Meanwhile, back in the present, two bodies—our heroes—fell to the hard, hard earth.
“Please confirm your friendship,” a voice greeted in dulcet, lady-like tones.
Lord Chuckles looked up from the ground he’d just been dumped upon. No one was there. Well, Grebok was with him, but as good as he was with sound effects, he’d yet to perfect any lady-like tones.
“Do you ever get really tired of falling through stuff?” his companion grumbled. He stood himself up, and wiped some tar-like residue off of his pants.
“Please confirm your friendship,” the voice repeated.
It was the first Grebok heard it. He froze. His eyes scanned around suspiciously. “Confirm the what-now?”
“I don’t know. Some invisible lady,” Lord Chuckles said, answering a question he had not actually been asked.
Looking around, absolutely nothing caught the eye. A lot of pale blue lines seemed to outline shapes in the air and along the ground, but for no apparent purpose. A friendly sign in the distance announced: Welcome to Friendmonger dot com!
“Please confirm your friendship.” The invisible lady was real pushy.
Grebok looked around and shrugged. “What, with Chuckles here?” He waited for an answer. None came. “Yeah, he’s all right.”
An entirely inorganic noise announced that this was acceptable. “Thank you, and welcome to Friendmonger dot com,” the air lady said.
Then, nothing.
Lord Chuckles and Grebok both seemed to expect something more. Or anything at all.
“You know, not in a gay way,” Grebok broke the silence defensively.
Chuckles frowned over at his newly confirmed friend. “Yeah, I think they got that.” He continued to squint at his surroundings. Absolutely nothing had changed. When they were on that hill—before that fucking robot sent them here—everything changed by the second. Here? Stasis. “Besides, you’re into banging robot broads.”
The knightly portion of the duo seemed to think that was rather clever of him. Grebok visibly didn’t agree. Well, too bad for him, Chuckles figured. He proceeded to think of some pun or rhyme to needle the urban barbarian with next: Any airlock in a meteor-storm, eh? We all know you’re robosexual? Does she let you stick it in her exhaust port? Does she like it when you pull her harrier?
Unfortunately, the Avatar’s search for his next good-natured ribbing was interrupted by a shadowy figure approaching them. Well, approaching Grebok, anyway.
Grebok grumbled to himself about what was and wasn’t funny when he saw the same shadowy figure. It wasn’t the lanky and cowled type of shadowy, like Lord of the Lemmings; just a person in silhouette. The figure walked directly up to him. The Keykeeper turned to Chuckles, who shrugged, and back to the shadow. He clenched his fist and invited, “Make your move, shadow guy.”
“New friend request,” announced the lady voice.
This was quite jarring compared to the shadowy shadow-guy voice he expected. “Uh, what?”
“Lorgmor wants to be your friend.”
Grebok cocked his head to the side like a dog. “Lorgmor? Ensign Lorgmor? Lorgmor, son of Jornus? Yeah, I remember that guy. He stinks.”
“Friendship confirmed.”
“What? No, I—” The shadow guy became Lorgmor: shirtless—maybe at the beach—throwing a thumbs up.
Lord Chuckles stood by, rubbing his chin. “Well, that’s weird.”
Grebok took a step back. “Yeah, I don’t like that. This place sucks.”
“Lorgmor thinks you might be friends with: Akwa, Bindur, Kelv, Thanic, Fange, Trivist, and Steve,” the lady voice insisted.
Another step back bumped him into Chuckles.
“More spaceships you’ve had sex with?” the Avatar chided.
The situation was already creeping Grebok out, he didn’t need this shit. He spun on his companion. “Dude, this could be serious. Would you drop the R.T. thing?”
Lord Chuckles held his hand open in a show of good intention. “Yeah, man. Absolutely,” he lied.
“I mean, I know these people.” Grebok sounded haunted. “How does the air genie know that?”
“Friendships confirmed,” the genie in question affirmed.
“No, fuck no! Shit.” Grebok waved his arms wildly, hoping to land a lucky blow to stop this desert-borne magic.
Seven new bodies showed up. Well, six bodies, and one crudely animated fat guy thrusting his hips repeatedly.
Lord Chuckles’s hand went for his blade (it was all fun and games until you were outnumbered) only to find it was missing. He winced at the memory of his beloved blade helicoptering down a grassy hill.
What happened next was a cacophony of light, sounds, and lady voices that left the heroes transfixed.
