Chapter Text
Avery stared at his screen, the game had crashed after D3rLord3 pushed him of the platform and the glimpse of the link in the chat was no use when he couldn't boot up the game again. This can't be the end, another double click on the game icon, come on, boot up.
Error message.
Again.
Screw this, it wasn't working. There had to be some way to force the game open, he might be not as smart as Derek, but he had google at his disposal, at least opening the browser worked. Searching for a solution didn't take long, thank you reddit. Open task manager, kill the stuck processes, easy. Find the games files next, couldn't be that hard. He hadn't had the time to sort through the old files on the Laptop since he got it from that storage locker, so he had all his files in a separate folder.
The game had to be in one of the old ones, only one way forward, opening each folder by hand. Man there were a lot of them, and each filled too, how long did Derek own this thing? Most of it looked like college work, there had to be a faster way to sort through this, but Avery didn't have the patience to figure it out, another useless folder, back to the start god damnit.
Next one was different, filled with plain text files each one filled with words just looking at the data they took up. Journals. One for each week going till a few months before he got the laptop. Should he open them? That felt like a violation of privacy and what good would it do, all of them were from before D3rLord3 first booted up that world what information could he gain? Scrolling through, the oldest file was different, named "if lost", weird.
He opened it, no errors thank god, "If Laptop is lost please return to Derek ######## at #########" oh. OH. That wasn't far from here right? Google back open, Avery dropped the address into Maps, 20 minutes. Easy.
If he can't figure out how to open the game to find Derek, than he was going to do it in the real world, where neither D3rLord3 nor the King could stop him. Stupid game, he was done playing by it's rules, he wasn't as smart at Minecraft as Derek, yet he did know how to drive a car and drive a car he would.
Transferring the address to his phone and shutting down the laptop to stuff it in his bag he was out the door. Derek would know how to boot up the game if they need to, better save than sorry and take it with him, pulling out of the parking lot and onto the road he finally had time to think. 20 minutes to think about what he would find when he arrived. Derek couldn't truly be dead right? He wouldn't have gone through with it right? Was Derek even real? Maybe he was dreaming all of this. What a sucky dream that would be.
No matter, this was real till he found that place and Derek wasn't there, or dead. He refused to believe his friend was really dead, he was so smart he had to have found a better way to defeat the King than dying. Screw that car in front of him, driving at snails pace, he had a friend to safe! The asshole even had the gal to honk when he passed him, sucks to suck. The honk got drowned out in the fireworks anyways. He had almost forgotten it was new years in all the chaos.
Pulling into an Parking lot was easy enough, not many people around away for parties in nicer areas he presumed. No wonder nobody noticed Derek not leaving his place for who knows how long, the building looked abandoned as is just as the street around it. A couple stumbled out of the apartment buildings door while Avery locked his car, now or never.
He ran to the door jamming his foot in the crack just in time, finally some luck, he would have hated to figure out another way in. A quick check that he was actually in the right building, yeah the doorbells had Dereks last name, good, okay. Avery took a deep breath, this was it, keep going forward.
The couple didn't even notice him, both clearly tipsy, the music blaring up ahead made it easy to tell why, seems there was a new years eves party here after all. When was the last time he had been to one of those? Despite the music the inside of the building wasn't much better than the outside. The atmosphere was gloomy, just like the world behind the second door. Icky. But this wasn't Minecraft, no lamps to suddenly go out, just him and an address.
Up the stairs there was his friend waiting.
Alive.
He had to be alive.
He wouldn't accept another outcome.
This was much more important than any stupid new years celebration.
Ascending the stairs the situation became more and more real, he wondered what Derek would look like, his Minecraft skin didnt give a lot of clues, he doubted he would be wearing an gladiator helmet in real life. Not that he was any better, yet he was wearing a Hawaiian shirt and kakis, better that nothing to make Derek believe he was the real deal. Maybe he should have grabbed a jacket, too late now he supposed.
Would Derek even remember him? He wasn't sure Avery would remember so what if he doesn't instead? Doesn't matter, his friend was helpless, unable to look away from a screen, he had to at least make sure he wouldn't starve to death... and that he would eat something different than smoothies, that had to get stale fast.
Up and up he went, till he stood before the door he was looking for and another problem presented himself, how was he going to get into the apartment? He couldn't just break the wall like in game, fuck he didn't think this through. Just ringing the doorbell wouldn't do it either, Derek couldn't get up to let him in after all.
Guess he would have to brute force it after all, let's hope the music muffled the noise he was about to make. Dropping his bag he moved to the door.
CRACK.
Ouch.
Going to the gym had been worth it, but shoulder checking a door still hurt like hell. No matter. He had to get in. Throwing his weight against the door again had it creaking concerningly, but it still wasn't open.
One more time.
