Your Princess is in Another Castle (10 page)

“Perhaps to the point of naive
té,” says Chris on his return.  “How’d he do?”

“Twenty-one,” says Sabrina. 
“Although we sorta stopped playing when he couldn’t stump me a final time.  But I’m convinced he’s a legitimate nerd.”

“That he is,” says Chris.  “
Who’d he stump you with?”

“Davin Felth and Bren Derlin, aka the guys who say
look sir, droids
and
the gate must be closed
, respectively,” says Sabrina.     

“Did you
manage to stump her thrice?” I ask Chris.

“No.  But it’s a shame I didn’t.  I was going to have
her work a shift as slave Leia if I had.”

“No way!” exclaims Sabrina.  “I don’t even li
ke to expose my navel.  A white gown and hair buns sure, but no metal bikini.  I don’t even wear a bikini to the beach, I wear a tankini.  And something tells me the owner wouldn’t be approving a slave Leia costume, either.”   

“What do you have against your navel?” I ask.

“Are you kidding?  Look at me.  I’m a pale little runt.  I joke with my mom all the time that she should have had another daughter because she’d almost certainly grow up to be some statuesque sculpted in bronze amazon-valkyrie hybrid since I got all the inferior genes.”

Much like Jessica, Sabrina is a girl who fails to r
ecognize her own beauty.  I can only hope that in Sabrina’s case her low self-esteem isn’t attributable to regularly rendezvousing with one of the Scott Squadron. 

“Y
ou shouldn’t feel that way, Sabrina,” I say.  “I remember the first time I saw you in here, I thought you were much too pretty to really be a nerdy girl.  That’s why I didn’t talk to you at first.  I figured you were just some cutie working here because you needed a job like so many female Gamestop employees.  I didn’t realize how sweet you really are.” 

Sabrina
blushes.  “Ah, it seems that a certain adventurer remembered to pack his potion of impress fair maiden for his quest today.” 

“It’s just the truth, that’s all.” 

“So you’re definitely flirting with me,” Sabrina declares.  “But I don’t know, maybe you’re just a compulsive flirt.  I know!”  She covers her eyes with her right hand.  “Quick, what color are my eyes?  If I’m really such a cutie you’ll have noticed.”   

I smile at Sabrina
with a look I wish she’d have seen.  “They’re as green as the light that gives the Lantern Corps their power,” I say.

“Good answer,”
she says, lowering her hand.  Sabrina looks at me, the floor, and then me again.

Chris shakes his head at me.

“So Chris,” says Sabrina, “I’ve noticed that you don’t ever seem to buy any Magic cards here.”

Chris
looks at me as if I should be the one responding.  “That’s right,” he says finally.  “I don’t buy my cards here.  See, that’d violate rule number one: always hide your true strength.”

“I thought rule number one was
don’t be Icarus,” I say.

“That’s for dating,” says Chris.  “
This is Magic.  Now Sabrina, I like you and all, you’re a nice girl, but let’s face it, you’re loyal to Dave.  I empower my deck with cards bought from you and you’re going to go straight to the boss man with my game plan.  I don’t want him knowing what cards I stack my deck with until I unleash them in a maelstrom of necromantic assault.  If he knew what I was buying he could better prepare himself with his heretical mixed deck, you see?”

“Chris, I don’t think
Magic really works like that,” says Sabrina.  “Whenever a new expansion is released, it’s no secret what’s in the lineup.  We know every card for every subset, it’s not like you can surprise us with cards never before encountered.  So buying your cards in clandestine fashion isn’t going to be giving you any kind of tactical advantage.  I suppose if you knew precisely what cards your opponent is playing with you could customize your deck to exploit the weaknesses of the opposing deck, but Dave has so many cards it’s impossible to make so accurate a prediction as to be beneficial.”

