Days at the Arcade

Chapter 5: Into the Simulation (Bibi)

Tell me. What was I supposed to think when I was asked "if I've been slightly compressed before?", or that "I'll be getting barf bags when we arrive there,"? What was I supposed to do? There was nothing left, absolutely nothing left, the second I stepped into the chamber.

I mean I just came into this thinking I was gonna play video games, not be warped in one of Jessie. Was that really too much to ask for?

Either way, I've already lost track of everything she said since the 'barf bags' comment. When recalling the advice she gave, all I could remember was 'Don't excrete bodily waste', the rest of what she blabbered drawing up nothing but blanks. My mind started panicking overtime, eyes darting everywhere and pools of sweat beginning to pile on my forehead. It felt like that moment in horror films, where the main character falls down the trapdoor and is sitting in the electric chair, praying that their brains aren't gonna be fried into burger patties by whatever kook was behind it all.

Here, Jessie was that mad kook, stuffing me into a tube, to be turned into a mish mash of pixels.

The only reason I hesitated before stepping out: I remember my eyes quickly locking on at Tara for a moment and how much calmer she seemed at the time, her arms and back straight and prepared for the worse. That glance, that one look to see how she was reacting, kept me standing in the chamber.

If she could do it, then so could I. Not complicated reasoning.

I still didn't get much time before the bottom and the top clamped together like a meat grinder, starting the journey. The process started instantly, being a mix of a hyper jump in a movie, being shrunk to the size of an ant, and getting stretched and chewed like gum all at the same time. It was a disorienting experience that was only that way because it wasn't any experience you've felt before. It was painful, but at the same time wasn't because your body didn't really seem to exist for most of it. It's like a stage of limbo, or what would be the process of getting into that state.

For all I know I could've just discovered what it feels like to get eaten by a black hole or what it feels like to be Neo when he got sent out of the matrix. I couldn't be sure.

Unlike Neo though I didn't recover too well from the entry. True to Jessie's word, as soon as we warped in, all of my body parts snapped together like a rubber band and started to seize up simultaneously.

The second I could, I immediately bent down on all fours to throw up, upchucking breakfast, lunch, and possibly a few vital organs. All of my limbs screamed and my head was being pounded by a sledgehammer.

I kneeled there for quite some time, blowing out whatever was left. I prayed that Tara had the same reaction, lest I look like a moron. She had to have. Nobody I knew could possibly survive that without puking at least three times. It was like the 100 foot drop rollercoaster except all barf and no ride.

When I finally retched everything to where my throat was scraping the bottom of my stomach, I managed to stop, my lips wet and green. My head swayed heavily, a ship in a sea full of lights and colors. What was left of my shrivel of insides felt like strained noodles. My only condolence was the fact that my limbs seemed fine, still sore but miraculously uninjured. I stayed there kneeled to the ground, filling myself up with a putrid-tasting regret. Regretting stepping into the arcade, regretting getting Jessie's message, and regretting ever going inside the damn machine.

"Mmh," Tara mumbled as she stood above me, annoyed. She was getting impatient. I knew. That didn't mean I cared.

"Yeah, just *swallow* Give me a sec." I wiped my lips and stood up to look at her with her crossed arms. She held her tarot cards, the entire deck clutched in her right hand.