>Early 2009 >13 years old >Playing Halo Custom Edition >join server on my (then) favourite map, RPG beta 6 >there's friendly banter going on over the textchat, these guys seem really cool >Make friends with the whole party, a first for me as I was unpopular at school, and I was living with my dad away from my siblings >become really close with a few users in particular; Chops, The Stig, Muggle, Pistoleplex and Yoshi >Have heaps of game nights with these guys, always using xfire for the voicechat >spend every available hour outside school playing games/in chat rooms, group becomes really close >fast forward to early 2010 >still my only friends, they've helped me stop being a huge n00b at halo and we've clocked up a lot of gaming hours together >Computer gets a virus (I still didn't know about antivirus programs) >try to meet Pistoleplex so I can be with at least 1 of my best friends IRL before my computer dies, but they're busy >we're a part of 8 major Xfire groups, never taking them too seriously (always having fun and sometimes messing around in dedicated servers) >leave a game one night and the next day the computer won't work >family can't afford a new one >spend the next 4 years unable to contact them >finally get my own computer in 2014 >boot up Xfire >See The Stig is online >"ohai Ryan, what's been going on? I know it's been a while but are you guys still down for some Halo CE?" >check other friends' login dates >all offline for over a year >realise The Stig is permanently logged in but probably hasn't used xfire in ages either >realise I'll probably never again get to talk to the best friends I ever had >tfw TL;DR: go back to the top and read it, you illiterate asses.