The Eternal Sleep

High, Dangerous and Beautiful

    They traipsed through the streets of ‘Westmist City’. According to the description given on the dictionary, automatically available to them on their stats screen, it was once a thriving city that fell into chaos after an economic downfall, the city’s people abandoning to find home in other surrounding cities.

    The streets were filled with damaged cars and broken glass, bin haphazardly turned on its side and the building themselves in varying states of disrepair, planks of wood boarding it shut. On the walls, however, there were works of art, painted pieces depicting famous places in the game or players who were well known for their achievements and stories.

    Luca and Jay were checking through their screens, returning their weapons or replacing them with simpler ones. While the sum of coins were hefty, they’d also gained a new defense weapon, a locket that could be placed around their neck and act as a shield against a certain amount of attacks.

    “Any idea where Rena might be?” Luca waved away his screen, putting his hands in the jacket pockets.

    “In her usual element.” Jay grinned at him, “High and dangerous.”

    Rena was a part of a community of high-risk painters and photographers, they earned coins by just climbing dangerous, risky, deadly places. Their pictures were ranked by the danger of the fall, and the paintings ranked by how hard the area would be to access.

    “She’s up there?” Luca shuddered at the height of the unsteady building. He was never afraid of heights exactly; it was the falling that bothered him. Luca could easily admit that having the teleportation charm greatly eased his fear, but he still hated the idea of standing on such unstable ground without control.

    “Yep, could you ‘port me up there?” Jay elbowed him as Luca rubbed the charm on his wrist, it wasn’t bulky and it gave him confidence, so he never really took it off. With a wrinkle of his nose to judge the height of the jump, he placed his hand on Jay’s shoulder and teleported.

    The charm could only carry two people at once, the user and a friend, he’d first believe that it was another downfall of the totem. Studying the use of the totem Olivia had noted to him in confidence, while it would be an issue if he were carrying people, if he were trying to get away from battle, he’d only accidentally bring one person with him, allowing an easier fight.

    They appeared in mid-air for a millisecond, next to the fire escape before teleporting in a flash of blue again, ground solidifying under their feet. Luca kept an arm under Jay shoulder as he stumbled, slowly letting him down to the ground to sit. “I still don’t know how you do that; that thing makes me so dizzy.”

    “I don’t know, I was like that at first, but any dizziness usually last a second for me now.” Luca muttered back absently, looking around on the empty fire escape level, the permanent seven o’ clock sunrise giving the area a soft glow. “I could have sworn-“

    “Guys, up here!” a shout came from above. Luca didn’t hesitate to grab Jay and teleport to the level above them.    

    He promptly leaned Jay onto the handrail, cringing as green haired teenager gripped it in slight distress, “I could’ve just walked!”

    “R-r-right, sorry.” His panic was cut off by the sound of soft laughter. He looked in the direction of the sound and was genuinely blown away. The wall was covered in a realistic painting of ‘Fiesta Town’, multiple colors spread across the canvas, shaded in such a way that Luca was certain he could just walk right though, “Wow.”

    Fiesta Town was a big place just north of Willow’s Town. It held endless parties resembling cultures from around the world and a theme park with every game and ride possible. Essentially, Fiesta Town was a party heaven for people who loved crowds, loud music and games. Luca had visited once with Jay and blown far more coins in his inventory than he’d even consider in the real world.

    “You like it?” the teenager looked at him, hand on her hip, the other holding a can of paint.

    “Like it? This is amazing!” Luca could barely tear his eyes away from the painting, “I didn’t even know you’d gone to Fiesta.”

    “I hadn’t actually, I don’t really like crowded places, I’m just using pic I got from the community site.” She leaned against the rail, her long, red hair pulled into rope braid design swayed in the slight breeze. Her avatar was wearing a white tank top, colored with paint and skinny jeans with normal sneakers.

    “For real?” Luca jumped as Jay’s voice echoed far too close to his ear, he hadn’t realized that he’d been able to pull himself up, distracted as he was at the painting. “That’s insane.”

    “I’ll take it as a complement.”

    “Damn straight.”

    “So… what have you two been up to the last hour.” She returned painting. With an open mind, she listening to their epic tale of bravery and terrifying moments, laughing at their greatly exaggerated moves and achievements and never once judging.

    They spent almost an hour just enjoying the synthetic sunlight, the breeze and chatting about their terrible day. Luca enjoyed moments like this, just getting to relax and not worry about his home life.   

    Rena had told the group in confidence that she’d actually been in an accident. A few years ago, her legs had been injured in a car accident and she hasn’t been able to walk without crutches since. Surgery was possible, to fix the damage that had been unfairly brought upon her, but it costed her a lot more money than her parents could spare if they wanted to send her to collage.

    There were people in her school who picked on her for it, called her names and made her day so difficult that she’d been called into counselling too many times for sending her bullies to the nurse’s office. ‘The Eternal Sleep’ was the one place where she could ignore it and not have to see looks of pity every day, could let loose and do the most invigorating things without restraints.

    She enjoyed the high-risk painting and photography and was one of the best in the community, rightfully earning her trophies and a spot on the voting tab for other painters and photographers. It gave her the chance to disregard the real world’s problems for a short time and just be herself.

    “I’m done!” Rena announced proudly, startling the duo sitting on the handrails. “Well, what do you think?”

    Luca and Jay wolf whistled earnestly, clapping as hard as they could until Rena shook her head in amusement. They waited quietly as she took multiple pictures of the painting, posting them on the community site where it would appear in the game’s world and in the real world on the main chatting stream of the website, allowing anyone to see it.

    “The others checked in, looks like they’ve got a lot of homework.” Jay scrolled though his chats, whistling lowly. “They promised that they’d be here tomorrow though.”

    “Not a problem, I myself should probably be getting back.” Rena cleared away her paint cans, rubbing at her eyes, “It probably around dinner time.”

    “Same here.” Luca nodded, stretching his arms.

    “Today went by pretty fast.” Jay yawned.

    It was time to log back into the real world.

    Luca gently pulled his headset off, blinking at the darkness of the room, he’d gotten accustomed to the bright sun of ‘Westmist City’. He sat up, stretching his arms and rubbing his eyes, listening to the soft ‘pings’ on his laptop as the others said their good nights.

    He pulled himself to his feet, leaning down to touch his toes and sighing in relief as he felt some of the tension drain out of him, his muscles relaxing the in the new position. Luca languidly unplugged the head gear from the laptop and placed it back on the shelf above, he replied his ‘Good night’ before logging out the game and turning off his computer.

    He could hear the sound of the television and soft, cheerful chattering downstairs, his mother, Sean and Jasper were certainly back. He glanced at the time on the digital clock, he guess it was time to join the others for dinner.