Day 8: Hello, World! [ Robot ]

"Village... village... festival... village... festival... village... throne room, so I’ll play the village card twice... village... "
"Ooof..." Jeff said looking up from his hand, "This is gonna hurt, isn't it?"
"Can't you see, Jeff?" Allison said, "This is the strategy of someone stalling for time. She's looking for that one card in her deck that will help her out, but all she's got are these action cards!"
"Oh? Is that so?" Penny smirked, as she pulled another card from her deck, "Perhaps what I was looking for... was THIS!" Penny slammed down the Militia card on the table.
"...I told you this was gonna hurt." Jeff said as he removed four cards from his deck.
"Ahhhhh... shit..." Allison rested her forehead on the table, "......is what I would say, unless I had this!" Allison smartly flipped the card she had been waiting to play, revealing the Moat card.
"Well played." Penny chuckled, "Treasure this moment, Alisson. It will be solace when I purchase the first Province of the game."
"That's because only a Province is good enough for you, Penny. I'll still have an opportunity to take one of my own thanks to my trusty Moat, but since I began collecting Victory cards early, in the end victory shall belong to me!"
"And that, Allison, is why you keep getting such trash hands. Time is running out, and you barely get the coins to buy more copper for the past two rounds."
"We’ll see about that... we shall see..." Allison grinned her most machiavellian grin, "Wait, did Gary remove any cards?"
"No," Jeff said, "He still has five cards in his hand. Gary?"
"Hey, Gary!" Penny said, "Earth to Gary! I played Militia."
"Mhmmm..." Gary said as he typed on his phone. Allison took this opportunity to tap on his skull.
"Yeah? I'm here!" Gary looked up from his phone and looked about frantically.
"For fuck's sake, Gary!" Penny said, "We're trying to play a game here."
"Oh, sorry... it was... important.." Gary said.
"Important, you say? "Penny said, "Let me guess, you were messaging your new girlfriend again"
"Well.. I didn't want to bring it up..." Gary closed his phone and pushed it back into his pocket, "But yeah, she really wanted to talk to me and I really wanted to talk to her... so... I guess I left the game for a bit, huh?"
"No worries, man." Jeff said, "But really now, you really are into this girl, I can tell... but I've never even met her once. Has anyone else here seen Gary's new girlfriend?"
"Not me," Penny said, "I don’t even know her name. I've just gotten used to calling her Gary's girlfriend now, and it's kinda weird it's becoming normal."
"Her name is Annie." Gary said, "And can we get back to the game now?"
"Now the game is called gossiping about relationships," Allison said, "And since you played the name-card, there's no going back! How come you talk about her so much yet we hear about her so little?"
"Yeah," Penny said, "I'd say you were embarrassed of her, but if you associate with Jeff I can not imagine what's left to be embarrassed about."
"Hey, Penny!" Jeff said, "People who live in glass-houses..."
"Should probably get a Moat." Penny said.
"She's got a point though, Gary." Jeff said, "Whoever this girl is, if she's good for you then we'll like her."
"Yeah," Allison said, "And if all we see you do is message her on your phone, we're gonna think she's living in your phone..."

With those words the realization dawned on the group, and Gary realized that too much had been said, "You... you're dating someone online, aren't you?" Jeff said.
"Oh my god!" Penny couldn't keep herself from laughing, "Is Annie your Internet girlfriend?"
"...plenty of people date each other online." Jeff pouted as he turned pale.
“Yeah," Jeff said, "But... that’s not like, really dating, is it?"
"Hehe, get a chat-room, you two!" Allison said.
"Seriously though,” Penny said, “you have to look at it from our perspective. I mean, if you have to look for a partner in, is it actually the other side of the world, right? Right? Well whatever, on the other side of the world, who probably spends all her time on the computer... is that not a little bit pathetic?"

Gary rose to his feet and stormed out of the room to those words.
"Ah, come on! Gary!" Penny said, "Look, I didn't mean it like that! I was just messing with you!"
"Let him go," Jeff said, "He was clearly too distracted for this game. Looks like it was never meant to be concluded."
"You just say that cause I was beating your ass!"
As Gary left Jeff's apartment, he was followed by Allison.
"Gary..." Allison said, "Look, I'm sorry... we went too far, didn't we? If things are working out with that girl of yours, then we support you no matter what."
"...thanks." Gary said, "It's... all right. And... sorry I stormed out like that."
"No, that's completely understandable. Honestly I think I'd do the same. But, look... I know things seem intense and serious with this Annie, but you gotta understand... not everything is as it seems online. For all you know she could be some kind of... of sex robot!"
"I know. It's not at all like that with Annie and I."
"Yeah, I must believe that you know what you're doing, but at the same time... I'm really worried about you. I care for you a lot, and I wouldn't want anything to hurt you. I'd just feel a lot better if I could talk to this Annie, even for a bit. Get a feel for her, you know?"
"Allison..."
"I'm just doing it to protect you. I'll tell you what I find, and you decide for yourself what to do with that. Besides, if Annie is as wonderful as you say then I simply got to meet her sooner or later. We are friends after all."
Gary sighed,"Allison... fine, I'll... ask if I can share her contact information. But only because you were the one who showed any interest. Just... try not to embarrass me."
"Have I ever done anything to embarrass you, Gary?"
"Not really, but that's sort of the thing, Allison. You always do what no one expects you to do."
"I'll take that as a compliment. If it makes you feel better, the fact you expect me to embarrass you probably means I won't do it."
"I... uh... guess so...?" Gary scratched his head while Allison went back inside, "Wait a minute..."

