The Pixelpuff Girls – Rescue of Lara Croft​

Response to ‘Bring Back the OC Revolution: the Summer Challenge

Character: Debgate
Source media: the Everquest massively multi-player online roleplaying game
Description: Tall Barbarian female shaman, at least a foot taller than the average human. Blonde.
Bio: Level 16 Shaman (at last recorded EQ activity in 2008)
Constant thanks to Allakhazam for maintaining the Spell set available to a level 16 Shaman.



Featured in Everquest, Galaxy at War III: Schism of the Sith, Star Wars: Resurrection; Intervention: Echoes of Eternity



Planet Iskalon

The Lambda-class shuttle descended smoothly through the salty, moist air of the waterworld known as Iskalon, towards the blue, thick-legged installation that stood above the rough waters, far from any land.

The few landing platforms were protected from the weather by plexiglase domes that had been scratched near-opaque by the environment.

One such dome retracted open to allow the shuttle to land, the Imperial craft folding up its large wings to provide a smaller footprint.

Settled, a ramp extended to the deck from below the flat, beak-like cockpit, and booted feet sounded as the stepped slowly down it.

The tall blonde femme in Imperial Navy greys – belted tunic, trousers, polished black kneeboots – ducked her blonde head to avoid clouting it on the shuttle’s underside, and greeted the short purple Twi’lek adolescent boy who waited for her.

“Fen, I came as soon as I heard.”

Fenlaka Zula was a jedi padawan, and like her, a favoured character of the t.fn user that had played or created the universes that they lived in. This sea-bound installation, too, while originating as the Stromberg Laboratory in the James Bond film, The Spy Who Loved Me, had been resurrected to act as a training base for new roleplayers.

Being only twelve, Fen did not spot the potential double entendre in her comment.

“Dad’s inside.” Fen offered, putting a hand forward to take the duffle bag she was carrying in her left hand. “Thanks.” He turned with the load, which fortunately felt very light, and led the way back into the facility, through double doors, a barrier composed of heavy plastic drapes that moved for people, but could not be shifted by something as intangible as air, no matter how forceful the wind.

Short series of corridors later, and the boy led them into Reception, with a high counter on the left, a sofa and some equipment racks against the far wall, and on the right, a couple dozen metres away, a large stone ring was set against the wall.

Players and characters were allowed to enter games, or come here by a variety of methods. Spacecraft or shuttle, like she had arrived; the stargate which dominated the room, teleport, transmit, or wrist-held vortex manipulators.

A pale white Twi’lek, brown robes, piercing blood-red eyes, rose from behind the counter, peering at Debgate over the computer screen that he had been using.

“Surgeon-Commander.” He rumbled, nodding at her, and using her rank within the Imperial Navy.

“Agent.” Deb nodded back, unable to raise a smile.

“Okay, here is what we know. Lara is trapped in the Tomb Raider game. There is a point that Sithy cannot play past, as Lara cannot progress further by herself.” Mitch gestured for her to sit on the sofa, watching as she stepped past him to do just that, crossing her legs as she perched on the tan leathers. “Fen, go make your Auntie Deb a cup of tea.”

“Okay.” Fen dropped the bag by the sofa, and left the room.

The Everquest shaman gazed up at Mitch. “I’m surprised the great Agent Nifesta did not go in, himself.”

“I tried. Each method I tried to enter, I got bounced back here. It is like the game will only allow a woman protagonist entry. We then tried Tosh, but she almost got eaten by a pack of wolves, almost at the loading screen. We’ve got her up in sickbay, in a Bacta Tank.”

Debgate nodded, her eyes wide in concern. She knew that one permanent staff-member at the facility, was Toshiko Sato, a petite Anglo-Japanese woman, who had been an operative with the Torchwood Institute in a former life.

“Is there anything I can do for her?”

Mitch shrugged. “If you can determine which wolf had her leg, we can supply you with some laxative to...” He hesitated. “Sorry, sorry, that was in bad taste.”

