“I still can’t believe you want to try out this game,” Sinon says, the metallic hairpins on the sides of her face clinking lightly. She’s still not that used to driving, in the game or otherwise, so she keeps her eyes on the road instead of turning her head back as she talks. Vehicular collisions are not particularly romantic.

I just want to know what you see in it , Silica replies in her mind, raising her head.

She understands that, for all the time they spent together in ALO ’s fairy realm, that wasn’t Shino’s ‘world’, not in the way this place is. When she doesn’t bury herself in the curve of Sinon's back, the gas and soot is more apparent to all of her virtual senses, and even though it was her own proposition, she has to ask, why? Why choose colorless tiles and cracked pavement over the boundless hues of fantasy?

“I’d be lying if I said I… particularly get it,” Silica admits. “But this world is important to you, right?”

“Yeah,” Sinon replies. “ GGO might be an acquired taste, though. This game is gritty.”

She rolls her shoulders, leaning further back onto Silica.

Excluding Silica, Sinon has never been one for bubbly and cute, so GGO would always be a better fit for her. But this virtual world was made with inhospitality in mind, so not exactly the perfect dating spot. The fact that she’s here for one surprises her more than it does anyone else.

“Well,” Silica says, “good thing you’re here, then! Having a tour guide to show around should be a huge help.”

Sinon wheezes. “So I’m your tour guide, now?”

“Yes!” Silica proudly proclaims.

The sniper smirks. “Okay, then.”

Sinon twists the handlebars, and the bugey roars as it peels through the road. She can’t help but smile as Silica’s high-pitched yell reaches her ears, just barely audible over the revving of the engine.

*

The howling of gunfire can’t be heard as much within GGO ’s hub city, but the loud advertisements that echo from the bright signs serve as a fitting substitute, volume-wise.

Silica’s only knowledge of this game comes from watching Sinon and Kirito fight for their lives, real and virtual, through a tournament broadcast. The fact that Sinon still logs in daily to Gun Gale even after that incident would be odd to anyone other than people like the beast tamer and her friends, who are all VR addicts despite their time in Aincrad.

The two years in the floating castle, despite the pain it caused her, was where Silica grew the most. She’d never openly say that there’s a part of her that misses the days after the one year mark, when she’d settled into her reputation in those lower floors and tried to forget the outside world so much that she succeeded. None of her friends would. It’s a silent understanding and an untold promise; not to admit missing those days, so they don’t have to, either.

What does GGO, a medley of grit, greys and metal, mean to Sinon?

Their circumstances are different, but the scars they bear stain their skins in similar ways. The masks offered by virtual worlds, Silica knew, gave one the opportunity to confront themselves in ways one couldn’t anywhere else. There was something to the kind of place one chose to do so that Silica found important to know.

Sinon got to see New Aincrad, walk over the same plains wherein the beast tamer had met Pina, bask under the same electronic sunlight she experienced for two years.

It’s not fair if only one of them gets to do it, is it?

**

The sun sets while they stroll through the city, and Silica understands more of the acquired taste Sinon had mentioned. The approaching dusk was somewhat nice on itself, but the place was still a palette of monochrome then, all steel on sand, black on white. Once it’s officially night time in game, 6:00 PM sharp, however, everything changes. The dark of night makes the huge, floating billboards pop, neons of purple and blue scattered through the cyber landscape. The virtual city night lights become luminous streaks in her vision while they dash on the way here on the buggy, not unlike how she imagines speeding through one of Tokyo’s nightlife districts in a motorcycle would feel like. It’s movielike, but not fantastical or unreal, but maybe that’s the point; she doesn’t think she’d have the guts to go at such high speeds with her flesh-and-bone body, nor would Shino have the confidence Sinon presents.

There are things from real life that one can only do in a game like this.

***

They stop by an equipment shop at the center of the now-luminous city. Unlike the last time she was here with someone else, Sinon has no tournament sign-in to get to after shopping, so they can take their time.

Sinon is surprised when Silica picks an overall sensible combat outfit; a tactical green and black leather outfit with red accents, along with a dark, moss-colored poncho. We kind of match! Silica beams as she presents herself, pointing back and forth between her and Sinon’s outfit colors. She frames her face delicately and comically she does so, her eyes shining like a cartoon fawn’s. Sinon knows it’s on purpose, this over-the-top display of sweetness, but it makes her smile anyway.

Of course Silica found a way to make this cute.

