rapidly in and out of view.
‘Stop it!’ cried Daisy, turning away and holding her stomach. ‘That makes me feel sick.’
‘Sorry,’ said Ryan, returning the view to normal. ‘What do you want to do then?’
‘Well, we know what to ask Tristram when we next see him,’ said Daisy. ‘If we can’t go any further then maybe you could show me some of your games instead?’
‘I thought you’d never ask,’ grinned Ryan.
He clicked around the screen, trying to find a way of exiting. He then tried a few keyboard combinations that normally did the trick.
‘Bugger,’ he said as they all failed. ‘Time for a reboot.’
‘Hang on,’ said Daisy. ‘How do you get off the Dream Isle normally?’
‘You just wake up,’ Ryan replied.
‘Or?’
Ryan frowned, trying to work out what she was getting at.
‘You enter a dream?’ he suggested.
‘Exactly!’ declared Daisy.
Ryan looked at her, puzzled.
‘So…’ she prompted.
Ryan fingered the wheel on his mouse for a moment before finally cottoning on to what she was getting at. He zoomed in towards one of the rivers and clicked on its gently rippling waters. Immediately the landscape disappeared and was replaced with the picture of Miss Ward. The two of them burst out laughing at the sight of it.
‘I knew you’d get it,’ giggled Daisy.
‘Well done you for thinking of it,’ replied Ryan, giving her a high-five. ‘I would have just turned it off and turned it on again.’
Daisy shook her head. ‘That picture is so funny.’
‘I’m glad you think so. My mum would kill me if she found it on here.’
‘It’s just your expression. I bet you can’t remember a word of what she was saying.’
‘I wouldn’t be able to no matter who was trying to tell it to me. I find school stuff so boring.’
‘So you don’t enjoy challenging yourself to learn new things and expand your mind?’
‘No, not really. I prefer to challenge myself in other ways.’
He began loading up his favourite Second World War shooter.
‘Besides,’ he added. ‘You spend most of your time staring out of the windows in class, or so I hear.’
‘That’s what Jack Thomas says, is it?’
‘Yup.’
‘I suppose I do daydream a lot, but I still get my work done at the end of the day.’
‘Doesn’t it annoy your teachers; you not paying attention?’
‘Not as much as if I stared at their breasts, I imagine,’ smiled Daisy.
Ryan’s jaw dropped. He had never heard Daisy come out with such a comment before.
‘What?’ she asked, upon seeing the look of astonishment on his face.
‘I… well, nothing actually. I just didn’t expect you to come out with a response like that.’
Daisy smiled warmly. ‘I’m really not a nutter Ryan. I’m just like anyone else.’
No you’re not, he thought. You’re more sound than anyone at school. If only they knew.
‘It was pretty sharp,’ he said out loud. ‘Here, check this out. I know how much you like the outdoors.’
He nodded at the screen, where a first person perspective showed a pair of legs rapidly descending towards an expanse of lush countryside, dotted with tiny villages.
‘What’s this?’ asked Daisy.
‘France, 1944. This is how I get out and see the world.’
‘Okay, show me what it’s all about then.’
Daisy was leaning forwards, staring at the screen again. Ryan could sense her close by. He almost expected to feel her breath on his neck. He wasn’t quite sure what he’d do if he did. The mere thought of it sent a tingling sensation rippling through his body.
He blinked hard and tried to concentrate as his character neared the ground. Already the sounds of battle were being fed to them through his speakers, despite them being turned right down in case his mum suddenly returned home. The crack of gunfire, the screams of the wounded and the distant roar of artillery resounded on all sides as Ryan landed in the midst of a desperate fire-fight. Immediately he was set upon by unfriendlies and went scurrying for cover, while sending off a burst of fire in their direction. He quickly found a hollow to duck into, making himself virtually invisible while he assessed his options. Flicking through his inventory, he pulled out a rifle and then slowly peered over the edge of the dip.
He caught sight of a couple of enemy soldiers who were advancing on his position from the direction he had come. Without a second thought, he took the nearest man’s head clean off his shoulders with a well-placed shot. This caused Daisy to squeal so loudly that Ryan jumped and his second shot caught the soldier’s accomplice in the leg, leaving him writhing around on the floor in agony.
