Chapter Text
"It's cold." Derek thinks.
He stares at the water, listening as the grainy, looping audio of waves fills his ears; a sound that seems to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. The ocean sparkles in the light, but Derek can only focus on how strange it all feels.
He shivers as a chill floats past him, the cold seeping into his armor despite the sun beaming down on him, if you could even call it that. Looking up, he sees the star set perfectly in the corner of the sky, with yellow lines protruding from it like rays of light…It looks like something out of a child's drawing. It feels close enough to grab.
Derek is alone.
An array of blues blur in front of him. From dark, to pastels, to teals, all mixing into a brown-ish pink as the water brushes over the sand. It's pretty if you're able to ignore the rough polygons that form at the peaks, or the missing textures just as the sea meets the horizon.
Derek hesitates before reaching a hand out toward the water, letting his fingers dip just below the glittering surface—an action that he soon regrets. A pained hiss escapes him as soon as the water seeps through his gloves.
Hot and cold climb up his hand with a fervor. It feels as if static stabs through the thick leather, becoming an almost numb sensation as the chill mixes with the dull heat.
The water that drips from his fingertips is anything but that...Derek stares with wide eyes, or eye, rather, as the geometric blobs slide from his hand. He shakes the lingering drops off and tries to ignore the sting as he turns around and starts retreating back to his house.
.
.
.
Well, he doesn't exactly own the house, but it feels nice to have something he can call his own, The small beach house is the closest he's ever come to "owning" anything since being trapped in the computer.
Derek discovered the structure during one particularly boring afternoon. Avery was away and the apartment was silent, as if the world had stopped spinning. Derek scoured the computer for anything new until he finally stumbled upon something that piqued his interest. It was an older title, but he decided to give it a shot.
…And it went terribly.
Hours were spent trying to break away from the game's main objective and droning voicelines. The game was centered around a surfing competition, something way too complicated and way too Avery for his tastes.
Derek eventually started wandering. The objective might've been uninteresting, but the world itself was far too big for Derek to not consider exploring. He walked until his helmet slammed into a wall, an invisible wall.
After taking a moment to adjust his helmet, Derek decided to investigate. He was no stranger to walls such as these in games, but this one was different. Beyond the barrier wasn't the edge of the world or some sort of yet to be unlocked zone, no.
Behind the wall was a beach, fitted with overarching palm trees and sand that sparkled in the artificial sunlight, but Derek didn't care for any of those things in the moment…
Off to the edge of the sand was a small beach house, it was a little cluttered but all Derek could see is how brilliant it all was. The place was away from the main objective of the game, on a quiet little beach that only he could reach…Who cares if it took the remainder of his day getting past that invisible wall? He had laid eyes on something that he just had to have.
Derek spends most of his days there, now. From sitting on the porch, to venturing back into the main game to steal borrow things to decorate his house with…Until today.
.
.
.
Derek clutches his hand close to his chest as he walks, failing to ignore the sting that runs under the nothingness that lies beneath his glove. It doesn't make sense. There was never a hand to begin with, so why does this hurt so bad? Are his gloves the problem? Is it a product of the game being old—
PRESS SHIFT TO SPRINT!
…Amazing, an addition to his suffering.
Derek turns around with a sigh, unable to hide his surprise as he catches a glimpse of his new tormentor. The invisible wall is supposed to stop anything from getting in…Except for him, of course, so how did this thing even get here?
Derek glares down at the game NPC before him.
It's a turtle.
PRESS ESC TO—
"Must you speak in all caps?"
Derek cringes at the odd formality of his words. It's like his thoughts are pushed through a filter as he speaks, and the words that force their way through aren't his.
Here he is, on a beach with an injured hand, an annoying turtle, and altered words. Forget the beach house, this was his last time dabbling in old games.
The turtle looks unfazed by Derek's obvious discomfort. It looks up at the knight with cartoonishly large eyes. A pair of sunglasses rest atop its shell with two white lines striking through the lenses as a "reflection."
Derek takes a cautious step back, shuddering as those beady eyes peer into his soul.
"…You may leave now."
Unfamiliar words tumble from his lips and onto the textbox that Derek can't see but knows is there, only visible from the outside of the computer
The turtle blinks every now and then, moving slightly as it "breathes."
