After heated rows and unnecessary confrontations, several friends walked away from me, forever. My relationship with my mother was stretched unhealthily until it was left dangling by threads, damaged horrifically it just hung waiting to be sliced through, permanently. My eyes turned a bloodshot red due to the lack of sleep. Dark circles decorated my eyes. My behaviour was slowly deteriorating as I started transforming into a nightmare.
It was DBO, the game I personally worshipped and loved that decided to boot me from its universe. It player wiped my save files, erased my priceless data at the click of a button completely destroying me. Reduced to nothing and seriously frustrated, I picked myself up from the ground I had been crying on and started again. The only hope left for me was vastly fading away into the horizon. I rejoined again later that evening, a friend at my side, preparing for the worse DBO could dish out. Sitting in the warm grove formed by my back side I begun to play and in a matter of five minutes I had completely forgotten about the player wipe...
“This time it’s gone too far!!!” I screeched furiously as I smashed the computer shut with shaking hands. Dragon ball online had wiped my file again in the matter of a few days, causing the veins to pop onto the surface of my forehead. Insane in the membrane, insane in the brain, I picked up my light jacket, left the house and lashed out… After I was finished I was sure no one in a mile’s radius was going to communicate with me again. Remaining friends not talking to me, my mum very angry with me and people shooting odd glances at me from every direction I walked, I retreated to my bedroom. But upon impact with the warm carpet stretched across the floor of my room I froze. I literally felt like a drink from McDonalds- my insides slowly being sucked out from me leaving behind clumps of cold, icy waste. Desperate, I allowed my self to become hooked to a different game to try to block DBO out from my mind, permanently.
Dbozmm was its name but truthfully it wasn’t at all a great game. Only because it was the splitting image of Dragon ball online I gave into it and got hooked in a matter of seconds like a fish clamping its jaws over the fat juicy bait on the end of a fishing line. I was shoved into a different galaxy with different rules. During lessons I could still hear the music of the game ringing in my ears. I protected the game like it was a new born baby. … I was once again totally, completely, obsessively addicted but the game had some serious bugs and after a few days it conked out leaving me shattered. Gifted with the personality of a moody cow, I didn’t wait for it to reappear and stalked off with my pride, or what ever pride I had left as most of it was dripping on the floor embedded in my shower of salty tears.
My orange brick house- a semi detached wonder, looks as empty as a glass of beer left unattended at a full scale party, but looks weren’t always everything… Inside the house countless problems floated in the air disturbing everything. Dogs barking, mother shouting, sisters screeching, cats clawing and worst of all my addiction with ‘Byond’ had resurfaced. I was stressed out to the bone and seriously needed a break from the computer and my house. So leaving behind everything I packed my bags I set out to Eurojam. The two weeks I spent away at camp were truly amazing. I was split into two- A kind hearted person who rarely showed their true colours and the cold wall which lived in my bedroom, lived on the computer…Camp made me feel ready, refreshed and rejuvenated .I thought about tackling the ultimate challenge when I got home- over coming my sad obsession and defeating the computer was all that was racing though my mind. Annihilating ‘Byond’ once and for all was now a life long dream, a life long dream that had to be completed before it was too late…
Eurojam- The fantastic twelve day camp with an unbelievably warm atmosphere deeply inspired me to chuck away my old life and start a clean slate free of addictive games, Having such breezy sunny days and dreamy, magnificent nights where stars twinkled everywhere for hours until light began to rise from the horizon, Euro jam was truly one of the best things that had ever happened to me. After I returned to my house feeling new and improved, I started developing sportive hobbies and kept a safe difference away from the computer at all times. But despite trying to move away from my old life, despite Eurojam the forceful waves of the computer drowned everything out and pulled me in yet again. I found myself initiating sleepovers just to play ‘Byond’, and all hope was lost as my soul, the changed person who I was trying to become was dragged right back to the computer like a speck of dust sucked up with ease by a Hoover. I felt like a piece of weak wood, being hacked at by a power saw until I finally cracked and split in half. And that moment precisely, Joseph Gayle was no more…
My brand new life was like a glass window shattered into millions of pieces irreparable, leaving behind a gaping hole in the soul that was me. My objectives, hopes and dreams- all tarnished. All of my emotions fled, abandoned me, only leaving behind the foolish side of me which I hated deeply. Only leaving behind a large space to be filled with nothing else but ‘Byond’… I felt like a possessed child at that moment- horrified and afraid that I could no longer control my actions. For the first time in my existence I felt the powerful urge to submit. I seriously considered giving up .Giving up my heart to ‘Byond’. During this time, frozen in my own thoughts everything I had ever accomplished flashed into my mind; everything that meant something to me whizzing in and out of my head. And then I saw it, clearly in my mind, closing down ‘Byond’ for the final time. Finally I knew what had to be accomplished to turn this dream to reality- what had to be done to shut ‘Byond’ out of my life. Permanently.
