In the middle of the room was the reason I had come here. The Alien. It was enormous, almost the size of a five-story house. And it was ugly. It looked like a mammoth, bloated tick. Its segmented legs seemed too lean to hold the creature. Moreover, all over the huge body were some red-colored and obnoxious-looking objects somewhat similar to sacks.
“You are one ugly son of a gun,” I muttered.
“It’s you who’s ugly,” the creature said. “All the humans so ugly you don’t deserve to live. You all must die!”
“This is why you attacked the Earth?” I asked. “Because we, humans, are so different from you? That’s the only reason why you decided to wipe us out, huh?”
“All humans must die,” the Alien screamed in pure rage, ignoring my question. “Once I take care of you, you little piece of shit, I’ll disable the VRC. I can’t put up with freaking humans any longer!”
I realized that the voice wasn’t coming from the creature. Instead, the Alien communicated with me with telepathy.
However, I wasn’t all that keen on holding this delightful conversation any longer.
“Time to get it over with,” I said as I pulled my epic pistol from its holster, held the gun in a two-handed grip, and lined the iron sights on the huge creature. It didn’t move at all. I started squeezing the trigger.
The bullets tore into the bloated body of the Alien with wet sounds, the spent cartridges flying in a smoking arc over my shoulder. The long Health bar above the creature reduced somewhat as the Alien took damage. I aimed at various parts of the creature, trying to figure out its vulnerable spot to do critical damage to it. Still, no matter where I fired at, the creature always took the same amount of damage.
“How’s it going?” Jessica texted me.
“Trying to figure out its vulnerable spot,” I replied. “Can’t find it. Where is it?”
“It’s inside its mouth,” Jessica said. “But it opens its mouth only when it’s about to spit fireballs. So be careful.”
“Got it.”
“By the way, do you have enough ammo to deal with the Alien?”
“Not sure. Maybe. Maybe not. It has enormous amount of Health Points. I might run out of ammo before the Alien dies.”
“Okay, I’ll try to help you somehow.”
She didn’t text me anymore.
I emptied the whole magazine into the creature, but it still didn’t move. I dropped the spent mag from the butt grip, pulled a fresh one from a pocket on my vest, and slammed it home. When I swept my pistol up and started firing at the creature again, the Alien suddenly let out with a thunderous roar.
Then the critter opened its enormous mouth and began spitting out fireballs in rapid succession. Activating Acceleration, I leaped to the side. As a few fireballs zipped past me, I felt their heat.
I tried to fire at the Alien’s gaping mouth to inflict critical damage on it. However, with the rate at which the Alien was spitting the fireballs out, it was extremely hard to aim and shoot as I ran. If I slowed down to take careful aim, the fireballs would hit me. So I concentrated entirely on getting away. I raced around the Alien. The creature didn’t try to catch up to me. It continued to stand still in the center of the room, turning to keep me in its line of sight.
I alternately activated Acceleration and Teleportation, doing my best to avoid being hit by the fireballs. Still, some of them slammed into me, inflicting damage on me and placing a fire debuff on my character, causing my Health to reduce over time. When that happened, I employed Shield and used stimulators to recover my Health.
Eventually, the Alien stopped ejecting bursts of fireballs from its mouth. I wasted no time in whipping my epic pistol up and starting pulling the trigger, sending slug after slug into the creature’s bloated body.
After I dumped two or three mags into the critter, its body started to shiver. I wondered what was happening as I reloaded my pistol. Then the sacks attached to the critter’s body opened and started disgorging humanoid mutants. They dropped to the earth, got to their feet, and ran across the room toward me. By the time I put a fresh magazine in the pistol, there were about fifty of them and counting. Dangit! I swept my gun and opened fire.
No way I could get rid of all the mutants before they reached me. The swarm of mutants armed with sharp teeth and long curved claws fought among themselves trying to be the first to reach me.
