John was sweating profusely and breathing in ragged wisps. His focus was intense, fingers pistoning rapidly. His other hand deftly handled a stiff rod with minimal movements. The hours had passed by quickly, but the fatigue was slowing him down. He was so close. The characters on the screen he was watching began to blur. He quickly rubbed his eyes to regain his focus before continuing his efforts. He was on the brink of culmination and he couldn’t stop now. He was about to break his previous record.

“Almost theeeere,” he said quietly through gritted teeth.

Then the basement door opened with its loud creaking, and then it bangs its doorknob onto a pipe with a loud clang as it reaches its apex. “John, honey? It’s almost time for dinner, but I’d like for you to take the trash out before we eat. And don’t forget to take the bins out to the curb.”

John slammed his hands onto the console in frustration as he stared at the high score in disbelief. He was only 100 points away from topping his previous high score in Gauntlet, and not just any high score, but a single-try high score; no continues allowed. “Moooom! I told you I was recording!”

“Oh, I’m sorry, sweetie. Be sure to wash up for dinner.” his mother commanded before closing the rickety door.

John rubbed his face and let out a long sigh and then turned to shut off his overhead camera. Maybe I can salvage some B-roll, he thought to himself. Then his phone dinged. It was Facebook. His anxiety spiked as he quickly unlocked his phone to see that it was indeed from the man who claims to own a fully functioning Polybius arcade cabinet. His groin even stirred as he opened the message that read:

“John,

Those terms you mentioned are acceptable. I can have the unit delivered to you by tomorrow for the $12,000 agreed upon. You have my cashtag. Payment is due upon delivery.

Victor”

John almost dropped his phone. He had been nagging Victor for the better part of a year, and he finally managed to get him to agree to a price. He was frozen in awe, exhilaration, and a bit of nervousness. Polybius is the pièce de résistance to any collection. A mythical cabinet that is thought to be just an urban legend. That is, until now.

Since John lives in his mom’s basement, it has allowed him to save up his meager earnings from his YouTube channel, and after reluctantly parting with his incredibly rare Pac-Land cabinet, he managed to scrape enough together. He almost puked when the delivery men carried it away.

He almost couldn’t contain himself as he sat at his computer and posted about it on Reddit. His head was reeling from the emotional roller coaster, and he hit, ‘Send’ before thinking about the consequences. He watched as the upvotes and comments slowly but surely came in in a steady stream.

“Yeah, right!”

“Another one bites the dust”

“TROLL!!! BLOCKED!!!”

“I wish i could afford to burn 12 G! Sucker!”

It frustrated him, but soon they would know the truth. Soon, his YouTube channel would blow up. He began to ponder the possibilities as he was then startled by the basement door opening again, again creaking and bumping into the pipe with a clang.

“Dinner’s on the table. Don’t forget to do what I asked.”

“Yes, mom! I’ll be right up.” He sighed again as he blankly stared at the upvotes rising steadily for a moment. How badly he wanted a friend to whom to brag. Bragging online is like licking a 9-volt battery and expecting it to taste like a lollipop. His stomach then grumbled at the passive thought of food, and so he grabbed his trash can and began clearing the trash still on his desk before going upstairs, taking them in twos.

As he sat at the dinner table, he smiled at his mother as she sat at her place.

“Thanks for cooking dinner, mom.”

“Oh, you’re welcome. Sounds like something reversed your mood.” she said, then kissing him on the forehead before taking a sip of her water.

“Well, you remember that arcade cabinet I’ve been saving up for?”

“Uh huh,” she responded, then taking a bite of food.

“So, the guy finally agreed to a price. It’s being delivered tomorrow.”

His mother finished her bite before responding, “That’s nice, dear.”

He knows that she’s genuinely happy for him, but he also knows that she’s never understood what these games mean to him and others like him. Especially ones as rare as Polybius. She will soon understand, he thought. He will finally prove to her that video games matter.

