Apocalypse 2020: A Wasteland LitRPG

by James T. Witherspoon

  He knew that it was only pixels, digital data, ones and zeroes, but he liked her hand being in his.

  Interlude 10

  One of Us

  After the arena fight against Laserdix, we were practically celebrities in the game world. The whole server had seen the showdown between me and Lucas. Everybody had heard of Boothe and Atomic Massacre.

  We spent a couple of days doing small quests around The Palisades, grinding up to level 12. Besides all the time we spent together in the game, I had been talking with Scarlett offline as well. We chatted on the phone for hours every night before going to sleep. Talking to her was the best part of my day.

  School was going great as well - my grades were rising, which of course made my dad happy. And I didn’t have to spend as much time alone as I used to. Foster and I hung out all the time, and the group of his friends that he introduced me to soon became my friends as well.

  So yeah, everything had been perfect. I should have expected Adam to come along and ruin it.

  I picked up my tray from the cafeteria line - Salisbury steak, tater tots, and corn - and started walking across the room towards the table that my friends and I always sat at. Several of them, including Foster, were already there, chatting.

  “Heads up, nerd!” a voice called from my right.

  Then a basketball slammed into the side of my face. I fell sideways, my tray flying out of my hands, my food scattering along the tile floor. I landed hard on my arm and the basketball bounced away, towards another table of boys sitting nearby. Laughter rose from around me.

  Then Adam walked over and picked up his ball.

  “I said ‘Heads Up’. You can’t catch?”

  A teacher approached - an older woman who I didn’t have classes with.

  “You can’t play ball in the cafeteria boys,” she said. “Hand it over.”

  “Sorry Mrs. Rimmer,” Adam said. “I thought Bran was going to catch it.”

  “Don’t let me see you doing anything like this again, or it’s detention for both of you. Got it?”

  “No problem, Mrs. Rimmer,” Adam said.

  She walked away shaking her head. I still sat on the floor, the side of my face stinging. Tears burned behind my eyes - not so much from pain, but from anger and embarrassment.

  Adam held a hand out towards me, offering to help me up, but I knocked it aside and stood on my own. Only to have him shove me hard back to the ground.

  “I offer to help you and you reject me?” Adam asked. “What’s your problem man?”

  “What’s your problem?” I yelled back. “Why can’t you just leave me alone? You’re big, good looking, on the football team, and have a ton of money - what the hell do you get out of picking on me?”

  “Are you trying to come onto me Bran?” he asked, a disgusted look creeping onto his face. “Are you gay? Talking about how good looking I am? I’m not into dudes, man.”

  “I’m not gay,” I said, standing up. I immediately felt his hands on my shoulders pushing me down again.

  “Stay there until we’re done talking,” Adam said.

  “Hey!” another voice yelled. I looked over to see my friend Splotch, who was almost as big as Adam, walking over. Foster and Craig marched behind him, looking furious.

  “Don’t touch him again,” Splotch said.

  “Or what?” Adam asked, and kicked me hard in the shin.

  I looked around for any teachers who could put a stop to this. Mrs. Rimmer had disappeared, not that she was very helpful anyways, and the two who were supposed to be monitoring the cafeteria were both sitting across the room, their heads in books.

  Splotch walked right up to Adam and stood directly in his face. He was a couple inches shorter, but looked up at Adam defiantly.

  “You touch him again, and I’m going to mess up your face,” Splotch said. “You’ll walk through the halls looking as ugly on the outside as you are on the inside. Everybody will stare at you like the freak you are and laugh at your hideousness. You’ll be the one getting things thrown at him, getting pushed to the ground.”

  Splotch’s eyes were wide and crazy. At that moment, I believed him. I believed that he would beat Adam’s face to a bloody pulp, and he would enjoy it too.

  “You should walk away man,” Craig added.

  Adam looked like he might throw a punch. If he did, I had no doubt that this would turn into a brawl. Then, for just a moment, I saw fear creep into his eyes.

