Dragons vs. Robots

big show of looking outside from left to right. “Did the world get taken over by pod people while I was on deadline?”
I blushed. I hadn’t thought about how weird that would sound, coming from me. After all, how many times had I told Maddy in the last three months that I didn’t “do” the internet anymore? She’d thought it was so funny—this twelve-year-old Luddite, obsessed with old-school video games and denying all things online.
If only she knew why.
“It’s kind of an emergency,” Lilli piped in.
Maddy gave her a skeptical look. “Emergency-emergency? Or, like, you need to learn some new TikTok dances emergency?”
“The first,” I assured her. “We have to check on someone. Make sure they’re okay.”
Rain started to fall again, splashing onto my shoulders. Maddy looked up and sighed. “Fine. Come in before you get soaked to the skin.”
She hustled us through the front door and into the arcade. The place had been shut down for the night, and the screens to all my favorite games were dark. Until, that was, Maddy walked behind the prize counter (she gave out the best prizes in town) and everything came to life. The screens loaded with their blocky graphics. Their eight-bit theme songs cheerfully beeping and booping through the arcade.
Lilli let out a low whistle, turning in a circle to take it all in. “Wow,” she said. “This place is like Ian heaven. No wonder you come here so much.”
I breathed in the familiar stale air, feeling my body relax for the first time all evening. Lilli wasn’t wrong. This was my safe space. The one place I could come and still feel like a gamer. I trailed a hand along an old Galaga game, having the instant urge to stick in a quarter and start playing.
But we had more important things to do now. So I plopped down at one of the tables in the corner, which Maddy used to host Dungeons and Dragons sessions on weekends. Reaching into my bag, I pulled out Lilli’s laptop.
“Come on,” I said, beckoning to Lilli. “Let’s get this over with.”
I could feel Maddy watching us curiously as Lilli came over and pulled up a folding chair next to me. “Everything all right?” she asked.
“We don’t know,” I admitted. Which was something I’d normally never say to a grown-up. No need to get them all worried and up in our business. But Maddy was different. I was pretty sure if something really went wrong, she’d have our backs.
After connecting to the internet, I drew in a breath, then loaded up Fields of Fantasy again, selecting the mail icon on the load-in screen and pulling up Ikumi’s message.
Help!
I bit my lower lip. What did she mean by that? Did she want me to help her? Or her dad? Both? A little more information might have been useful in this case.
“Why don’t you write her back?” Lilli suggested.
I nodded, placing my hands on the keyboard again. Hey, it’s Ian and Lilli, I typed. Sorry it took us a while to reply. Is everything okay? What do you need?
I glanced back at my sister. “Does that sound all right?”
“Yeah. Send it. Then we can wait—see if she replies.”
“Good idea.” I pressed Send on the message. Then I turned to Maddy. “Do you mind if we hang out for a little bit? We’re waiting to hear back from our friend.” I paused, then added, “We don’t know for sure, but she might be in some trouble.”
“And… she doesn’t have a phone?” Maddy asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Her dad’s really strict,” Lilli said quickly. I shot her a grateful look.
Maddy didn’t look entirely convinced. But in the end, she nodded. “Fine. But you gotta make yourselves useful if you’re staying. Help me clean the machines. These games get crazy dirty during the day.” She tossed me and Lilli some rags and a bottle of Windex. “I can use all the help I can get.”
And so we got to work, wandering the arcade, wiping off the screens and controllers of the various game cabinets. Maddy wasn’t wrong; some of them were filthy. Definitely needed to remember to wash my hands after my next visit.
“What on earth is this game?” Lilli asked a few cabinets down, squinting at a bear in a party hat being chased by killer trees. “It looks weird. And it doesn’t even have a… What’s it called? A joystick?” She rolled her rag over the little trackball that sat in its place.
“Crystal Castles,” I said, stepping over to her side. “It’s supercool. You, like, run around this maze, collecting gems.”
“So like Pac-Man.”
“Uh, yeah, except completely different!” I exclaimed, a little offended. I mean, really! Crystal Castles and Pac-Man were not even remotely the same. That was like saying Mario and Zelda were the same! Fortnite and Apex Legends!
Lilli rolled her eyes. “So sorry. My mistake.”
Maddy walked over to us, placing a hand on my shoulder. “I swear this kid was born before his time,” she declared. “Before my time, even.”
Lilli giggled. I groaned.
“Whatever, haters,” I said, walking over to the Dragon’s Lair cabinet and watching the familiar animated scene of Dirk the Daring and Princess Daphne play out on-screen. “These games might not have the flashiest graphics or soundtracks sung by celebrities, but they’re still awesome. The building blocks of today’s most important games.”
Lilli groaned. “Here we go again.”
“He’s not wrong,” Maddy relented, leaning against a Centipede machine. “Some of the stuff we take for granted in games now was totally revolutionary in their time. For example, did you know Sega released a home version of virtual reality glasses back in the eighties? They’re super primitive compared to what we have now. But at the time it was a huge deal. And it paved the way for the VR systems we have today. Even that mixed-reality theme park they’re building out in the South Pacific.” She tapped her finger to her chin. “What’s it called again?”
“Dragon Ops,” Lilli and I both said together.
“Yes! Right!” She laughed. “I wonder