My pistol clicked on an empty chamber. It had run dry, but I didn’t have enough time to reload it as several of the mutants were on me already. Quickly holstering the pistol, I whipped my sword from its scabbard, took hold of the hilt in both my hands, and swung the sword in a wide arc, going for the neck of the nearest mutant. I felt the sharp edge of the sword bite deep as it severed the mutant’s windpipe, blood spurting in every direction.
Another mutant reached me. I buried the blade in its neck to the hilt. I then twisted the sword and yanked it clear. Blood gushed from the wound as I pulled the sword loose.
Suddenly I felt a twinge of shooting pain from my left arm all the way down to my leg as another mutant raked my flesh with its claws. Out of my peripheral vision, I noticed the Health bar reduce by about twenty-five percent. Dangit! Those mutants dealt lots of damage to me, despite my wearing the legendary leather armor. Had to be real careful from now on.
I drove the blade into the head of the mutant who had wounded me, then reversed my grip on the hilt, and pierced the chest of another mutant that was about to take a swing at me. Yanking the sword free, and leaped backward and turned to confront yet another mutant.
At this moment the unforeseen transpired. My right foot slipped on the smear of blood. Thrown off the balance, I landed on my butt. Several mutants were on me at once, taking advantage of my misfortune. My blade arced in low, taking two mutants in the chests, drawing blood. Two of the mutants were dead in as many seconds. I took a swing at another mutant, but it quickly retreated beyond the range of my weapon.
Then claws whistled through the air in front of me, barely missing my face. Another mutant was about to swing at me. There was no way I could fight my way out of the siege before they slew me.
But I had my psi-powers.
I employed Surge. The dark energy slammed into all the mutants near me and thrown them backward. I leaped to my feet and reached for a stimulator. As soon as I used it to recover my Health, the mutants had me surrounded again.
Before any of the nearest mutants could hit me, I leaped into action again. A stroke of the sword ruptured one mutant’s abdomen, its guts falling out, and then a second swipe chopped off another mutant’s right arm. I turned to meet yet another monster. A shining streak of steel connected with the third mob, slicing through its left wrist as easily as a hot dagger would through butter. Then I slashed again, leaving an inch-deep slit across the mob’s throat. The mutant uttered gurgling sounds, clutching at its neck with its right claw, blood spurting every which way.
I employed a reversed strike to slash my blade across another monster’s chest, the sharp edge slicing several inches into its flesh. I dodged a blow from another mob, then stepped between two mutants, and swung my sword, the blade flashing in the faint light, streaking first to the left, then to the right, slashing into each mutant’s neck, almost severing it.
I pivoted to meet several other mutants, swiping, slashing, chopping, the keen edge of my sword cutting and tearing left and right, the severed limbs and heads flying everywhere, blood abundantly pouring over the ground.
For a moment, there was no mutant nearby. Taking advantage of it, I glanced in the Alien’s direction and almost moaned in frustration. The sacks were still open and disgorging more mutants. Would be there the end of that?
Suddenly, something slammed into my back, sending me down to one knee. I swung my sword once more, plunging the blade into the mutant that had bumped into me. Its arms flailing, its body started convulsing. I finished the monster with another swipe of my sword and got to my feet to find myself circle
d in again.
I slashed my sword in a vicious semicircle, the blade’s tip slicing open the throats of the near mutants, the mobs gagging, blood dribbling from their mouths. I leaped to the side to dodge the blow of another mutant and plunged the sword into its left eye, bursting it apart. The mutant reached for the sword in a futile attempt to pull it out. Its body quaked, then went limp as its arms dropped to its sides.
As I yanked the sword from the mutant’s head, the blade made a wet slurping sound as it came loose. Then I felt claws rake my back, reducing my HP and causing me to grind my teeth in pain. Employing the Surge psi-power to shove the mutants a few feet away from me, I used a stimulator to heal myself.
One mutant snuck up on me from behind and wrapped its massive hands around my throat. Before I could do anything, another one hopped in front of me and raked its claws across my chest, drawing blood. Between the choke and the swipe, my HP got reduced almost by fifty percent.