It’s also cute, albeit in a different way, when Silica’s eyes look away from the armor section of the store and widen as she takes notice of a display of combat knives. They’re military-grade blades, absolutely indistinguishable from the real-world articles. Unlike just a moment ago, the shine in her eyes is unfeigned.

“Oh yeah, this game has these!” Silica exclaims.

Sinon turns to her with a quizzical look.

“... You’re interested in the knives?” That makes it two for two, the times she’s taken someone new here and they thoroughly ignored guns. Are all fantasy game players like this?

“Of course I do!” Silica exclaims, like it’s obvious. Her look all but says, I spent years fighting with daggers, remember?

Silica takes one of the knives from the demo display. It looks comically large in her hands, and yet it pales in comparison to the ones she’s grown used to in fantasy games. She spins the handle in-between her fingers, resting it on her knuckles. The hand flourish when she bumps the blade upwards, sending the knife spinning high, and then catches it from the air with her open palm is almost too fast to see. She gleefully changes the grip a few times before finally settling it in a simple reverse grip.

“They have such a better feel than those bulky daggers!” Silica exclaims in glee.

“ Impressive,” Sinon mutters under her breath. She can’t help but be hit with a sense of deja vu .

There’s a sensible distance one can gain when looking at someone brandishing a bright sword that looks more like a cosplay prop, or a fantasy dagger coated in filigrees. But there’s no distancing from seeing Silica, in all of her titanic five feet of height, doing knife tricks one would expect of a special forces soldier, or perhaps a movie greaser, when the blade is so realistic.

Sinon would be lying if she said she doesn’t find the display at least somewhat attractive.

Sinon heads over to a small menu in front of the knife section as she selects the same blade Silica had in hand. Soon after she goes through the proper transaction steps, holding Silica’s hand and laying it over the holographic display, one of the store robots scoots over to hand Silica her item.

Silica’s smile makes the credits Sinon spends all worth it.

… Is a knife a weird gift to give your girlfriend? Sinon thought, but that was a bridge already crossed. Then, she remembers the real reason they came here.

“I know you’re mostly here to look around, but you’ll still need some sort of main weapon if you’re to experience the game.  Pick whatever gun you’d like to test out and we can go to a shooting range.”

****

“You can’t be serious.”

“I am absolutely serious!”

Instead of the shooting range, the two find themselves by a station near the edge of the city, connected to the game’s starter fields.

The vehicle’s mounted weapon protrudes from a hatch on top. Its long, steely frame glimmers as it reflects the sun’s harsh light.  The heavy machine gun could be mistaken as some sort of cannon for the uninitiated in the ballistic arts, with its bulky, long barrel, but it’s a high-RPM, lightning-fast automatic weapon, nothing short of a reinforced harbinger of death.

“You said I could pick any weapon,” Silica reminded the other girl. “I’m picking this mounted gatling gun.”

Machine gun, actually, Sinon thought of correcting. Other than the regular shooting ranges in GGO, there were also training grounds for driving by the outskirts of the city, by the game’s starting area - it had been where Sinon had trained her bugey skills, in fact - but the knowledge of that, or of the existence of mounted weapons, is the sort of knowledge most newbies wouldn’t have.

Silica did her research for sure... and was probably planning this.

Sinon’s original plan was to simply show Silica around the game, so buying an expensive armored vehicle sounds unwise, especially when there’s only two people.

The sniper squints her eyes at the shorter girl.  Noticing Sinon’s glare, Silica fans her eyelashes pleadingly, and Sinon’s resolve falters.

… I guess I was thinking of getting everyone else to convert and help me out, anyway?

“... Fine,” Sinon concedes. “But you better help me convince everyone else to hop on here for the PKer problem, then.”

Silica immediately jumps in excitement. The humvee’s engine purrs to life as Sinon turns the engine key, and the newbie gunner excitedly hops to the top hatch.

*****

Silica is small, but she doesn’t feel so when she holds onto the trigger in the huge weapon’s handlebars, the generated mobs in the starting fields shattering into red sparks. She loudly laughs in excitement as the high speed vehicle traverses the shifting sands.

The ride is a feeling unlike her other experiences with virtual worlds. It might be due to what Sinon earlier described as a “commitment to grittiness,” but the game still replicates hints of discomfort; her small frame vibrates from the gun’s recoil, her fingertips feel a bit too warm, and she has to ask Sinon to stop every so often because of dizziness.

It’s annoying at first, but it grows on her.

Silica wonders if this is part of what draws Sinon to this world.

******

Silica finds the pink hue that covers GGO ’s desert sands endearing.