Debgate stood up from the sofa, her lanky frame unfolding like the solar wings on a newly deployed space station, “Okay, do you have a changing room around here?” She indicated her luggage. “Brought my Northman Imbued armour. Boosts my magical abilities, and stats.”

“Sorry again.” The Twi’lek shook his head. “You won’t be wearing that. The game wouldn’t accept Tosh straight away. She got a step further than me, due to being the right gender, then got blocked too, till we tried her out in a facsimile of the Lara Croft outfit. Tight sleeveless vest, shorts, white kneesocks, kneeboots, backpack, pair of guns in thigh holsters. The colours do not seem to matter, so if you want, we can make up the vest and shorts in the same pattern as your armour, so you feel at home.”

There was no warmth in Debgate’s smile. “Yeah, that won’t be necessary. So I have to dress like a fashion crime to have a shot of rescuing Croft?”

“Seems that way.”

“Ger-reat.”

To be continued...

 

Continued...

Debgate went to a private room to strip off, to allow a black astromech to scan her for her measurements, then re-clothed herself to rejoin the others for tea and biscuits.

Mitch Nifesta rolled his chair from behind the counter, to join Deb and Fen at the sofa. "You being an Imperial officer, would suggest you received some sort of small arms training?

She shook her head, then had to move hair out of her face. "Nope. I trained as a doctor at Coruscant Med, then the Captain gave me the naval rank so I wouldn't get over-ruled by junior officers over every little thing.

"The outfit comes with projectile handguns that have more kick and recoil than blasters. We don't want you breaking your wrists whilst trying to defend yourself.

* * * *
Location: some snowy mountain range, possibly the Andes

Debgate materialised into the Tomb Raider game, a hundred metres from a two carved stone doors set into the side of bare grey rock, a freezing wind battering her, and whipping her hair across her face, and off in different directions.

There was no longer any mystery to her, why Lara kept her brunette locks braided so often. She had ofter advised the shorter femme that she would look better with her hair down, but now she understood why the archaeologist ignored her.

The tall Barbarian was in the traditional-coloured set of singlet and shorts, with the aqua-marine top, khakhi shorts. And since there had been no time to teach her how to safely handle projectile weapons, her thigh holsters were filled with Blastech DL-44 blaster pistols.

So far, the game was not complaining.

Deb had been born in the snowbound Everfrost region of her home world, so the frigid environment did not bother her, although with Mitch’s warning, she had buffed herself with Resist Cold, one of a series of Shaman spells her level of the Everquest class had access to.

All that stuff had made her a better Surefall Paramedic.

Debgate tentatively approached the doors with the older Twi'lek's warning top in her mind: "We are not sure if animal threats and structures reset after Lara passed through. Some might, and some might not. One thing to be careful off, getting close enough to that door, triggers the appearance of several wolves."

She tried to be aware of items to her periphery, but concentrated on the stone doors that towered to maybe four or five times her height.

The native of Antonica's frozen region, quickly spotted displaced snow and ice, due to bootprints, hand holds, and bullet strikes.

Lara, had, for some reason, climbed up the stonework to the left off the door.

What the hell was that about?

The growl from the right got an instant reaction from her, the woman quarter-turning that way, dropping to one knee while speed-drawing a blaster from her right holster.

An impact from behind her, slamming into her back between the shoulder-blades bowled her into a forward roll over the snows before she could get a shot off, and an opportunistic canine closed its jaws on one of her limbs, only wo wheel away, whining pitifully, trying to wipe at its own muzzle with its forepaws.

Debgate thumbed the blaster's power levels to heavy stun, and started firing randomly at the black, four-legged shapes that now encircled her, then within a few short moments, lay around her, their bellies expanding and deflating rythmically as they slept.

Back at the RPF Adoptions' base, She had had time for a quick re-union with her long-lost Surefall Paramedics' colleague, Yavscout, a pureblood Elf hailing from the same MMORPG as she, and he had buffed her with several of his spells, including Shield of Thistles, a skin shield that while offering negligible protection, was useful in that anyone touching her, or in the unlucky wolf's case, biting her, received return damage in the form of thistles, hence its distress.