Already when Allison left Jeff's apartment she got a text message from Gary with Annie's Skype handle, and she took the opportunity to add her to her contacts. When she got home she set up her laptop in her living room while slipping into her pajamas and preparing a cup of tea with some sugar. Of course, being Allison it was more like a cup of sugar with some tea.
She sat down on the sofa and snuggled up tightly with the laptop in her lap while taking sips from her tea. It was already 1.30AM, but obviously she couldn't sleep when she had a new person to contact, one that Gary is particularly interested in no less. So when she booted up her program she ran Skype and opened a new chat window with merANNEgue.

Double_Ls: Sup <3
merANNEge: Greetings. You must be Allison.
Double_Ls: My reputation precedes me!
Double_Ls: Does Gary talk about me a lot?
Double_Ls: I bet he talks about me a lot. Not that he'd run out of things to talk about...
merANNEge: You do come up from time to time, I must admit. Rest assured he left only the best impression, insofar as he respected your privacy.
Double_Ls: It's just I keep finding myself wrapped up in some wacky venture or another. Maybe on purpose, who knows XD
Double_Ls: Yeah!
Double_Ls: Gary's my brother's former dorm mate, but we ended up hanging out together more than he did once they graduated.
Double_Ls: You know how it is.
Double_Ls: How did you end up running into each other?
merANNEge: We both play Call of Duty. We ran into each other a couple of times, mostly on opposite teams but we sort of connected, and then we looked each other up on a message board.
Double_Ls: Yeah, he used to be totally addicted to that game for a preiod.
Double_Ls: I mean preriod.
Double_Ls: Shit!
Double_Ls: PERIOD
Double_Ls: Sorry, it's like almost 2AM here, I should absolutely be asleep already.
Double_Ls: What's your time over there?
merANNEge: It is currently 1:51AM over here.
Double_Ls: Oh crap! I'm not keeping you up here, am I?
merANNEge: Don't worry about that.
Double_Ls: Yeah, but seriously though! What're the odds of us being in the same time zone?
Double_Ls: One in twenty-four I guess.
Double_Ls: No, wait!
Double_Ls: Not all time zones have the same population density.
Double_Ls: Or access to the Internet.
Double_Ls: Oh wow! It's way too late to be thinking about stuff like this!
merANNEge: You're really fun to talk to, Allison. It just seems I'm not needed in the conversation all the time.
Double_Ls: I get that a lot.
merANNEge: Don't worry. I don't mind listening if what you have to say is interesting, which it is.
Double_Ls: Thank you!
Double_Ls: But now I wanna know more about you. And your deal with Gary.
Double_Ls: How long have you been dating now, and do you plan to meet each other in real life?
merANNEge: We've been together for what is now the better part of eight months. I don't quite know how to quantify a relationship, but the both of us fit together like French and toast. I definitely look forward to seeing him in my future, though I keep getting worried it won't work out that way.
Double_Ls: Because it's an online relationship?
merANNEge: That's... part of the problem, yes.
Double_Ls: Oh, I wouldn't worry about that! Let's just say that I'm a bit of pro when it comes to arranging trips.
Double_Ls: So where are you exactly right now?
Double_Ls: Care to indulge me?
merANNEge: I'm not sure I should tell you, but I guess if I don't you'll find out from Gary, so I guess I'll just tell you I live in Richmond Virginia.
Double_Ls: First of all, if you don't want Gary to tell me, he won't tell me no matter what. He always takes requests like that really seriously.
Double_Ls: Second of all, no you don't live in Richmond! That's where I live! That's where Gary lives! Why would you be in an online relationship if you could see each other by local bus?
merANNEge: I think I've said too much.

Allison scratched her chin. If Gary knew that she lived in the same city as Annie, and they still didn't meet, even though they wanted to, there must have been some reason for that. Allison got the impression this Annie was probably not a catfish, but something was definitely up here.
The first thing that occurred to her was that Annie was underage. She definitely didn't get that impression while chatting with her though. Besides, Gary would never do anything like that. Not knowingly anyway.
Allison's next theory was that Annie had some kind of domestic situation, but Gary definitely had enough sense to tell Allison if that was the case.

There was only one other theory Allison could come up with. Honestly it was by far more far fetched than any of the theories she already had discarded, but now that it had crossed her mind she had to test it out.