Gangbuster Games Inc. was doing well, and Logan Birch liked to think that he had a big part to play in that. But the truth was that he had no stake in the business. The men behind it were invention-driven and they were communicators, whereas Logan was more of a (self-important) cog in the machine they had built. But he enjoyed his work and took pride in the code that he wrote, even though none of it was visible to those who played the games.

“Towers of Taiko” was Gangbuster’s biggest multiplayer online role-playing game, and Logan enjoyed playing it as well as building the upgrades at work. Perhaps the biggest change that had been dreamed up by the inventors was the “immersive bracelets” connected to the controllers that were designed to create physical feelings. These devices used stimuli that was not injurious but could give sensations of pain or pleasure. The engineering was not something that Logan knew anything about, but the effect on players who chose this add on interested him. He had elected to beta-test it and now always played at home with the bracelet on.

Logan preferred to work alone, but with the growth of the game, the bosses had decided that a junior software developer should enter Logan’s workspace. Josh Lever appeared to be similar to Logan in many ways, and they should have got on well had it not been for Madison.

Logan had a crush on Madison Delaney from the moment that she had joined Gangbusters 3 months before Josh. Logan had been invited to explain some of the technical aspects of “Towers of Taiko” which Madison had already played, and after a while they started playing it together from their respective homes, after work. They became game partners, exploring the towers and taking on enemies together.

While at work Logan remained shy about discussing anything with Madison that was not about the game, but he wanted to. He wanted to invite her out on a date, even though he had no real idea about what a date was. He decided that he had to say something, but it did not go well.

“I’m sorry, Logan, I like you a whole lot, but you are just not my type,” she had told him. “Let’s face it, you are the same size as me if not a little smaller. I prefer a more muscular type … like Josh. Besides I have gamed with you, and I know how you interact with female characters. You are all about tits and ass and objectifying women. Josh, on the other hand, is an old-fashioned gentleman. He understands the true value of women.”

Logan was quietly furious, which helped him not to be disappointed. It seemed to him that Madison had not idea about people, and about Josh in particular. Still, he left the conversation with the promise that they would play again that night, as friends, even if they could be no more than that.

But he spent all afternoon wondering about how he should deal with “the Jason problem”. Some truly desperate and violent thoughts came into his head, but it was clear to him that he needed to find a solution that exercised his intellect and his skills. It was all he had, as Madison was right – even in real life Josh was larger and stronger than him.

He decided that the answer was to lure Josh away from Madison even before they got together. He knew that Josh, far from being the man Madison thought she was, played another Gangbuster MORPG – “Amazon Island”. This was a game targeted more at women but Josh played it as one of the few male characters, probably just for the opportunity to mix with the virtual semi-naked babes. Logan’s plan was to become one of those female characters and get friendly with Josh, then collect evidence of his true character.

It required a new VPN, address and game logon with no connection to Logan, and a new identity – Alyssa Harrison, online name “Lys”. He ran an analysis of the type of women that Josh liked to approach so he combined all those features in his avatar – a voluptuous green-eyed blonde more often with a sneer than a smile. This new girl suddenly appeared and approached Josh’s character “Jayvar”.

She could speak too. Lys found a voice simulator, but found that he could quite well by using his voice with some pitch alteration, so that there was no time lag and yet the sound was feminine and nothing like his own voice.

Initially Jayvar seemed impervious to Lys’s charms, but Logan knew this game as well as “Towers of Taiko” at least from the technical side. He could show Josh some cheats and before long they were playing partners on “Amazons” and Logan was neglecting “Towers”.

To his surprise just as Jayvar was becoming increasingly attracted to Lys, Logan found himself warming to Josh. Like him, Josh was quiet at work and secretive of his private life (such as it was) but he had a quirky sense of humor that seemed to match Logan’s, and a sensitivity that was touching. Logan found himself enjoying Josh as a partner in gaming more than Madison.

But he never really liked “Amazons”. He always preferred “Towers”. So, Lys persuaded Jayvar to move to the other game, and to join the beta testing of the immersive bracelets. From there, things started to become very strange.

Josh seemed to take to this new game like a natural and he was far more aggressive in his approach. Within only a week or so, Jayvar was taking the lead and Lys was following, pointing out from experience he various traps and obstructions in the game. For Lys this suddenly seemed to be the more appropriate role. She was not the sneering amazon anymore – she was the adoring companion of the masterful but inexperienced but slightly reckless Jayvar, an exciting newcomer to the game. They combined well in this pattern – it was a perfect pairing of daring and understanding.