She gets a good vantage point to admire the landscape as she’s wrapped in one of Sinon’s arms and they zip up a rocky structure. The grappling hook’s line is taut with their combined weight.

Despite the pleasure found in their proximity, as her hand holds Silica’s body close to her by the waist, Sinon does so primarily out of practicality, as Silica doesn’t possess a grappling hook of her own.

Silica, however, finds herself smitten by the situation. Being carried in the arms of a cool girl as she takes in the sights of a foreign world, the warmth of her body providing solace in the cold, simulated night, is a scene befitting a dream she’d have long ago if she’d known she liked girls sooner.

Silica sighs in disappointment as they reach the summit, going from dream to simulated reality. As she looks at Sinon, she’s glad this reality, virtual as it is, is still dreamy aplenty.

The plateau atop the rock formations, where monsters couldn’t reach, was the perfect stargazing spot. It allows them to wind down after spending an entire day driving, shooting, and in Silica’s case, shouting in excitement. Sinon is not exactly the romantic type, far from it, but even she recognizes what the beauty of GGO’s night sky can do to one’s heart. She’s glad she gets to watch it with someone else now, instead of only her sniper rifle for company.

Sinon sits herself by a boulder on the plateau that she manages to find snug. The wordless invitation she gives Silica, as the spot to her side seems like it would fit her perfectly, beckons the younger girl, who hasn’t acquired the same grit to be truly comfortable on the hard surface. Thankfully, Sinon’s shoulder is softer than the rocks.

“So, what did you think?” Sinon asks. “Was I a good tour guide?”

“Yes,” Silica answers. “I give you five stars!” She nuzzles closer onto Sinon’s side.

They stare out at the sky. The moon is hidden behind drifting clouds.

“I have a confession to make,” Silica admits, in a tone that sits between jokey and serious. “I didn’t want to try this game only to shoot guns.”

“Oh?” Sinon’s surprise is clearly feigned. Even she would be able to understand that Silica’s request to see this game was a date proposition. There was a reason she decided to cap the night off with stargazing.

“Yeah. I guess I figured… playing this game would make me feel closer to you.”

“Oh.” Sinon’s surprise this time is genuine. “Well… do you?”

“Hmm.” Silica looks at them, sitting side by side, sharing warmth, and yes seems like the obvious answer here. “I mean, yes. But I suppose I was looking for an answer.”

“An answer… did you find it?”

“I’m not sure I did. I think I found… something,” Silica says. Her grip on Sinon’s arm tightens, a mix of affection and nervousness. “I think there is something important about virtual worlds, and why we’re drawn to them. I... now that I think about it, maybe I could’ve just asked you from the beginning.”

Her heels pitter-patter on the rocky surface.

“What does this… What does GGO mean to you?”

Sinon looks at Silica, a bit puzzled.

Silica doesn’t know how fair of a question it is, really. Could she explain what drew her to virtual worlds? Why thinking of Aincrad, her former prison, makes her feel homesick? But she’s nothing if not sincere, and she wants to know. She figures Sinon, introspective as she is, thinks about those things more than she does.

“GGO is, you know.” Sinon makes a meaningless hand gesture. She thought obsessively before about this question - her objective, her growth, her path towards becoming stronger , she called it. She doesn’t know how to distill it in a sensible way, is all.

A place to face my fears?  

Where I met Kirito, thus, how I met you?  

“ Home?” Sinon says without registering.

Oh.

It’s under this night sky, beneath a red moon, that Sinon realizes this is the first time she got to enjoy this world with someone she truly cared for, life-or-death situations notwithstanding. This place, with its odd smells, rattling sounds, and even unpleasant sensations, has been one of the few places of respite she had from… everything. Others. The world. Herself. It’s more evident now, with someone to share it.

“I came to this world because I wanted to surpass who I was. I wanted to become stronger,” Sinon explains, unsure of whether she sounds pretentious. Sinon’s jaw clenches, and Silica gives her a reassuring squeeze. “When I first came here, there was nothing I wanted more than to erase my real self with this- this stronger version of me. This better version of me.”

The image of Hecate II, her sniper rifle, her companion, comes to mind. She’d thought before, at times, what was she without its weight on her back, other than a fragile girl who can’t help but retch at the sight of gun replicas? Without burnt fingertips and trembling shoulders from gun recoil, how could she call the strength she built here real?

This place is home because it was under this same carmine moon that she realized Asada Shino, the high-schooler, was just as much of a warrior as Sinon, the elite sniper. Under this virtual sky, nothing but code threads woven into a reality, was where she accepted who she was.