The door swung open with a bang, he was in, finally! Scooping his bag back up he ran inside swinging the door close behind him. He didn't want an audience to whatever he was about to find.
It wasn't hard to find Derek's room, the apartment was smaller than he imagined. Derek's eyes were still glued to the screen "Derek?" Avery called out his name, no reaction. Maybe the being unable to look away extended to speech? Hearing? He approached, "can you hear me?" the game was still running on the screen. Nothing but the platform remaining. No eyes, no King, just a few blocks, and D3rLord3s avatar.
Okay. He had to work with what he had. Pulse, he had to check the pulse right? He could do that. "Hey Der, imma touch you okay? Don't be scared, it's just me Avery." He carefully jammed his fingers against Derek's pulse point, just under his chin " you remember Avery right?"
A heartbeat but no response. Creepy. Could he not even feel things happening outside the game anymore? A blink! Derek blinked, he was alive, he was very alive. Just unresponsive. Avery let out a breath, he was alive, that's something.
Checking out the rest of the room let to nothing exiting, just a normal room, very dusty and definitely not lived in by the person in it, but otherwise normal. The fridge under the Table was nearly empty but a few smoothies remained, Derek must really like them to have so many stocked. Avery would have to refill it if he couldn't figure out how to wake Derek up in time, but he could worry about that later.
How could he wake Derek up? He was usually the one with all the answers, but even if he had them there seemed no way to communicate with him. His avatar was also dormant, Derek's hands just resting on the keyboard and mouse. What if he shut down the game? No he couldn't risk it, what if that made everything worse?
Still the game had to be the key, it had been every time, trying to boot it up on his laptop didn't work, yet here it was open for him, he hoped Derek wouldn't mind if he borrowed his account for a second.
Commandeering the mouse and keyboard from Derek's hands he started to look around, for a second at least. Derek's hands flew back to the Keyboard hitting enter. Avery flinched away, what the fuck.
A chat message from D3rLord3 appeared in chat, damn Derek types fast;
D3rLord3 - why am I moving? -
D3rLord3 - what is happening? -
D3rLord3 - I killed you what's going on?? -
D3rLord3 was running around frantically hitting F5 for a different perspective, looking for something, anything, Avery watched for a second before hitting enter on the keyboard himself where Dereks hand had moved away to use the mouse. Derek froze, yeah this must seem scary when you are unaware of the other person in the room.
Moving Dereks hand away was harder this time, but he needed that A to explain what was going on, and it wasn't like Der had a lot of muscle on him;
D3rLord3 - Derek it's me -
D3rLord3 - Avery -
D3rLord3 - I am here don't worry you're safe -
Avery moved away again to let Derek answer;
D3rLord3 - Avery? -
D3rLord3 - You were supposed to log off! -
D3rLord3 - Where are you? -
D3rLord3 - Why are you typing with my name? -
Derek seemed to at least have caught on that Avery could only answer when he wasn't typing pulling away from the keyboard, he was the smart one after all;
D3rLord3 - I am not in the game Der -
D3rLord3 - I am standing right besides your desk -
D3rLord3 - Like in the real world -
D3rLord3 - I don't know why you can't hear me -
D3rLord3 - but I am here -
D3rLord3 - you're safe -
D3rLord3 - I promise -
A few second passed before Derek was sure Avery was done typing and he could reply;
D3rLord3 - How did you get into my apartment? -
D3rLord3 - How did you even find my address? -
D3rLord3 - Why did you come here? -
For all of Dereks smarts he really couldn't comprehend one thing and it was driving Avery mad;
D3rLord3 - Because I care Derek -
D3rLord3 - I promised I would find you and I did -
D3rLord3 - Now use your big brain to get out of the game -
D3rLord3 - You can worry about your apartment when you will actually use the damn thing -
This time Derek didn't answer right away just letting the curser blink in the chat window
While he waited Avery took a long look at his friend, he was skinny, unhealthily so, what only eating smoothies for months will do to a person. His hair was a mess too, unwashed and greasy, his clothes probably weren't better, god he stunk, the first thing they were gonna do when he was out of there was wash all that grime off.
The clicking of the keyboard redirected Avery attention, finally and answer;
D3rLord3 - I will try to think of something -
D3rLord3 - But I don't know if we can do anything -
D3rLord3 - I am good at Minecraft puzzles Avery -
D3rLord3 - I don't know if I can solve this -
Derek stopped typing again so Avery took the Keyboard;
D3rLord3 - We will figure something out -
D3rLord3 - I will go and get us something to eat now okay? -
D3rLord3 - Don't be scared when I don't answer -
D3rLord3 - I will be back don't worry -
Avery waited a few minutes to see if Derek was going to answer again. Nothing. He let go of a sigh. Let's see what else this apartment had to offer in terms of food, hopefully there was something that wasn't already moldy, otherwise he would have to drive shopping and he would rather not leave Derek alone for too long.