  “You are all gay, aren’t you?” Adam asked.

  “Would that make you feel better?” Foster asked. “Getting beat by a bunch of queers?”

  “Throw a punch,” Splotch said. “Do it, please. I want to see what your face looks like after I smash your nose in.”

  Adam stepped back. “Fine! You just go be gay together. Leave me out of it man.” He turned and walked away. Moments later, realizing that there was not going to be a fight, the rest of the cafeteria returned to their various conversations.

  I finally stood up.

  “You alright?” Foster asked me.

  “Yeah,” I said. “I’m good. Thanks for the help, guys.”

  “That guy’s a dick,” Splotch said. “Don’t worry about it.”

  “Yeah man,” Craig said. “Besides - you’re one of us.”

  Even before we got back to the table, rumors were beginning to spread that Splotch was crazy. He didn’t mind. Hell, he probably was crazy.

  I figure we all are, at least a little bit.

  Level 12

  War for the Palisades

  1

  “Hey Bran!” Scarlett said as soon as Boothe logged in. “We’re all just checking the shops and gearing up for the next mission. Abigail is supposed to brief us on it soon.”

  Only a few seconds later, as if she had been waiting for the entire team to be online, Abigail sent a message.

  Atomic Massacre - please report to the second-floor conference room as soon as possible.

  “Time to go,” Braddock said.

  Boothe quickly chose the new power he had gained after leveling up last time they played - he went with Overload Processors, as he noticed that it seemed to lead to being able to actually take control of robotic enemies. That would be pretty freaking cool!

  Afterwards, they made their way to the conference room, where Abigail greeted them, and they took their seats.

  “I’d like to send you all on a scouting mission,” Abigail said, pressing a couple of buttons on the podium to make a map appear on the screen behind her. “Victor tells me you don’t have the best track record with simply scouting, but that’s what I need you to do here. No heroics.”

  “No promises,” Scarlett said with a smile.

  Abigail gave her an annoyed look, then pressed a button on the podium and continued talking while the map zoomed in on central Dallas.

  “We need you to go into Dallas and look around the dome, preferably unnoticed. As long as the force-field is up, we have no way into Orion’s base, so no way to defeat him. We need to find a weakness, some way to take it down. We do not want it to come down right now though. We need to wait until we have troops in place to storm the base, else we’ll lose the element of surprise. This is why I need you to just scout. Got it?” She looked pointedly at Scarlett.

  “Got it,” Scarlett replied.

  The map zoomed in and a red line appeared down highway 75 south towards Dallas.

  “This is the main highway, though you might want to take the smaller roads to the…”

  Just then, sirens wailed and lights flashed down the hallways.

  “What the hell is that?” Caustic asked.

  “That means we’re under attack,” Abigail said, pulling her pistol from its holster. Follow me.”

  Boothe and the rest of his team readied their guns and ran behind Abigail out into the hallway. The place was in chaos, with Eagle soldiers and other players running in every direction. Abigail grabbed one of the soldiers by the arm.

  “What’s happening?” she as
ked.

  “Attack from the east, ma’am,” the soldier said. “We’re assembling the defense.”

  “Good. Go,” she released him and he ran down the hallway towards the stairwell. Then Abigail walked into her office and looked out the window.

  “Oh my God,” she said.

  Boothe stood next to her and looked out over the wasteland to the east of the building. There must have been a thousand of them. Bandits, mutants, and robots - some driving trucks and some riding on what looked like giant mutated rhinos.

  “What do we do?” Boothe asked.

  Abigail shook her head. “We kill as many as we can.”

  2

  “You have angered Orion!” a voice echoed from the group gathered outside the Palisades nest. The speaker stood on top of a truck that was armed with multiple machineguns and filled with similarly armed bandits. Two huge speakers attached to the side of the truck connected to a megaphone that amplified his voice so loud that it rattled the windows where Boothe stood.

  “You destroyed his buildings, so now he will destroy yours. Alright boys, FIRE!”

