Family Game Night
August/7th/2013
In my household we have a time during the week when we all come together as a family and enjoy ourselves, it was our family game night, and it usually took place on the second Wednesday or Thursday of the month. We did a lot of different things, board games, card games, even video games.
But, while most families would be enjoying the norm, game night for us changed quite a bit when mom remarried.
That being said, while I enjoy a good video game as much as the next gamer, things for us got real.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
...A little too real.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
We were currently getting shot at by a gang of filthy people in tribal looking clothes and armor, who at this point, were getting on my last nerve.
"I hate Raiders, I swear to God!" I shouted over the gun fire, back leaned up against a rusted and destroyed prewar car as bullets hit the side of it and flew overhead. I wasn't the only one here, next to me was my step-dad, grinning through all of it like the goofball he was, then again he did have a few screws loose.
"Oh, pooh. I guess taking that turn a few miles back was a bad idea after all," Discord said, tapping on the screen of the Pipboy 3000 he was wearing. It was just like the one I had on, but rather then it being black, it was bright orange. "I thought there wouldn't be anyone on this road ..should really get this thing looked at."
"Yeah ...yeah, you do that," I uttered. As much as I loved the annoying chaos lord, there was an equal amount of dislike to go along with it. "My mom's gonna be upset when she gets back her, you got her killed, again."
"Well, she was the one whole choose to play the game on realism mode." Discord shrugged. "And head shots get you killed, realistically speaking. Besides, if she is upset, we'll get to that bridge when we cross it," he said, starring at his Pipboy. "Maybe a little be sooner then I'd like, here she comes."
I looked down at my own Pipboy, and saw a yellow triangle coming towards us from the Southeast. It looked like she was gunning for us at the speed of an Olympic runner thanks to Fast travel, a few moments later, and we heard additional gun shots being fired.
"What the fuck, kill that crazy bitch!"
"Who the hell you calling a bitch, that's not very nice!" I heard mom yell. There were a few more gun shots, then she came tumbling over the hood of the car right between me and Discord, sending dusting flying up in my face. I coughed and waved the dust from in front of my face.
Discord grinned. "Welcome back, my dear, I must say that was faster then last time-," the chaos spirit began.
Mom interrupted him. "Cut the crap, Discord. Dying may not hurt, but it get's annoying having to run all the way back here from Goodsprings, under the hot sun, no less," she muttered, tugging on the collar of her shirt underneath her light armor. "Christ, it's hot out here." She sat up and leaned against the car; the gun shots had started up again, these guys couldn't be very smart, all they were doing was wasting ammo.
All of our clothes were pretty much different in game, we were a courier squad, but even so we didn't wear anything similar. Mom wore a pair of dirty blue jeans, with metal pads on the knees, a green T-shirt and over that, plain gray armor.
Discord had on a fancy prewar brown suit, and a bulletproof trench coat over it. How he made the coat bulletproof, I've yet to find out.
As for me, I had on an customized armor vault 22 jumper. Mom and Discord said I should wear something with a bit more protection, but I was just fine with it, besides it was comfy and snug.
"So, about our little problem with the Fiends. We still need to take out that sniper in the building if we want to get anything done," I reminded them, pointing my thumb towards on of the crumbling apartment complex on the other side of the car. "Any ideas?"
Mom gave a small smile, ejecting the empty magazine out the bottom of her nine-millimeter handgun, then adding another from her fanny pack. "We could shoot the asshole with a rocket, you still have it, don't you, Justin?"
"Yeah, but we don't have a launcher."
"We didn't have a launcher, you mean." Mom sat the handgun on her lap and starting flipping through her wine red Pipboy. She clicked a couple of buttons, then a rocket launcher appeared in front of her from a mass of green partials. Grabbing it out of the air, she held it with her finger near the trigger, a grin on her face. "If we use this baby, we'll be done our quest in no time."
"It's always a surprise with you, isn't it, Dominique," Discord said.
Mom nodded. "You know it, hon," she said, glancing over at him. "Don't think just because I re-spawned, you're off the hook, mister."
