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“Vanny, are you paying attention?”
“Mhm...” The near constant tapping of buttons was uninterrupted as the young woman’s eyes stayed locked on the screen in front of her, paying no mind to the rabbit-shaped figure lurking behind her as said figure’s whiskers twitched in barely hidden annoyance that even that unmoving grin couldn’t hide.
“Are you going to put that toy down then?” The rabbit questioned the woman dubbed Vanny once more, moving closer with only a brief flicker of his image to loom over the woman curled up on a two-seater sofa. At that the woman finally let her eyes leave the screen, eyes darting to the side as if she was trying to look at the peeved rabbit without fully taking her eyes off the screen.
“No, it’s relaxing,” she began, eyes darting back to the screen as the controller vibrated and the telltale audio of a fish biting caught her attention as she waited to see her catch, only to grumble slightly this time as she watched the small avatar that bore a somewhat similar resemblance to herself gleefully presenting an egg to the player and rabbit. “That’s the thirtieth one… where’s all the new fish.”
At that the rabbit, which Vanny had dubbed Glitchtrap early on in their partnership, sighed and began to silently watch the screen as Vanny continued to catch fish. Or eggs in this case, apparently. Of course he was amenable to giving her time to herself, but it wasn’t as if he could just completely vanish! They were like two peas in a pod. Or perhaps two minds in one body would be better in this case. She was his best conversational partner and Glitchtrap was not taking it well, being ignored in favour of colourful eggs and this little ideal island she had taken a liking to in the past week or so. He’d easily held her attention during previous days of playing but for some reason she was much more focused on achieving whatever goal this sort of game had.
“What could you even be doing that needs this much focus?” He questioned, finally losing his patience and coming to terms that perhaps this game was the only way to get any of her attention once more. It seemed to work as instead of answering without even an acknowledgement of his location like all previous attempts, Vanny took the time to turn her head and give him a sly smile.
“Bunny Day, Glitch,” she chirped out before once again she snapped her attention to the screen and seemed to aim and fire a slingshot above her head, hissing out a ‘yes’ as a red and white present box fell from the sky and she proceeded to open it and give an interested hum at whatever the contents was. It only left the rabbit even more confused. Bunny Day? So the game had its own set of holidays, possibly. And going by the sheer amount of animals and lack of more human characters like the one Vanny controlled, they were themed on the different animals in the game? Though it didn’t explain why she was so focused on the game due to that.
“Bunny Day?” He finally questioned with a tilt of his head.
“Yeah, Bunny Day,” Vanny responded, giving the rabbit an amused smile and turning back once more as she began scrolling down lists of items and creating various egg-themed objects she proudly began to display in the nearby home she’d claimed as hers, watching as it slowly turned into a pastel egg-themed nightmare. “Like Easter, but… not, I guess?” Glitchtrap finally gave a slow nod in understanding, knowing she’d know what he was doing despite being unable to see him from her current position. That explained the theming, but not the sudden obsession with the game that seemed worse than the previous days she had turned the game on.
“And is this a one day thing?” He could almost feel her amusement mingled with nervousness rise at that question. He could almost feel exactly what her answer was about to be without her even uttering a word in response, so he opted to answer for her. “It’s not, is it?”
At that, Vanny seemed to finally break away properly and give him a guilty look from over the back of the couch. “OK, it’s gonna be like twelve days. But it’s fun, and the furniture’s pretty sweet,” she emphasized with a wave of her hand at her freshly decorated house that she could feel he was unimpressed at the idea of anyone living that pastel hell she’d created. “You’d probably enjoy it too. Branch out from virtual horror games, why don’cha,” Vanny mumbled lowly, going back to the game once more as Glitchtrap slipped into thought, not thinking about his lack of irritated response in favour of talking to a cute white deer that was named Diana, according to the text box and exchanging an outfit she’d obtained for what looked to be currency of some sort. Eventually Glitchtrap broke the silence.
“Perhaps you have a point,” he mused, tapping a finger to the unmoving face of the plush mascot, head tilted down to examine the top of Vanny’s messy head of hair, unbrushed due to lack of intentions to go out today. Glitchtrap’s figure flickered out of existence, Vanny unaware of the changes in visible company until her hands unexpectedly froze and soon the rest of her body fell out of her control and a few flutters of her eyelids replaced her normal eye colour with a purple that almost glowed in the darkness. “I’ve decided it’s about time I had a turn, Vanny,” Vanny’s own voice announced, amused as the woman finally realised what had happened. Pushed back within her own mind as the rabbit took the wheel all she could do was sit back and watch.
‘Glitch I swear if you dare touch my flowers,’ Vanny warned from within their shared mind, interested in where this could go whilst also quietly mourning the future loss of her perfectly crafted island if Glitchtrap saw fit to damage it. He didn’t even know the workings of the game, he could do anything and declare it as some beginner’s mistake.
