Infinity Legends

Chapter 10: No Fast Travel

Luca shifted on his bed. He was no stranger to waking up early given how often there were practice sessions before class, but he had hoped for a little extra time in bed on Saturday. Too bad Barry seemed to have other plans.

Rubbing his eyes, Luca sat up, his head bumping on the dorm’s ceiling as he looked down from the bunk. The sun wasn’t even up yet, and Barry was already running all over the room, and not being very quiet about it. When the drowsiness finally left Luca’s gaze, Barry was shoving a puffy coat into a backpack.

“Barry…” Luca grunted, his mouth still too dry to say anything else.

“Oh, I woke you up…” Barry looked over his shoulder, but quickly resumed his hasty packing. “Sorry. I’m in a hurry.”

“A hurry? At…” Luca checked his phone, the brightness of the screen almost blinding him. “At 5 AM?”

“I have a train to catch,” Barry zipped the backpack close and hooked it to his shoulder. “I’m visiting a friend.”

“You have friends?”

“An old friend,” Barry said.

“Wait!” Luca jumped down from the bunkbed. “Are you saying…”

“Yes, you got what you wanted. I am getting in touch with my old team.”

Luca shot a fist into the air. “I’ll never understand chief. Guy’s a reverse psychology master!”

“It wasn’t him who convinced me, really,” Barry said.

“Who did, then? Me?”

“Would you believe if I told you it was a sorority girl who’s secretly a Fantasy Stars Legend player?”

Luca laughed and waved the thought away, then ripped his pajama pants off and jumped into a pair of jeans.

“What are you doing?” Barry asked.

“Forget trains, I’ve got a car!” Luca said as he randomly picked a shirt from his still boxed belongings. “I’ll drive you to your friend’s.”

“It’s a four-hour ride…” Barry said, then watched as Luca just shrugged it off. “Don’t you have to train in the afternoon?”

“Eh, I’ll tell chief I’m helping you live up to your potential,” Luca dug into the moving boxes for a set of keys, then grabbed said box and started towards the door. “No need to pack if you never unpack, huh?”

“Well, at least bring your gaming gear,” Barry said. “You’ll need it.”

***

Barry had gone through six roommates since getting to campus, most of which had left after filing a form for “incompatible personalities”, and still he had interacted more with Luca in three days than he had interacted with all other five roomies put together. A four-hour car ride would make that a landslide and either settle or break their relationship for good.

Luca had a good heart, and unlike all the others had at least one common interest with Barry, so Barry had been trying really hard to ignore the can of pringles rolling between the car benches or the thick layer of dust on the console. But the struggle was short lived. About half an hour into the ride, he barely acknowledged the small nuisances as he delved deeper into conversation with Luca.

The talk had gotten really interesting when they started exchanging personal Fantasy Stars chronicles.

Barry had talked about his crafting exploits, how he basically invented dark-matter upgrades to melee weapons before they became a standard vendor item. He also had some interesting hunting tales in which he took out enemies four times his level by outsmarting them and laying traps, reminding his plot against the Bluehorn.

As Luca started talking about Takol’s adventures, Barry allowed himself to smile widely and took his eyes off the countryside vista running by along the highway. It was possibly the first time Luca had ever seen his new roommate smiling and he enjoyed that. He also enjoyed showing off some of his most interesting ploys. Few players could say they had sabotaged a cruise ship filled with high-level players, crashed it on an icy planet and left with a whole safe worth of loot.

A little more people could say they had been in the Battle of Spruce, that being the biggest PvP event in Fantasy Stars history, but only Takol and a few other characters had manned the guns that shot the Cerberus’s bridge. And, of course, there was that race down Fiery Man’s Canyon!

“Now its down to me, the guy or the gal. We get out of the cave, the guy—never learned his name—had the lead. I was just behind him and the chick was breathing down my neck. I can already see the finish line, and I mean… I figure the guy’s already won, right? He’s got a good lead.”

“But…” Barry smirked in anticipation.

“Just ahead... a firepit.”

“Oh no…” Barry already knew what was coming.

“Oh yes!” Luca laughed. “The Fiery Man spawned! Tossed a fireball right at the guy in front of me. At that moment I thought for sure I’d win…”

“Didn’t you?” Barry asked.

“I should have. When I saw the Fiery Man, I decided to fly closer to the walls. You know, play it safe.”

“Smart.”

“But the girl behind me? She charges straight for the finish line.”

“Not smart,” Barry said. “Fiery Man would get her next.”

“That was her only chance at beating me, but yeah, she was a sitting duck for him… but the guy that got fireballed? He freaking survived!”

“Woah!”