"I wouldn't dream of it," Discord uttered, offhandedly, pouting.
"Good. Now, sweetie, if you'd hand me that rocket you have, please."
I gave a nod and began scrolling through my Pipboy. When I finally found what I was looking for with all the other ammunition, I pressed the button in the bottom right corner of the device and a average rocket appeared the same way my mom's launcher had. I picked it up and held it out to her; she took it and inserted the rocket into the launcher, getting a click when it locked into place.
"Alright you two, here is what we're going to do," she started, holstering her nine-millimeter. "We've been in Fallout-verse for a good two days now, which means it's been a few hours at home," she turned to Discord for a moment. "It has only been a few hours, right?"
"Yep, almost three. I have been keeping track, ya know."
"So, we finish this up, get rid of the Fiends, and we should be back home to get John in the bed," Mom said. "But, first things first, we need to finish off the Fiends so we can get the holodisk from the dead body over there. What I want you two to do is cover me while I take out the guy in the building with the rocket launcher, then we start picking off the ones on the ground."
"Well, it's a better plan then mine. Looks like I get to use this after all," Discord smiled. He went through his Pipboy and what materialized in front of him was something you'd find in a old cartoon.
"Is that, a punch-gun, seriously," mom mused, raising an eyebrow.
The spirit of Disharmony nodded, excitedly. "Why yes it is, dear~! A little something new I crafted, and all without magic, mind you, I call it ''The Punch-Gun 2.0''."
There was more or less a rule mom came up with to make games fair for everyone, Discord was not allowed to use unnecessary magic. Mom was a true gamer, always had been since the Atari; even though she doesn't play video games as much anymore, when she did, she got serious, hell, she got farther then I did playing Skyrim and I started playing the game first.
Of course, my stepfather wasn't a slouch when it came to games either, but he joked around a lot.
"Um ...didn't using that last time get you hammered through a window by a Super Mutant, not to bring up bad memories, but still," I reminded him.
Discord shrugged it off. "Yes, but that was the last one, this one however is the next level up. You'll see," he said, before turning his attention to my mother. "Now, my dear, we will begin if you're ready."
Mom raised up the rocket launcher and held it over her left shoulder. "Never been more ready then I am now, babe! Let's get this started~!"
"Oh ho~ this is gonna be fun!" Discord turned around and aimed his punch-gun over the hood of the car, index finger on the trigger. He pulled, and the boxing glove at the end of the gun went flying out, a mini rocket booster in the back of it.
"Oh shit! Move-!"
Then an explosion happened, followed by yells in pain. I peaked out over the trunk of the prewar automobile, and whistled at just how much damage the weapon had done, there was a huge crater where at least three Fiends had been standing before; all that was left now was the smell of burning earth and blackened body parts.
"Ah ha ha ha~ now that's what I call a knock out," Discord laughed, hysterically.
"Nice job, hon." Mom stood up and aimed towards the apartment complex's rooftop. "Now for our friend, mister sniper!" She pulled the trigger and the rocket went shooting off. One explosion later, another red triangle on the Pipboy's HUD (heads-up display) disappeared. "I believe you can handle the left overs, Justin? Exp doesn't grow on trees."
I gave a nod, holstered my pistol, and brought out my Grenade Rifle. "You're not wrong about that, mom." I held it towards the wall where the last bit of Fiends were hiding behind as I leaped over the car, pulling the trigger. After this I'd be that much closer to level eighteen. "Here's Justin~!"
XxxxX
I brought the rifle barrel up to my lips and blew the smoke out of it. In front of me lay the bodies of the last two fiends that I'd needed to get rid of, completely blown to bits by the blasts of the grenades. I reloaded the rifle one last time, then slung it over my shoulder.
The body we had to retrieve the holodisk from was just a few feet away, and with mom and Discord checking the area for weapons and extra ammo, I decided to get it myself.
When I got close enough to the corpse, a small transparent menu appeared over it, asking if I wanted to search the body. I selected 'yes' and the inventory screen flashed open.
