There are no Manx proverbs for this

UNOVR was hardly perfect and bug-less, but wasn't that the same with all video games? Pace had never been the kind of guy to point and laugh on twitter because games were buggy or whatever. Sure, if it was genuinely to a point where you could barely play the game, that's something different, but bugs were fun! Glitches were fun, and they were the kind of things he adored pursuing as a kid. Bomb-jumping over the fence in Termina Field to access the Great Bay without Epona in Majora's Mask? That shit wouldn't have brought his IGN score down, it would've made him the king of the playground! So when his UNOVRcon app beeps with the most obvious of glitches, Pace can only laugh and slide into his friend's DMs.

IBIS: check out this glitch lol
>

The typing bubble popped up for a solid three minutes or so before Pace's phone beeped again, with Muin 's reply popping up.

MUIN: It's not a glitch.

IBIS: but ur in london 🤨🤔🤔

MUIN: No.
MUIN: Dream Kingdom Lounge.

This interaction hurt Pace's head slightly. Muin... lived in London. He worked in London. That was really far away, so... he must have won a ticket, all-inclusive. Which... Pace pauses for a moment and lets the thought roll around his tongue to taste. Muin... was here. Right here, upstairs, in the Dream Kingdom Lounge. Right now.

He'd done track for years and played baseball for more, but Pace wasn't sure if he'd ever ran as fast as this. It wasn't even on purpose - he didn't notice he was barrelling past over con-goers at a rate of knots until he nearly blunt-forced-trauma killed some teen girl trying to take selfies with a Pikachu cut-out. "Sorry-!" He pats her arm in a form of apology, and does the same to the cut-out, then speeds off once more. Up a flight of stairs, then up another, all the time with that little beep ringing through his head: Muin is nearby. In real life! Sure, Pace had other people he could've caught up with - Tuesday was probably here, whatever she looked like, and he'd seen Oz earlier. Sure, he could've had a bite to eat with his actual real-life friend who he'd met in person before, but who cared about that when the brand new virtual person he'd only met virtually was now real? Well, he'd been real the whole time, but... far away.

He arrives at the doorway to the Dream Lounge and looks up at it in reverent fear, like seeing the true form of an angel for the first time. This was very real. Pace didn't often get nervous, but... he sure was feeling something like it right now. He takes his first step in and nearly dies violently when his app beeps again, but it's only a notification about claiming his virtual GARDENER STAMP. Oh god. Okay. Crisis averted.

But then again... the Dream Lounge was huge, and there were plenty of people dotted around it's various corners. And with that realisation, Pace suddenly has a thought spring into mind - Muin probably doesn't look anything like his avatar, does he? Not everyone made themselves look exactly like themselves like Pace had taken the time to do. As he stares blankly at a few small crowds of people who all look nothing like his silver-haired friend, he verbalises his emotions with a quick, quiet "Fuck."

Ah, but the phone! His greatest enemy, his dearest friend, it still has use after all! He unlocks it once again and opens the DMs tab of his UNOVRcon app.

IBIS: hey im here where are u?

A map. A map. The app has a map!

Pace opens it with fingers like lightning and zooms into Muin 's location. Sure enough, here he is, in the Dream Kingdom Lounge, just right there. Forward, a little bit away, very close. This isn't Detroit to London anymore, this is... one step to the sixtieth-or-so step.

The last time they'd hung out, they'd been in the Birchwld Grove, and here they were now, still beneath canopies and with the fresh smell of nature around them. Things had felt so natural - no pun intended - so would that still last? Would it feel easy to poke and prod Muin when he was right there? Would Pace chat and laugh so easily when they were conversing with their real bodies, could he catch glimpses of Muin when he's not looking and smile like he did in the Grove? (Wait, had he done that?)

He takes a deep breath to settle the nerves and the ADHD, and then begins to walk. His head points down at his phone then looks up, back down and then up again, returning to periscope, checking the area out. Who of you is Muin? Is it you, this girl with the blonde pigtails who's reading a manga? No, Muin's location is further back than that. Are you one of these two - maybe brothers, Pace thinks - who are laughing with eachother about one of the games they played? But no, Muin's location isn't on top of them, either. But no, just past a collection of bushes covered in blossoms there was a bench just tucked a little more out of the way than some of the others were.

