I’m three sugar-free mimosas in when I get the call. It’s my work phone, which I distinguish from my regular phone by only using it at work. “I need you,” gasps John over the phone speakers. 

The boys are five members down on their four member team in World of Mania II: Life on Mars, due to a small mishap with a cloning device and another, much larger, mishap with the same cloning device. They need a gaming professional, but I’m way too drunk to drive back home to pick up my vastly more skilled half-brother, and way too sober to let a man do my gaming for me. 

Damn, now I’ve gotta figure this out. It looks like I’ll need the computing power of a Quantum Architech Eco Soft X7. Or at the very least a MacBook Pro wrapped in tin-foil to make its rays stronger. At this point I’ve run out of time, my glass has run out of alcohol, and the public library next to this bar has run out of computers. 

I pour myself two shots of the vodka I brought from home and toss my credit card at the manager. It doesn’t go very far so I pick it up, throw it at the manager, and tell him “this one, and every one hereafter, is on my dime.” I’m asked to leave when my card is declined. I whip out my backup gaming rig, World of Mania II: Life on Mars already loaded up. “Girls,” I tell the girls. There are like 100 girls in the bar. I have nothing to say next–I hadn’t thought that far ahead. 

I shoot a couple aliens, but they’re cloning themselves by the thousands. They’re even cloning my dead teammates and using the bodies to spell out vulgar words in their alien language–one of my least favorite things that can be done with dead bodies. 

My hands shaking, I type out ryuggrovyugseh. I’m hoping it's some kind of serious religious slur used against the aliens that worship the Mania Mars. The computer censors it out. My one strategy, gone. I have to think of something better, and fast.

I type ryuggr0vyugseh, then wait.

The aliens laugh at me and tell me ryuggrovyugseh doesn’t apply to them because they’re atheist. Then they call me a bunch of my-world slurs and cause me to lose the game. None of the slurs were against women, because the alien race in World of Mania II: Life on Mars has only one gender. Racial slurs are more relevant to them. But not to me–another successful day as a white girl in gaming.