“Akwa thinks you might be friends with Bimmy, Fredo, and Lot.”
“Trivist sent you a gift!”
“Bindur thinks you might be friends with G’reaux, Thiek, Nameloc, Craley, and Reaneobe.”
“What color are you?”
“Do you want to play Dungeon Explorer?”
“Fredo sent you a ribbon.”
“Kelv thinks you might be friends with, Bivou, Andraxithaxiax, Gebu, and Sera.”
Grebok barely had a second to interject. “Th—that’s my sister–”
“Friendships confirmed.”
“How well do you know Ronnie James Dio?”
“What 1960’s Cultural Icon Are You?”
“Gebu invites you to join his cause: Autistic Star Chimps.”
“Do you want to play Dungeon Warrior?”
“Trivist is a fan of Your Mom, do you want to be a fan of Your Mom?”
“Steve thinks you might be friends with Jezzy, Xiag, Gerlach, Hobie, and Bru.”
“What Vestigial Body Part Are You? Gebu took the test and found out he was: Plica Semilunaris.”
“Andraxithaxiax scored 1,436,789 in Beglamoured Deluxe.”
“Thanic thinks you might be friends with Llliadriall, Spaum, Fira, and Black Jesus.”
“Do you want to play Dungeon Crawler?”
“Fange poked you in the belly.”
“You’ve been glittered by Black Jesus.”
“Llliadriall commented on Gebu’s What Vestigial Body Part Are You result: Inorite!”
“Sera is a fan of Kendra Shields. Do you want to be a fan of Kendra Shields? 35 more friends are fans.”
Grebok and Chuckles took several steps away from the growing mob, but the chaos was all around them. The landscape erupted in all directions with glitter, banners, vestigial body parts, and pictures of that teenage girl. Everyone he had ever said a quick hullo too were conjured out of thin air, hawking well-wishes, fake gifts, and costume jewelry. It rose into a lunatic chorus so that no individual voice could be heard.
They crossed a thin blue line and suddenly all became quiet again. The plain whiteness returned. They could see all the chaos and sparkling of Grebok’s expanding mess but it stopped at the line.
“What, the?” the Son of Drogmar looked around to see if they had entered some unheralded new land, but the sign still welcomed them to Friendmonger dot com. “Where?”
Lord Chuckles noticed a little flag attached to the sign. “Oh. This is my… page… it’s called,” he read. “I suppose this is my land, and that’s yours over there.” He pointed back across the small line into the yawning mouth of madness.
“How come you’re not up to your tits in friends and griffons shitting rainbows?” Grebok looked around. No shadow men. No lady voices. No invitations to promenades or requests to join in faux activities.
“No, see, I do have a friend.” Lord Chuckles pointed to the lone individual with his cap turned backwards in a jaunty way. He’d be damned if he knew who it was, but it didn’t matter. He squinted to make out the name, the figure waved. “Yon, Tim, there.”
“I think he comes with the place.” His companion scanned over on his side of the line. “Yeah, I’ve got one of him too.” The same individual waved from the back of Grebok’s crowd.
Chuckles’s jaw clenched. “I’m sure my friends are all too busy being too wildly successful to waste their time with this shameful festival of festoonery.”
Grebok gave him a long look. “Dude, Xiag over there is Duke of the Nine Moons of Krelos.” He searched for Xiag with his pointer finger. “That’s nine whole moons. If he’s got time, whatever hobo peasants you knew growing up have time.”
“Too bad there’s no electricity on Moritania,” Chuckles retorted. He was obviously proud of his insurmountable defense. “Yeah, suck that, caveman. How’s that taste? As good as our ship’s vagina? I doubt it.”
Grebok had found the Avatar’s button! He never found anyone’s button. “There’s no electricity in Alveheim, either, but Llliandrial is all up in this piece.” He pointed to some tall, elf maiden handing out colorful eggs.
“Why don’t you shut the hell up?” Chuckles pushed Grebok.
“Why don’t you?” Grebok spat back what he thought was a witty retort.
The Avatar took a deep breath. Calmly, he grabbed one of Grebok’s mangy, grime-caked dreadlocks, and pulled.
Grebok thumbed his fellow hero in the eye.
They collapsed to the plain, white floor, thumbing, pulling, and biting. So consumed were they, that they didn’t hear the lady voice’s return.
“New friend request.”
