Chapter 1: The Cry Behind the Screen

Late one night, I was gaming online when there was this girl on our team who just couldn’t land a shot, and everyone started flaming her. Then, out of nowhere, she just went AFK. Just disappeared.

The room was dim except for the blue glow from my monitor. The only sounds were the relentless tapping of keys and the sharp, sarcastic voices in my headset. I could hear the frustration in everyone’s tone—people dropping f-bombs, calling out missed shots, the chat getting toxic fast. Just another midnight queue—or so I thought.

A few minutes later, she reconnected. When she spoke, her voice was shaky, like she was about to cry, as she apologized:

The crackle of her mic was the only warning before her words broke through, barely above a whisper, her words trembling like she was holding back a sob. For a second, I wondered if she’d even say anything at all.

"Sorry... I'm really sorry..."

"I was just boiling water to give my son a bath, put him in the tub..."

"And then I... I forgot to turn off the stove..."

"Now he's been burned—what am I supposed to do?" She paused, and I felt a chill run through me. Now he's been burned—what am I supposed to do? My mind scrambled, trying to make sense of it.

Her words tumbled out in a rush, like she couldn't get them out fast enough. I could hear the raw panic in her voice.

For a second, the whole team went silent, the usual banter dying off as everyone tried to process what she’d just said. Nobody said a word.

I just sat there, stunned.

It felt like someone had poured a bucket of ice water over my head. The game. The trash talk. The late-night adrenaline. All of it just... stopped. For a moment, all I could hear was the faint whir of my computer’s fan and her uneven breathing through the mic.

I glanced at our support's username: [QueenOfGames]. Even the name sounded way too dramatic.

I remember thinking, who picks a name like that? It sounded like someone trying too hard, or maybe just trolling. It was almost funny. Almost. But the tension was too thick.

The jungler yelled, "Girl! You trying to freak us out or something?"

His voice was a little too loud, like he was trying to cover up his own nerves. I could picture him sitting in some cluttered dorm room, half-laughing, half-worried.

The marksman chimed in, "If you don't wanna play, just say so. No need to scare the hell out of us at midnight. Let's just surrender."

His words popped up in chat with an eye-roll emoji at the end, but I could tell he was just as thrown as the rest of us. He tried to play it cool, but I wasn't buying it. The room felt colder, somehow.

He started a surrender vote, but our mage didn’t turn on his mic—he just instantly hit reject. No words, just a click.

The mage always played it cool, barely spoke, just clicked. Even now, when the mood had gone from competitive to downright creepy, he kept up the silent treatment. I wondered if he was as freaked out as the rest of us.

So the game kept going. Somehow.

Our characters kept moving, but nobody was really paying attention. We were all just going through the motions. Nobody knew what to say or do next.

QueenOfGames kept crying, "No, it's real, my son, he's been burned..."

"What do I do, what do I do..."

Her voice was raw, the kind of desperate that makes your stomach knot up. If she was faking it, she could have had a career in Hollywood, no joke.

I felt the urge to say something—anything—to break the tension. But the words just stuck. It was like watching a train wreck in slow motion.

I finally called her out: "I've never heard of anyone giving their kid a bath by boiling them. Seriously, what planet are you from?" I regretted it as soon as I said it.

My voice came out sharper than I meant. I was trying to snap her out of it, or maybe just convince myself this was all some elaborate prank.

QueenOfGames sobbed and tried to explain again:

"At first, I boiled the water... started a match... the water got cold..."

"You guys kept yelling at me, kept flaming me..."

"I panicked, so I—I put the tub and the kid... both on the stove..." [sobbing]

"But..." [sobbing] "I didn’t think..."

The way she said it, her voice hitching with every word, made my skin crawl. It was so bizarre, so wrong, and yet there was something in her tone that made it hard to just write off as trolling. It just didn't feel like a joke.

She suddenly stopped mid-sentence.

The silence stretched on, each second heavier than the last. I could almost hear her breathing, ragged and uneven, on the other end of the line. Just her ragged breathing, nothing else.

After a couple seconds of silence, she suddenly shrieked, her voice turning sharp and furious:

"It's all your fault for yelling at me! It's all your fault! All your fault!"

"I won't let you off the hook!"

Her words hit like a slap. The room itself tensed up. Every hair on my arms stood on end. I felt a shiver run down my spine.