Gloomy Gaming (closed)

It was a gloomy Saturday, like most November Saturdays, and like always, he was procrastinating doing any form of homework. He'd originally come to the land of books and boredom to find a novel for research, but the secluded area with the T.V. and Xbox had tugged at his mind, eventually pulling him in.

So, sitting in the back corner of the school's library on a giant beanbag, Jake had an Xbox controller in hand, furiously moving the directional sticks under his thumbs back and forth in attempt to dodge bullets. Having been playing this some version of Halo for the past hour or so, the Autumn had gotten himself stuck in quite the predicament. In the last stage, his character infiltrated the alien base and placed explosives in it, which of course made it blow of. Now, the surprisingly large amount of surviving aliens were chasing after him; out for blood. 'I knew I should've played multiplayer on this,' he thought to himself before smacking the little joystick to the left, just barely dodging a missile that'd been shot at him.

"Come on..." he mumbled through clenched teeth, body tense, and practically about to leap out of his seat from anxiety. Several nearby students had gathered around, watching with wide eyes and sometimes gasping as he skirted around death itself. Though he was focused on the game, he couldn't help but overhear that no one had ever made it as far as he had in such little time, which made Jake smirk. It felt good to be a winner, even if it was just a video game.

"Game Over."

Large words covered the blood-red screen as his character was suddenly shot and fell limp. The camera flew up into the air and showed the huge hoard of aliens that'd been chasing behind him before the score screen popped up, his on the top of the other player's names.

"Damn," was all Jake said and leaned back into the beanbag, finally able to relax. Disappointed sighs and mumbles sounded from behind him, and he listened as the crowd of curious students disappeared. Well, he'd broken a new high score, so not all of it was in vain.

Letting out a sigh, the tall student sat up and clicked the 'home' button on the controller. Pressing a few buttons and moving across the screen this way and that, he arrived at the 'my games' folder. Shuffling around between several games, most of which were shooter games, he aimlessly looked through the choices, not yet ready to get on his homework.

She wasn't the only one procrastinating that evening, it seemed.

Ishiko wandered into the back of the library, a manga or two recently checked out and held safely between her hands. Once she'd noticed a rather frustrated young man attending to the school's xbox, she'd made the quick decision to sneak up behind him, a kind smile in tow. Whoever he was, he'd seemed to have gathered a bit of a crowd, although most had managed to float elsewhere as he'd begun to ponder what game to play next. "Pardon me," she called, tapping the stranger on the shoulder...

He'd had rather broad shoulders, she'd noted quietly. In fact, standing next to him, she'd felt abnormally smaller than usual. It intrigued her. "Is there room for another player?"

Flipping through a variety of games that were already downloaded on the station, the sound of a girl's voice caught his attention and he turned around in the beanbag to see a small Japanese student standing over him, a smile on her face. So she wanted to join in, eh? He usually wasn't a big fan of split-screen playing, but when when the second player was someone as cute as her, he couldn't possibly say no.

"Of course," the husky voiced student replied and scooted over on the giant puffy chair to make room for her. Flipping the joystick back over so that the screen landed on Halo, he pressed X. Leaning forward, he grabbed another controller for the girl and handed it to her as she sat down. So, you a fan of Halo?" he asked with a smile on his face, a brow raised teasingly.

His voice was far deeper than she was expecting. A smile touched again at the corner of her lips as she cozied herself into the plush cushion, her leg brushing up against his. "I might have played once or twice," she mused, her voice lilting. As she took the controller from him, she fiddled with a few of the buttons. An innocent giggle escaped her.

He had no idea what kind of storm was coming.

"Take it easy on me."

Pressing some buttons and navigating his way to the game's home screen, Jake set up the game to be two players and after the two of them customized their characters, the battle began. The Autumn had set it up so the two of them were on the same team with a few other online people, and the opposing team, blue, was made of more random players.

"My name's Jake by the way," he spoke, his gaze still focused on the screen in front of him. "I haven't seen you around much," the tall student pointed out as the two of their characters ran through a maze of buildings towards the first checkpoint that they were supposed to destroy.

While she'd put on a kind enough smile for him, her eyes remained focused on the screen, scanning away for any reason to pull her finger on the trigger - literally. Whoever had jumped into the game against them had no idea what they would be going up against. "Ishiko," the summer answered in a sweet voice. "It's nice to meet you. I have just recently moved here from the western coast, so that isn't a surprise." She peered into closer, leaning up against him. "Have you been here long? I still don't know my way around."

OOC: apologies for the wait ;;

Both focused on the game, Jake had to pry his eyes away from the screen, and the feeling of her leaning against his side sent a chill up his spine. "I guess you could say I've been here for a while," the tall student replied. "And yeah, it's a pretty widespread area, so I could show you around sometime," he added, a smile growing on his face. Before he could say anything else, the second round started and Jake quickly snapped his attention back to the screen.