"It's fine," Adam assured him. "It's the right call, Cyn."
"But we're still on for Seattle," Logan said. "I suggested that we do a charity tournament as well, to raise money for victims of cyber-harassment and internet-assisted violence. The gamer forums are pissed, but at them, not us."
"They're saying," Knock explained, "that KoG was trying to kill the PLG and all good games. It's entirely possible that the members of Paradox, Executive Pain, and PsychoDreads were all talking while we were busy and decided to do this."
"Uh huh..." Jason said, having a feeling there was more to it than that. "Who started the idea?"
"Fizz," Adam said from beside Kate's bed. "He went to all the outfits on the TeamSpeak server and got it started. Knock's boyfriend - "
"Just friend," Knock corrected. "Ripper, Cyn."
"Yeah," Adam said. "He got the same going in Flawed, talking about how Dez had been targeted at F5. And that went to Reddit, which bled into Twitter, and now it's trending on Instagram and Facebook as well."
"Holy shit," Jason breathed.
"What's going on?" Riley asked as she walked into the room wearing a hospital gown on top and her jeans beneath. She looked between them all as she headed back to her bed and dropped onto it.
"We won," Psyc said softly, and yet he didn't sound as excited about it as he should be.
But before Jason could ask why, Braden's bed was wheeled into the room. A few people quickly stood and grabbed their plastic chairs to get them out of the way. Then Braden's bed was angled into a spot right beside Rhaven's. The man turned his head to her and reached out, clearly wanting her hand. Rhaven stretched for him, and their fingers could just barely touch.
"Well?" Psyc asked. "How bad?"
Braden nodded, so the nurse cleared her throat and looked at her chart. "Complete break of..." She paused, apparently changing tracks a bit. "He broke one rib completely and has a hairline fracture in another. Both are right at the front, so here." She pressed a hand just beneath her breast. "Which means that breathing is going to be difficult for a few weeks. No extra lifting, and he's probably going to require some assistance. Rhaven, he said you live with him?"
"I do," she agreed.
"The medication he'll go home with is potent. No driving while he's on it. No lifting anything over five pounds for the first week. Trust me, he won't want to. He'll also need a checkup with his local doctor in two weeks, and they can arrange a treatment and rehabilitation plan from there."
"I'm fucking changing my flight," Psyc said. "Brae, you're gonna be down for a bit. The least I can do is come help."
Braden laughed once, then pulled his hand back to grab at his side, groaning to prove that had been a bad idea. "Moving in already, bro?"
Psyc just kinda stuttered in place, his body not sure what it was supposed to do. "What?"
"I got a damned good internet connection," Braden said, his voice weaker than usual. "I got an extra room, plus the office. No reason you can't do your job from Ohio as well as California, right? Sadly, we can't say the same. I mean, if Rhave's ok with it."
"Really?" she asked.
Braden just nodded. "And I'm gonna be a pussy for a bit."
"Least you're still alive," Psyc said, moving around the bed to clasp Braden's arm. "Sure, man. I'll move in with you two."
"And babysit my ass?" Braden pressed.
"Probably," Psyc agreed.
"Best boyfriend-in-law ever," Braden said.
Rhaven just sat up. "Guys? Is it just me? I mean, every time KoG came after us, things seemed to get better for me. Does it really take a crisis to get something good to fucking happen?"
"No," Riley said, sitting up to match her. "This? The good parts? KoG had nothing to do with that. The reason we're all here isn't because they made us. It's because we are the ones who were brave enough to step up when they said to step back. We would've ended up here anyway. We would've come head-to-head at some point, realized we had so much in common, and still found our own happiness. I refuse to believe that anything good was because of KoG. I think we figured out how to do it in spite of them. I think that our power lies in the fact that we're gamers, and we refuse the idea that friendships require that we