Chapter Text
“THIS HOW YOU DO ME?!”
It's an expensive iPad, but as you watch the fishtail animation you absolutely dreaded seeing, you can’t help that your mind thinks back to the silly little inside joke you’ve started in the server for when the Gacha Gods do you dirty.
cantbeagoonerififinish: “I swear to fucking god if I lose a 50/50 to Nii-san or FishBoy again I’m gunna drive to the Harbour Bridge and YEET my iPad off it.”
Zero5-HT: “AHAH NOT THE HARBOUR BRIDGE”
Linda: “My sister in Astra…”
cantbeagoonerififinish: “Like a fucking FRISBEE”
You smile to yourself, but then as the animation ends you realise the next blow and your face screws itself back up. Not only is it a 5 star you already have, it’s a fucking MYTH, so you can't even get Lunar Emblems from ranking it, and you’ve been 20 Emblems away from finally buying Precise Control for weeks now. Son of a bitch.
You’ve been playing for just over 100 days and you’ve been pulling for this myth banner harder than MC pulled Zayne in Silent Poem – and you didn’t even get a new outfit. Bullshit.
You share your devastation and a screenshot of the pull summary with the Girlies before pulling yourself up off the couch.
cantbeagoonerififinish: “anyone know what the traffic is like rn because it’s frisbee time”
Linda: “EYEBROWS”
cantbeagoonerififinish: “they’re already silver! won’t even notice”
Linda: “I’ll bring a razor next con then!!”
cantbeagoonerififinish: “saving for a new one would take longer than the grow back, fucken Astra’s just tryna keep me and my husband apart😭”
Linda: “he’s tryna push you back into Gege’s arms it’s His plan”
cantbeagoonerififinish: “brother, ew. Astra on sight”
That was your last pull before you head over to a friend's, so you decide with a feral smirk to take a detour over the bridge, park the car, then take your bag and iPad up to the viewing walkway.
You’ve gotta commit to the bit just a little and get a picture to show the Girlies.
Positioning yourself leaning slightly over the railing, you’re concentrating on getting the shot at the right angle of you pretending to throw the tablet over the side when a huge truck drives past, too close, too fast. You lose your grip, and the instinctive lunge to snatch the tablet out of the air sends you careening over the side.
You’re pretty sure you scream the whole way into the churning water below.
—
Slowly, then all at once, you wake to a rhythmic beeping and bright fluorescent lights. The room suddenly comes into focus and you bolt upright; the sound of rushing air fills your head and you can’t tell if you actually remember the splash or if your mind fills in the blank with foley.
The fuck? Oh, right. The bridge. The joke. The photo op… An embarrassed groan escapes you.
The mortification sets in as you realise how your dumb joke to send to a LaDS Girlies Discord server turned into a hospital visit. The nurse taking your vitals watches as you cover your face with your hands, and over the mask you can see the relief and joy in her eyes to see that you’re awake.
Concern takes over when she sees your shame beginning to grow into panic and you start to look around the room, disoriented, a little scared, very sore in places that don’t quite make sense considering you fell into calm water rather than some kind of white water rafting tourist trap.
“Hey, hey,” her voice is soft and kind and vaguely familiar, “you’re okay.”
She goes on to answer the questions that you hadn’t asked, couldn’t ask, the questions that left you paralysed, that were so jumbled in your mind that you couldn't figure out how to phrase or prioritise.
“You had a bit of a fall after the fight but you’re going to be fine. You’re at the hospital, you’ve been here for 2 days, you have a lot of surprisingly minor injuries and we’re waiting for the results of your brain scans.” You relax a little, but not entirely… What fight is she talking about?
You spot a jug of water on the table next to your bed. She follows your longing gaze and pours you a glass, bringing it over for you to sip on while she continues with the tests she was doing before you woke up.
Your voice is shaky and a bit rough, but you manage to rasp out, “thank you, I think I remember what happened.” Her eyes crinkle as she smiles at you before turning her attention back to a very fancy piece of monitoring equipment you’ve never seen before.
Finishing the water, you place the glass back on the table as the nurse wraps up. Her hand is warm on your shoulder as she reassures you.
"You're recovering well, and your scan is due back any minute now.” She steps away from your bed and turns to leave, “Dr Zayne will be in soon to discuss the results.”
Dr Zayne? Trust this world to give you that kind of bonkers coincidence.
You almost laugh before you realise how inappropriate that would be considering you just fell off a bridge and probably almost died (though you may still die of embarrassment when you have to explain to a doctor what you were doing on the bridge when you fell).
The nurse continues, “he’s been so worried since you came in, and he’ll be so relieved to hear that you’ve woken up.” She pauses and glances behind her like she probably shouldn’t say any more; her voice drops a tiny bit as she meets your eyes. “He thought we’d lost you.”
You’re not sure how to respond to her change in tone; it feels far more somber and personal than you know how to handle, so you just nod.
As she opens the door, you stop her when you realise you need to express your gratitude. “Thank you.. sorry, what’s your name?”
She looks confused for a moment, like her answer wouldn’t or shouldn’t be new information to you, but she recovers quickly and answers your question warmly.
“My name is Yvonne.”
At what point does it stop being a coincidence and start being… something else entirely? You manage a faint “thanks, Yvonne”, your voice even shakier than before, and she leaves the room.
Now that you’re alone, you throw the blanket off and hike up the hospital gown, taking in the kaleidoscope of bruises and scrapes all over your legs, and begin gingerly testing a few of the more colourful ones with your fingertips.
A searing pain kicks up in your ribs when you bend forward. As you go to move the gown so you can inspect your torso, you catch sight of the ID bracelet on your wrist and you freeze when you realise that it’s wrong.
Your name is correct, but the birthday isn’t your actual one. It's the joke birthday you use when you don’t want to give away too much real personal information when you’re signing up for online games: April 20th.
You vaguely register the beep of the heart rate monitor speeding up as you read the name of the hospital. Akso.
Akso Hospital? Dr Zayne? Nurse Yvonne?
The whole situation is too much to process right now but one thing breaks through all the noise: the sound of a knock on the door and an oh-so-familiar voice – one that as of late you’ve often started to associate with a buzzing sound – asking “is it alright if I come in?”
Absolutely fucking not… you want to say, but instead, “give me a minute.”
Your knees draw in and your face sinks into your hands, heart rate starting to climb again. The shrill beeping of the monitor does nothing to calm your nerves.
Dr Zayne. THE Mister Doctor Zayne Li MD PhD, the unreasonably handsome pixel man who you’ve got to know and cried for and yearned for and jerked it to and..
Wait, if Yvonne thought I should know her name, if it’s my name on the bracelet… and Zayne’s been worried about me? Oh god oh fuck oh jeez oh shit oh heck. I guess I’m her? I’m me? I’m MC?!?
Okay, so I know where I am, I know who I am… what’s missing is when. At what point in the story?
Well, you’re not going to figure that out if you just sit in here by yourself forever. Taking a few deep breaths, you try to get your heart rate back to semi-normal (knowing that’s hardly going to last once HE walks in and talks TO you rather than at you through a screen) before...
“You can come in now.”