  A dozen bandits stood up from their positions in the back of the trucks. Launchers were mounted on their shoulders, and with little warning, they fired. The rockets spiraled through the air, leaving trails of smoke behind them.

  “Get back!” Boothe yelled. He grabbed Abigail and threw her away from the window, diving backwards himself just before the rockets landed.

  The force of the blast knocked Boothe across the room, slamming him against the far wall. Glass exploded inward. Shards sliced across his skin like razors. The building shook, metal girders squealed as they bent, and more explosions rocked the tower.

  Boothe looked around to see that the side of the room near the windows had been completely blown apart, the floor collapsed, the windows gone, leaving only smoke and the open air outside thirty feet above the ground. Abigail lay on the floor next to him. Scarlett and the rest of the group were in the hallway, still standing, covering their eyes with their arms.

  “Boothe!” Scarlett yelled. “Are you okay in there?”

  “I’m good,” Boothe said. He looked down at the chaos spreading outside the building. Eagles were now pouring out of the ground floor and charging towards the enemies. Some drove out of the parking garage in armored vehicles, firing heavy machineguns and RPGs. The sentries that Caden had reprogrammed fired from the front doors, guarding the entrance from enemies. Boothe wasn’t too worried about them getting in, he was worried about whether the building would still be standing when the battle was done.

  Abigail struggled back up to her feet.

  “Everybody needs to get down there,” she said. “Take out those rocket launchers. The building won’t be able to take another blast like that.”

  “You guys head down,” Boothe said. “I’ll meet you there.”

  “I stay here,” Mariko said. She walked over to the edge of the building, knelt, took aim, and blew the head off one of the bandit’s far below.

  “Right,” Boothe says. “She stays.”

  “What are you going to do?” Scarlett asked.

  “I’m going to fight,” Boothe said.

  He gave Scarlett a smile, activated the energy shield on his helmet, and jumped from the building. Wind rushed past him as he fell the thirty feet to the ground. He landed with the slight bend of his knees, his boots soaking up the impact, and took off at a run towards cover. Bullets flew past him and explosions seemed to come from everywhere. It was hard to tell the Eagles apart from the bandits in the chaos of the battle.

  Boothe tried to focus on one thing at a time. Tried to condense the mayhem to something that his mind could comprehend. A huge bandit with spiked shoulders and a wicked looking two-handed axe leapt from one of the trucks and charged towards a group of Eagles who hid behind an overturned yellow Mustang. They didn’t see him coming and wouldn’t be able to defend themselves.

  Boothe took the shot, aiming a burst at the bandit’s bare chest. The three shots hit in a tight grouping and blew a hole right through him. He fell to the ground dead. It was only then that Boothe noticed the Eagles that he had just saved were Laserdix. Lucas turned and gave him a thumbs up before continuing to fire at another group of bandits.

  A car sped past right next to Boothe, nearly knocking him backwards - a bandit’s truck, its occupants spraying machinegun fire in every direction. It seemed they didn’t care if they accidentally hit one of their own, so long as they cut down a few Eagles as well. Their headstrong berserker attacks were working too. Boothe saw several Eagles fall to the ground, riddled with bullet holes. He couldn’t tell if they were NPCs or players.

  Caden’s robotic guards fired their miniguns from the front of the building, their bullets ripping through the enemies. One of the bandit trucks exploded, sending flailing bodies through the air. Boothe saw the damage to the Palisades then for the first time - four huge smoking holes had been blasted into the side of the building by the rockets.

  One of the mutant rhinoceros creatures charged past - it had a row of five horns, each at least four feet long, down the center of its face. Its body was the size of a house, with leathery brown skin and rippling muscles. Its hooves were big enough to crush anyone who was unlucky enough to get caught underfoot. A bandit with a machinegun rode on top of it, blasting at anything he passed, until the rhino slammed into one of the Eagle’s cars. Its horn pierced the side of the vehicle and by slinging its head, the mutant tossed the car aside like a child’s toy. It flew through the air, the occupants screaming, until it landed twenty yards away with a crunch.

