* * * * *

A few hours later, the two were still walking through the woods. As ever, the sky was black, but the odd shadows under the trees and the creepy repetitive music didn’t frighten Hyuk as much as they used to. With his muscles and the extra weight of his gun-arm, Ravi couldn’t walk very fast, which gave Hyuk time to try and get some answers.

“Hey Ravi. Can I pause this game sometimes? Is there a pause button?”

Ravi just stared at him blankly.

“Okay… How about a quit button?” suggested Hyuk. “Or an exit? Is there an exit? And what do I have to do to get to it?”

The boy with the gun-arm just walked beside him in silence.

“Do you hear the music playing?” Hyuk asked, suddenly curious. “Like, right now. A really creepy tune. It goes like bam, ba-bam, ba-bam…”

“You’re a weird kid, you know that?”

That hit something within Hyuk. In his game room, Hyuk was a cool kid whose high scores were second only to Changmin’s. But at home, at school - or anywhere else for that matter - Hyuk was just a weirdo, a game-freak, an outcast.

“Sorry,” muttered Ravi. “Didn’t intend to wake them bad memories.”

“It’s okay,” replied Hyuk. After all, the kids at the game room liked him. Even Kyuhyun wasn’t really his enemy. And now, Hyuk seemed to have gained a new friend.

Walking through the woods, Hyuk watched Ravi out of the corner of his eye. During the past hours, he had learned a little bit about the boy – that he was a little awkward, and that he was not exactly the smartest person ever. But he seemed nice enough, and his laugh was – there’s no other word for it –cute.

But was he a game character? Or was he, like Hyuk, a person who had pushed the wrong button on a machine, and got into this strange game?

Shaking his head, Hyuk tried to shake away that thought as well. Right now, he had more urgent issues. He decided to change the subject.

“So, uh, who is this princess Hakyeon everyone’s talking about?”

Suddenly, Ravi stopped in his tracks. His smile was a little strange – half-amused, half-confused, as though he was sure Hyuk was messing around, but couldn’t quite get the joke.

“Who is princess Hakyeon?” repeated Ravi, still smiling. “I admit, kid, I don’t know that one. So, what’s the answer?”

“I’m not joking!” said Hyuk, but Ravi wouldn’t stop grinning. “Really! I have no idea who this forehead princess is!”

Smile falling of his face, Ravi stared at him incredulously. Hyuk suddenly wished he hadn’t said anything.

“Okay,” said Ravi, eyes boring into Hyuk as though he was an especially difficult puzzle. “Well,” started Ravi, taking a sideways glance at Hyuk, “Hakyeon is, like, our princess. The only child of the king and the queen.”

“Yeah.”

“And she’s, well, in danger.”

“I know that, too. The tutorial dude told me.”

“… Say what, kid?”

“Never mind.”

“Okay, well, she’s beautiful. Like, really beautiful. Like a goddess or something.”

“Yeah, I kinda figured – wait a second!”

Hyuk suddenly halted, staring at Ravi, who had a strange mischievous smile playing on his lips.

“Did you, like... make out with her or what?!” asked Hyuk, bewildered. What kind of game was this?

Ravi only continued to grin at the sky above, hands behind his head.

“Yah, I know you can hear me! Did you hook up with the freakin princess?!”

Still refusing to answer, Ravi started whistling, face practically shining with pride. Finally, he cleared his throat.

“Ahem. I may or may not have – accidentally – stumbled into her chambers once or twice.”

“And tripped over your feet and fell into her bed?” suggested Hyuk, now laughing himself.

“Yeah, something like that.” admitted Ravi, grinning like an idiot. “It was amazing.”

The woods were still and quiet while the two continued their journey, but the silence was no longer awkward. “She has the most beautiful forehead I’ve even seen.” confessed Ravi, whispering. “Tall and shiny like the moon.” His eyes were dreamy.

“Sounds like you truly love her.”

“Y-yeah. I do.” A splash of red appeared on Ravi’s cheeks, almost as red as his hair. “More than anything.”

It was a few minutes (or hours? In this place, it was hard to be sure) before Hyuk remembered his Chopper doll.

“Oh, I almost forgot! Do you know what this is?”

Reluctantly, Ravi took the plushie. He looked almost comical, tall and muscular as he was, holding a plushie in his huge hands. “Uh, a toy? I used to have a similar one when I was a kid.”

“It’s supposed to have powers – huh?!”