“No offense,
” says Chris, “but you’re just a laywoman.  You have the shortsighted vision of someone trying to grasp concepts of compelling intricacies that take many years of studious study to master.  I don’t expect you to understand.  In fact, the fact that you don’t understand is all the proof I need to know I’m right.  I was tapping a Royal Assassin alpha back when you were still in Rainbow Brite pajamas combing the tail of your favorite My Little Pony.  Whereas other men may keep a photo of their sweetheart in their wallet, I keep a Magic rulebook.  You face me on the table and you’re gonna be on your knees begging not to be slain by the Lord of the Pit before you can even draw enough land to make your first summon.  So don’t criticize my strategy, baby. Marvel at its awesome might.”

“Several things,” says Sabrina.
  “One, I’m twenty-two, not sixteen.  Two, I’m not so preoccupied with you that I’m going to rush over to Dave to tell him what Magic cards you bought from me.  Three, last week when I played against you with a blue deck I won.”

“Okay,
blue ranger, okay,” says Chris.  “So you’ve dipped your toes into the pool and gotten a taste of the blue.  But blue’s overpowered. It always has been.  Everybody knows it.  No pros play blue.  Only newbies.  Because pros assemble a deck with skill and precision.  Newbies play blue because they can’t handle the challenge of mastering a real color and just go for the quick fix.  You want proof just take a quick look at the Power Nine.  All three that are colored are blue.  Totally unbalanced.  Totally unfair.”

“Wrong again,” says Sabrina.
  “No newbie could ever afford cards from the Power Nine, or have any idea what they even are.  You’ve been traversing the planes so long it’s driven you mad.”

“I can see that you’re beyond any semblance of r
ational debate,” says Chris.  “I will take my leave of you now.”       

“Dave’s in the back,” says Sabrina.

“Thanks,” says Chris.  He disappears into the back room.

Sabrina turns her attention back to me.  “Your buddy
is quite a character.  I enjoy playing around with him, but I’d love to see him spew some actual fanboy rage sometime.”

“Just be around him long enough and I’m sure you’ll get the chance.
  Or you could just badmouth the Flash if you want to get it over with.”

“I have done that
, sort of.  We were talking once and I said that one of the problems with a lot of the DC heroes aside from Batman is that they don’t have a prominent rogues gallery.  He tried to defend Flash’s villains but I just don’t see how a guy who specializes in throwing boomerangs is gonna be much of a match for someone who can easily outrun speeding bullets.  Superman is at least vulnerable to kryptonite. Unless you’re Professor Zoom or someone else who also has super speed it just seems to me like the Flash would be invincible.  And talking apes and rainbow-themed rogues do not make for the most formidable nemeses regardless of any given hero’s powers.”       

“So you’ve got it
bad for the bad boys, then?”

“
Only in the sense that they have to be there in order for you to see how good the good ones really are.  So are you a Magic player like Chris?”

“I used to
play back in high school.  Not so much anymore.  You a serious player?”

“Just casual.  Some people don’t approve of casual
play, but that’s the way I like it.  Picked up most of the history by proxy.  I don’t even have my have my own cards, I just use Dave’s.” 

“I thought he was your father.”

“Oh, yeah, he is.  But I like to downplay that.  I don’t want people to think I’m like Sophia Coppola in Godfather III.  I want them to think that I attained this lofty position on my own merits.”    

“I don’t think you’re like her at all.  She brought that film down.  Yo
u make this place much better.”

“You must enjoy making girls blush.
  You going to follow through or do you just flirt with every girl you meet?”

No,
I only flirt with an unresponsive best friend and one of your co-workers.  “Do you bat your eyelashes at every other nerdy guy who walks in here?” I ask.

“Face it
Sabrina, he’s afraid of hitting the jackpot,” she says.  

The auditorium Chris and I are sitting in appears to be occupied by around fifty guys all looking to buy a date.  It could seat another hundred.  A dozen bachelorettes are to be auctioned.  While I have a particular girl in mind, any of the twelve could serve my purpose. 

“How do you handle a disappointing date?” I ask Chris. 

“I’m used to disappointment.  I bought a 32X and a Virtual Boy. It rolls right off of me.”   

