FINAL PAPER

FINAL PAPER

Trevor couldn’t sleep at night. Ever since he had purchased tickets for PAX, two months earlier, he couldn’t find anything that would sufficiently distract him from the excitement of this upcoming convention. He tried reading his Dungeons and Dragons manual, he tried replaying Fable on his X-box, (only this time choosing to be good) and he had tried re-reading JRR Tolkien’s Silmerilian.
He had rifled through his closet every day for weeks, all the time concerned that he had nothing to do this event justice and proclaim his nerd pride to the world. Was it the day to show off his free Halo II tee in the charcoal black, his newly acquired Word of Warcraft: Burning Crusade tee in gunmetal black or the classic, ever popular, black-as-night Legend of Zelda tee with carefully detailed Master Sword in midnight black? After careful consideration Trevor decided that it was of the utmost importance to firstly proclaim his adoration for Penny Arcade in general and thus he decided on the midnight black, oversized, Twix and Weatherby attire, with perfectly coordinated Fred Meyer blue jeans. He chose his knockoff Target Doc. Martens, ‘80s shades and an Office 2007 messenger bag to complete the outfit.
Trevor’s concerned mother had noticed this newfound change in her 28 year-old son, and with a “tisk tisk”, she insured that he ate double broccoli servings at dinner. When she dropped him off the next day at 6:00am in front of the Maidenbour Convention Center she gave him a kiss on the forehead and bade him beware of “Goth girls”, who’s never ceasing attraction to skinny white nerdy boys she had heard about on Oprah. Trevor promised his mother he would be careful and quickly made his way toward the nerd posse waiting for him in the pre-purchased ticket line. At first the nerds were content to discuss whether Pirates or Ninjas would win in a battle of wits but after several hours of waiting, the nerds had become antsy. All had not checked their email, instant messaged their Internet girlfriends, or played WOW in all of four hours. Those waiting in the line to purchase tickets were glaring at the shiny red badges around Trevor and his fellow friends necks.
A large, baseball capped, football player type from the other line bumped into one of Trevor’s friends and didn’t acknowledge this significant faux paux.
“Hey man, watch it,” yelled Trevor.
“Fuck off, you little nerd,” the insolent, ignorant meathead yelled back.
A hush fell over the surrounding crowd. The football player didn’t understand PAX, he had probably come because of the 30 foot screens in which he could more effectively play Madden 07’. He didn’t read Penny Arcade - he’d never understand it. It wasn’t “for him”. The meathead didn’t know what he was getting himself into, he wasn’t in high school anymore and the jocks weren’t on top of the proverbial social ladder. He was in nerd country now, and no one used ‘nerd’ with such an utter lack of respect and in such a degrading fashion at PAX. It was ok for fellow nerds to call each other this term, but it was their word!
This was the once place in which nerds could put aside their feelings of shame and openly declare their unhealthy love of night elves, where they could assemble tabletop villages - complete with hand decorated warriors, and where “all your base” is just generally understood. Thus, Trevor and his fellow nerds could not let an openly offensive comment like ‘nerd’, from a jock, go unchallenged.
“Your mom services more requests than HTTP” Yelled Trevor, to a cheer from the surrounding crowd, complete with clapping and cat calls.
“She keeps all her ports open like Windows ME” Added in Trevor’s friend, holding back rage.
“What the fuck did you just say to me?”
Thankfully the PAX enforcers chose that exact time to open up the front doors and Trevor and friends were swept up in the scramble to get inside. Immediately Trevor led the way to the tabletop gaming arena, intent on testing his new ‘Magic’ deck. As he descended the floors, he caught sight of a set of fishnet tights and spiky black hair going past to the upper floors. They locked eyes in a purple flash and she was gone. Blinking Trevor stumbled off of the escalator.
Trevor spent several productive hours perfecting his strategy with the new cards, and with his friends egging, decided that a caffeine run was in order. Leaving the stand with arms full of Bawls and pockets packed with Bawls mints, Trevor decided to try his luck at the PC gaming arena.
Signed up for a Counter Strike: Team Fortress tournament, Trevor and friends prepared their headphones and microphones for the match. Teams and characters chosen, Trevor smiled at his friends and turning to the other team yelled,
“Well, prepare yourself for some internal fragmentation.”
After two fierce hours of bullets flying, several games had ended and Trevor’s team was still second in gross kills. Trevor spray-painted the brilliant blue color of team on the side of his base, in defiance. He led the way through the ruined surrounding buildings, sure to strife around corners to avoid early detection. Watching his teammates and looking around for the enemies, he stumbled into a side staircase that led the way up to a view of the final enemy flag and watched several enemies re-spawn before his very eyes. This spot was that was too good to be true. Whispering into his microphone, he alerted his teammates of this perfect sniper location, and told them from which angles to approach.
Suddenly brilliant purple eyes pulled him back into reality. There was the girl, in skin-tight leather with black fishnet tights. The roar of bullets from his right headphone forced his vision back onto the screen. His men were making their move, now, and they needed him to have their backs. Focus back on the task at hand, he took out three enemy men in the area, one after another, the red laser visible for less than a millisecond. His men slowly creeped in, in case of hidden reinforcements, but there were none. The ground desecrated, and the final flag taken by the blue, the game ended in victory for Trevor.
“Owned!” Yelled his teammates, as Trevor took off his headset and went in search of the purple eyes. Found at last, Trevor sat down next to the black haired girl watching the game from afar, and looking deep into her purple abyss asked, “What would you say if I told you I roll 20s?”
“Excuse me?” The girl blinked, and Trevor lost focus of his goal.
“Thhhat I roll 20s, you know twenty sided dice?” Trevor’s voice started to falter, his triumphant confidence slipping. How could this girl not understand? Did this girl not speak ‘nerd’? Would she not be impressed by his “Dungeon master” status? Would she laugh at his name being included in the Pong hall of fame at all three of the local arcades back in the day? Would she understand if he told her that she looked just like Arwin from Lord of the Rings?
“I’m sorry, do I know you?” The girl’s milky white face was crinkled in a look of distain.
“No… ” Trevor’s voice trailed off.
“Then why are you talking to me?”
Trevor gulped. Not responding, he stood up, turned around and slowly made his way back to his home base, his mother ship, his nerd posse. Head inclined down, feet dragging, Charlie Brown style.
“C’mon Trevor,” a friend said in an understanding tone, patting him on the back. “We have some nerd-cord rap to hit up.”
“Oprah was wrong, Tad.”
“What?”
“Nothing. Lets go.”
Futuristic Sex Robotz were still setting up their instruments when Trevor and friends descended upon the concert hall. They were thankful that they had planned for this concert in advance and already had bright orange armbands on their pasty white wrists. The smug look on their faces apparently became too much for a fiercely loyal FSR n00b with greasy hair that had the appearance of being died blue, at one time, long ago.
“Office 2007 sucks!”
“What did you just say?”
“I said, Office 2007 sucks!”
“My father worked on that edition you $@#$.”
“Not surprised.” Trevor had half a mind to challenge a “Virtual Fighter” Duel, knowing that the little twerp likely wouldn’t have heard of such an old school Saturn game.
“Yea, that’s right. Don’t be upset that my father could out program yours anyday. He reports to Steve Jobs!”
The Microsoft hit was too much for Trevor, and again he retorted without thinking. “Don’t you throw insults at me when you don’t have any idea what they mean, script kiddie! I was modding out my Atari from before you were born! I have more records beaten in Ms. Pack Man than you could count, and I was playing Vampire the Masquerade in my basement before the video game had even become a distant thought in anyone’s mind! Don’t be upset with me just because you’re frustrated that all ladies are giving you ‘Denial of Service’.
The newbie glared back, not sure to the extent that he had been insulted.

