"Nerf this!" shouted D. Va's smug voice, followed closely by the sound of her MEKA initiating self destruct mode. The loud siren began to hum and the power core starting whirring, shortly to be followed by…

Nate stuck out his arm and slammed the source of the noise: his official D. Va merchandise alarm clock. He yawned loudly and stretched before sticking two feet out his bed, standing up slowly. He walked one step… two steps… three steps, and slumped into his computer chair.

Nate Page. Age 20. Slightly above-average height. Not obese, but neither was he an athlete. Currently living alone in a small flat on the east coast of the US. He was presently sat in a comfortable computer chair styled to look like D. Va's MEKA unit. His desk, keyboard and mouse were all also D. Va branded. His walls were painted her signature colours, and there were posters pinned from ceiling to floor of her, her films, her missions etc. In the spaces where there were no posters, there were instead shelves. Shelves full of official D. Va merchandise.

To many, Nate was an obsessive freak. To the rest, a bedroom-dwelling pervert. Deep down however, Nate knew the truth: his love for D. Va was pure. He was not the sort to go searching for the (obviously photoshopped) explicit photos, or to read the (purely fantasy) sexual exploits people claimed to have had with her. He loved D. Va for who she was. A Starcraft professional, yes. A witty and entertaining streamer, certainly. A hero to the Korean people, without a doubt. However, she was so much more than the sum of all her amazing parts. She was an idol. A muse. A force of good which had no equal.

It was due to this undying passion within Nate that his reaction to the headline on "Nerf This" (the #1 D. Va news blog, of which he himself was a contributor) was so extreme.

"Win a V.I.P meeting with D. Va!"

Nate read the latest headline and froze. He then re-read the headline, and his pulse increased. His hand started to shake. Finally, he read the headline one final time very slowly.

Meet… D. Va.

Not just a shout-out on her stream. Not just getting waved at in a crowd of people. Not just a handshake and a signature at a convention meet-and-greet.

A full on, one-to-one, V.I.P meeting with her.

Nate quickly skimmed the terms and conditions. Must be 18+. Check. Must be able to travel. Check. Must have a "glitch" account (the site that D. Va, as well as every other gamer, streamed on). Check, obviously.

The meeting would take place at this years Blizzcon being held in Hanamura, Japan. The V.I.P pass would allow full access to all the announcements at the convention, as well as free food and drinks. The actual session with D. Va would last one hour.

The rules: at some point between now and before Blizzcon (a few weeks away), D. Va would call out the name of a viewer in her stream. If that person responded within 15 seconds (proving that they were actually watching the show), they won.

Immediately, Nate began to devise ways to rig the system in his favour. He couldn't leave a once in a lifetime opportunity like this to be determined by dumb luck. Firstly, he would make dozens of bot accounts to watch the stream in order to give himself a better chance of winning. He kept a master list so that he could immediately jump into the correct account if one of them was announced.

Secondly, he needed to make sure he was always awake whilst she was streaming. Well, I already have that one covered, Nate thought to himself, and it was true. His alarm had woken him up today at 7.30pm. A strange time to start the day, until you convert the time into the Korean equivalent: 9.30am. This gave him exactly half an hour in order to prepare for watching D. Va's stream just as it starts at 10am.

Finally, simply being awake while the stream was live wasn't enough. He would need to always be able to hear the stream, no matter where he was in his flat. Luckily, he had a pair of wireless headphones (styled to look like D. Va's pair, of course) which suited the job perfectly.

"annyeonghaseyo modu! (good morning everybody!)" a familiar voice rang through his speakers. It was D. Va, starting her stream at the usual time. His usual half an hour preparation time had flown past in what seemed like seconds. Now he had to choose between eating breakfast and going to the bathroom, which would mean missing out on the start of D. Va's stream, or he would just have to wait a few hours for her first scheduled stream break.

Easy choice Nate thought to himself as he sunk deeper into his seat, and started another day of idol watching.