“I can see the Virtual Boy.
  We were younger in those days and the promise of being able to immerse yourself into a truly virtual world was mighty tempting.  Before its release I kept thinking that by looking into that eyepiece and seeing nothing but a game screen I’d be able to completely detach myself from the shackles of the flesh and blood world.  Then I played one on display for about ten minutes and told my mom to get me Earthbound for the SNES for my birthday instead.  One of the smartest things I’ve ever done.  Still have the cartridge and the player’s guide.”

“Well
, I bought into the hype and got one.  All I can remember playing is Teleroboxer
and
Nester’s Funky Bowling
and then trying and failing to trade it to one of my friends.  First for some Game Gear games, then for some comics, but he wouldn’t budge.  I almost told him to just give me a picture of his sister’s feet for it, but I didn’t want to expose myself like that to him.”

“His sister have nice feet?”

“Oh yeah.  Our families spent a Fourth of July together at the lake and she’s running around in this little stars and stripes bikini and she even has her toenails painted red, white, and blue.  I was feeling so jingoistic looking at those patriotic toes that I wanted to ride my bike down the road to where this English couple was vacationing and beat the tar out of their boy, Simon.  And I usually abhor violence.”     

“
I see.  What about the 32X?”

“I was only twelve
years old when it came out.  Now see, I had an original model Genesis, the bigger one that had the headphone jack and volume control.  I also had an original Sega-CD, the bulky model that the Genesis sat on top of.  Put together that already made for a pretty tall console.  And then the 32X came along, another Genesis add-on, promising to turn the 16-bit Genesis into a 32-bit system.  To my little mind, the 32X was going to double the power of my Genesis.  All the hidden abilities of my Genesis games were going to be unleashed by the 32X.  I mean I know now that it’s just a worthless add-on that plays its own worthless games, but back then I thought it’d make Sonic the Hedgehog 3 even more awesome.  Like I’d be playing Sonic and just be in awe of its enhanced graphics and I thought I’d be finding new top-secret zones with even more rings and getting even higher scores.

“
Now the 32X was inserted into the game cartridge slot of the Genesis.  So once I got it, I’d have the 32X hooked into the Genesis from above, and the Sega-CD attached from below.  It was already going to be a tower of power made up of three consoles, but I was thinking of taking it even further.  I’d heard about the Game Genie and how it lets you create your own codes and unique effects for your games.  Naturally, I had to have one.  So I asked for one for Christmas along with a 32X.  I got them both.  They were my big presents for the year.  When I got them I became convinced I was about to tap into the ultimate power and be able to alter gameplay mechanics however I saw fit.  Perhaps I’d even be able to travel into my videogames like how the contestants on Nick Arcade or Captain N were able to.               

“
So the Game Genie worked by inserting a game cartridge into it and inserting the Game Genie itself into the Genesis.  Of course, I’d be inserting it into my new 32X which sat atop my Genesis.  But I didn’t stop there.  Why limit myself?  With the Sonic & Knuckles game and its lock-on technology, you could insert Sonic 2 and 3
into the Sonic and Knuckles cartridge to unlock even more features.  So ultimately I had Sonic the Hedgehog
3 at the very top of my gaming tower, which was inserted into Sonic and Knuckles below it.  That was inserted into the Game Genie, which fit into the 32X, which was atop my Genesis, which was atop my Sega-CD.  That Christmas morning my brother Caleb and I rigged all this up, and the tower of power was so tall we actually had to stack all of it next to our TV because it wouldn’t fit in our entertainment center.

