocabulary. While I could blame him for that—after all, he’s had over a decade to get used to ‘Justin’... not that we were speaking during those years—the fact is I don’t want to blame him. I want us to move past it, and sometimes that means biting my tongue. Pretty sure I’ve bitten enough holes through it I may as well invest in a few studs.

I stub the cigarette out on the railing. “You done?”

He sounds so tired when he says, “Yeah. I’m done,” that I reconsider my dedication to play tonight. Maybe I can catch a bus…

“Mom’s fine,” Rob says after a minute of silence. “She misses you. We both do.”

“You see me every day.”

“It’s not the same.”

“Yeah, well…” I take one last look at the city sprawling before me. It stinks, and it’s loud, and the light pollution means the city’s bird population is constantly awake and pissed off about it. It’s also the only place I’ve ever felt marginally accepted. It’s home.

Turning, I head back inside to grab a soda and check on the chat feed as I pull us back to the conversation we should be having. I’ll just have to suck it up and call Mom to check up on him in the morning. “So why aren’t you meeting me in Constantyne? If you miss me so much.”

I know the answer before he says it. I still want to hear it from his own lips. “I just thought… Alexa’s gonna try to rebuild her castle. Figured I’d try to help.”

“She tell you that?”

“She blocked me.”

Shit. It’s serious, then. I pull up my friends list, noting the other Wolves are mostly online, but MSWYVERN is greyed out. Whether that’s because she’s offline or if she blocked everyone from the server, I have no idea. Either way, it seems like a major overreaction.

“What happened back there, anyway? That was over the top.”

“I promised her I wouldn’t tell—”

“Rob,” I groan. “Come on, man. I’m your brother. Surely, you can trust your own brother.”

“Yeah-huh. I gave my word.”

Hardly able to blame him for keeping a promise, but also mildly annoyed at his insistence on keeping the secret that started this drama in the first place, I say, “Okay. Just don’t come crying to me when she files a restraining order.”

“I’m not stalking her. I’m just worried.”

“Worried because…?” I let it hang. He probably won’t take the bait, but it’s worth the shot.

“Cute. You’re not nearly as smooth as you think you are, kid.”

“Please. I am the smoothest of smooth operators.”

“Sure you are.” Rob laughs. “That’s why Lucy won’t leave you alone.”

“Speaking of stalkers,” I mutter. Things weren’t always this strained between Lucy and me, but lately it was getting weird. It also wasn’t anything I cared to talk about. Before he can press the subject, I say, “So what am I supposed to do? We’re supposed to team up. Winston put his plans on pause to help us out.”

Rob’s voice goes hard and cold. “Guess he doesn’t have to do that anymore.”

“Right,” I say. “So you’re punishing him.”

“I ain’t his daddy; just don’t associate with assholes. Frankly, I’m surprised you are.”

“Not my place to judge, dude. Especially when I don’t have all the facts.”

“Fact is I told him not to fuck the server.”

“Wait, I thought you weren’t his daddy?” I snicker, but Rob grunts in annoyance.

“Kid,” he warns, and I relent.

“Alright, alright.” I lean back in my chair, staring at the ceiling as I try to come up with a plan. There’s a chance Winston will let me tag along with him, though I’m less inclined to be his bitch-boy. When Winston gets going on one of his projects, he rivals Ms in terms of sheer attitude. Not that I’ve ever had the chance to work with Ms. She’d been long gone by the time I joined the Wagon. Rob’s level of bossy I’m used to, and we make a decent team with him building and me on supply runs.

Much as I dislike the ideas of putting Winston off, or helping Rob cyber-stalk an old teammate, both issues pale next to the simple fact that I don’t want to play DUSKFALL alone. You can call me a wimp all you like, but horror has never been my go-to genre. I’m more of a FPS guy. The only reason I played this was to reconnect with Rob. I stayed as long as I had because, well, it pushed my streaming into a real career. If something works, there’s no reason to “fix” it. Right?

Quickly, I skim through the ongoing discussion in-chat. Drama makes for an active room, and those with opinions are still throwing them around. It seems like the Wyvern-stans are winning. That decides me.

“Look, I still need to talk to Winston but why don’t I meet you somewhere and we’ll find her dragon-loving highness together? I know she’s all ‘rawr’ about soloing but we’ll call it recompense.”

“Just do me a favor? Don’t use words like ‘recompense.’ I don’t need my baby brother showing me up.”

“Fuck you, you uncultured swine.”

“That’s better.”

“And we’re back, folks. Sorry about the break, there. I know I promised y’all a party and...well. Sometimes shit doesn’t work out, yeah?”

The response is mixed. Rather than giving the group a chance to get worked up or, even worse, fight about it, I press forward, “Speaking of, there’s been a slight change tonight’s plan. We’re still going straight into the megaserver, no worries! It’s just going to be me and Rob for now. Winston’s gonna be on the channel in the next couple days to give us the details on that fantastic chain trap he used.”