Later that night as he was responding to the nicer comments on Reddit, he received another message from Victor. It was a video with the caption:

“Thought you’d like to see some real game footage”

The video’s thumbnail had some motion blur, but the colors were vibrant as per the rumors. His eyes went wide as he sat back in his gaming chair and played the video. It was only twenty-five seconds long, but it was heaven to him at that moment. Even if it didn’t have the most vivid colors he’s ever seen in an 8-bit game, the shapes were fast-moving and slightly hypnotic, causing him to be even more entranced.

When the video ended abruptly, he felt like he was snapped out of a slight trance. He brushed it off as just his excitement, but it was harder to brush off the fact that he had a raging erection tenting his jeans. It caused him to pause for a moment before playing it again. He relaxed his right arm and held the phone with his left. He was really trying to focus on the gameplay to get an idea of its objectives. He couldn’t believe that he was getting to see real game footage.

When the video ended, again he felt like he was snapped out of a trance, only this time, he had pulled out his seven inch cock and was still mindlessly stroking it. He couldn’t understand why, but he didn’t seem to want to stop either. He set the video to repeat continuously. Each time the video would play, he would notice that his stroking would become faster. Each time he questioned why he was masturbating, but continued to not care to have an answer.

He was starting to get a grip on the gameplay. Two small colorful patterns were to be fit together before colorful moving targets would need to be hit, and then you would move ahead and repeat this process as it gets mildly harder each time. He began to repeat in his head, ‘Connect the patterns, hit the targets, move ahead.’ By the time the video had played for the twentieth time, John was slumped in a drooling stupor with his hand and lap covered in cum and his hand still jerked slightly on his flaccid penis as though it was still trying to stroke it. There was a foggy sense that he was still awake and vaguely aware of his surroundings, but his vision was mostly filled with the colorful hypnotic patterns from the game footage.

He heard the basement door open. He heard his mother call to him. He felt his nerves building, knowing that she might come down and see him in this state. She doesn’t like having to come down, but he then heard her call out again as she slowly began to step down the steep, creaky stairs. Despite his spiked anxiety, he couldn’t snap himself out of his stupor.

“John, are you sleeping?” she asked as she made it down the last few steps.

He wanted to yell out to her, but he couldn’t.

“John, sweetie?” He then heard her gasp as she no doubt saw that his cock was out and that there was cum all over his lap.

He wondered why she didn’t just leave, but then he could vaguely see her out of the corner of his eye bend down to pick up his cell phone. ‘Mother, no!’ he wanted to yell. He wanted to rip the phone out of her hands, but he could only sit there and wonder what it might do to her as she still stood there. John felt a deep guilt when he heard her moans before she collapsed. She’s a classy, old-fashioned woman that most likely never performs self gratification.

The next morning, John awoke in bed not having any memories of the night before. He didn’t try to remember as it felt like every other morning to him. He’s not much of a morning person, but today was possibly the biggest day of his mostly pitiful life. He almost couldn’t contain himself and his impatience was being tested not knowing exactly when it was to be delivered.

As eleven o’clock rolled around, he suddenly got the notion to go see Isabella, a young woman who works at a local diner and is an avid gamer. He has had a crush on her ever since she showed up for a Gauntlet tournament he had hosted when he got the game several years prior. Isabella is of mixed race from the Mediterranean. She looks Greek, but has the olive complexion of an Italian. She’s tall for a woman and has a skinny athletic build. To most, her nerdiness makes her not as pretty as others, but she has big ice blue eyes that have that dark rim on the outer edge of the iris.

He sat at one of her tables, and she surprised him by coming up from behind. “I thought you said that you wouldn’t come here anymore.”

He had, and he had meant it”Yeah, well, you’re going to want to hear about this.”

Isabella shifted her weight onto her other foot in an annoyed manner. “Yeah, and what’s that?” Her tone filled with even more annoyance.

“I scored Polybius.”