Growling in pain and rage, I brought my sword up, the razor point of the blade tearing up into the neck of the mutant in front of me, piercing its jugular vein, going past its jawbone, and lodging itself in the base of its skull, the tip of the sword exploding out its scalp. The mutant gurgled and blood erupted outward from the wound, pouring down its chest as I yanked the sword free.
The other mutant was still choking me. I reversed my grip on the hilt and thrust the blade backward and into the chest of the mutant behind me. The choke was gone. I whipped around and stabbed the mutant a few times in quick succession, planting the blade into the mutant’s chest, throat, and face.
Another monster reached me. I met the mob with a blow to its torso, splitting it open. Then I swung my sword at the mutant’s neck, the blade slicing through the flesh and bone with the same ease a sharp knife might cut a paper. As the severed head flew to the side and decapitated body of the mutant collapsed to the ground, I glanced around the room, ready to confront other mobs.
But I found none. Only severed limbs, heads, pieces of gory flesh, and mutilated bodies lay all around me. I looked in the direction of the Alien. All its sacks were closed now.
I quickly pulled and used on myself a couple of stimulators and vigors to recover my Health and Mana respectively. Then I opened fire with my pistol, the bullets tearing into the Alien’s flesh with sickening slurping sounds.
After a few moments, the Alien let out with a roar and started to spit out the fireballs. As I burst into a run, I realized that Jessica’s plan was working. The Alien acted not like an intelligible creature but rather like a Raid Boss, like a common monster. It acted according to a certain behavior pattern just like all the other monsters in the game. The Alien would emit fireballs, then would pause for a few moments, then would disgorge mutants from its sacks, then would pause again. Then the process would repeat.
As the Alien was spewing the fireballs at me, I caught a glimpse of a sudden burst of light off to my right. I glanced in that direction in time to see a chest appear out of nowhere.
Then I got a message from Jessica.
“Max, I tweaked with the game code a little,” she said. “Now I can teleport some chests with ammo and consumables over to you.”
Once I ran up to the chest, its lid flipped open even without my touching it. Inside were a few pistol magazines. I grabbed them as quickly as I could manage before any of the fireballs could hit me.
And so it went.
I fought the mutants and dodged the fireballs, taking ammo and consumable out the chests materializing every now and then. In the time between the Alien’s spitting out the fireballs and disgorging the mutants, I fired at the creature, dealing damage to it.
However, I had to be constantly on the alert. The fireballs and the mutants dealt lots of damage to me. It was very exhausting. It seemed to me as though I had been fighting the Alien for a few hours.
Then I found out that the sacks could be destroyed. Each took about two or three mags to explode. It resulted in fewer mutants the Alien disgorged, which was a good thing. With each obliterated sack, the Alien’s bulk shrank somewhat.
Eventually, all the sacks were disposed of. The Alien got reduced more than by half and was now the size of a one-story home. It also grew two long blade-like nasty-looking appendages from its shoulders. Then the creature rose to its feet and let out with a roar.
Then the monster burst into a race toward me and very fast at that. Now that the Alien was shrunken, it could move very fast. I fired a few shots at the creature and then the monster was on top of me, swinging its blades. I ducked one blow, but the second one caught me on my right side, reducing my HP nearly by fifty percent.
Dangit!
I used Teleportation, then yanked a stimulator from my pocket, and administered a shot to myself, recovering my Health. Judging from the volume and clarity of the pounding of feet on the ground, the Alien had already covered the distance, which I had put between the creature and me by using Teleportation. I employed the Acceleration and took off.
I decided just to run around the cave and wait for the Alien to get off my tail so I could try and counterattack it. Yet the Alien seemingly wasn’t going to let up on me even for a second. It was weird. Since the Alien had been turned into a Raid Boss, it was supposed to act according to a certain behavior pattern. It should pause every now and then so that the player––me––could counterattack it. It would be extremely difficult for me to attack the Alien while running away from it if the Alien didn’t slow down. I wondered what was going on.
Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed a message pop up in the log.
> Remaining time: 4 minutes 59 seconds
What the heck was that supposed to mean? Then Jessica texted me. “Max, we got a problem.”
No shit, I thought.
“The Alien’s trying to hack my application program as it fights you,” Jessica continued. “You got about five minutes to defeat the Alien.”
“What’s going to happen when time’s up?”
“The Alien will no longer be a Raid Boss. It’ll teleport back to the space station and–– Well, then the Alien’ll find me and–– Guess, you know the rest.”
Talking to Jessica distracted me for a moment. The Alien slashed one of its blade-appendages across my back. I managed to duck under the other blade. Then I employed Teleportation and used Biokinesis on myself, replenishing my Health. Sure enough, it wasn’t long before the Alien caught up to me again. I burst into a race, trying to get away from the creature.
“It’s been chasing me on end since I destroyed all its sacks,” I texted Jessica. “It doesn’t let up on me even for a moment.”
“With the sacks destroyed, the Alien turns into a Berserk,” Jessica explained. “But it’s supposed to stop for a few moments every now and then.”
“Well, it doesn’t.”
“Guess it’s a result of its hacking. You have to come up with something.”
I glanced at the log as I ran.
> Remaining time: 2 minutes 37 seconds
I had less than three minutes to deal with the Alien. Dangit. Glancing over my shoulder, I looked at the Alien chasing me. The monster had about twenty percent of HP left. It wasn’t much. On the other hand, could I stiff the Alien before the time was up? It was anybody’s guess.
I started to use various psi-powers on the Alien in order to slow it down and then to fire at the creature. It worked.
I also employed a psi-power I had unlocked when I reached level 100. The psi-power was called Levitation. When using the skill, I got lifted several feet in the air beyond the range of the Alien’s blades. While hovering in the air, I fired away at the creature, which was flailing its appendage in futile attempt to hit me.
When the Raid Boss had less than ten percent of HP left, the unexpected happened. My psi-powers no longer affected the Alien. Luckily, Levitation and Acceleration still worked.
As I emptied another magazine into the creature, I checked the log.
> Remaining time: 85 seconds
The Alien had about five percent of HP left. I ejected the spent magazine, reached for the fresh one, and found out that I had only one extra mag left. I slammed it into the butt grip and looked around as I ran. Yet the ammo chests were nowhere to be found.
Moreover, when I tried to use Acceleration, nothing happened. I told Jessica about all this.
“Gotta be the Alien,” she instantly texted back to me. “It’s hacking the game code, foiling your attempts to use your skills and interfering with my trying to help you. I can do nothing to help you out now. Sorry about that. You’re on your own now.”
I glanced at the log.
> Remaining time: 55 seconds
I had less than a minute to finish the Alien off. There was no point in running away now. Either I stiff the sonofabitch or I would die trying.
I came to a stop, spun around, and opened up at the Alien racing toward me. The slugs were penetrating its body with slurping sounds. As the creature bore down on me, it opened its mouth as if it were going to spit out the fireballs. I prepared to leap to the side, but no fireball ejected from the maw. I continued to fire, sending the bullets into the creature’s mouth, dealing critical damage to it. The Alien had one percent of its Health left now. I glanced at the log once more.
> Remaining time: 35 seconds
The Alien was all but dead. I squeezed the trigger again, expecting the bullet to deal critical damage and finish the Alien off. However, instead of firing, the pistol clicked empty. I had run out of ammo. And the Alien was too close now, towering above me. The creature swung one blade. I managed to dodge to the side, avoiding the blade as I dropped the pistol and slid the sword from its scabbard.
The Alien continued swinging at me. I blocked some of the blows with my sword. Then the unforeseen happened. The sticky long tongue leaped out of the Alien’s mouth and got wrapped around my waist. Before I could do anything, the tongue retracted and I found myself inside the huge and reeking mouth cavity. The jaws closed behind me, plunging everything into darkness.
Glitch Book Six Page 5
