The Phone

Dan exited his morning history class and was hanging around the lockers waiting for Emma and Randy when something caught his attention on the ground. Someone had dropped their phone and as it was in a pink Hello Kitty phone case he suspected it likely belonged to a girl. He stashed it in a free pocket on the idea he would hand it in to someone later. As he was doing this, he heard a voice from behind him.

“Dan the man.” The voice called.

Dan turned instantly, recognising the voice of his friend Lionel. Lionel was a short black guy. He wore wide-rimmed glasses and sported a high topped fade.

“Lionel,” Dan replied.

“We miss you at the table, man. There’s always a space if you want to game with us.” Lionel advised him.

“I got bored with the power creep in the 2024 edition. I kind of lost interest at that point.” Dan explained.

“We’re not playing Fifth Edition now. Carter lent me this game called Blades in the Dark. You play crews committing small heists. Its pretty fun, characters are a lot more simple than D&D.” Lionel told him.

“That sounds pretty cool. What’s the setting like? “ Dan asked.

“Its sort of a Gothic version of Victorian London.” Lionel explained

“That sounds cool. Who are your players at the moment?” Dan queried.

“You know Carter & Matty. I don’t think you’ve met Effie; she only started playing with us recently.”

Dan recognised the name but couldn’t picture what she looked like. He believed that Emma shared some classes with her. He guessed that the two of them were held up or most likely smoking between classes.

“So when are you playing?” Dan asked, becoming more curious.

“Our next game’s tonight if you want to join us. We meet at my house around seven.” Lionel answered.

“Cool, well I don’t have any major plans so I might be there.”

******

Dan sat through the rest of his morning classes and was waiting for lunch alongside Emma. They were chatting about their morning classes but were interrupted by Dan’s phone going off. He retrieved it from his pocket and realised it wasn’t ringing. He was confused for a moment when he remembered the other phone he had found earlier.

The call was coming in from an unknown number. Dan answered regardless.

“Who is this?” A cute female-sounding voice asked.

“This is Dan McNamara.”

“Cool. Well, you’re holding my phone, Dan. I’m glad someone found it and didn’t lose it.”

“No problem. Who am I speaking to though.” Dan asked.

“Oh yeah, probably should give you my name. It's Effie.” She answered.

“Where are you?” Dan asked her.

“I’m in the cafeteria. Using Carter’s phone” Effie answered.

“Cool. Well I’m queuing with Emma. “ He put his hand in the air to wave, hoping she would notice.

After a minute or so a slim, perky brunette found him in the queue. Effie was 5.3, had medium length light brown hair. She was wearing the traditional school uniform for most of the girls at their school a white shirt and plaid skirt.

Dan handed the phone over to Effie. She hugged him in appreciation.

“Thanks for finding my phone, Dan. I really thought I had lost it.” Effie explained.

“I found it earlier and almost forgot I had it. I was chatting with Lionel earlier; he said you’re gaming with him?” Dan asked.

“Yeah, I only really joined his group a few weeks ago but its a lot of fun. Why are you going to join us?” She asked.

“I don’t really have any plans for tonight, so yeah, I might do,” Dan responded enthusiastically.

“Well see you tonight then Dan.” Effie hugged him a second time before heading back to find her friends.

Emma had remained silent throughout the entire conversation between Dan & Effie. She gave him a knowing look. “So are you going for the math rocks or the girl?

“Both, I think,” Dan replied honestly.

Randy appeared behind them pair of them in the queue.

“Today sucks. The two of you want to get wasted after class.” He asked the pair of them.

“I’m going down to the skate park, and Dan has a hot date,” Emma replied with a suggestive tone.

“A date?” Randy queried.

“Not really. I’m gaming at Lionel’s place tonight.”

“Nerrrrrrd” Randy mocked.

“Randy, you buy Imperial Guard figures and hope nobody notices.” Dan retorted.

“Dude, you can’t be saying this in public. I’ve got my image to consider.” Randy joked.

All three of them burst out laughing. They continued bantering as they lined up to get whatever was being served at lunch.

******

Dan had got home from school and changed out of his school uniform into jeans and a t-shirt. He had a few hours to kill before going to Lionel’s place. So he took a shower and put on Event Horizon before heading out to Lionel’s place. He grabbed some snacks and a drink on the way. Lionel only lived a few blocks over, so it was easy enough to walk.

He knocked on the door and was greeted by Lionel’s mother, Tyra.

“Hi Dan. Are you here to join the others. They are all downstairs all ready. How is Christine?” Tyra asked.

“She’s okay. Yeah, Lionel invited me earlier. “ Dan explained.

Having gamed with Lionel before, he knew he held his sessions in the basement. He opened the door and headed down. The basement was fairly cramped and filled with boxes. In the middle, they were all sitting around a small wooden table. Lionel was at one end with a copy of the rulebook and various papers. The players being Matty, Carter and Effie were sat opposite him. Dan sat himself down on a free chair next to Effie.

“Dan, glad that you could join us,” Lionel said to him.

“Welcome back, brother,” Carter told him.

Carter was a stocky ginger guy who was already seeing his hairline start to recede. He looked over at Matty, who was a gangly, tall guy. The four of them had been firm friends for many years and Dan had only left the game when he started spending more time with Emma & Randy. Effie was sitting next to him, wearing a tight blue T-shirt and shorts.

“So what are you playing, Dan?” Matty asked.

“I’d not looked at anything so far. What is everyone else playing?”

“I’m playing a Cutter, Matty is a Spider and Effie is a Whisper,” Carter explained.

Lionel handed Dan the book and he spent several minutes browsing the character options before on settling on The Hound. Lionel explained the setting and the particular premise for the game he was running. They were playing cultists, stealing arcane knowledge from wealthy individuals, and their patron was an otherworldly entity.

“So why are we working for an extra-dimensional spider?” Dan asked.

“Because he read Perdido Street Station last month and thought it was cool. “ Matty answered.

“Hey, we all take our inspiration from somewhere. So now Dan has a character, shall we start?” Lionel asked.

The four of them played through their latest heist which had them stealing some forbidden text from a wealthy Doskvol noble. Apart from several fights, it went off without much of a problem. Carter’s character took several points of stress due to some really bad dice rolls. In between heists, the game became more relaxed.

Effie had started chatting with Dan over the current video games he was playing.

“Pragmata. Diana is just weirdly adorable.” Dan told her.

“I’ve been replaying Nier Automata. I missed so much the first time I played it.” Effie explained.

“I’ve still only played Replicant and not played Automata. That flower trophy can fuck off.” Matty told them both.

“I hated that. I thought I was doing everything right, and I never got the pink flowers. I stopped trying.” Effie told him

They got back to the game once Lionel and Carter finished with his downtime actions to relieve character stress. They went through a second heist, which they spent more time preparing for and got through it without any of them taking any stress.

After the second heist, they called it a night as it was pretty late. Dan and Effie continued chatting after the game, bonding over their shared like of female game characters that needed protecting.

They exchanged numbers and continued chatting over text later.

Just before settling down to go to sleep Dan got one last message from Effie.

The message contained a link which Dan opened.