“And instead of finishing the race, the madlad flies directly into the Fiery Man! I’ve never seen a brighter explosion! And the girl had her path cleared for her. Beat me by a neck.”

“Damn,” Barry said. “Sorry to hear that.”

“Nah, winning doesn’t always matter. Much rather have a good story to tell,” Luca leaned back on his seat with a satisfied smile. “Besides, I saw the two, the guy and the girl, talking after the match. Pretty sure there was a chemistry there. I like to think I witnessed the start of something special.”

“I wish I had your outlook on second places,” Barry said, redirecting his gaze to the distant mountains past the car windows.

“Nothing’s stopping you,” Luca shrugged. “You’ve already taken the first step in turning your defeat into a tale of overcoming!”

“You’re pretty hopeful about how this trip will turn out,” Barry chuckled. “But I appreciate it.”

“What about you?” Luca changed the topic before the mood weighted his car into the asphalt. “Any epic Kramen tales? What were you up to during Spruce?”

“Training. That was my second pro-player year, and Spruce was one huge permadeath trigger.”

“That it was…” Luca nodded. “Almost lost Takol for good a couple times. Personally, though, the stakes of permadeath make the important moments that much more exciting!”

“I agree, but we cannot afford the risk,” Barry leaned his head against the window. “The characters we use in the tournaments are the same characters we play as in the MMO open-world.”

“Oh, I didn’t know that!” Luca turned to Barry. “So if you want good stats in the tournament…”

“You need to level up through quests and grinding like everyone else, yes,” Barry nodded. “We just avoid situations that may trigger permadeath. If our characters permanently dies in the regular game, it can no longer be used in Legends tournaments.”

Luca nodded in comprehension. He could relate to that, in a way. Somehow like he avoided intense physical activities before a swimming tournament. A dislocated muscle or sprained foot would be as disastrous to an athlete as a dead character to a competitive FSL player. Not that losing characters wasn’t sad altogether, having to restart from scratch, but at least stakes were generally no more than that to casual gamers, and permadeath was not all that common. You only really experienced it if you tried something high-stakes enough to change the game’s world or result in astronomical benefits.

“So, this friend we’re meeting… Anything you can tell me about them?” Luca asked, changing radio stations to something more cheerful and road-trippy.

“Only that you’ll like her,” Barry said.

“Oh, it’s a her.”

“Yeah,” Barry smiled at the thought of seeing her again. “I just don’t guarantee she’ll like you back.”

***

Barry froze as he stepped out of the car. Partially because his legs were on the verge of a serious cramp after four hours sitting down with a Pringles can rolling between his legs. Partially because standing in front of the Crooked Goose was the emotional equivalent of being hit by a cotton-coated truck.

Five years had passed, and the only change in the bar was a new potted plant by the entrance. The neighborhood had certainly changed, though. Some smaller houses were replaced by buildings and many local coffee-shops were now Starbucks. There was a new shopping center a few blocks down, and the local park had been reopened, but the Crooked Goose remained the same.

The same façade, the same sign, the same parking lot and the same porch, with the same bench on which Barry had sat five years ago.

“Come on,” Luca tapped his friend’s shoulder and led the way into the bar, stopping at the sight of a ‘closed’ sign on the door.

“Guess we’re too early for morning drinks,” Luca bit his lips, but Barry simply brushed past him and grabbed the doorknob.

The same old doorknob on the same old door, which would just pop open with the right jerk and twist. Voila! Open Sesame!

“Okay, guess we’re breaking and entering now,” Luca shrugged. “Why not?”

“Relax. I know the place,” Barry said as he pushed into the bar.

“So did Ocean’s Eleven. Still illegal.”

Barry stopped three steps in. The interior was just as intact as the exterior. The jukebox was still there, the bar was still dirty and the whole place stunk of alcohol. Barry never knew if said smell came from the floor polisher or the bottles of cheap liquor behind the wooden counter, but it smelled like home nevertheless.

“Piss off! We’re closed!” a draggy voice came from the back room that served as managing office, meeting room and Fantasy Star training center, followed by a short red-haired woman whose exposed arms and shoulders were covered in tattoos. She was rubbing the sleep of her eyes, despite it being almost noon, her bare feet clapping on the shiny floor. “Go on! f**k off! I said we’re…”

She halted, seemingly cured of her sleepiness and probable hangover. Her eyes went wide as if she had just seen a ghost.

Because she had.

“Hey, Dana,” Barry nodded at her.

“f**k you, kid…” Dana shook her head and smirked as color returned to her face. She walked to the bar, poured herself a cup of whiskey and raised it in a toast. “Took your sweet f*****g while to come back.”