Futuristic Sex Robotz choose that time to take the mic, and it was perfect because the entire lack of any actual physical engagement was becoming awkward.
“… but Sammy J stands up and says “not tonight, I got a job to do, enough is enough, I’ve had it with these motherfucking snakes and stuff. ‘Gonna get this guy to court, safe and sane, I want these motherfucking snakes off this motherfucking plane!”
Trevor was fully enjoying himself and singing along, when he felt a tug on his oversized nerd shirt.
“That was kinda hot.” Trevor turned to face the purple contacts of his dreams. It was the girl. He could only mumble back, not actually string two words together.
“That was sexy, kinda, to see you tear that, what did you call him, “noob”, down. “ She touched his arm, and Trevor looked at it in shock.
“What if your dick was as big as the ocean, it’d be the only snake not encroachin’”….
“Do you want me to freak you?
“I think I’m ok, how bout not.”
“C’mon…” She began to dance with him, and obviously dance, in this context, is defined lightly.
“Talk nerd to me,” she whispered lightly in his ear.
“I can program?”
“No… nerd! Nerd terms, I want to hear you say them to me.”
“I’ll reformat your hard-drive?”
“Yes, that’s it! That’s what I want to hear!” Trevor was happy that the concert was so loud because this girl was yelling.
“My flow is so intense I'll overflow your buffer, corrupt your stack pointer -
making all your data scream with pain and pleasure.”
“Yes! YES!”
“What is your name, anyway?” Trevor asked, bewildered.
“Zelda.” And Trevor had been shot by cupid’s arrow. There was no hope for him now.