Unless Lara was a few hundred metres beyond the door, the buff would fade long before she reached her.

Still kneeling, Deb holstered the blaster, reached round to take off the backpack, and unzipped the top to pull out a Naboo S-5 Ascension Gun, the subject of some debate back at base as to whether to go with it, or a grappling hook and cable from a stormtrooper belt.

Standing, she turned to the doorway, aimed at the stonework above the portal, and fired the piton into the carved architecture, gave it a couple moments to drill or adhere however it wanted, then gave the liqui-cable an experimental tug to make sure it could support her weight.
She held the cable taut, and climbed up the wall, slowly till she got to the top, bringing her level with the top of the doors, and could see the finger depressions in the snow that had gathered on the top ledge to her right, where her predecessor had shimmied along.

But then what?

Looking down, she could see to bootprints deeper than the others, showing where Lara had jumped down from this height.

"Yeah, I'm not doing that."

Not having watched The Phantom Menace, or worked with the Naboo Security Force (NSF), she did not know that even before climbing, their members attached some part of the liquicable to their belts; she had both hands gripping the S-5.

She managed to manouver her right hand free without released her left hand's grip, and tentatively started penduluming left to right to get her free hand on the ledge, then reluctantly, had to let go of the gun to get her left hand on the ledge too, the rest of her hanging free, almost kissing the lichen-pocked stone door.

"Why the heck did I agree to this sith?"

She knew why. Besides Lara Croft being a close friend, there was a reason she had agreed to come without hesitation.

She existed to rescue.

When her player, Sithy, had looked about Everquest, he had seen a need for beings who could assist other adventurers, and created the Surefall Paramedics rescue team.

Yavscout. Elven Druid. The team's Scout. His skills practised to enable him to visit zones unsupported, and map them out for the benefit of the main team.

Yavinelf. Half Elf Rescue Ranger.

Her. Barbarian. Shaman. Surefall Paramedics' Roving Agent.

Everquest's environment was not one that promoted climbing. Heights could be scaled by walking or running up them, or if your class permitted, levitation.

And life in the Empire had technological crutches to make such activity unneccesary.

This. This was new to her.

Treat this like investigating a new zone. Get it done. She thought to herself, looking up at the stonework above the door. What had Lara been looking for?

The doors were dark grey stone. Above them, was carved shallow inversed V-shape, like the roof of a house, and beneath that roof, were three circles inside each other, and at the centre, like a bubble of stone.

Mostly untouched by human hands, the surfaces had been uniformly battered by wind and ice, so signs of human contact should stand out.

Debgate strained to pull herself up to the ledge, the feel of the stonework scraping her ample chest through the thin material of the singlet, as she managed to get one forearm onto the ledge.

Good. Now she could use her other hand to start carefully probing places to see if anything was the opening mechanism.

"I'm gonna be annoyed if these can be opened from ground level." She murmured, then about three probes later, punched, a bit harder than she intended, the central bubble of stone.

Nothing happened with the doors, but the bubble shifted slightly.

"Hello?"

Straining to raise herself on her left elbow, she slapped the bubble again, like delivering a high-five with the her right palm, the impact stinging.

KRRRRR The sound accompanied the two doors opening out slowly, the one to her right, no probs; but the one which she was suspended above, started to push inexorably against her belly, knees and feet, and threatening her precarious hold.

"Oh, ****!"

Well this ******* thing was going to keep opening, so she timed her release as carefully as she could and hooked her hands over the top of the moving door as it moved her aside.
Now she was going to have to do the arm haul thing all over again, but if she could not do this with Yav's best buffs, she could not do this at all.

She had resisted when the elf had started to cast his own enhancing spells on her.

"I've got my own buffs, you know?"

"Of course I know, but you are level 16, while I'm a 27. You don't think mine can be more powerful as yours? Shadow, a level 50, used to buff me when I started out. We want to start you out as best you can, to get this done."