She fidgets with her fingerless gloves as she continues. “It’s hard to give a simple answer,” she concedes. “But if I had to try, I’d say… this is the place that showed me it was okay for me to be myself. To recognize my strength, to connect with others. Back then, before this game, I never thought I’d get to have... this, I guess.”  Sinon nudges Silica’s shoulder with hers, playfully. “Who knows. Maybe I just wanted to be proven wrong.”

Silica’s heart tightens. She moves a hand to Sinon’s cheek.

“I’m glad you were proven wrong, then.”

In what Silica is pretty sure is the first time, Sinon is the one approaching her for a kiss.

It’s quick and sweet. Sinon’s thin lips press onto Silica’s lightly. It’s easy to forget they’re in the virtual world then, with their eyes closed the way they are, the waves of warmth  radiating through their faces as the only signal their AmuSpheres send to their brains.

*******

The night goes by quietly as they stare to the sky, save for the distant sounds of underground monsters shifting the sands and Silica’s occasional comment of how she’s sure she can tell the constellations even through the thick clouds. They have little time before GGO’s short day cycle robs them of this sight.

That sky, this world, are virtual, and they know that. It’s hard to tell, though, when it shares stars with the real one, when it shares warmth with the real one, when the strength they gain, the bonds they deepen, the sights they see, carry over to the real one.

The air in Gun Gale Online smells like gasoline and gunpowder, but Silica doesn’t mind… at all, really, when it grants them the opportunity to be so frank and close, so near when they’re so far.

A faint, reluctant smile surfaced.

   “But he liked English. Even if he tried to play it off. You could tell when he forgot to look bored—when he started dissecting a poem like it was a crime scene.”

The smile lingered, then gentled. “He sold me weed sometimes. I auditioned for his band once. Didn’t make the cut.” A small shrug. “Not exactly my genre.”

He kept speaking—not to wound, not to win, but as though he’d sensed the fracture Steve had opened and chose to shore it up with something sturdier than accusation. A recollection. A small mercy. Evidence.

Proof that Eddie had existed in rooms Steve had never entered. That he had occupied dimensions beyond the narrow hallway of Steve’s knowing.

His gaze drifted past Jonathan’s shoulder to the cinderblock wall, mottled and unremarkable. Eddie’s name turned over and over in his mind like a cassette caught in a stubborn loop—the melody warping, bending where the tape had thinned from too many rewinds.

He thought of the Upside Down—of a sky split by red lightning, flickering like a broken marquee gasping against an endless night. He had never been good at summoning noise against the dark. He defaulted to it anyway, sarcasm and volume and motion, as if distortion alone could hold back the end of the world.

He was even worse at sorting feelings that refused to file themselves neatly. Hand him a bat and something with too many teeth and he was solid. Reliable. Hand him grief braided tight with guilt and contradiction, and he felt suddenly unequipped.

The basement seemed to constrict around him. The ceiling lower. The air thinner.

He swallowed.

Maybe this was what growing up actually meant—the understanding that people could be irreconcilable and still be worthy. That someone could bruise you and shield you in the same breath. That harm and kindness could share a body.

   That Steve Harrington was actually… a good dude.

Eddie’s voice rose in his mind unprompted, as if he were leaning back in a chair across the room, boots hooked on a table.

Steve had once believed redemption followed a straight road. You screwed up. You paid. You improved. Roll credits. Cue the triumphant synth as the hero drove into a well-lit future, windows down, no rearview mirror required.

But nothing in Hawkins obeyed a clean arc. Not the fractures webbing beneath its soil. Not the friendships that bent and re-formed under pressure. Not him.

And certainly not Eddie Munson.

He glanced once more at the staircase, at the absence Dustin had carved into the room, and felt the familiar pull—the instinct to follow, to fix, to press gauze over whatever had split open.

He stayed where he was.

He let his silence remain where it had fallen and turned his attention back to Jonathan instead. The earlier flare of irritation drained from him as quietly as it had arrived, leaving behind a contemplative ache that pressed along his ribs and would not be shrugged off. He found himself wondering—again, as he had in the sleepless hours since Eddie’s death—how many iterations of Eddie Munson had existed beyond the fractured glimpses Steve had known, and how many of them were gone now, sealed inside stories he would never be invited to hear.

   “Okay,” Robin announced suddenly, clapping her hands once. “Pivot. Hard pivot. New topic before we all sink into the emotional tar pit.”