Boothe grabbed a frag grenade and a medkit to replace the ones that he had used earlier. Happy with his leather armor and weapons for now, he queued up at the back of the line. When he reached the front, the man wordlessly pointed to the two bins sitting in front of him. The word Buying was spray-painted on one, and Selling on the other.
Boothe put the medkit and the grenade into the Buying bin and took the assault rifles from Cthulwho to put into the Selling bin. The man pressed a few buttons on a computer nearby and numbers appeared on LED screens above each bin.
$10 above the Buying bin, and $360 above the Selling bin.
The man in the hockey mask looked at Boothe expectedly.
“Uh, I accept.” Boothe said with a shrug.
The man nodded and pulled cash out of the register nearby, then silently placed one bill at a time on the counter in front of Boothe. With that, the man pressed a button and the LEDs above the bins changed to Thank you for your business and Please come back soon.
Boothe, Scarlett, and Cthulwho left the shop and split the money outside.
Gained $120
With that done, they walked down the street towards the Eagle’s Nest, then into the alleyway where Victor’ black van still sat. As they approached, Victor opened the back doors and waved them in.
“Come on, come on,” he said. When they were all three inside the van, he shut the door. “You have the package?”
“The information is stored on my drone,” Boothe said. The little robot hovered over to the computer at the back of the van and plugged in. The monitors there all changed to show maps of the region, dotted with red markers.
“What is this?” Victor asked.
“This is the location of other bandit camps,” Boothe said. “Coordinates that the computers in Epic Center were communicating with. All the logs are in the data files.”
“Amazing,” Victor said. “This is far more than I expected you to bring. You have all done great work here.”
QUEST COMPLETE: Datathief
REWARD $350
Boothe gains 1000XP!
LEVEL UP!
Boothe reaches Level 6!
You have unlocked a new class power.
“I think it’s time to introduce you to the rest of the Eagles,” Victor said. “Follow me.”
He led them out of the van and back into the Eagle’s Nest. The bar was bustling with activity, filled with both players and NPCs, all chatting or looking for work. Victor guided them through the crowd and to an unmarked door in the back of the bar, near the restrooms, then they all four walked inside and Victor shut the door behind them.
“Great,” Cthulwho said. “It’s a storage closet.”
“Please,” Scarlett said. “You know he’s going to press a button and a door will open to reveal an underground base or something.”
“You’re half right,” Victor said. “It’s not a button, it’s a string.”
He pulled the string hanging from a bare lightbulb in the corner of the room, and the entire floor shifted, moving downwards. Then after a few moments, the same door they had just walked in opened to reveal a white pristine hallway. Windows on the right wall revealed a conference room with a podium at one end, and rows of empty chairs lined up in front of it. On the left, doors lined the walls, each labeled with a name and title.
“This,” Victor said, “is the true Eagle’s Nest.”
“Wow,” Boothe asked. “What do you all do down here?”
“Try to save the world,” Victor said casually. “Come with me and I’ll explain as best I can.”
He talked as they walked down the hallway. The place was mostly empty, but they occasionally passed another NPC. All the people here were dressed in suits and gave Victor a salute as they passed.
“The Eagles’ ultimate goal is to restore civilization to the world and reverse the effects of the Apocalypse. We have scientists researching ways to regenerate the ozone layer and remove radiation from the ground so that vegetation will grow once again. We have crews working to expand the walls here in Wichita, and creating more similar civilized zones elsewhere. All of these things are important for the preservation of humanity and other species, but right now our primary goal is to take down Orion. The Bandit King is the currently the biggest threat to our organization. He seems to desire only chaos and destruction, and has found some way to organize the bandit clans in the region to rally against us.”
At the end of the hallway, the path split to the left and right. Victor stopped and turned to face them.
“I’ll be honest,” he said. “We need all help we can get. You would be a huge asset to our efforts. If you join, you’ll each get your own storage lockers and access to our armory. In return, we will occasionally call on you to perform missions. We pay well, of course. Are you interested in going further with this?”
Boothe looked to Cthulwho and Scarlett, who both nodded.
“Bandit’s suck,” Scarlett said. “I’m all for taking them out.”
“Sure,” Cthulwho said. “Sounds fun.”
Boothe agreed. “We’re interested.”
“Good,” Victor said. “We refer to our groups in the organization as cells. Cells can be made of two to five players. You will be called upon to perform missions from time to time. Cells are ranked according to the missions that they complete for the organization. If you decline a mission, or worse, fail a mission, your ranking will be lowered, while if you succeed, your ranking will go up. You’ll need to come up with a name for your cell.”
Boothe looked at the others once again. “Any ideas?”
“The Whovians,” Cthulwho said.
“No,” Boothe and Scarlett said simultaneously.
“It has to be something badass,” Boothe said. “Something that makes us sound cool.”
“Atomic Massacre,” Scarlett suggested.
“What does that even mean?” Cthulwho asked.