Ryan moved the little finger of his left hand ever so slightly and hit the Escape key.
‘What’s up?’ he asked, slightly annoyed. He prided himself in his ability to pull off one-shot kills on demand.
‘It’s horrible!’ Daisy cried.
‘Of course it is. It’s war!’
‘But why would you want to re-enact something so barbaric?’
‘Err… because it’s fun?’
‘Fun? You just killed someone!’
‘Dizz, it’s a computer program. I can load it up again and that same guy will have miraculously come back to life. It’s no big deal.’
‘But it’s horrible,’ protested Daisy.
‘Look, there’s no point simulating a gentle stroll in the woods, is there? What fun would there be in that? You need to have some action or strategy; something to make you think and to make it enjoyable. Listen, I’ve played this level before. There’s a village not far away that I need to liberate, once I've found some of my own men. If you’re still not happy when I get there then we’ll try something else.’
Daisy nodded uncertainly. However, she was no longer falling off the edge of the bed with excitement.
Before Ryan continued, he accessed one of the menus and turned the parental controls on to minimise the amount of blood and gore on the screen. It seemed to do the trick. As he made his way through the level, his unerring knack for head-shots making his progress swift, Daisy settled down and began to get quite into it. So much so, in fact, that she began giving Ryan warnings whenever she glimpsed a foe hiding in one of the ruined buildings. While this would have usually annoyed him, Ryan took it as a sign that he was starting to bring her over to the dark side.
Finally, having secured the village just in time for reinforcements to arrive, he sat back and grinned at Daisy.
‘Fancy a go?’ he asked.
‘Oh no, I couldn’t possibly. It looks far too complicated.’
‘Nah, it’s easy. I’ll fire up one of the training missions for you.’
‘Okay then, yes. I’ve never used a gun though, Ryan.’
‘Neither have I. There’s nothing to it, trust me.’
A few moments later Daisy was standing in front of a grim-faced drill sergeant, who was barking orders at her in an hilarious cockney accent. Thankfully the parental controls were preventing her from being exposed to some of the language that Ryan had been subject to when he had played through the training levels.
Daisy was now in the command chair with Ryan on a beanbag next to her. She was sat so far forward that her face was barely a foot away from the screen, and her brow was furrowed in concentration as she fought to get to grips with the controls.
‘It doesn’t make any sense,’ she cried as she ran round in circles looking at the ground, while the sergeant reminded her of what a disgrace she was. ‘I’m either facing straight up of straight down.’
‘Use the mouse to set it level then,’ said Ryan, amused at how quickly the game had engrossed her.
‘How? It all feels wrong. It’s like down is up and up is down.’
‘Oh you’re not one of them are you?’
‘One of what?’
Ryan nearly said ‘freak’, but was glad his mind intervened in time. He reached over, took the mouse from her and changed one of the settings that really did make up, down, and down, up.
‘Ah, that’s so much better!’ said Daisy, plunging straight into the assault course with great aplomb. Then she was on to target practice, which seemed to bring out a certain amount of ambivalence in her. On the one hand, she appeared to be put off by the mannequins that she was told to shoot at. On the other, when it came to actually firing the gun, her skill level was pretty high for a first-timer. Before long, she had made it through the training stages and the drill sergeant had grudgingly declared her, in his best ‘apples and pears’ voice, fit for duty.
‘That was fun,’ Daisy smiled, sitting back and feeling satisfied with her efforts.
‘Told you so,’ said Ryan. ‘And if you enjoyed that, just wait until you get stuck into a real fight.’
‘Oh no! I couldn’t possibly. That’s quite enough for me. Really Ryan, that’s all I can handle for the moment. It is great, but it does make me feel a bit giddy after a while.’
‘Okay, so what do you want to do then?’
‘Actually, I’m excited to meet up with Tristram again and find out more about the Academy.’
‘What, now? Dizz, it’s not even eight o’clock yet. You can’t go to bed. We haven’t even had dinner.’
A week ago the idea of Ryan actively encouraging Daisy to stay round his house a little longer would have sounded ludicrous.
‘I know, but I just can’t wait to get back there. Aren’t you excited about it too?’
‘Yeah, but I’m not going to bed at stupid o’clock for it. Seriously, if you really do want to go to bed, we at least ought to have something to eat first. Remember