Page 88 of Game Over

Snackless: be nice!!

PeaPodThePlayful: he’s doing his best :(

PeaPodThePlayful: at being a feeder.

MostlyBex: who cares how tf jesse plays when they look like that oml

Eixela22: fckn huge too ayoooooo

Even though I had no real interest in streaming myself, it was always a blast when I got to come on. To the viewers, I was just a side character to the stream, almost an NPC in the Theybe_Knot cinematic universe. A beloved repeat cameo that the fans were always excited to see.

Cameo… I should probably call him. It’s been a minute.

But I was way too busy for that tonight lining up my traps to try and catch the other team off guard. Though I was usually our healer, I was pulling double duty tonight since Tara couldn’t make the stream.

I didn’t mind so much though. It was pretty fun to pretend to be in the limelight, at least in short stints. Especially when I was lurking and someone asked about me.

Once, Jesse even did a stream where he called me out of the blue to ask me coding questions while he tried to make a game on stream with his chat. It was categorically a disastrous unplayable piece of garbage, but I’d nicked the files out of his drive and finished it up for him as a Christmas gift last year. Jesse played it as part of a special NYE stream and I’d earned the nickname “Code Daddy” from the chat. It was funny, especially when one of the mods added aCode Daddyemoji to the chat that gets spammed whenever I’m around.

The entire social ecosystem and language created in the chat, all centered around Jesse and their charisma was so interesting.I always found it impressive, how gravitational they were, even when they didn’t recognize it themselves.

“Damn,” Jesse groaned as his character went down. I’d been working to set up heals, but for some reason he’d moved away from the group, making himself easy pickings for the other team.

“Get back in there, we need our shooter,” I ordered, the faintest tinge of an alpha bark lingering at the edges of my tone.

“Coming back from spawn now,” they mumbled, shifting in their seat with a little huff.

The countdown for the other team began as they captured the area, making me sigh down the mic. My eyes moved to the screen with Jesse’s stream, keeping watch on it for the last few moments of the countdown.Defeatarrived in large red letters a few moments later, the chat going wild depending on whether they won channel points or lost them. Jesse was normally a pretty sure bet, so I’m sure his believers weren’t happy. Especially not with convention season coming up—there was a lot riding on being able to redeem for big prizes like being invited to join the mod team for a special breakfast or priority queueing for his meet and greet.

I pulled up our private chat and shot him a message.

Char.Ruin13: You doing okay? Seem off tonight.

I watched him glance to his second screen before his eyes dropped to his lap, almost quick enough that I missed it before he returned his focus to the chat.

Jesse: Yeah, just off my game a bit

Char.Ruin13: No worries, I got your back

Jesse: :))

We started the next game, Jesse taking a few extra seconds before running into the fray to deal some damage. I worked to set up a few heal spots before joining the battle to provide on-site healing. We were doingmuchbetter this round, our tank holdingthe line far more effectively now that they’d gotten their bearings with the rest of the team.

“Where are you Jess? Need a heal?”

“I’m good, just keeping my distance, looking for a weapons upgrade…” His tone was short and strained, a subtle sheen forming along his skin.

My eyes flashed to my third monitor before focusing back on the game, trying to ignore the way Jesse’s shallow breaths in my headset pickled at the back of my neck.

I tried to keep my focus on the game, but Jesse was distracting as fuck.

Watching his stream, it didn’t seem like his demeanor was that off. Sure, he was a bit stiffer in his chair than normal, but he was still landing shots… some of them, at least.

Even with his more frequent misses, our team was winning, with Jesse taking out their healers left and right as our tank worked on gaining control of the goal.

The round ended in a well-deserved win, the chat congratulating us as we watched the highlight reel for player of the game—me—roll.

I leaned back in my chair and turned to the monitor I’d been trying to keep my eyes off of all game. The third one, sitting to my side.

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