“It’s just two of the coolest words that I could come up with on the spot.”
“I like it,” Boothe said.
“You’re just saying that because you want to make out with Scarlett,” Cthulwho said.
“No I’m not!” Boothe said, his face growing red.
“We’re Atomic Massacre,” Scarlett said to Victor.
Victor wrote the name down on the pad of paper in his hand and said. “Great! Atomic Massacre. This way.”
“I did not agree to that name,” Cthulwho said.
Interlude 5
Foster
Lunch was the worst.
After that first day, when Adam began targeting me, I started skipping lunch entirely and would instead go to the school library to draw. I’d just wait to eat when I got home. The library wouldn’t let me in during class hours though, unless I had a note. So every day, I had to go to a teacher and convince him to write a note for me. I had a list of excuses I would use.
“I need to study for a test.”
“I have homework that I want to get a head start on.”
“I’m just not feeling very good today.”
I tried to switch it up and have a different teacher write the note every day so that none of them would know that I never actually went to the cafeteria. I’m sure they still knew.
Today, when I arrived at the library, a sign hung from the door.
Closed for Conference
I wadded up the note in my hand and tossed it into the trash can on my way to cafeteria. The place was already full and noisy with conversations. Since I didn’t have any friends, I had nowhere to sit. I looked over the cafeteria tables, trying to find a seat that was isolated, then spotted the end of one table that was completely empty. I sat there, feeling eyes watching me from the other students sitting nearby. I reached into my new backpack, pulled out a sketchbook, and opened it to my most recent drawing - an image of Scarlett and I in the Falcon on our drive towards New Wichita, the sun setting in the background. I had bought a new pack of colored pencils just for this, and it was turning out
to be one of my best drawings ever.
Until I heard someone behind me say “Oops, and a cup of soda spilled over my shoulder and splattered all over the sketchbook. The pages were ruined instantly.
Adam shoved me hard to the side, knocking me out of the chair and onto the ground. “You’re sitting at our table, nerd.” He picked up my soaked sketchbook and tossed it across the room.
“Sorry,” I said, standing up and grabbing my bag. Adam and his friends sat down, laughing. It wasn’t the same table that they had been sitting at that first day when Adam pulled the chair out from under me. Likely he had just decided that would be their table when he saw me sitting there.
I walked away, my eyes burning. I felt like crying, but I wouldn’t. This was bad, but crying in front of everybody would make life here unbearable.
Before I made it halfway to where the sketchbook had landed, another boy leaned down, picked it up and started flipping through the drawings. He was tall and skinny, with a striped shirt and shoulder-length sandy brown hair.
“That’s mine,” I said, rushing up to get the book from him before he threw it somewhere else.
He smiled and handed it over. “You’re a great artist,” he said. “I really like the Apocalypse 2020 stuff.”
I looked at the picture I had been drawing of Scarlett and Boothe in the Falcon. The pages were soaked and wrinkled. The colors had ran and spread out, fading and blurring.
“Thanks,” I said.
“Do you play?”
I stood there, looking through my ruined book, so angry that I had almost forgotten where I was. “What?” I asked.
“Do you play Apocalypse 2020?”
“Yeah,” I said.
“Wow,” he actually looked impressed. “I wish I could play. How did you even get a ticket?”
“I placed fourth in the contest.”
“What? That’s crazy!” he said. “You must be really good at video games.”
I nodded, looking around nervously for some way to escape from this situation. Some people were still staring at me as I stood talking to this guy in the middle of the cafeteria.
“You can come sit with me and my friends, if you want,” he said. “My name is Foster.”
“That’s okay,” I said. “I’ll just go…”
“No, seriously,” he said. “Come on. I know you’re new. I know it sucks. You can sit here.”
“Okay,” I said.
“What’s your name?” he asked.
“Bran.”
I followed him over to the table nearby, where a group of other guys were sitting. There were a few empty seats at the table. Foster sat in one and I sat next to him.
“Hey guys,” Foster said. “This is Bran.”
They all gave little waves and “Heys.”
“So how is the game?” Foster asked.
“It’s really cool,” I said. “I haven’t ever played anything like it. It makes you feel like you’re really in that world when you’re playing it.”
“Sounds awesome,” Foster said. “Maybe we could hang out and play games sometime? I’m always so bored after school.”
“Okay,” I said. “That’d be fun.”
I tried to dry out my sketchbook while the conversation around me continued. I kept quiet and listened, learning who the people at the table were and trying to follow what they were talking about. I was still uncomfortable, but it was better than sitting alone, or getting harassed by Adam. Some of the guys even reminded me of my friends back in Austin, who I would sit with at lunch talking about video games and school and girls.
Maybe I could actually make friends here.
Level 6
Atomic Massacre
1
Atomic Massacre - Please report to The Eagle’s Nest for your next mission.
“Are you seeing this?” Scarlett asked, shooting another mutmite.