The elf had been right, of course, and she had gotten Strength of Earth off him, which she had supplemented with her own Spirit of Bear and Dexturous Aura to increase her own Stamina and Dexterity, respectfully.

She got a forearm, then the other on the top rim of her door, hauled herself up and over it, then got one entire leg over it, so that she was sitting on the door like it was a very thin horse.
Placing both palms in front of her between the V of her thighs, she pressed down on them to lift her choob cheeks to shuffle backwards to where the door met the wall.

She really could have done with facing the other way, but was too late now. Gripping the door hard with her knees, and leaning back against the rock, she leaned as much as she dared to swat at the hanging S-5 pistol, and when it swung away from her fingertips, and swung back, she got a good grip, a death grip with one then both hands, then swung her left foot up and over the door to let go of the door and let the gun take her weight again.

The gun's liqui-cable spool lowered her safely to the floor.

Deb released the cable, ran around the door, and into the dark cavern that faced her.

Only, it was not a cavern any more, but the interior of a temple, made out in gold and white stone, with carved blocks of stone about chin height with her, and lots of tall pillars that did not reach the high ceiling.

"Impressive." She admitted aloud, stepping slowly forward onto the brown earthen floor.
There was no sign that anything of the frigid environment outside had ever penetrated into here.

The Surefall Paramedics' agent, for her life as an Imperial officer had no bearing here, narrowed her eyes as she peered around, taking everything in.

The huge doors closed with finality, behind her, but Deb paid them no mind.

Lara had come this way, and the doors had been sealed. She doubted Croft would have closed what was possibly her only way out.

Realising she still had the S-5 gripped in her hand, Deb reached round to get the backpack, only to discover it was no longer with her. It was sitting in the snows outside.

"Well, frag." She muttered, annoyed with herself, despite the success of beating her first puzzle.

 

Before I continue...I have never seen a narrative like this, so tell me, why is it told in a way the radio presenter would broadcast a footie game? Is it half-prose, half-RPG?

Sorry if that's a stupid question, I am just not familiar with RPG enough.

 

I once tried to be helpful, and offered assistance to the person running a roleplaying training programme for newbies on the Welcome New User forum. This led to me taking over, and this was my method of operation, characters chatting to anyone who posted, and offering reviews, articles and their own ideas to get information across to the learners.

I cannot find that thread now, so maybe Skiara (WNU mod) somehow removed it.

I don't really know what you mean by radio presenter and footie game; I mean, I know what that is, but I don't actually know how to deliberately write like that.

Oh, RPG, I suppose. Since the mainstay of this piece, is a game character operating in another character's game.

 

Now it makes much more sense. So, basically, this is in-and-out-of-universe-at-once story? I shall keep that in mind.

One of her first comments to me when I joined the board was VERY xenophobic, so I'll rather avoid approaching her and stick to you.

Well, given that you have explained me what this is, the whole parallel makes sense.

...

May take me a little while to figure some things out, but this is original on so many levels that one just has to embrace it and approach it the right way.

 

Location: Temple of Stone and Gold


Lara, I mean, Debgate, considered the interior of the place, basically sightseeing, then started at the ominous throaty growl from an unseen threat.

"O-okay," She muttered nervously, drawing one of the DL-44s with her free hand, and holding both it and the S-5 in front of her, as a thumb clicked the latter weapons' setting away from liqui-cable, to something that would be actually useful. "N-now what?"

Whatever it was, was not one of the wolf-species that had been outside, not with that forty cigarette-a-day throaty sound.
Sounded rough.

"That's what you get, burning the candle at both ends," she chided the mystery beast, turning slowly on the spot to aim and view all around her.

It growled again, this time from her left!

She swung her guns that way.

The growl was repeated, this time from her right! "Either you've invented Lesser Succor," She murmured, referring to a druid and wizard teleportation spell, which her Yavscout occasionally put to good use to evacuate casualties, "or there are two of you."

