r/G2eSports • u/hnhnh2 • Aug 12 '19
Meme Monday A Day in the Life of GrabbZ
My morning always starts the same. My phone vibrates - it is a Snapchat from Carlos, my boss. My contract says I must open every Snapchat and message from Carlos, and that his contact in my phone must be a dog and a scarf. When I was first hired, I had asked him why not have a cat instead, because ocelots are cats. He had looked at me, confused, and said he had never heard of ocelots before. He seemed upset that they gave “his name” to the animal without asking for his permission. He came around when I showed him a picture of one, quickly called his assistant and instructing them to purchase enough small G2 jerseys for every ocelot in the world.
I open the Snapchat, and today it is a picture of the yesterday’s Fnatic game. The caption is “We will draft Garen/Yuumi next week” and I know that if I do not do this I will be fired. I write it down in my notebook, which I now keep in a safe under my bed. My mortal enemy stole it from my bag last week and gave it to the G2 social media person, and it ended up on Instagram. It was good they did not show my doodles of Qiyana.
I get dressed and ready to go to work. As always, I wear two different socks. One says “#TLWin” and the other says “#FNCWin.” Carlos tells me that they are to remind me that we walk on and crush our competition. The socks are another contractual obligation.
I walk to work, making sure that I am not being followed by anyone from XL or Misfits. Their coaches harass me all the time, asking for tips. We recently hired sOAZ and GorillA to be my bodyguards, as they now have so much free time on their hands.
I get to the Team apartment and head up the stairs. The old lady who lives next door to the team opens her door as she hears me. “They were shouting all night again.” She says fearfully. She looks like she has not slept peacefully in years. I know that I look the same.
I open the door and am overwhelmed by the smell of forgotten pizza, spilled soda, and Korean food. I walk down the hallway to the kitchen and see Miky in his customary spot on top of the refrigerator. I reach up to pet him and give him a few scratches behind the ear, his favorite. He purrs calmingly.
“Uma Jan,” I call out. “Did you feed Miky yet?” Claps and Uma Jan share the responsibility of feeding Miky. Claps is the best at feeding, but occasionally Wunder helps out too.
“Caw Caw!” is the battle cry as Uma Jan Naruto-runs out of his room, his blanket tied around him like a cape. He jumps up in the air and throws food at the ground, and then pulls his hand back. The food does not come back, much to Uma Jan’s surprise.
I should have never let him play Xayah, but this is an improvement from the Yasuo days. There are still marks on the walls from the sword.
Miky hops down from the fridge, rubs against my legs, and sniffs at the food. We only feed him Korean barbecue now to prepare him for Worlds against SKT.
I walk to the darkest part of the apartment and open the door to Wunder’s room. Two years ago, I offered to replace the lightbulbs, but Wunder told me he liked it dark. I shiver, because the room is so cold. From the light of the doorway, I can see him laying on his bed facedown. Wunder is the heaviest sleeper on the whole team, only waking up on Fridays and the weekends.
I check for his pulse. He is alive. I breathe a sigh of relief.
I close the door behind me and make my way to the gaming room. I step over where Miky lays in the sunlight. He meows at me, as though warning me not to go inside.
I enter the gaming room and I immediately regret it. Sitting at his computer is Craps, his hair messed up and bottles of soda on the floor around him. The only way I can tell Craps and Claps apart is by their clothing: Claps wears only G2 gear from g2esports.com/shop while Craps only wears old Fnatic clothing back from Season One. The quality of the Fnatic gear has only gone down since then.
I sigh, knowing that today will be a solo queue day. I consider letting PromiseQ out of his cage and telling him to play Mid, but I never know if Miky will fall from too high again. We try to keep him from jumping up on all the tall things in the apartment, but no matter how many times we tell him, he never listens. The boy only seems to want to climb.
My phone starts to vibrate. I look at my Team ROCCAT background and see the time. It is almost 10 o’clock.
Miky howls and darts under the couch. Even after only a year on the team, he knows what is coming.
Uma Jan looks around, eyes wide with fear. There is no room under the couch for him to hide, and there is no place he can flash to for safety.
I think back to the days of Unicorns of Love, sweet, simpler days, and brace myself for the coming storm.
Time slows, and in those few peaceful moments before it happens, I am aware of only my heartbeat pounding in my chest and Wunder’s meta-shaking snores.
“AAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” My mortal enemy shrieks, bursting out of his room. His voice is shrill and joyful and energetic; complete opposites of everything I am.
He flails his noodle arms in the air over his head, his hair messed up as always. He opens his mouth and shrieks again, so loud that Miky cries from under the couch and slinks further back under the shadows.
I cringe, but I have to fight the urge to run out of the apartment. If I quit, Carlos would have his samurai hunt me down.
“GOOOOOOODDDDD MOOOOOORRRRNNNNNNIIIINNNNNNNNGGGGGGG!” Jankos screams, his voice still high and shrill. Uma Jan covers his ears, a futile defense against the Polish banshee.
“Can you not yell?” Craps asks feebly from the gaming room. “I’m trying to learn Zac Mid.”
“WHAAAAAAAATTTT?” Jankos shouts. The windows quake with the force of his voice.
Craps knows better than to repeat himself, because then Jankos will just shout louder. I hear his quiet, sad plea between soft sobs: “Please, let us just win Worlds. It will be worth it if we win Worlds.”
I put in my earplugs, well worn from repeated usage during our drafts. I have long since stopped caring about what the team wants to play. If they do not play what I tell them to play and lock in some weird flex like Tristana Mid, Annie Top, or (god forbid) Garen, then I can pretend like I said it was ok.
The earplugs are mediocre protection from Jankos’ shouts, but anything is better than their raw power on my human eardrums.
Jankos notices me, and my heart pounds in my chest. Jankos’ eyes spark, and I strengthen my soul for what I know is to come.
“GRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAABBBBBBBBBZZZ!” The jungle demon shouts. My gelled hair ruffles from the force of the noise. His eyes are wide with excitement. “CAAAAAANNNNNN IIIIIIIII PLAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYY QIIIIIIYAAAAAANAAAAAA?”
I brace myself again, knowing that my next words could be fatal. “You have to play Sejuani.”
Uma Jan moves first in a panic. He dashes by me, then Jankos, blowing out with his mouth each time. When he reaches the door to his room he flings his bedsheet cape behind him. It is the best imitation wind wall in the EU.
Miky cries out from under the dark couch, and Craps runs out of the gaming room, his arms outstretched. Miky darts out from under the couch and leaps into Crap’s arms. Craps carries Miky to the gaming room and locks the door. Normally, it is Miky who carries the team.
I am left alone with the jungle demon.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!” Jankos screams. He throws his noodle arms in the air, wiggling them left and right like the snakes of the Medusa. I can only imagine what the old neighbor thinks goes on in here.
“I WANT TO PLAY QIYANA!” He shrieks, spinning around in a circle as he imagines holding the circular blade of the newest champion. “I WANT TO DAB LIKE CLAPS!!!!”
I try to reason with him, knowing the futility of it. “Carlos wants you to play Sej-“
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!” He screams again. I know that Uma Jan must be standing very still right now in his room, hiding from the noise as he pretends to be Teemo. I wish that I, too, could disappear like the toxic yordle.
“CARLOS SAYS I CAN PLAY ANYTHING I WANT!” He shrieks.
Jankos keeps shouting. The curtains flap from his power. He gets louder and louder and higher and higher in pitch. The windows begin to shudder, and a glass breaks on the table. I feel my skull start to tremble, and I fear, not for the first time, that my head will be crushed like Team Liquid at MSI.
I know better than to fight him, but my contract says that I must. “You can play Qiyana,” I shout over him.
He quiets down, but before I continue, I wait for the room to settle. He looks at me with questioning eyes, and I see in the jungler’s lion eyes the same look he gives to the Mid and Bottom lanes. He is looking for a gank, and I am his target. His fingers flex threateningly.
“But you have to gank top lane.” I finish.
Jankos considers this. He has some strange aversion to playing in the Top lane, which none of us understand and have never spoken of out loud. We all have nightmares of invoking the wrath of the Screamer.
“YAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYY!” He screams happily. He rushes towards me, and throws his noodle arms around me in a joyous embrace. I know the real reason he wants to play Qiyana, and the real reason Jankos practices day in and day out and gives every game his 100%.
He is just trying to impress Yuuli, the cute, pink haired referee.
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Tbh if I put as much effort into my ranked games as I did writing this I'd probably not be Iron I.