Derek takes a few more steps back…Maybe the creature is frozen or—
PRESS
"Please. Stop."
F TO—
"I do not care for these buttons. Leave."
Derek's walking grows frantic. Caution bleeds into annoyance as he quickens his pace, stumbling as he nearly trips over some rocks. He freezes momentarily, surveying his surroundings, his options. The house is too far, and going back to the main game sounds like a fate worse than a second death.
With little patience left, Derek chooses to leave the game. He lets out a sigh of relief as he's met with the familiar sight of the desktop and…sand?
Sand. Everywhere. Slowly rising as Derek quickly comes to realize that he's wasting time. He looks around, seeing that the sand is quite literally pouring out of the game he left. The grains of beige cascade to the floor like a waterfall.
The faint sound of shuffling can be heard from outside of the computer. Derek turns to see Avery. His Avery. The same Avery that will probably kill him once he sees that his computer is flooded with digital sand—
"…Der?
Fear, irrational and loud is all Derek can feel as he scrambles to the top of the notepad.
Hi.
Avery.
The words are his, and the words are stupid.
Avery gets closer to the computer, a gentle smile rests on his face as he looks at Derek with those curious eyes…He's far too kind, always has been.
"You alright?"
Has he not noticed the sand?
No.
Yes?
Avery,
I need you to restart the computer.
Please.
"Hm? Why—" Avery stammers, just now noticing the pixels pooling at the bottom of the screen. "Why is there sand everywhere?"
Derek only half-listens to Avery as he's barraged with questions. He doesn't have the time for this, and he does not want to know what suffocating in sand feels like, even if he's already dead.
Avery.
Avery, restart the computer.
Avery's questions come to a halt as he looks from the sand, to Derek's very nervous sprite.
"Okay, okay…But you gotta tell me later, okay?"
Sure,
Aves.
I'll t
The screen goes black before Derek is able to finish his sentence. Avery tries not to think too much about it. He knows that Derek isn't dead or anything, well he is, just not in that way…Matter of fact, the ghost is probably just somewhere else in the apartment while he waits for the computer to turn back on.
Avery is pulled from his thoughts by the low buzzing of his phone. Who decided to text him now, of all times? He grabs the device, only to see…5 missed texts from an unknown number.
Avery?
Aves?
AVery?
Hi Avery.
:)
There's his ghost.
"Oh— Hey, Der…I kinda thought you'd show up on the notes app or something." Avery says, watching as Derek's sprite appears on the screen. As always, it looks slightly different from how it is on the computer. But this is…
I hate this.
Derek says the quiet part out loud, doing a half-hearted spin as he tries to get a look at himself.
On one hand, he's taller when in Avery's phone. Derek's always hated how small he is on the desktop or TV. But, on the other hand, he looks terrible. The colors are too flat, his gloves are too large, and why is his plume the exact same shade as his cape? They're practically blurring together.
This
This is terrible.
There's really no better way to put it.
And to think that he was afraid of a turtle and some sand only a few minutes ago…
Avery lets out a laugh at Derek's obvious disgust, although he seems to be preoccupied with something far more interesting: moving Derek's cape around.
"It's not that bad…" He says, "Plus, you have, like, physics now. That's cool, I think."
Stop that???
I'm not some fidget toy.
Avery.
:(
"Fine, I'll stop…" Avery pouts, the corners of his mouth twitching as he tries to fight back a grin, "If you explain where all that sand came from."
…
No.
"Then I guess I'll have to—"
PRESS SHIFT TO SPRINT!
If Derek could scream, he would. A sudden weight drops onto his shoulder, and he's greeted with the beady eyes of his tormentor once again…Derek nearly trips over his cape as he flails, trying anything to get the damned turtle off him.
How did it even follow him from the computer? What does it want from him?
Avery
Avery help
Avery
Avery stares dumbfounded at…whatever is unfolding in front of him. Derek continues to flail around until the turtle finally falls off his shoulder. The knight holds the creature at arm's length, face turned away in obvious discomfort.
"You're scared…of a turtle?" Avery teases.
Stop LAUGHING at me???
This is serious.
It is gross.
I need it gone.
"Der, it's a turtle."
And I despise it.
Now what?
PRESS—
STOP.