“I was convinced I was about to become a gaming
god.  I sat in my chair holding a controller, ready to become the lord and master of not just Sonic the Hedgehog,
but of all life forms, of the cosmos itself.  I whispered
welcome to the next level
to myself because I thought I was about to become like Will Decker when he merges with V’Ger at the end of Star Trek: The Motion Picture, a fully evolved super-being.  I ordered Caleb to power on the console.  He hesitated.  He actually feared
what we were about to unleash. ‘Do it!’ I yelled, and he turned on the Genesis.  There were sparks.  We had made the mistake of having three Sega consoles as well as a NES, SNES, a TV, a VCR, an Atari, a lamp, and a clock radio all jacked into a single electrical outlet.  The overload caused an electrical fire.  Our power adapters melted while we called for our dad to put out the fire.  He got it under control pretty quickly, all we lost were the power cables and our TV was fried beyond repair.

“At the time though, I didn’t attribute the meltdown to having too many
things plugged into the outlet.  I thought it was actually God himself raining fire down on us for our arrogance in daring to create such a blasphemous tower and attempting to achieve gaming godhood.  On that day with my very own eyes I saw the folly of the makers of the Tower of Babel.  I didn’t think it was a coincidence that what started the fire was something called Genesis. 

“And on that day
I vowed to never again make the same mistake as those tower builders and of Icarus, who suffered the same fate as they did.  I didn’t want to burn.  It wouldn’t be until several years later that I learned just how worthless the 32X really was because I never again tried to use mine and none of my friends were stupid enough to have bought one.  Since then I’ve tried not to be like Icarus in making my life decisions. And I can tell you that in asking Sabrina out, you’re not going to be acting as Icarus did. You’re not attempting to build a Tower of Babel.  That’s why I’m here supporting you now.” 

“That’s quite a tale, Chris.  I didn’t realize you were s
o religious.”    

“Well, next time some blowhard tells you vide
ogames are a bad influence, you can tell them that story.” 

Chris looks at the newspaper on my lap, with the photos and profiles of th
e twelve bachelorettes and studies me intently.  “If you get the winning bid for this Samantha girl, you’re actually going to take her out on a date, right?  To get some practice interaction so you can muster up enough confidence to ask out Sabrina?  Even if the date with Samantha doesn’t go that well?  You’ll still ask out Sabrina?”

“I’m not expecting it to go particularly well with Samantha.  In fact
, after the date is over I’m not even planning on asking for a second even if it ends somewhat neutral or even positive.  I just need to go through the motions.  Decide where we’re going, pick her up, exchange pleasantries, you know first date kind of stuff.  Because it’s not the asking out of Sabrina that is the challenge so much as it is her accepting and my making date number one worthwhile for her.  I need the practice.  That’s why it doesn’t matter if Samantha is into me or not.  I just need some experience, to get a date under my belt, and once I do, I’ll be able to ask out Sabrina.” 

“If it will help you, then do it.  Just don’t back down after you win her.”

I open up my wallet and display five twenties.  “I’m serious about this.  A hundred bucks I’m willing to spend if I have to.  Now it’d be nice if I could get Samantha since she’s an English major.  Having some common ground would give us something to talk about.  But if I can’t get her then I’ll go for anyone else I can afford.”

Chris snatches the paper.  “Samantha Ande
rson, a Sigma Pi Kappa pledge. English major like you said, wants to go into teaching.  Dark hair and glasses so she’s got a bit of a Baroness thing going.  She enjoys horseback riding and studied ballet for eight years.  Well, that’s a bummer.  She’s definitely not the girl for me.”

“Why is that?”

“Ballet man, it pretty much destroys your feet.  Now I’m not so shallow as to totally write off a girl for not having the cutest feet ever, but ballet just ruins them.  Like I wouldn’t even want to rub a ballet dancer’s feet, let alone be kissing them.  And that’s a real tragedy too, because ballet really makes your feet hurt so you’d want them to be rubbed a lot.  But I wouldn’t want to rub them because the very thing that made them sore and in need of massaging in the first place has turned me off of them.  And Samantha here tortured her little treasures for eight years and if she studied when she was younger when her feet were still taking shape and coming into adulthood then they’re likely in permanently poor shape because they never got to form naturally. 