"Let's see, scrap metal, cigarettes. Nine-millimeter ammo, I'll be taking that," I pushed my finger on the item of choice, adding it to the rest of my stash, then began looking for the holodisk again. "Junk, junk, cherry bomb, empty Nuka-Cola bottle ...ah ha, holodisk!" I pressed on the item box and a grayish metal tape materialized into my hand.
I exited out of the menu, strolling over to the others with a smile on my face.
"I've got the holodisk!"
"Well done, Justin, though your shoot out with the Fiends was a wee bit sloppy," Discord comment.
I just sucked my teeth and shrugged. "Tch ...whatever, I got the job done, didn't I," I replied, waving the holodisk in the air. "If anything, you should let me use that punch gun sometime."
"I don't know, it took me quite a while to craft this," Discord said, thoughtfully. "We'll have to see, anyway, let's get back to the Crimson Caravan, Alice is probably still waiting for the stolen tape-." he was cut off when a small beeping noise started coming from his Pipboy. Lifting his arm up eye level, he gave a sigh. "Well, it appears that game time is over for now."
I gave a small groan. "Aw man, come on."
A small yellow circle flashed over our shoulder, showing me that the game was saving and overwriting everything that we had done up til this point, then Discord snapped his fingers.
There was a flash of white, then we were all standing in the living room in our normal house clothes. I looked over and for some reason, John was leaning over the back of the couch.
He looked up at us. "Hey, what gives, I was at the final boss," John whined.
"Sorry about that, kiddo, but times up. It's past eleven-thirty, that means it's time for bed," Discord said, in a somewhat fatherly tone.
John gave a groan, just like I had. "Oh man, this sucks and blows. Daaad, come on-."
"John, don't get ahead of yourself. Watch your mouth, young man," Mom said, sternly. Whenever she spoke in that tone, it was a sign that you'd better go back to your lain, and stay in it. "And no back talk, you hear?"
"Yes, ma'am," John uttered.
"Now go get ready for bed, and check on your brother, I'll be right up."
John nodded and didn't waste any time going up the steps; once he was up stairs, Discord turned to my mom and smiled. It wasn't one of the normal smiles either, it was one of those smiles he had when he had something planned.
"Dominique, I was planning on bring a friend over sometime next week for lunch," Discord said.
Mom put a hand on her hips. "A friend, huh, and you planned to tell me this, when?"
"Oh, you know me, I think of this stuff at the last minute."
"Discord," and there mom was using that tone again.
Discord sighed, letting his shoulders go limp as he gave a pout. "Alright, you caught me, I've been planing this for a while, I just didn't know when it was going to be," he said.
"It's fine with me. Who is this friend of yours, anyway," she asked.
"That's a surprise, my dear. She did help me help me with my ''reformation''," Discord said, using air quotes. "To be honest, I don't really think you can call me reformed just because I'm not trying to take over the world, but you know ponies, can live with em', can't turn their clouds into cotton candy either."
Mom smiled. "Well, you've got me interested, Discord. Anyone able to get you to shape up must be something," she said, strolling over to him and hugging on his arm. "Tell me more about her, what's her favorite food, I need to know what to make."
"Now, dear, it's a secret."
"You know, Mr. Discord, I do have other ways of making you talk."
Discord grinned. "If you insist on trying, who am I to stop you." He turned to me and waved. "Nighty, night, kiddo."
"Don't let the bed bugs bite, Justin," mom added with an equally wide grin.
"Uh ...yeah, good night." And then they were both gone in Discord's usual white flash, most likely to their bedroom. I tend not to think about it much, whatever they do is their business, and I'll be damned if I think about something like that.
Anyway ...so his friend was a pony, which meant she was from Equestria.
"Guess that means we're eating vegetarian for lunch," I uttered, throwing myself down on the couch. I wasn't really tired yet; so for the rest of the night, I watched TV until around one-fifteen, then I went to bed, wondering what rest of the week would have in store for me.