Star Divers- Dungeons of Bane

by Stephen Landry

  That which may never die must be contained.

  Level: 4

  Damage: 65

  Weight: 5 Ibs

  Weapon Type: Melee

  Rarity: Rare

  Impact: 10

  Range: 0

  Stability: 10

  Sharpness: 8

  Elemental: Soul - Steal a player’s mana for better attack.

  Critical Chance: 60%

  Modifiers: None

  As we made our exit my rifle became unique and I decided it was the right time to give it a name.

  AKA Naomi.

  M7-7 Ki / Energy Rifle

  Description: Robot killer.

  Level: 3

  Damage: 60

  Weight: 5.5 Ibs

  Weapon Type: Scout Rifle / Ki Rifle hybrid

  Rarity: Rare

  Impact: 8

  Range: 8

  Stability: 9

  Reload Speed: 8

  RPM (rounds per minute): 300 bursts

  Affinity: 9

  Sharpness: 8

  Elemental: Unknown

  Critical Chance: 80%

  Modifiers: Bonus EXP gained against Robots

  And, of course, the last item added to my inventory was still a mystery.

  Egg

  Unknown

  Unknown

  12.

  Dominance

  Quick Lore

  Hollows are not human nor are they alien. The first sighting of a Hollow appeared six months after the release of Bane. A level 31 diver was pulling a salvage run inside starship ruins on the jungle planet Sonaria. It was there that they encountered what they thought was a new alien-species. What they actually found was a hostile, shadow-like figure that appeared around the dead. After documenting the Hollow, the entire team was killed as more and more of these figures appeared.

  After the incident, which became known simply as ‘The Cascade’ Hollows began to appear in almost every quadrant. Theorists believe they are drawn to powerful artefacts or echoes and that they are actually shadows of creatures of inter-dimensional origins. Others believe they are the lost souls of the dead, forced to wander space for eternity. Hollows may not seem like a threat when first approached but can quickly turn hostile. Since the appearance of Hollows, more than 4,000 players have been killed by them causing the price of salvage missions to sky rocket and guilds such as Corpse Divers to form.

  It took three hours to reach the bridge.

  ‘So what are you going to do with the egg?’ Gorge asked. I was holding it in the palm of my hand as we were resting now back at the bridge. The egg looked like that of an Ostrich, with a rune in it. If Bane had been a fantasy game I would have guessed it was a dragon’s egg of some kind but Bane was not a fantasy. The egg was definitely alien. The rune felt familiar. I couldn’t quite remember where I had seen it before or if I had. Maybe this sense of familiarity was just something I had created myself to make the situation feel more under my own control. With everything that was happening both in the real and the game world. I felt powerless. Defeated. Trying to survive. Trying to uncover the mysteries of my friend’s death while millions watched, without my really knowing why. I wanted to speak about this powerlessness aloud, but it wouldn’t matter. Everything was changing. Since Damien’s death it was obvious now that Bane, like the starship that turned into a dungeon, was evolving into something more than a game.

  In case it was possible we had missed something and could discover what the egg was or some kind of clue as to why the ship appeared so powerful in the first place, Nel was downloading more information from the ship’s computer. The entire ship had gone quiet since we destroyed the core, minus a few Voths here and there. We even passed by the Thorn and saw that its corpse had been picked clean by several of the smaller creatures that were scurrying away from us inside the darkness. The Hollows had disappeared as well. Perhaps they weren’t drawn to the energy anymore.

  ‘Sir, it’s possible the egg may be an ingredient of some kind, perhaps for the perfect omelette,’ said Nel. I couldn’t tell if the robot was being sarcastic or serious, but it had been so long now since I ate, I was starving.

  ‘I’m not going to cook it,’ I said.

  ‘What do you think is in it? If you did decide to cook it I hope you share with the rest of us,’ Gorge smiled, taking the egg from my hand and looking it over. He licked it.

  Hurriedly, I stretched out a hand to take our discovery back from him. ‘We’ll analyze it back on the Ibanez, Nel’s sister Tel can figure it out.’