They had paid to get the Falcon out of the shop and driven back to Perry. They stopped at Caden’s so that he could show Boothe how to upgrade his drone. For his power that he earned at Level 6, Boothe decided to take Combat Drone, which allowed him to add a laser gun to the little robot. The weapon was hardly noticeable - just a small barrel on the right side of the metal casing.
After leaving Caden’s, they had gone into Perry and to The Depot where Cliff offered Scarlett the same mutmite quest he had given to Boothe earlier and she took it so that she could level up to six.
“Yeah, I see it,” Boothe replied. He stood back in the battle, letting Scarlett do most of the work and only jumping in if she got herself in trouble - which she never did. She didn’t really need him here, but she had asked him to come anyways. And Boothe wasn’t ever going to turn down a chance to spend time with her.
“Where’s Paul?” she asked.
“I don’t know. I’ll call him.”
A minute later, after Scarlett had destroyed all the mutmites in the Den, Boothe returned saying “He’s about to log in now. We should head back to New Wichita.”
“Yeah,” Scarlett agreed. “I’m done here anyways.”
They returned to The Depot and Scarlett got her payment from Cliff.
“That did it,” she said. “Level 6! Woo!”
“Awesome,” Boothe said. “Now we’re even.”
“So you can never quest without me again.”
“Deal.”
She smiled at Boothe, tossed him the keys to the Falcon and said “You drive. I’m going to look through these new power options.”
On the way back to New Wichita, Scarlett talked about her choices as an Assassin. Boothe didn’t have much to say in the conversation, but liked listening to her anyways. Not really listening, of course. He couldn’t hear her voice. Just text on a screen. Still, it was nice.
“I think I’m going to go with On the Run,” she said after listing all her options. “I’ve already started into that tree by taking Run + Gun, so might as well keep going. It allows you to get a free movement after killing an enemy.”
“Seems good,” Boothe said.
“I’m going AFK for a few minutes,” Scarlett said.
“Okay.”
Boothe continued driving, while Scarlett sat completely motionless in the seat next to him. An empty shell. Just pixels on a screen. It was odd because the character’s appearance did not change at all, but to Boothe it was obvious that Scarlett was no longer there.
She returned just as Boothe drove the Falcon through the gates of New Wichita.
“Sorry it took so long,” she said. “Just had to take care of a few things.”
“No problem.”
They parked the car and walked to The Eagle’s Nest, where Cthulwho was already waiting. He joined up with them, then together they made their way through the crowded bar and to the small storage room in the back. Boothe pulled the string and the elevator took them down into the true Eagle’s Nest.
When the elevator opened, Victor was already walking down the hall towards them.
“Good,” he said. “You’re here. Into the conference room - the mission briefing is about to begin.” He held the door on the right open for them to walk through.
The seats inside were nearly all filled with players facing towards the podium at the front of the room and chatting amongst themselves.
Scarlett led the way into the room and found a place for the three of them to sit together. Then Victor shut the door and took his position behind the podium.
“Allow me to extend a welcome to each of you,” he said. “You are all new to the organization, but we have high expectations for this entire group. With that said, let’s get straight into the missions.”
With the press of a button on the podium, the screen behind him lit up with a map of the region. A dozen red dots were scattered across the map.
“Recently, information was recovered containing the coordinates of many bandit camps in the area. We now have enough cells to hit each of these camps simultaneously. We hope that by doing this, we can break communicati
on between the camps and severely damage Orion’s network.”
Next to each of the dots on the screen, a name appeared. Boothe scanned across them and saw Atomic Massacre next to a dot about 22 miles east of New Wichita.
“You have each been assigned a camp,” Victor said. “Your mission is to eliminate this camp, using whatever means you wish, in the next two hours.”
“Two hours?” somebody said from a seat a few rows up. “That’s not enough time!”
Boothe craned his neck to see who was speaking. He identified the person just as Scarlett elbowed him in the side saying, “That’s Lucas.”
“Guess he made it to New Wichita after all,” Boothe whispered.
“Jerk owes us money.”
Victor cleared his throat and said. “Two hours is all we have. We expect Orion will soon discover we have this information. When he does, he will move his camps and we will lose him again. We need to hit them fast. We trust in your abilities to accomplish this. You would not be here if we did not think you were capable.”
Lucas settled back in his seat, pouting, but didn’t say anything else.
Victor reached below the podium and came up with a stack of folders, placing them in front of him.
“One by one, I’ll call the name of your cell. When I do, please come forward and take your dossier. Inside, you will find all the information we have obtained about the camp you have been assigned to. You will also each receive a voucher for a supply box from our quartermaster, containing equipment you may find useful on this mission. I suggest you take a bit of time to prepare and head out as soon as possible.”
After this, Victor began calling out the names of the cells. Miami Digital, Primordial Rebirth, Chaotic Decay, Scandroid 84. As he called out the names, players stood and walked to the front, taking their dossiers and leaving the conference room. Lucas stood and walked up with his group when Victor called for Laserdix.
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