“Oh please, have some faith in me,” he retorted, examining the two neon red and blue controllers in Vanny’s hands as he examined each button before curiously pressing a few to see what kind of reaction the game had to his tests. He seemed to open a variety of menus and with a few pointers from Vanny taking it upon herself to be a backseat player Glitchtrap was soon repeating similar tasks that the young woman had been carrying out prior. Though his interest soon began to waver and he dropped Vanny’s arms to their side and frowned. “This is what you’re so engrossed in?” He almost sounded disappointed.
‘It’s always more fun with more players. If you’d let me I can invite some friends,’ Vanny suggested, drawing an amused huff of air from the bunny still firmly in control.
“I’m right here, surely we can work something out.”
‘Well I only have the one set of controllers… and the one body,’ she shot back, definitely raising a brow in some sort of amused expression if she had control over her face right now.
“Like I said, I’m sure we can work something out,” Glitchtrap repeated as he examined the controllers in his hand before looking to the monitor within the dock as if deep in thought. With some finagling he worked out to connect the controls back to the monitor and lifted it out triumphantly, like unsheathing the sword from the stone. “I can work with this, for example,” he explained before getting comfortable once more, attention focused solely on the console held within their hands as he brushed off Vanny’s threats of if he did anything and how much she’d saved for this Switch. A few slivers of neon purple finally flickered across the screen and within moments Vanny was looking around and in full control once again, confused.
“...Glitch?”
The lack of a reply was unsettling, but she slowly turned her attention back to the game left in her hands and examined the immediate screen with a wary gaze as Vanny looked for any immediate damage or changes. A quick look assured her nothing was different and she went back to her game in silence, assuming Glitchtrap had grown bored after all and decided to leave her be. Her routine continued as normal on her island as she continued to collect eggs. It looked like Zipper was even out and about finally, burying eggs as she ran by.
...Wait.
Vanny backtracked and eyed the rabbit’s actions, sure she’d never seen him doing this. She could pass it off as some rare event but she’d basically tagged along with this dull yellowish rabbit most of the day and testing to see if he’d grow bored. In fact, wasn’t Zipper a much brighter yellow the other day? It wasn’t until the rabbit stepped back from a hole containing a freshly buried egg and turned to face the screen that she caught on as she saw those bright purple eyes clearly staring right back at her.
‘You know, Vanny. You may be right. It’s much more fun with multiple people,’ Zipper… no, Glitchtrap spoke. Or at least tried. His method of communication was seemingly restricted to the same method as the other islanders: that high-pitched garbled way of talking accompanied by a dialogue box. It was almost cute if it wasn’t attached to a recoloured Zipper model. That rabbit was just unsettling, and Glitchtrap just seemed to amplify that.
“How did you even do that?” She inquired, examining her Switch as if that would have the answer.
‘It wasn’t that difficult. This is just a simple little trick. You can put this back in the dock if you please, it won’t affect anything,’ he explained whilst explaining nothing at all. He immediately went back to the odd task of burying eggs and various other items he seemed to be pulling from nowhere before Vanny yelled in surprise and ran up to what she would probably call his avatar.
“Hey, put those back where you got them. You’re not ruining my game with hacked items, rabbit,” she angrily complained as she furrowed her brows. “I want to play this fair, so you have to too. Or you can just leave this island, got it?” She shot the virtual rabbit a stern look as she waited for him to respond, knowing in the back of her mind he could easily wipe her data if he wanted, if doing all this was simple for him. They locked gazes for only a moment longer before all the marks indicating items to be dug up vanished and the reject Zipper shrugged.
‘Have it your way. How about you show me how you want us to play, then?’ Glitchtrap asked, amused as Vanny immediately went off on a long discussion where she explained everything and he simply trailed after her. It wasn’t long until she stopped by one of the homes and only now realised she’d yet to see an islander wandering ever since Glitchtrap’s tampering. She shrugged it off as just some weird side-effect and gestured for him to enter first.
“This is Diana’s home, she just moved in yesterday so she just finished setting… up...” Vanny’s explanation trailed off as the home loaded in, Glitchtrap already examining the items in the house that looked every bit like Diana’s home. Except that wasn’t Diana at all. It was one of the wolf villagers, but not. It took a moment but the white and pink colour scheme soon brought the animatronic called Mangle to mind from the VR game. And just to confirm that, the name matched and everything. It was Diana in all but visuals and name.
Not quick to judge just yet, Vanny exited the home and ventured to the next nearest home. This was should’ve been Teddy’s home and upon entering he looked almost similar. But she noticed those rosy red cheeks and the slightly darker fur colour. Once again the name confirmed her suspicions. This was Freddy. The Toy model to be more specific. And as she quickly opened the map and glanced to her list of island inhabitants the frown she sported grew deeper.
“Glitchtrap, did you just replace all my villagers with the animatronics?!”
‘Hey, Vanny. I got this DIY recipe for a backpack, isn’t that charming?’ He continued on as if he’d not heard a word of her yelling. Eventually he did revert the villagers, but not after he had a little more fun. Vanny was certainly right about the game being entertaining.