They were advancing well through the game – further than Logan had ever been, but he knew that the game had many more levels to go. The game had only been finished by a handful, and for those a special bonus had been developed that required them to go right back to the beginning and find secrets that only a “first round winner” could access. Logan was busy writing code to keep ahead of those, but in his working hours. It seemed like all other hours, except for sleeping where y=he could, were spent in the game – living it.

Fatigue may have been the cause of what happened. Jayvar was leading the way as usual - his armor had grown extensively by taking hits and recovering. Lys could handle a little combat but in this late conflict when both were tired, Lys became the target and Jayvar turned his back to protect her.

It was a Level 8 injury. They were forced to retreat, with Jayvar still taking the majority of the blows until they found shelter on a lower level. This was serious and they both felt it. The immersive bracelet on Josh’s wrist was sending out its signals, and both he and his avatar were grimacing from the pain.

“Take off the bracelet, said Lys to her partner.

“No, Lys. This is the price of bad practice fronting the enemy,” he said.

“But I am felling it too,” said Lys, and strangely, she could. She was desperately pulling together the right prizes from her virtual sack and drawing from her acquired abilities, to cure her partner.

Their hiding place was cramped, but they could both be concealed if they stayed close. It was the first time that they had touched each other’s skins in this world of theirs, and it was strangely real. Lys’s efforts were working. Jayvar’s health was rising, and the pain abating.

“You shouldn’t have turned your back to protect me,” said Lys. “I would have survived. But thank you.”

It just seemed such a natural thing to do in that small hiding place, with the understanding that the danger had passed through what they had done together. It was a small kiss from Lys’s tiny Cupid’s bow lips, returned with passion by Jayvar.

Lys pulled back, in surprise more than anything, a look that converted to the avatar with total accuracy.

“Lys, I had to turn for you,” said Jayvar. “Don’t you understand, game or not, I am falling for you. I am falling for you hard and deep.”

There was a sensation in Lys driven by the last three words. It spoke to organs she did not truly possess, as if screaming out for him – hard and deep.”

“We need to save and finish,” said Lys. “I don’t know about you, but I was shaken by that. We nearly lost the game. Check in with me tomorrow, at the usual time …”. And she was got – exited without any further exchange.

Logan looked at himself in the mirror. He had been crying. He thought it was only her, but it was him. He looked different, he decided. The game was getting to him. Or Lys was getting to him. He looked feminine. He looked soft anyway, and he had not had a haircut for months. It was almost like he was turning into her. That feminine voice now came so naturally that he had answered his own phone in that voice a couple of days before. He had needed to say to the caller – “Oh, you want Logan. I picked up his phone by mistake. I’ll just hand it to him.”

But this could not be so easily dealt with. He was tired but could barely sleep that night thinking of how he was going to deal with what had happened.

The next day Logan called in to work from home. While Gangbuster Games Inc. adopted a policy of “collegiality” the company easily allowed work from home for workers like Logan based on computer login time and work output being maintained. In the case of Logan that would always be at higher levels than average.

The thing is that Logan had been dreaming of Josh when he did sleep, and they were not Logan’s dreams – they were Lys’s. They were a girl dreaming about a boy. Logan had woken up in a cold sweat.

Logan wondered about not joining the game that night, “at the usual time”, but he decided that he would need to find the courage to explain things to Josh. He wrote code and he understood that the best code was direct, and that patches and excuses were bad code and slowed processes and made product bad. He logged on, and Lys re-emerged almost automatically.

Jayvar was waiting for her, in full armor and with his weapons ready. He spoke before she even had a chance – “I’m sorry if I came on a bit strong last night, Lys,” he said. “I know this is only a game, but you are so real to me that I cannot imagine my life without you in it somehow.”

If Lys had thought about the whole truth that now seemed a cruel move. Could he be let down gently somehow?

“You didn’t upset me, Jay,” she said. “I suppose that I was just not ready for all that the bracelets could do. From pain one minute to extreme pleasure. I just had no idea…”.

But now he was up close to her again, and his arms were free of tools and around her waist, and he was looking into her eyes, and she was … swooning – the first time but she knew what it was.

“I felt the same way,” he said. “But surely these feelings are not mechanical simulations. We are humans. We can feel love, and they say love happens against all odds.”’

“Please don’t use the word love, Jay,” she said. “There’s something you need to know about me in real life, something that would make you not love me, and not even like me, it is …”.

“I don’t care about anything like that,” he interrupted. “You are the most wonderful person in the world that matters to me most – the one with you in it. I want us to be together in life too, but until that day I want to commit myself to you, if you will commit yourself to me. Let’s get married, you and me, in the game.”

“I don’t think that is possible,” she said. “But if it was …”.