Fingers twitching in fear, I slowly inched the pointer on my screen to ‘my documents’. Inched the pointer slowly to ‘programs’ sweat roiling down my face all the time. Inched it further to the folder called ‘‘Byond’’ and stopped suddenly. Everything that had troubled me, ruined me, destroyed me, all lay in this bright yellow rectangular folder. But not even this satisfied me enough, fuelled by rage and hatred I browsed on… Forcing the mouse under ‘personal data’ and fighting the computer and myself, I finally had the pointer over the file ‘Joseph Gayle .dmi’. Tears were already forming in my eyes as what I was about to do. Shivering vividly now, I right clicked and the option popped from the folder. Without turning back I scrolled down the options and rested my pointer on the ‘delete’ tab.
“‘Byond,’ I swear, I’ll never miss you.” I shot to the machine and then clicked on the delete key erasing the Joseph Gayle online forever. Instantly, I could feel him, smell him and even taste him inside of me, disintegrating. The one and only link connecting me to the computer- annihilated, and for a brief second I could feel his rage.
“Wh- why? Ho-how? I don’t believe this… I DON’T BELIEVE THIS IS HAPPENING!!!!” Veins pulsing everywhere on his body, pumping the last of his blood he dropped to one knee. “No… NO... NOOOO!!!” Suddenly, just like that I knew it was over for me, over for ever, over for eternity…
Drying his tears on my woolly sleeve- the last of him, I stood up knowing that life would now improve for me. I stood up as Joe- the being that had rested in Joseph Gayle for a very long time, never exposing his true colours. Sighing at the tears on the floor I picked up my light blue sports jacket and turned to the semi- glass front door. There was one more thing I had to do. My friends were still all at ‘Byond’s’ mercy in different stages, still hooked, still in danger. Picking up the phone and dialling three numbers I repeated the same phrase down the phone to all of them. “Meet me in the park by the swings. This IS important.” And I trudged off towards Kenton recreation. I already knew that this would be the final conflict of ‘Byond’- those who walk towards and those who walk away would be separated. As I entered the large field, the wind blew through my hair and the green grass moved to the breeze as far as the eye could see. The park was a breezy, spectacular vision today, trees swaying in the wind making me feel guilty about what I was going to do… All three of them stood by the basketball court, looks of anxiety and suspicion crossing their faces. And as I waded through the uncut grass approaching my friends, I knew this would be very difficult…
Before I could begin attempting to persuade my friends to follow me into the real world and leave ‘Byond’ behind, I was rudely interrupted. Alex, Shivdude and HH all lounged on the wall in front of me, very impatient.
“Joe… WHAT IS IT” Alex started “My god I was in a seriously important championship tournament!!!”
“Joe…” HH began.
“Couldn’t it wait?” Shivdude spat- very upset. I was bombarded with questions and insults shooting at me from every direction. I raised my sweaty palm, fingers extended, to show that I needed silence for what I was about to say. Alex locked his eyes to mine. He didn’t like to be ordered around but on this occasion accepted that I needed peace.
“I have come today to talk to you about ‘Byond’.” Immediately HH sniggered but my forceful look stunned him into silence. The others watched intently while I continued my speech. “‘Byond’ is a laugh to begin with but do you know what it can do t-”
“Joe is this all you came to talk about?” Alex interrupted.
“Well as a matter of fact… Yes it is. This site is a parasite, a virus waiting to take over your life and control you.” Alex HH and Shivdude listened with a surprising amount of respect until I was almost finished…
“So this is why I quit.” I ended looking around eagerly awaiting a response.
“Joe, you really are a weak fool!” HH sneered then bust out laughing, howling like a hyena Alex doubling up in the floor beside him. I was shocked, all I’d said to them, and nothing had changed their opinion if anything it had just made them worst. I was distraught
“Shiv, let’s get out of here and leave the weak baby!!!” Alex shouted already half way through the grass with HH trotting after him like a personal lap dog… But Shiv didn’t move. He stuck with me and boomed “Forget you and H! I quit too!!!” This was the second shock of the day for me. Alex and HH stood frozen to the spot. All four of us watched to see who would make the first move.
“Come on H we’re off.” And Alex and H turned their backs on me and Shiv and jogged through the swaying grass back to ‘Byond’, back to the other side, back to their own destruction. It was too late for them. Before I’d even thought of ringing Alex and HH, they were only listening to ‘Byond’- it was too late for me to change their view, only they could accomplish that now. As for me I WAS FREE!!!
As I quickly dashed home I could feel the fresh, cool breeze gently blowing against my warm face. Blowing down the prison gates of my old life. Tears of ecstasy tickled down my face. I WAS FREE!