  ‘There is a forty-nine percent chance that she won’t,’ Nel said.

  ‘Sorry, no offense,’ I added.

  ‘None taken, anything my sister can do, I can do as well, I do not believe that either of us is capable of discovering information that does not exist,’ Nel sounded affronted, ‘perhaps we should dispose of the egg before it hatches and kills all of us; there is a ninety-seven percent chance the egg is a hostile entity.’

  ‘We can’t just kill it,’ I said placing the egg back into a protective casing inside my satchel, ‘no matter what we aren’t going to do that.’

  ‘OK, so no killing it, no eating it, what’s the plan? Put it in a zoo?’ asked Gorge.

  ‘Study it, use it if we can,’ I answered.

  ‘Neat; so what are you going to call it?’ Gorge was smirking now. I could tell he was still thinking about eating the egg.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ I answered.

  ‘If it’s a new species you can name it after yourself or after someone you care about,’ said Chaz, as if he was hinting I should name it after him.

  ‘Maybe Spot, Spot is a good name,’ Gorge said.

  ‘You could name it Nel, or Mel, or Nel two-point-o,’ Nel offered.

  ‘Think it’s a girl or boy? Both?’ Chaz said.

  ‘I don’t know; I don’t know what I would name it; I DON’T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT IT,’ I was getting frustrated. The only two not obsessively talking about the egg were Cass and Kira.

  ‘I still think we should eat it,’ said Gorge after a moment of silence.

  Somehow, Nel seemed to have formed a comedic rapport with Gorge. ‘There is a ninety-eight percent possibility Breq will attempt to kill you if you eat the egg,’ she said, with a clear note of amusement in her voice.

  Kira, who had been ignoring all of us, drew a rune in the air with her fingers. She had been quiet most of the walk back, concentrating on rebuilding her mana and stamina. Something told me that she had seen an artefact similar to the egg before but I didn’t ask. She wasn’t a Corpse Diver and it was not my place to investigate her past or try and interrogate her for information. A grappling hook appeared in her hand. She fired it just north of the wall where earlier the dropship had come and rescued us. She shot the other end into the ground and the rope began to transform into a ladder.

  ‘We need to get out of here and find somewhere safe to regroup,’ she said.

  Cass was reading a holographic map and spoke without looking up. ‘Already contacted the Ibanez, they should be sending a ship to pick us up, waypoint is northeast after we reach the surface, maybe a ten-minute hike, five minutes if we aren’t slow from where we are now.’

  ‘Something is wrong, do you hear that?’ Kira said.

  ‘Yeah it sounds like gun fire,’ I answered.

  ‘Sounds like a battle coming our way,’ Gorge unshouldered his rifle.

  ‘OK, don’t panic, Corpse Divers won’t let anything happen to us, not to mention there is a guardian protecting this place, no one can come close to penetrating those defences,’ Cass said.

  Slowly, we began climbing the ladder, even as the sound of gun fire grew louder.

  Transports and fighters flew overhead while others descended towards the surface of Rem from orbit above. Some were falling while on fire, others were retreating away from enemies overhead. Another set of fighters were flying towards us: strafing the area as Crimson King soldiers moved towards us. We had reached the surface.

&nb
sp; ‘We have a siege,’ said Gorge.

  ‘What the hell is going on here? I thought a guardian was supposed to be protecting this place?’ said Chaz.

  ‘Looks like they sacrificed a Titan to take it down,’ said Cass pointing towards the wreckage of a Crimson King Titan in the distance.

  ‘We are worth millions,’ said Kira.

  I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. ‘Not that much, really?’

  ‘They also want vengeance, Lady Gray killed thousands of players in your name,’ Kira added.

  Barricades and fences held back a swarm of Crimson King soldiers while refugees ran down our left flank looking for any cover they could. There too were the remains of the giant guardian that had come to protect the dungeon. On the surface of the ship, all sounds were loud. When we crawled outside the ship, we crawled through a small dampening field that had blocked most of the noise of the siege around us. We were lucky the battle hadn’t grown to the point that we had our heads blown off as soon as we came above ground. We slid behind the ruins of the starship that was still sticking out from below the desert sands.