Jayvar’s lips had smothered the words of Lys again. The embrace was real and so was the passion, felt in every square inch of their flesh, and not just the wrist. It seemed that he was right. These feelings were not generated by the game, and how could the feeling of his arms around her and his lips on hers and his hot breath on his face be generated by a wristband?

“If we want to get married then I suppose it is just a question of writing the code,” she said.

“I will ask my friend Logan Birch to do that,” said Jay.

Hearing that name made that third person sound so distant and unimportant that he barely registered. She was Alyssa – Lys. Who was Logan Birch but an empty shell – an exoskeleton cast aside to allow the living creature to fly free.

So, when Josh approached Logan in the morning to ask a favor, an idea for the improvement of the game, a request from a regular player who also happened to be an employee of Gangbuster Games Inc., Logan had to say yes.

And until the day that his other person said yes, their nightly game sessions became even more exciting, with the adventure tinged with romance, and their teamwork peppered with glances and humorous asides, and moments with steamy caresses. As a symbol of their commitment, the game now allowed for not just charms to be worn on the hands, but a plain gold band bearing the two linked T’s for those married in the game

Logan needed help with the art to decorate the wedding grotto and a mage was imbued with the authority to officiate at weddings in this virtual world, and it was done, with many gamers known to both Jayvar and Lys being witnesses.

One of them observed – “How will the nuptials be consummated then?”

“We will need to meet in real life for that,” said Jay. “But I am hoping that will be soon.”

One of the witnesses looking on was “MadGirl” – the avatar for their co-worker Madison Delaney. While she continued to work with both Logan Birch and Josh Lever, she had noticed that Logan had pulled out of the game completely and Josh was not so obsessed by this girl Lys that he had married her in the game. She was intent on finding out who this Lys was and she was well equipped to do that.

She was aware that Lys showed some knowledge of the inner workings of the game, so while she could not rule out a skilled outsider it seemed as if this “new girl” could work for Gangbuster. She had looked hard at all the women in the building, but it was only after she found herself sitting an watching Logan at his desk that it hit her – since when had Logan Birch been adopting feminine gestures? When she examined the timing of everything it seemed to make sense even if it sounded crazy.

“I know your secret,” she said. She had pulled Logan aside and was ready to put it to him. “You are Lys in Towers of Taiko, and you and Josh are married to one another! How weird is that?”

“He doesn’t know!” Logan was in a state of panic. Somehow it seemed that his off work life of passion and happiness was bound to end, but surely not like this? “Please give me a chance to explain it to him before you say anything.”

But how do you break a man’s heart and break your own at the same time? It is not something easily done. It would require the courage of Jayvar, and neither Lys nor Logan had that courage.

Logan sought leave and it was granted.

Madison would have told Josh had it not been for the fact that the disappearance of Lys had hit him hard. So hard in fact that he barely noticed the absence of Logan Birch. The employee he was closest to at Gangbusters was Madison Delaney, somebody he had been socially neglecting of late. But It was she who he went for comfort, pouriung out his heart about the woman that he had fallen for but who had now disappeared completely.

“She did warn me that I would not like the person she was in real life, Maddy, but I am just hurting so bad that she has gone.”

Madison did not have the heart to tell Josh what she knew, initially putting it off until he had shook off the funk of rejection – except, that never happened. Josh still hoped that he might here from the woman he had never even met in the flesh

It was months later when Alyssa Logan applied for a job with Gangbuster Games Inc.. She had an impressive Github status. That is the record of code and code remediation by individuals known only by their access name. It is a record of successes that is available on the web for employers to assess skill. Hers was impressive, and Gangbuster had need of a coder of that caliber following the recent resignation of Logan Birch.

Josh had his head in his screen where it stayed during his sad days. He had not even noticed her arrival until she was standing in front of him. When he looked up, he knew immediately that it was her.

“Alyssa, this is Josh Lever,” somebody said, but their eyes had already met.

“We have already met, but in another place.” It was her voice. And then she raised her hand and there was the plain gold band bearing the two linked T’s. “In fact, we’re married.”

Josh could not get out from his desk fast enough. He wanted to hold her and kiss her and never let her go, and the whole floor stood to watch in amazement.

“Where have you been, Lys,” he said. “My heart has been aching all this time.”

“Making myself into the woman you need me to be,” she said.

“I don’t care what you are, so long as you are real, and so long as you are with me,” he said.

The End

Author's Note:
This is a story from my latest anthology "Love Bytes" (17 stories on a theme of the internet, cyber gaming, social media etc.) published on Books2Read, Amazon, Amazon Kindle, Apple, Kobo, Everand, Thalia, Smashwords, Angus and Robertson, Vivlio, Palace Marketplace and Fable.
A link to Amazon is https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0FQGJ41XC.