Random Acts of Muscle: Persona Athletica

[V.R.Goh]

This follows the same vein as my other Random Acts of Muscle with one exception. In this one, the characters you create are playing Persona Athletica (Latin for "Althletic Role"), an online world similar to Second Life in which they create avatars with varying degrees of physical fitness, with a main focus on athletic musculature. Once the avatar is created, the digital likeness that they create will become the person's physical appearance.
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19-year-old Max couldn't wait to get home from class. Max was a civil engineering major at a school known throughout the state for its engineering program, hence its mascot, a beaver. This choice of mascot was the butt of many a dirty joke among the students there. The only class Max had that day was Calculus and he knew the material well enough to be able to get an A on his midterm without studying more than an hour a week. Despite that, he always made sure to get in an hour of studying a night. Tonight, however, was different. He had just installed a free online game that he heard about from a friend.

It was called Persona Athletica, and it seemed similar to Second Life. It was an online world where people could interact virtually. This was something for him, since he was not very social. His roommate was the complete opposite. Sergey, an exercise physiology major with a concentration in biochemistry, was very outgoing and, unbeknownst to him, the aesthetic fantasy of his roommate. Sergey, born in the United States to Russian-born parents, was 6'2" tall and weighed 250 pounds of thick, ripped muscle. Whenever Sergey was in their room or in the dorm's common room, he would walk around shirtless. Many times, Max would steal glances at Sergey's thickly-muscled chest, wide shoulders, bulging arms, and washboard abs. Max knew he was heterosexual, but the thought of having muscles like Sergey's made him hard enough to yank attention away from partial derivatives and toward his fully-erect member. As soon as his class finished, he packed up his books and hurried back to his dorm.

As soon as he got in, he logged on to his computer and started up Persona Athletica, or PA for short. Once the game was ready, he started to create his avatar. The avatar was the digital image that other people in PA would see and what he would manipulate through the world of PA.

Immediately, he was prompted to choose a gender; he obviously decided that his avatar would be male. Almost immediately, a digital mannequin, faceless yet decidly male, appeared on the left side of the screen. On the right were dialog boxes where he could insert things like his name, age, height, weight, and build. Currently, Max carried 125 pounds on a 5'8" ectomorphic frame. Max entered the height as 6'2" and entered the weight as 250 pounds. With each change he made, the picture changed to reflect the alterations. The list of builds ran the gamut of major sports types: Swimmer, Gymnast, Runner, Baseball, American Football, Soccer (football), Rugby, Boxer, Powerlifter, and Bodybuilder. Max imagined Sergey and his massive muscles throwing around hundreds of pounds as if the weights were only made of styrofoam and chose Bodybuilder. Two secondary boxes appeared below Build Type labeled Secondary Build Type and Body Fat Percentage. This listed the major categories of bodybuilding competitions, from Bantamweight to Super-Heavyweight. Go big or go home, Max thought, and he chose Super-Heavyweight. He then entered a body fat percentage of eight percent. The finished main profile looked like this:

Avatar Name: MaxBeast07
Age: 19
Height: 6'2"
Weight: 250 pounds
Build: Bodybuilder
Secondary Build Type: Super-Heavyweight
Body Fat Percentage: 8%

After adjusting the hair length, hair color, and eye color to match his own, Max was happy with the finished product. The face was much fuller than his own due to the added muscle, but it looked like him nonetheless. Below the face, however, is where the similarities ended. The body of his avatar was nothing less than what would be seen from a Greek god. Every muscle stood out in bold relief, as huge as they were defined. It was the kind of body that he dreamed of having, and a similar body to what Sergey proudly displayed every day in their room. On the bottom right corner of the screen appeared a button labeled "Create Persona." Max clicked it and waited.

Within a few seconds, Max started feeling a warm sensation in his solar plexus, like he had just drank a cup of hot cocoa on a cold winter's day. This warmth, accompanied by a tingling not unlike the pins-and-needles feeling you get when your foot falls asleep, spread throughout his torso and into his limbs. Eventually, he felt this strange sensation in all parts of his body. He couldn't explain why this was happening, but it would soon become apparent. The tingling quickly disappeared, replaced by an outward pressure from deep inside him. Max could feel his bones stretching and lengthening, indicating that he was getting taller. He almost felt as if he was being pulled on a rack, but without the extreme pain that would accompany that particular form of Medieval torture. He couldn't believe it, though he was seeing it with his own eyes; the game was changing him in real life.

While his bones were adding six inches to his height, his burgeoning muscles began to double his bodyweight. He could feel his shoulders widen while his chest thickened with brawn. Soon, his feet were mostly obscured by his swelling pecs. Max hurried to the full-length mirror on the back of the door to continue observing his change. His arms, once thin as pipes, now exploded with size and strength; he was quickly earning his tickets to the gun show. A tightening in his stomach signaled the formation of a nigh-adamantine eight-pack that could take a punch and emerge unscathed. Thickening legs and glutes raised him up in his seat. His clothes began to tighten beneath the increasing mass.

Small ripping sounds sounded the death knell for his current ensemble. Max could feel holes developing along his back, chest, and on both sleeves, while similar gaps began to form in his jeans. The young man was fortunate to be barefoot, otherwise his shoes would have burst from his expanding feet. Within moments, the growing stopped. Max looked to the computer to see a dialog box: "Persona Creation Process Complete. Enjoy your New Life in Persona Athletica."

As Max turned to face the mirror again, the reflection that greeted him was exactly like his PA avatar, only wrapped in tatters of what used to be a dark green graphic tee and a pair of blue jeans. The newly-minted muscleman grabbed either side of the hole on his chest and, in a single motion, tore the shirt off of him. He dropped the remains of the shirt to the ground, exposing his bodybuilder's physique. In a similar fashion, he ripped the denim rags off of his tree-trunk legs and diamond-like calves. Max marveled that even his package had grown to match his new muscles. He had the body of a super-heavyweight bodybuilder without the shrunken equipment that came with using anabolic steroids. Max was about to pull down his boxers, which surprisingly survived the change intact, when Sergey walked in. The young Russian-American musclebeast's jaw dropped when he saw his new roommate. Clearly, Sergey was impressed with his roommate's new look.

"So," Sergey said with a smile as he glanced as Max's computer, "you just made your PA avatar?" Max's jaw dropped. He couldn't believe that his roommate played PA as well.

"We should play sometime," he continued. "My handle is Medved58."