  The dead guardian differed from the one in the Spire. It was four times as large, with a body that looked more like a gorilla than the other had. Still, somehow the Crimson Kings had slain the mecha giant. Its twisted body lay across the landscape like a sinking ship, as fighters descended from the sky above.

  ‘Okay, we have to move if we are going to survive,’ Gorge had jumped up on a projecting girder and was studying the situation, ‘it looks like there are three or four guilds at work here: the Crimson Kings are gunning for us, but they are being held back by Lady Gray in alliance with the Astra Exploration team. She’s probably promised them study rights to the planet and dungeon.’

  ‘How are you getting this information?’ asked Kira.

  ‘Remember, I’m tapped into everything. Lady Gray’s Titan is in the atmosphere and I can hear them talking to one another, bits and pieces mostly, I can’t concentrate on everything but I got just enough to know we ain’t alone down here.’ Tapped into Lady Gray’s Titan? I couldn’t believe it. If anything she was probably letting him listen while keeping tabs on us at the same time.

  I was relieved. Gorge had played a part in a large share of famous battles and if we were going to survive out here, following his lead was our best bet.

  ‘Three Titans and several cruisers are firing at one another above us, looks like the Kings are playing their biggest hand yet, forces from six different quadrants have pulled together and dropped out of the world gate,’ Gorge paused, ‘nearly every resource they have is being put to use.’

  ‘New waypoint,’ Cass looked up at me from her map, ‘we have to rendezvous with Kilo-squad and regroup, they are going to escort us to a safe rally point so we can get off world.’

  ‘Kilo are south of us,’ Kira said.

  ‘Get ready!’ Gorge shouted as we stood behind the cover of a substantial protrusion. A blast of energy flew overhead, destroying the hole through which we had climbed. The Crimson Kings were making their move. If we had made it to the surface any later we would all be dead.

  Battle screams from the Crimson Kings troops mixed together with those of the refugees trying to flee. The refugees were heading towards an aid ship called the Dauntless. The aid ship was run by players that helped other players that found themselves in a tough situation. There was a cost, of course, and no doubt the Dauntless was making a fortune. As a Corpse Diver we were forbidden to use such contacts and would have our contracts terminated if we did, however, this situation might make for an exception.

  ‘We need to follow the refugees, we can escape with the Dauntless and have them take us back to the Ibanez,’ I said.

  ‘That will break our contract!’ shouted Cass at once.

  ‘Not necessarily, since I am paying you for the mission I can pay for your passage: any means necessary to escape,’ Kira said.

  ‘We can work it all out when all of our lives are out of danger,’ I pointed towards a Crimson mech walking our way. The Astra Exploration group were retreating and the Crimson Kings were coming our way. A private yacht flew across the sky above us. The Youthful Indiscretion. It had a polished hull covered in scorch marks and was equipped with a single luxury suite and ion defence canon. On the side was the logo of Sun-blossom Studios. They had been filming the action, only now it looked like they had gotten caught in the middle of the battle.

  ‘Kilo squad is going to cover us,’ Cass said in an encouraging manner. I didn’t believe her. I trusted her, but I knew she was wrong in this case. The Crimson Kings were out for blood and nothing would stop them. Not to mention Kilo squad weren’t exactly special forces, while Dauntless had players with abilities that would and could protect us.

  ‘I’m going to the Dauntless; you can follow me or not.’

  Cass shook her head. ‘Fine.’

  And looking around, I could see that everyone else agreed it was our best option as well. We waited another minute before moving. Then, cloaked from the Crimson King’s radar by Kira, we slipped past the mechs that were converging at our last known location. This was our chance to join the refugees: now or never.

  Luck was on our side and we didn’t have to fight our way through. Having turned herself invisible, Nel followed close behind us. She could attach herself to the outer hull and follow us from afar until we were able to meet back up with the Ibanez.