Her posture and expression immediately changed. “Wait. What? There’s no way.”

“No, seriously. You should come over tonight. I invited a few local gamers, too.” That was a lie, but he knew that she wouldn’t come if she knew that she was coming alone.

“I—” she stammered with an unsure look on her face.

“Look,” he said as he quickly pulled out his cell phone and unlocked it, “I have a video of some real game footage.” However, when he got to the message, it had been deleted, and then a sudden flood of memories of the night before crashed into his brain and he was suddenly struck with seeing the hypnotic patterns from the game footage.

“John. John! Hey!” she said, shaking him by his shoulder.

He snapped out of his slight trance and startled her as he bolted out of the booth saying, “I have to go.” he said, realizing that he had not seen his mother that morning. “Come by at nine.” He then ran home as fast as he could.

When John bolted through the kitchen door, he was surprised to see his mother. She was a bit startled, but continued to stir the brownie mix in a large bowl on the counter.

“Are you okay? Was someone chasing you?”

“Uh, no, mom. I’m good.” He stood there and watched her to see if there were any clues as to whether or not she could remember the night before. Was it a dream? “Did, uh, anything interesting happen last night?”

“Hmm, not that I can recall. Why do you ask?”

“Oh, no reason in particular.”

“Alright, son. Oh, and by the way, your game thingy arrived. I had them take it downstairs.”

John was struck with excitement, trepidation, and a little bit of guilt that caused him to be momentarily paralyzed. He was about to ask her if she had remembered tucking him in last night, but that and the guilt got swept aside by the realization that it was actually there. It was in the basement waiting for him. The need to see it, touch it, play it, had all the recent high strangeness momentarily forgotten as he bolted down the stairs. The doorknob hit the pipe so hard that it rang like a bell for several seconds. He barely heard his mother gasp as he slowed for the last few steps, and he could now see the back of the cabinet.

His jaw was now slacked as he approached the unit. There was a bit of dust in the vents and a few strands of cobwebs, but it looked to be in good shape for being over forty years old. He knew, though, that if even one of the bad rumors about it were true, then it would have most likely sat in someone’s private collection or in storage for most of those years. He couldn’t help but trace his hand along it as he slowly came around to the front of it. It was a basic cabinet with plain sides.

His eyes slightly teared up just as the front of the unit was coming into view. He was feeling tingly as the marquee with the name, Polybius, came into view. His eyes slowly came down and his brow furled heavily as he saw the strange joystick on the control panel. He was further confused by the fact that there were no buttons, but he leaned down to look at the large joystick that looked a bit like a joystick for a plane or jet, except that it looked like your hand would go inside of it somehow.

He was very anxious to see if it would boot up, and so he stopped speculating and went and grabbed his dolly to move the unit to where he could plug it in. The cabinet was a lot heavier than he expected, but he managed to get it into the spot where Pac-Land was. He hurriedly plugged it in, but was disappointed when he didn’t hear anything. He raced around to the front, and even though the screen was still blank, he could tell that the monitor was on.

He stared in awe as it slowly warmed up and the title screen materialized. It looked just like the screenshot image that’s been floating around since the beginning. He spent a long moment going over the simple title screen. This was it. The urban legend right there in his home. He was touching it, breathing it in, and trying to contain his inner child that wanted to jump and hoot and just go crazy in a tantrum of wild energy. At 32, he didn’t allow himself to act like that anymore, but the temptation was very hard to resist.

A pang of nerves and his subconscious reminding him of the previous night was easily overcome with how badly he wanted to play. He went and grabbed a handful of mock quarters and put them on the control panel before grabbing one and crouching to put it into the coin slot. It was then that he noticed that the control panel was flush with the coin slot panel, and as he went to put the mock quarter in, he noticed a strange three inch ring of red LEDs just below the control panel. They were not lit up and he couldn’t see anything else that hinted as to why they were there. He dropped the coin in and stood to see that the credits number had indeed changed to, ‘1’.