And on it, there was a young man.

His young man?

Pace suddenly felt very much under-dressed. Was it seeing this guy - Muin? - dressed so nice. His pants fit him, and his shirt fit him and... well, Pace's clothes fit him too, but... he was only in jeans and some old Lions merch he'd thrifted. Did he look alright? Things felt different off-stream - he didn't have his own face (or tits) in the camera staring back at him to know when he needed to fix his hair or pluck his unruly eyebrows. Was he actually ugly all along?! Okay, no, calm down. Had he been walking this whole time he was thinking? Oh, fuck, he was right here.

Well, if this is Muin, then he's going to certainly know that he's Ibis. They're practically twins, but Muin is... not. Is this really the right guy? Well, here he is staring him in the face and instead of doing something like asking him if he's the right guy or saying hello, Pace is overwhelmed by the incessant need to grin like the sunshine. There's only one, quite stupid, thing he can think of to say.

"Did you get a haircut?"

For the record, Pace had probably never seen a steamer - portable or otherwise - in his entire life.

Pace’s eyes may well be darker than Ibis’, not so sunlight as they are deep brown with flecks of gold, but Muin ’s eyes are quite different. No purple, but a pretty silver-grey that Pace had dropped into as soon as their eyes had met. And from his eyes, Pace studied Muin’s face further - no, Percy’s face. His first thought had been how different he looked, but that wasn’t quite true, really. The hair was different, the eye colour was different, the clothes were different… but…

Pace, midway through his thoughts, almost sub-conciously looks Percy up and down.

…really, he was Muin, quite identical. It was almost like catching him out of cosplay or something.

“Sure did, huh? Suits you.” He smiles, eyes finding Percy’s again. Gold and silver, and just a little zap down the back of Pace’s neck. Ah, fuck. What was that about?

“Oh! Stupid me, I should’a taken it off, then you might’ve known it was me right away, right?” Pace laughs, and extends a hand. “It’s good to meet you too, dude. Properly, this time. But basically the same place we always hang out, huh, this place is great!” He gestures around at the plant life around them, across the floors and ceilings, springing up in bushes and trees. “Do you reckon they’re real? You’d know, right?”

And despite all of the things to see in the Dream Lounge, Pace can’t help but keep smiling at Percy, who’s real and made of actual real human things like flesh and blood, right in front of him. And of course, now the floodgates had opened, the talking had begun. If he'd known Percy was going to be here, he might have actually taken his Adderall today, but instead, the poor lone Manxman had to deal with conversation. Terrifying.

“...This is so weird” He laughs. "How was your trip over? Musta been long"

Pace’s love of physical touch - even in the polite form of a handshake - is the kind of thing that comes naturally. He never had to learn it through any professional settings, he rarely had it instilled in him in the form of manners. His father had mentioned it was polite, of course, to greet someone with a handshake. He’d said much more without words, as well, taught by example - Farah had been the kind of man who hugged, who held, who would always find some excuse to have a hand on your shoulder or to ruffle your hair. Pace had grown up with an outpouring flood of physical affection, so how could he have not learnt to pass that on?

He shakes Percy’s hand firmly, as Percy does back to him, and the way their hands touch makes Pace laugh out loud. Why, exactly? Well, why else - because he’s real. He can feel everything in UNOVR, of course, but right now he could spend hours rubbing his fingers across Percy’s palm - if it wouldn’t have been totally insane to do, that is - and be able to feel each line, each little bump. Those kinds of things weren’t the same in VR, no matter how advanced it was.

“Oh, they are, huh? That’s so cool” Pace beams, looking around to bask in the glory of the room once more, now that Percy’s confirmed the legitimacy of the plants, though he keeps a tight leash on his excitement - don’t overdo things. His father had left a gift in the way Pace interacted with the world, but his mother had left her fair share, too. Don’t freak him out. Don’t be too much.

Instead, Pace looks back at Percy and holds his gaze tight as a rope while he speaks, telling him about his long journey. Pace had never been on a plane before he had to come here, but he always imagined when he was younger than it would hell on earth, or… hell in sky. Having to sit still for all that time? In reality, it wasn’t awful, but it wasn’t exactly interesting or fun.