At the word “powers”, Ravi’s face suddenly contracted into an expression of pure terror. He threw the doll back at Hyuk as though it was about to explode.

“Ravi, look, it doesn’t do anything,” reassured Hyuk, lightly squeezing Chopper. It was incredibly difficult to comprehend that Ravi, the boy with the gun-arm, the coolest dude Hyuk had ever seen, was afraid of a plushie. “No matter what I do, nothing happens. That’s why I asked you.”

It took a while for Ravi to speak.

“As for me, that thing is just a toy.” He threw a suspicious glance at it. “But when I think of them wizards… A guy can never be sure a thing is safe. They could’ve done something with it, I guess.”

“Apparently, I’m supposed to use it as some kind of weapon…” muttered Hyuk, disappointed. His only hope was now all but shattered. “Unless I misunderstood something?”

“I dunno,” said Ravi, “but I wouldn’t mess with it.”

“Why?”

Ravi lifted his gun, checking the gears at his elbow. “I don’t like magic,” he confessed, fiddling with his gun-arm. “Swords and guns I can handle. I can even fix up a poison for ya. But magic…” He frowned deeply. “That thing is weird.” But then, his expression brightened, and he let out a small chuckle. “Even weirder than you.”

Quickly, Hyuk picked up a stray branch off the ground (which was nothing more than a few brown pixels) and flung it in Ravi’s direction. Laughing, Ravi swat it away with ease using his gun-arm.

“Kid, ya know ya don’t have a chance against me,” he chuckled.

“But I get points for trying, right?”

“Yeah.” said Ravi. “Guess ya do.”

There was a fond gleam in his eyes, a gleam that shone brightly through the night.

At long last, the village was in sight. A few brick-red rooftops poked their heads behind a gentle hill.

Perhaps it was wishful thinking, but Hyuk thought he saw a thin trail of smoke coming from one of the rooftops. Hyuk wasn’t cold – during the entire time he’d been inside this game, Hyuk hadn’t felt either coldness or warmth. But rather, it was the feeling of being at home that Hyuk missed, a feeling most strongly felt in front of a fireplace.

“This place, it’s my hometown,” said Ravi, eyes distant.

“So I better not say anything bad about it, right?” mocked Hyuk, grinning.

At that, Ravi couldn’t help but to smile too. “Yup, don’t mock it. It’s ma turf.”

“Got it.” said Hyuk, as they conquered the last of the hill and entered the small village.

As it turned out, the place wasn’t much more than a few houses scattered around the neighbouring hills, with most of them clustered in the shallow valley in the middle. Just like everything else, the houses were made of blurry blocks, brown and green and vibrant yellow, with a red rooftop each.

Just like Hyuk had seen from afar, a steady line of smoke was coming out of the biggest house in the village.

“That’s the inn, kid,” said Ravi. “Rent a room there, but tell them I sent ya. Sometimes they give ty rooms if they don’t know ya.” About to leave, Ravi suddenly remembered another thing. His eyes grew wide. “Right, where are you from, anyways? I mean, after you get some rest and stuff, will ya be able to find your village from here?”

Hyuk prayed to all the gods he’d ever heard of that his face didn’t show how uncomfortable he was. Something was telling him not to tell Ravi anything about how he had once pressed the wrong button on a machine and ended up in this world. Because, if Ravi was truly just a game character, how would he react to the fact that his whole existence was just a few lines of programming code?

That thought opened more questions than Hyuk could deal with – and each of them more disturbing than the last. A change of subject was needed, and fast.

“I, uh… I’m sorry for all the trouble I’ve caused you.” stuttered Hyuk the first thing that came to his mind. It wasn’t a lie, though. “I mean, you didn’t say anything about it, but you stopped your search for that forehead princess to help me, didn’t you?” continued Hyuk. “So, thank you. Really.”

To his relief, Ravi didn’t notice the hint of panic in Hyuk’s voice. For once, Hyuk was thankful that Ravi wasn’t all that smart.

“Hey, no problem, kid.” He threw a hand over Hyuk’s shoulders, grinning. “Just don’t start crying again, ‘kay?”

Pretending to be angry, he pushed Ravi away, only to earn a laugh from him.

“I’m gonna be at ma house, in case you need anything.” said Ravi. “It’s right at the end of that street. Big, ugly, yellow thing, you can’t miss it.” He pointed to their left, where a cobblestone path twisted and turned between houses, ascending right to the top of the hill.

“See ya ‘round!” said Ravi, winking. Without further ado, he disappeared into the narrow street.

* * * * *