The first day after the competition's announcement went by without event, as did the second. However, at 3am on the third day, D. Va finally announced the first name with a chance of winning.

"Competition time guys!" her soft voice announced over her stream. She leaned into the camera and squinted at the list of viewers in her channel. "Lets see… MonkeySurf72, are you there?"

Nate was not at his desk whilst this was happening – he was on the toilet. As soon as D. Va had said the word "competition" he had immediately pulled up his trousers, tripped over, hurriedly stood up again, banged his elbow on the door, and dashed to his desk.

He didn't recognise the name she had called out as being on his list of bots, but he still searched. You didn't leave something like this down to intuition.

No results found. Nate could feel his pulse in his ears. He looked over at the chat, which had been in a complete state of pandemonium just seconds before, to see that it had been turned to "quiet mode". Nobody was allowed to say anything except the moderators or the name that had been read out.

"Ten seconds left!" D. Va sweetly counted down.

Nate stared at the chat box. If a message from "MonkeySurf72" popped up, that was it. All of his hard work would have been for nothing. Sweat beads started forming on his forehead. He stopped breathing.

"Five… four..."

The chat remained empty. Nate couldn't handle the stress of the situation and closed his eyes.

"Three... two..."

Nate peaked at the chat through his fingers.

"One... oops! Looked like you missed your chance!" D. Va giggled to herself. "Stay tuned for another draw tomorrow guys!"

Nate finally caught his breath and leaned back in his chair. His heart slowly returned to a normal pace. That was way too close, he thought to himself. He decided to double the already high number of bots he was running in the chat.


The next day, Nate was prepared. He had brought all the food he was going to eat that day into his room, as well as several bottles of water. Once I've drunk an entire bottle, I'll also have the toilet situation covered, he thought to himself.

It wasn't until the sun had started to rise outside of Nate's window that the next draw happened. Nate had started yawning, kept awake only on the caffeine from his Mountain Dew (the drink of choice for all professional gamers, including D. Va).

"It's the moment I know you've all been waiting for..." D. Va's voice came over Nate's headset, causing him to bolt upright in his chair. "Time to see if we can get a winner for this competition," she said, once again peering down a list of names on her screen.

"MemeKid420, are you awake?" she asked. All the blood suddenly rushed to Nate's head – that was definitely one of his bot user names. He quickly searched his master list and found the name, clicking the link that would send him to the browser tab that had been logged into that account.

He clicked into the chat box and victoriously typed "WOW, I WON!". A gong sound rang into his headset, signalling some sort of error. A red error message appeared in the chatbox.

The chat is currently in quiet mode. Only the moderators and "MemeKid420" have speaking privilage.

"Ten seconds left!" D. Va's voice reminded him.

He looked down, confused. He realised that he was not logged in as MemeKid420 on this tab, but instead was logged into one of his other throw-away accounts. Something had gone seriously wrong with his list.

He immediately set to work clicking through all the open browser windows, checking the account name on each one.

"Five... four..."

His clicking increased pace. His hands started to shake. He gritted his teeth. If D. Va had seen his APM she would have been impressed.

"Three... two..."

Nate started to audibly shout as he flew through the remaining tabs.

"One... oh! There you are!" D. Va said, in response to Nate's very frantically typed message of "HERE" after he found the correct tab.

"Congratulations!" she exclaimed, her beautiful smile beaming across the screen. "I can't wait to meet you! Someone will message you shortly to get your details."

The chat was unmuted, and was immediately filled with incredibly vitriolic messages regarding the winner and their own despair at not being picked. However, Nate was too busy trying to recover from his intense movements to notice. He stood up, removed his headset and immediately fell face-first onto his bed, letting out a primal roar muffled by the duvet.

"I'm going to meet her... its really going to happen..." he said to himself. He reached his hand over and grabbed hold of his D. Va body-pillow, hugging it tightly. Only 2 weeks and 3 days until Blizzcon – but who was counting?