  Several other Eagles, including Lucas’ team changed their focus to the mutant rhino. Boothe had no idea how they were going to take that thing out, and even if they did there were at least half a dozen others just like it.

  Boothe joined in firing at the mutant, and ordered Marty to do the same. The drone hovered just above his shoulder, trying to stay out of the path of all the flying bullets as best he could. Every shot they fired hit the rhino - it was difficult to miss a target that large - but most of the damage was prevented by the creature’s thick hide. Bullets from the other Eagles also punched into the thing’s skin, but they only seemed to make it rage all the more.

  Then a deep WHOOMP sound came from Boothe’s left and a grenade launched through the air. It hit the rhino directly in the face, but instead of bouncing away it stuck there.

  “Perfect!” Caustic said, now standing by his side. Braddock was right behind him, blasting away with his revolvers. Boothe took a quick look around, searching for Scarlett, but he couldn’t find her in the chaos of the battle.

  “Watch this,” Caustic said, pointing his attention back towards the rhino.

  The grenade exploded, blowing away half the creature’s face, tearing meat away all the way down to the skull. With a howl of pain, the rhino collapsed to the ground, sending up a cloud of dirt as it slid to a stop.

  “Awesome!” Boothe said. He reached up and gave Caustic a high five.

  “Thank you. Thank you,” Caustic said, with a small bow.

  Then a hail of machinegun bullets hit them both from the side. Boothe didn’t feel them at first, as they sizzled against his energy shield.

  Boothe takes 6 DAMAGE!

  Shield 0/5

  Shield depleted!

  Boothe HP - 5/6

  The last shot bit into his shoulder - hurting, but not too bad.

  Caustic was not so lucky. With no energy shield to protect him, and being a bigger target, he didn’t have a chance. Several bullets slammed into his metal armor, pinging against his shoulder and abdomen, and then one ripped through his neck, just below his helmet. A geyser of blood spewed from a massive hole in his throat, the smile on his face melted, his muscles went slack, and he fell.

  Caustic was dead before he hit the ground.

  3

  Boothe knelt over his friend, shaking him, trying to revive him. There was no use - blood gushed out of his neck,
pooling onto the ground. His heart had stopped. Boothe looked over to his Friends list and saw that Caustic’s name was no longer there.

  “Foster?” Boothe said into his microphone. There was no answer.

  “He’s gone Boothe,” Braddock said. “No time to mourn now. Get back to cover!”

  Braddock was right. Bullets rained down on them and another truck drove past. A robot standing in the back sprayed death from its miniguns. Boothe ducked behind a wrecked car and looked to where he could help the most.

  “Marty, go hack that robot,” Boothe said, pointing towards the vehicle that was speeding past.

  His drone immediately went into action, using the new speed boosters that Caden and Boothe had installed to fly towards the truck. A bandit with wild green hair drove the thing, swerving towards Eagles on the ground and laughing as his wheels crunched over them. Another bandit sat in the passenger seat, while a robot stood in the back, the miniguns on its arms rotating at high speed.

  Marty caught up to them and attached to the back of the robot’s head.

  Hacking (90%) - SUCCESS!

  Disable or Overheat Processor?

  Ah, time to try out his new ability.

  “Overheat the processors, Marty.”

  The robot’s miniguns stopped spinning. Marty detached and hovered away from the truck as smoke poured out of the seams between the metal plates that made up the robot’s body. The bandit in the passenger seat noticed first and turned to look. His eyes went wide with fear just before the robot exploded. The robot’s metal body became shrapnel, bursting outward, ripping into everything around it. Both bandits were launched from their seats, their bodies torn to pieces in a cloud of blood. The truck spun out of control, turning into a ball of flames before slamming into the side of one of the mutant rhinos. The rhino wobbled, then fell sideways. The bandit riding its back toppled off, screaming as the rhino landed on top of him, crushing him into a soupy mess. Then the truck exploded, blasting a huge chunk out of the side of the rhino’s body.