The hall was laid out with a soil covered floor running up the middle of the space, with raised areas like loading docks to her left and right.
The central area was littered with massive stone blocks about chin height to her, and several ionic-styled gold and stone columns with ornately carved bases and tops.

The columns did not reach all the way to the high ceiling, but to a level that matched the only exit that she could see, a square opening against the far wall that would lead deeper into the mountainside.

Debgate swung her guns to cover movement to her right, and sighted a muscley-shouldered yellowish Big Cat with over-sized incisors hanging outside its closed mouth, standing on the dock, regarding her balefully.

Sabretooth, she recognised. She had shared the Lake of Ill Omen, or at least the land that bordered it, with frequent members of that species, and found them formidable opponents.

With full health and mana'd up, she could handle them, but if your fight versus flight chose the latter option, there was no way you could outpace the things. And here, she was indoors.

"Good, kitty."

To be continued...

 

Location: Temple of Stone and Gold


Guns aimed at the sole visible Sabretooth, and senses listening out for the other, Debgate considered her next move.

She wasn’t keen to kill every animal that growled at her, and unlike in her own game, she wasn’t going to earn any levelling points, be able to pick up slabs of meat, and there could be in-game mechanics that she did not know about.

Maybe the word would somehow spread to other animals, that would then attack her on sight, rather than simply try to intimidate her with a throaty growl.

Maybe working to save dozens of clone troopers, daily, when she worked the Republic Surgical medical Units (Rimsoos) during the Clone Wars, and otherwise dedicated her life to medicine, had made her soft.

She had no inclination to shoot this thing.

Staring into the Sabretooth’s eyes – she hoped that was a good idea - she holstered the DL-44, then tucked the S-5 into the back of her shorts.

“Easy there, Tiger.” Deb’ held one palm up to the beast, keeping the other within easy reach of one of the blasters.

It occurred to her that … “Frag.” She had forgotten what the spell was called! And she could hardly pull her spellbook out to have a look. “Sith!”

She glanced quickly at the Big Cat in case her raised voice attracted its ire, but it had not moved.

Carefully, one boot at a time, she stepped towards one of the giant man-sized blocks of stone that she could see by the marks in the earth, had been dragged or pushed into position by someone.

Her attention was momentarily diverted, as in her Minds Eye, the square icon for her Shield of Thistles buff started to flash, slowly at first.

Oh well, that was going to fade in a few seconds. Next animal to bite her, was not going to get a mouth full of thistles. Shame.

Deb got to the stone block. To climb it at the nearest side would mean turning her back on the visible cat, and she didn’t want to do that.

She sidled round to her left, with one hand aloft, moving round the corner and out of sight of the cat, and the moment it was out of her sight, as she figured, there was a grown from it, and the soft impact sound of it landing on the ground level.

By this time, she had hauled herself onto the block, scrambling to her feet, with the S-5 pulled from her waistband and aimed down at the Sabretooth, which was now moving round beneath her, looking up with cunning in its yellow eyes as it skirted left and right.

“Good kitty, my ass.”

The former Surefall Paramedic had hopped up here for more than mere cat escape purposes, so she did that now, stowing down her top, turning and jumping up the crenulated column with her fingers getting enough purchase on the wide, flat top, that she was able to haul herself up onto the platform that the top formed, and stayed down on one knee while the Sabretooth, that had jumped up onto the block below, now lacked the opposable thumbs to follow her.

Debgate looked at the rough-surfaced square of stone that she was kneeling on, then up at the hall ceiling. It was just wide enough that if she'd brought a sleeping bag, she could kip up here, so it was plenty wide enough to kneel on.

This column, and it's five friends, three on this side of the room, and three on the left side, were well short of meeting the ceiling.

It looked like they supported a floor that was no longer up here.

The Barbarian gazed around the floor below, for some sign of the missing floor material, and then her gaze alighted on the stone blocks, like the one she had hauled herself onto.

