Origin of a Hero By Nicholas Foland Wednesday morning 3:00 A.M. Doug’s Apartment Doug knew he had an early day tomorrow, but he didn’t care. He had to finish the campaign on another Call of Duty game he bought that day. Doug thought that was one of his weak points whenever he got a new game: he liked to complete it as soon as possible. Then it makes the game pretty useless and a waste of $60. But he didn’t care too much since he had hundreds of games to choose from in his arsenal of gaming. Doug glanced at the clock and saw 3:00. He knew that he had to be at school in 5 hours so he finally called it a night. He was getting tired anyway. He shut down the console and got ready for bed. As he brushed his teeth, he mentally thought about what he had to do tomorrow: Let’s see…tomorrow, or, well, I guess today is Wednesday. I have class at 8:30. I have the assignment for that done. Then I have class at noon. That’ll give me about 2 hours to nap between those two classes. After my noon class, it’s work from 4-8, damn it. I know I work only 3 days there, but it suuuuuuuuuucks. It’s so tedious and demeaning! He finishes saying obscene things about his grocery clerk job then he spits. He gargles some water and spits again. He smiled and looks at the mirror. “Oh yeah. Keep staying handsome!” He says while doing a quick muscle show for himself in the bathroom. He made his way to bed and thought about his games as he drifted to sleep. Wednesday morning 9:20 A.M. Florida State University Doug walked out of his Criminal Justice class and started his way toward the library. He made sure to whip his yellow scarf around his neck since it was a little nippy that day. On his walk, he got the usual comments he gets from fellow students. One girl said to her peer, “Wow, I wonder how much he works out!” Surprisingly, Doug doesn’t work out too much. He should weigh twice what he weighs now, with all the soda and junk food he eats. He knew this, but he still flaunts his body like he works out three times a day. He gave her a bicep flex as they cross paths. “Dude, he’s like 30 and still goes to college. He must be retarded,” a random student said, thinking he was far enough away for Doug not to hear him. He did, however. Luckily, Doug shook it off. Why, no, asshole. I’m actually 26. If you’d ask, maybe you’d know I started college late because my previous life plans didn’t work out like I thought they would! Doug is referring to the five years he spent trying to make a living on gaming. He got inspiration from YouTubers like Markiplier and Pewdiepie. He thought, These people make six figures on playing video games?! I have to get a cut of that! He would record himself playing all types of video games: action, co-op, adventure, and a whole lot more. For a while, he only had about 1,000 subscribers on YouTube, not nearly enough constant viewers to make a living off of. He decided to see what income he’d get going into competitive play. Unfortunately, all the games he tried competitive play in he wasn’t good enough. After five years, he realized he wasn’t getting anywhere and his parents kicked him out. Now he rents a tiny apartment, works at a subpar grocery store, and is trying to get his degree, so he can go into guidance counseling. In the library, it was quiet as usual. The soft clatter of keyboards and rustling of book pages can be heard throughout. Doug made his way to one of his usual couches for his nap. As he settled in, he set the alarm on his electronic watch for his next class. His eyes closed, then he started to think about how terrible his job was as he drifted off. Wednesday morning 9:30 A.M. Doug’s Dream Doug realized he was sitting at his computer in his apartment. Not questioning anything, he put on his headset and started playing his online games. He started playing Zombie Action Hero, a game about a character trying to survive the zombie apocalypse. After about five minutes, the room and his computer vanished right before his very eyes. He then found himself outside in an empty field. There was a light fog and a faint sound of some growling encompassed him. What the hell is going on? Doug thought, still oblivious that he was in a dream. He noticed that he had a single pistol in a belt-holster that he was wearing. He looked around and started seeing glowing green objects coming towards him. He looked closer to notice that the glowing is coming from the eyes of zombies. Doug then realized that he is in a dream and started to get ready for the slaughter. All at once, the zombies screamed and started running towards him. Show time! Doug whipped out his pistols and started to shoot the zombies, giving each zombie he saw a bullet in their head. His movements were fast, swift, and precise, not missing a single target. After about
54 Inscape 2016