“I always thought it’d be easier if we had wings, y’know. Probably would be quicker, way easier…” He speaks without thinking, nearly cutting off the end of Percy’s sentence, but he smiles like a child when he says it, eyes lit up like seeing heaven. Flight, after all, as Percy well knew in their discussions since they had flown together, was something special for Pace. His own flight - however impossible, however far away. He had thought, once, as a child, that he was supposed to be born with wings and he came out wrong. He remembered his father had laughed, then hugged him tight, and told him that there was not a single thing wrong with him, wings or no.

“-a particularly short trip either”

Oops - what had Percy said…? Short trip… they’d already spoken about his own, so… surely about Pace journey down, no? Pace nods, hoping he got it right. “I was thinking about driving, but it would’ve taken me like, literally thirty hours” He laughs “The flight was expensive, but… that’s what savings are for, right?” He almost shrinks at his own words for a second then, a little reminder that, actually, his savings are for when his bike breaks down, or when his washing machine explodes, not selfishly journeying to the other side of the continent for a pokemon convention. But… Percy was here. So it wasn’t just a pokemon convention anymore, was it?
“It’s so weird seeing you have an actual face, and… hands, and everything” Pace speaks, holding his gaze and pairing it with a bright smile. “It’s different, right? In a nice way, I mean. I like your avatar and all, the hair’s nice, stuff like that, but I like this real Percy more” He laughs, leans back on his hands and - as always unaware of his and other’s personal space as he is - brushes his shoulder against Percy’s as he does so.

Pace had always been the kind of person who never noticed distance. When he’d first discovered his friend ozone was in Toronto - about 4 hours away - he’d made plans to visit as though he lived in the next street over. When he had met people from different states, different countries eve, Pace rejoiced as though simply being on the same planet as someone was to be their neighbour. But in his mind, that was all-but the case. Ever optimistic, ever happy that he shares this earth with the people he wishes to share it with. Isn’t it beautiful?

This part of Pace was the same that made him late to work because he’d been distracted by watching a bird build a nest, or two cats laying in a sunbeam together. Unending joy with the world, ceaseless optimism. And yet… it didn’t run so deep, did it? But he didn’t want to think about that right now. His mother didn’t deserve the power of ruining a moment like this, with the thoughts and feelings she inspired in Pace. Friendship, that’s all he needed, and him and Percy were already such wonderful friends.

He doesn’t notice Percy’s subtle shift away, but does grin when Percy seems to ask about his staying arrangements.
“Not a hotel, I got an AirBNB” He nods, a smile crossing his lips “Must be since the con’s so big, a bunch of people put up their places up. Most of them are crazy expensive, but there were a couple apartments and flats and stuff, so I snapped one up. It’s actually pretty close to the con” The way he leans in as he says it hints to some kind of flirtation, and it’s not entirely incorrect. Pace flirts all the time, it’s just how he is, unconsciously; but is he doing it on purpose? Right now? Uh… next question.

The smile fades when Percy clarifies his compliment, though, and combines with a labrador-esque tilt of the head. You can almost feel the soft, fluffy ears flopping down as he does so. “You do?”, like it’s a surprise that Percy is stunningly handsome.

“Aw man…” Pace shakes his head sadly, grieving. “...You work that good job, you live in a nice house, all that and you still can’t afford a mirror?” And he grins before even finishing the sentence, too happy with his stupid joke to wait the amateur dramatics out. “Yes. I do. Aaaand I’m glad that Muin’s the real you and all, but aaaalso, this is the realer you, isn’t it? Like, physically. And better by far”

Percy plays nicely and bats the compliment back, which Pace catches not entirely swiftly, as though unaware the ball would be thrown at all. He’s knocked off-guard, mostly by that smile. Shiny pokemon, much? What were the odds on that, again, like one in fifty six billion or something? Give or take - but whatever they were, the odds that Percy smiled like that always seemed lower. It was rare, in the game, to see him smile at all, and now in the real world… here it was. Like seeing an eclipse or something. Not just the faintest little pull of a half-smirk, but a real smirk. Ah… out of entirely nowhere, Pace steers the conversation elsewhere.

“...You wanna get something to drink after this?”