“Mm.” Come to think of it, those looked like, if they were lifted up here, they would slide neatly between the top of the columns, and the ceiling. “Realised they were a bit bloody heavy, did you? And you are up here without your lift and pulley equipment. Didn't think that sith through, did we, Lads?” She theorised aloud, “And the Sabretooths probably didn't help either.”

GORROAWWW!!! One of the beasts let out a throaty roar in vocal objection to her maligning its place in the construction process.

“Ahhhh SHADDUP!” Deb yelled down at it in a more pleasant impression of the handle-barred Yosemite Sam cartoon character. She hadn't thought it would have much effect without his trademark slap around the chops, but was surprised to note the Big Cat slink away from its guard position, away across the floor, its head and ears down. “Oh, I'm going to pay for that if I fall off this thing.”

Well, if the call worked by itself, perhaps the Bith-slap was purely gratuitous. She wasn't going to jump down to find out.

“Oh well, back to the grind stone.” Debgate stood carefully, brushing white stone dust off her kneecap as she sized up the jump distance to the top of the next column. She was certain this was the way Lara would have gone.

She took three steps back, gathered herself, eyed her destination, and went for it.

Only to apply the brakes upon spotting tan movement below her! She teetered wildly on the edge, leaning forward and trying to arrest her forward momentum before she fell upon the silent Sabretooth - not the one she'd dissed - nodding up to her with Will Smith-style nonchalance. Aaiight?

"Hello Marcus. Hello Mike. Aaaiiigghhtt. How are we gonna frak up the Surgeon-Commander's life, today? I dunno, I dunno. Hey, I have an idea! Why don't we harass her while she tries to do something that will require a modicum of DROKKING CONCENTRATION!"

Her end shout helped her straighten and step back to safety, grateful that the column had not even shifted; it was stable as anything.

To be continued...

 

Location: Temple of Gold and Stone


On her second attempt, Debgate made it across the flat crowns that topped the three columns, diving hands-first off the last one to break-roll onto the floor of the wall opening before her, into her now favourite kneeling position, to stare at the biggest jewel that she had ever seen - a huge foot-high green diamond floating off the ground, and spinning slowly. it was knee-high to her.

That last leg had not been easy. And she looked quite the sight.

With her long legs, jumping from the top of one column to the next, looked easy, especially if young Croft had come this way. She certainly had longer legs than the brown-eyed archaeologist.

But Debgate had fallen short off the second one, the toe of her leading boot sliding down the crennelated sides as her bottom jaw cracked on the edge of the platform, almost breaking her neck, but succeeding in biting the tip of her own tongue off, gouting blumberry juice* down her chin, throat, decollage, and the breast of her singlet, the silk harsh, crusted and stiff against her skin.
Her mouth was filled with the saltiness of the blood, and she had her tongue jammed into the inside of her cheek to lessen the pain.

The two sabretooths had jumped her too, squashing her under their combined weight, and worrying at her neck with their fangs. Thank Tunare that Yav's Skin like Steel buff was still in play, otherwise, she'd have been dead.

But she was ****** off! If she had been a Force User, she would have been outside pulling a Star Destroyer down through the atmosphere, just for the lulz.

She'd had to settle for smearing one cat across a wall with of her own Area Effect Wind spells, and ripping the happy sacs off the other one, just to get it to leave her alone.

Now, in the path of this mad-looking woman, a large green diamond floated in the air, a metre off the floor, spinning slowly.

Well, she wasn’t going to touch it. Frag that.

Debgate rose off the floor, bringing up her right forearm, and pressing a button on the leather-banded Vortex manipulator on her wrist, hoping tjhat it would connect her to the RPF Adoptions Centre.

“Jeff no, it could be a trick!” An anguished voice, male human from the sound of it, burst from the device' tiny speaker, drawing her surprised stare. What in the Original Light?

“A trick?” A female voice piped in, not sounding best pleased about something.

“I, I, um-, I mean, no-no, not a trick, exactly.”