  The Dauntless’s soldiers were scanning the profiles of all whom they let aboard. Most were NPC characters, while some were actually players caught up in the fight. I noticed several of these players were aligned with the Crimson Kings but I couldn’t make out whether they were traitors or spies. Either would call cause for concern. While not everyone would know our faces, thanks to the camera, those aligned with the Crimson Kings would.

  We sent Chaz in first. He behaved as if unaware that we were using him as a guinea pig, though I was sure he knew it. He was the only one of us that didn’t have a target pinned to their back. With a thumbs up, Chaz made it through their security check and turned to enter inside.

  Time slowed as fire erupted from the interior of the Dauntless. An explosion. A bomb set off by one of the passengers. Dauntless’s soldiers ducked for cover. I saw Chaz’s body fly backwards towards us. He was alive. Just barely. His health was in the low twenties. Kira rushed towards him and gave him an injection. As my ears rang, I looked around and saw crew from the Dauntless fall to the ground, their health zeroed out. We should have seen this coming. I tried to scream but my mouth wouldn’t move. My body was telling me to log out of the game and forget all of this but I couldn’t. I couldn’t abandon everyone after all that we had just gone through…from out of the frying pan into the oven. That old-world expression echoed in my mind. Damien use to say things like that a lot. He wasn’t the only one though. Lady Gray had said it to me once, a long time ago, when I first joined the Corpse Divers and watched an orientation video. She had said joining her clan was both the best and worst mistake I would ever make in my life…that being a Corpse Diver meant more than just playing a game…that I, as a new recruit had jumped head first from the frying pan into the oven.

  Bullets were flying across the field. More soldiers were falling. I could see the shadows of mechs behind me. Hand to her mouth, Cass was calling for an airstrike, screaming at some holographic person. Nel was visible again. Gorge’s mechanical arm was missing and the Youthful Indiscretion that had been flying away from the battle before was crashing.

  The Crimson Kings had come for us.

  Pro Tip

  Know your enemy.

  Strategize and plan accordingly. Sacrifice if necessary. Push them in the direction you want them to go by making them believe that it was their decision.

  13.

  Lure

  Quick Lore

  The smallest hint in the archives, faint traces on deep-space scans, referenced objects that existed one moment and disappeared the next. It was widely acce
pted that with the galaxy being as large as it was there were likely undiscovered species, worlds, and even civilizations, both new and ancient left, to be discovered. The space between stars was so vast that even the most explored quadrants could still hold secrets known only to the stars themselves.

  The sky had turned red. As my hearing came back, I could hear refugees screaming and guns firing (at us?) from the haze of smoke that surrounded what was left of the Dauntless and the Youthful Indiscretion. Only one of the three cameras that had been along for the ride was actually looking at me now. The other two were focused on the chaos around me.

  A figure emerged from the smoke. He was wearing solid black body armour with a golden skull mask underneath a hood; there was a rifle in his hand. This wasn’t the same masked figure I had seen kill Damien in the Cold Zone but there was something familiar about him. It was the leader of the Crimson King’s honour guard. As Gorge stood in front of me, holding me back with his mechanical arm, I could feel the rage building inside of me. How many players had just died because we had walked into their trap? The CKHG was named Set. His profile was public and I was easily able to scan most of it.

  Name: Set

  Age: 21

  Level: 60

  Status: Alive

  Mana: 100

  Class: Tech-Mage

  Health: 150

  Stamina: 105

  Load out: M7-7 kinetic Rifle, Star-killer (melee) Smoke grenades.

  ‘Well, well, well…look what we have here, looks like a couple rats that got caught in a trap,’ Set said, laughing, ‘not the one I had planned mind you but I guess it will do; nice job Ra.’

  A second soldier walked out of the smoke and threw the head of one of Kilo squad’s members down into the dust, ‘our vengeance waits.’ This second figure, Ra, looked similar to Gorge: he had an Orc-like appearance with red skin and cybernetics across the whole of his body. He looked more machine than man and his limbs were auto-cannons. Like something out of a comic book. He too was wearing a golden face mask over his usual helmet, along with a hooded black coat. Unlike Set’s mask, which was a skull, Ra’s was more human in appearance. I couldn’t read his profile and when I did try I felt my vision blur.