“So s
orry, but I couldn’t handle it.  It’d be like a boob man… it’d be like you involving yourself with a woman who lost both breasts to cancer.  Ballet’s a cancer to feet.  Now maybe, maybe if she’s been out of ballet long enough, maybe then they’ve started to heal.  But it’d take a lot of pedicures and massages to rehabilitate them completely.” 

“
So a waitress then, I guess her feet will always be tired and in need of rubbing, but not battle damaged to the extent of a ballet dancer’s.  So would you be happy with a waitress? Or a professional runner, perhaps?”

“Yeah, a waitress would be perfect.  I don’t know about a runner, though
.  I’d have to look at them first.  Running is different from walking.  Oh, and a roller-skating waitress, that’d be really hot.  I’d love a roller-skating waitress.”

“Out of curiosity, do you think Sabrina has attractive feet?”

“I don’t know man, I haven’t seen them.  I’ve looked, mind you.  But she always wears shoes every time I see her.  Never wears sandals.  One time I was playing Magic with Dave in the back and she’s there reading on the couch, lying on her stomach with her legs up in the air crossed.  I call that the omega position.  I love it.  There’s no sexier pose a woman can strike than that.  But she had on socks.  Socks and it was killing me because she’s right there in the omega position yet she’s keeping her socks on.  I just kept hoping for her to feel even the slightest precept of perspiration, to have a single droplet of sweat drip down her forehead so she’d realize how much more comfortable she’d be if she slipped off those socks.  But she never did.  

“Now if Sabrina
had been barefoot though, I’d have definitely been too distracted to win the game.  And it’s possible I couldn’t have helped myself and would’ve blurted out to Dave that I wanted to suck on his daughter’s toes and I just might have said that had she been barefoot and had nice enough feet.  I mean, I know you’re not a father, but if you’re playing Magic and your opponent blurts out of the blue that he wants to suck on your daughter’s toes, well I don’t care if you’ve just tapped a Shivan Dragon, such a declaration is going to throw you off your guard. 

“Now as you know
, I take my Magic very seriously.  I play to win, and I play to the end.  Game’s going on too long and I ain’t just gonna wanna quit or let my opponent quit.  I’m losing I don’t pout and start playing like a wuss to lose and get it over with.  I’m always giving it my best shot. 

“
So if Dave gets freaked out and decides to take a swing at me, a real swing in real life, he punches me and I go down because of what I’ve said, and such violent behavior wouldn’t be totally unjustified in this case, well you know what I’m gonna do? If I’m still conscious I’m just gonna get right back up and keep playing, that’s what I’m gonna do, because that’s the way I play.  And if Dave is like the game is over so get out you sick freak and never come back, well I’m sorry but I’m afraid that’s just going to have to count as a win for me, because I was willing to keep on playing.

“In the end though I actually wound up losing the game anyway, because as
distracting as her bare feet would have been, her socked feet were even more distracting because I was so close to seeing them and had wanted to for so long, like I was Tantalus finally about to get a sip of wine at long last but then no, for it’s moved out of reach yet again.  You know now that I think about it, maybe they both knew about me and were engaging in psychological warfare.  If so, mission accomplished.

“So
to answer your question I don’t know.  But given the way Sabrina carries herself, the way she smiles, I’d say she has very pretty little feet.  But don’t worry buddy, all this happened back when you were avoiding Molly by avoiding the store so you hadn’t even met Sabrina yet.  So don’t be worrying that your best friend secretly wants to be shrimping your girl once you get with her, because I’m not some backstabber, okay?”

“Shrimping?” I ask, as an emcee appears on the stage.

“Slang for toe sucking,” says Chris.  “Personally I find the term demeaning, it makes it sound as if the act lacks nobility.  But in this particular instance where the context is the hypothetical yearning of a best friend to suck on the toes of his best friend’s girl, well, I found it appropriate.  But you’re not Jessie, Sabrina isn’t Jessie’s girl, and I’m not a backstabber, outside of D&D at least, so I got your back man, I ain’t stabbing it, cuz I got your back.  Don’t forget that.”