Deb wondered if the comlink element needed tuning. That fact that she'd been called 'Jeff' ought to have been her first clue that this exchange was not meant for her ears.

“Steve. How about this; cheating on your girlfriend is...wrong?!”

“Jeff, also, this is wrong. I am doing these in ascending order.”

The Surgeon-Commander harruffed around her sore tongue, turned the vortex manipulator off, and continued on her way, her leg accidentally barking the floating diamond.
“Oh, frag!” She swore, expecting to find herself back back at the loading screen, or something, but instead, across her minds eye, in the manner that was familiar from her Everquest days, the legend [Your position has been saved] appeared.

“Oh, that was a save crystal, was it?” She asked aloud.

Garrooar echoed through from the chamber behind her.

“Oh yes.” She acknowledged the unspoken request. “Your balls.” Deb dug into blumberry-soaked shorts that were cold and damp against her thigh, and under-arm bowled two fleshy spheres back into the temple chamber, then turned and proceeded past where the vanished diamond had been floating, along the short, low-ceilinged corridor, hewn from the living rock, as it were, to emerge into a much more cheerful looking place.

The previous chamber had seemed huge, what with the high ceilings, but this was a natural cavern, perhaps an acre in size.
The ground was lumpy brown rock, scarred with either natural or carved trenches, several metres wide, that were spanned by rope and plank bridges; the four walls of the cavern were white and flat, definitely machined; the ceiling looked and felt low, especially compared to the temple behind her, but she would need a ladder to touch it. Best of all, a huge section at the centre of the ceiling was curved up out of sight from her angle, and let in a huge amount of natural daylight that definitely raised her spirits.

If her emergency teleports, plural, failed to work, for she had the vortex manipulator as well as Shaman magic at her disposal; if she could get Lara back here, there might be an extraction point.

GARRAOW, rolled around this chamber, source unseen, but it sounded larger than the Sabretooths.

“Of course,” Debgate acknowledged aloud, proceeding to reconnoitre around the sides, skirting the nearest rope bridge and trench.


OOC: The speech from the vortex manipulator, was lifted from Steven Moffat's Coupling series.

* "blumberry juice" is now my SW equivalent of the British slang term, "claret". Refers to blood spilled in a fight.

 

"Walking in another's shoes" is exactly what one does in a role-playing video game (hence the name "role-playing"), and this story is an engaging and original exploration of that entire concept, taking it to some very interesting and even meta levels. Debgate, as I understand it, is an original character from one game who finds herself having to take on the role (and the very distinctive clothing!) of another character from another game; on top of that, she's a paramedic who has to "wear the shoes" of an imperial officer at the same time.

I like how the icons and spells and commands pop up occasionally to make it clear just how fluid the boundary is between the game world and whatever "real" world is outside; the big green "save" diamond floating in the middle of this very carefully-described landscape really drove that home too. For some reason the "[Your position has been saved]" moment struck me as a particularly priceless little window through he fourth wall. For me it brings to mind the scenes from inside the computer world in Tron and the LINC-Space sequences in Beneath a Steel Sky, mainly because those are the examples of this theme I know best—there are undoubtedly many others, too. Trippy in a very fun way—nice work!

 

Findswoman

Yet again, you are the only fellow Challenge writer to give feedback.

Glad you like this abbreviated entry.

Yes, Debgate is a character of mine from Everquest. The game was so addictive that even when I stopped playing it, I wanted to continue the histories of my characters in the roleplaying games on the RPF forum.

 

Oook, I think I finally figured it out. Now I have to look up and around, just in case I am somebody's character, because tomorrow, I may just end up running away from the bees on Diamondus, helping Jazz Jackrabbit get to Tubelectrics aka the giant radio. The first moment a player description appeared, I thought it was a mistake, but then there it was again and this woman was running from one place to another, as her blocky, pixel self.

While I was confused by the colours at first, now I think there should have been more of them, or different fonts, to make this fustercluck of a combined reality even more effective. This was a wild ride, an unique concept and a huge compliment to my OC challenge theme! Thank you!