The Arcade

You enter at the lowest floor. It is bright, pink, the music tinny and the games silly. Familiar faces, like the impossible claw game, mingle with strange machines whose purposes are unclear, but are stuffed with toys. Small children and teenage girls operate these devices with surprising and inexplicable precision. Continue upwards, the second floor, and the noise overwhelms you. Simulated engines rev up and imaginary clutches engage. Rows of steering wheels manned by young men, eager to power through impossible turns at break-neck speeds, practicing for future driving license tests. A terrifying premonition grips you and you ascend. The third floor is quiet, silent. Pinball machines, ancient relics of an analog age, slouch, ashamed, in the corners. Their weak bells cannot compete with the siren songs of higher floors. Obsolescence walks here, and it smells of the quiet death of a nursing home. If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, none other of my race will find them here. The fourth floor calls, and I answer. Here, I see the living dead. Smoke clouds the air, and rows of men sit, like drones, motionless except for the quick click of fingers on buttons, the practiced twist of a joystick, or the flick of a cigarette. No one speaks. The games are unfamiliar, strange, I grow frightened, I turn and go. The fifth floor is different. From within I hear voices, loud cheering and angry swearing. Even in Japanese I recognize the rhythms of competition. The poster on the door stops me for a second. The faces are familiar. Jin Kazama, Heihachi Mishima, Nina Williams pose in improbable positions, and I know that I am home. I enter. Young men again, but crowded around a handful of machines, watching. I join them. The players are good, very good. I smile, and when King breaks Ganryu's spine with three linked throws, I cheer with them. The young man next to me smokes a cigarette and turns. He ask, "Do you play?" in slow English. Modestly, I respond, "I can try." We sit down, two machines, one next to the other. I pick my avatar, Jin Kazama, simple, powerful, direct. He chooses Marduk, the Native American giant, but I am not afraid. His large size is compensated by little speed. We begin, and we draw a crowd. Back and forth, we fight, until the giant falls. I turn to my opponent, and I smile a smug smile, a Cheshire cat smile, quite pleased. He smiles back, politely, then looks over his shoulder at his compatriots, and he winks. In an instant, I learn why a mouse should never venture into a lion's den. The second round begins, and I open with the Demon's Fist. He blocks. Double Lift Kick. He blocks. Low Sweep. He jumps over it. Back Roundhouse. He blocks. Forward Throw. He ducks. I turn my head to look at him, and that was my last mistake. His brow is furrowed with a concentration he hadn't shown before, and when I turn back to the screen, I'm dead. The giant crushes me with six powerful blows of his fists, then shatters me over his knee. Now, he turns to me, and his smile is wide, and full of teeth. The third round goes quickly, my failure is complete. I laugh, obviously outclassed, excuse myself with a meaningless, "Good game," then take my leave. His friends' laughter chases me out the door and up to the sixth floor. The sixth and seventh floors are the same, but different games, ones I do not know. I fear to face the predators within, so I descend, back out the rabbit hole, holding close the tattered shreds of dignity and pride that are left me.