A large number of viewers drop the channel. Great. I’d known my monopoly on the before-launch crowd would end the minute the server went live. A lot of them are players in their own rights, and others are bound for more popular channels such as B4B4BLKSHEEP. Still, the fickleness hits hard. I swallow it, plastering a grin on my face. The gesture helps me pretend.

“The beta should live any second, guys. I’ve already got the game up, and the new splash screen looks gorgeous, doesn’t it?”

I shrink the chat window down to a small corner, bringing the splash screen back into focus both for myself, and the chat. Whereas the old screen had been sort of campy—a stylized, sketchy demon deer dripping blood from its mouth—this artwork is way more subtle.

The screen graduates from a yellow-orange at the center, highlighting the “load game” and “options” selections, to a dark blue-black at the edges. Stylized branches reach toward the text like grasping, talon-tipped hands. In the background, a dense forest is outlined against a moonlight sky. The screen is mostly inanimate but for the faint rustle of branches in the wind and the occasional glimpse of moonlight-white eyes blinking in the distant forest. Serene, haunting music plays at a subtle volume.

“I have to admit, it’s a large departure from the gore they featured in the early years, but if this indicates an overall new direction, I’m here for it.”

That’s partially true. Pretty as the new artwork is, it’s also unsettling. Like I said, horror games aren’t my usual thing. I’m not a wimp by any means, but something about this dramatic shift makes me uneasy. Over the top blood and gore are one thing. Childish, in a way. Most people will never see that sort of carnage in real life, so there’s distance there. Maybe it’s just that I grew up in a dense, dark forest with legends of ghosts and serial killers stalking the night in addition to the actual bobcats and coyote. I find this to be uncomfortably closer to reality. I loved those woods, but I never went out by myself after dark.

A countdown begins in the chat. The clock ticks closer to eleven, and the opening of the mega server. I hover my finger over the ‘Enter’ button, waiting for the final second.

5...4...3...2..

Nothing happens.

I click it three more times, before finally saying aloud, “Okay, it doesn’t seem to be loading.”

The word “Load” highlights on the screen, before the world fades into darkness.

Silhouettes of trees appear first, distinguished from the pitch black only by a faint, white glow emanating from a rolling fog covering what I can only presume is the forest floor.

“This is new,” I say. My heart thuds against my ribs, pulse quickening as I realize this is the type of darkness that usually comes with demons. Suddenly, the things we toyed with just a few hours ago seem a lot less laughable.

But the chat is still live. The feed has gone quiet. They’re paying more attention to the game now that I’ve broken from routine, and I have space to fill. Dead air can be a good thing; occasionally. Left too long, it can kill your stream.

I turn in a slow circle, searching for something to comment on. All I can see are stark black pillars I presume to be tree trunks. No textures. No light refraction. Just columns of void rising into the darkness above and around me.

“So right out the gate we’ve either got a heavy change of art direction, some new content, or a massive glitch. Bets, anyone?”

A few people chime in. I skim their comments as I walk forward. “I’d like to give them the benefit of doubt, personally. It’s possible there’s something we’re not seeing yet.”

As if on cue, one more step and the forest suddenly clears into a small, circular patch of rolling mist. On the other side is a tree so large my fingertips wouldn’t touch if I put my arms around it. Unlike the others, this tree is textured; roughly resembling an oak. But that isn’t what really draws my attention. No; my interest is reserved for the full-length mirror set into the tree itself, fused like it grew there naturally.

“Mirror, mirror on the wall…” I approach the mirror slowly, not quite sure what to expect though this seems like a perfect introduction to a character creator. “Or is this more of a Through The Looking Glass, situation?”

The face peering back at me is not my own. According to this, I’m a plump, moustached guy with a striking resemblance to a certain Italian plumber. Laughing, I touch the bristly hair beneath my nose, feeling the way the follicles part. My mirror-self does the same, perfectly synchronized.

That’s when I realize what should have been obvious from the start: I can’t feel my bed, or breeze from the fan on bedside table. There’s no controller, or keyboard input. There’s just this: the slightly frigid air of a strange forest, and a hyper realistic face echoing my own confused delight back at me.

A glance at the chat confirms my viewers are starting to figure this out, too. Best to not leave them in the dark. But before I disclose my thoughts, I tap the glass.

Condensation fogs the surface. Words appear, written like someone drawing their finger across the glass.

“Do you accept this avatar?”

“Oh--Shit. No.”

The words and condensation disappear. Vocal commands seem to work. Good to know.

“How do I change my body type?”

The mirror fogs and clears to a selection of pronouns and genitalia configurations. Fucking seriously?

“Buckle up, y’all. We have found the character creator. If this thing is half as intense as it looks this is gonna get weird.”