Lost in Space

by Dmitry Raspopov

  “Who are you talking about?”

  “The damn team! I hate them all. Nikita’s such a nasty piece of work. He’s killing everyone’s motivation and arguing with Styopa all the time. On top of that, he harassed me at the party!”

  “What?” I was boiling with rage. “Did he…?”

  “Relax. Our guys took care of him.” She rubbed her cheek against my lap. “But now I just hate playing with him. I hate him so much I have an urge to disclose his ship’s location to the enemy every time.”

  “I saw that you made it into the final.” Despite her assuring that the matter had been settled, I now wanted to talk to Nikita in person. Taking my position in the team, and now harassing my girl. Is he out of his mind?

  “We did. But playing like that, we only scored fourth. You should’ve heard the manager yell at everyone after the battle.” She turned her face to me.

  “Why is Nikita acting like that?” I was surprised. “You won Int, after all. He should be happy.”

  “He and Styopa had a nasty falling out after Nikita was named MVP. They keep swearing at each other all the time. Imagine how others feel, playing in such an atmosphere.”

  “He has a three-year contract,” I reminded her with glee. “Enough time for everyone to get along.”

  “No need to look away. I can hear how happy you are,” she said sadly, reaching for me. “Believe me, everyone regrets that we traded you for him. Yes, we won Int. But how are we to keep playing? Second defeat in the row in the new season. The manager’s going to cut our salaries if we lose again.”

  My heart sank, but the news made me even happier. Vengeance has been served, however small and not by my hand.

  “Apart from that,” she suddenly changed the subject, “Starry Sky is losing its audience. Your damn Galaxy is luring in everyone it can reach.”

  “It is,” I agreed, recalling the TV broadcasts. “Our government is still pondering it over, but China has already passed the law taxing the gamers’ income. Now people pay from their game earnings.”

  “No surprise there. I’ve been told you can easily make thirteen dollars per hour there. Is that true? I’ve heard of several guys dumping their jobs to do Galaxy full-time.”

  “Yes, you can make that much. But you also have to spend much if you want to progress,” I explained. “Guess how much I’ve recently spent on upgrading my ship? Over 300,000 credits. That’s 60,000 dollars at the current exchange rate. That got me a new railgun and a gravity compensation system.”

  “So that’s what you were spending on instead of food,” she scolded. “You couldn’t be any worse at personal budgeting. Why can’t you leave anything for household needs?”

  “But that railgun…” I started to explain, but then realized that she didn’t really care.

  “Whatever. Let’s make up.” She stood up and cast a demanding glance at me. “I’m so mad with everyone at work that it would be stupid argue at home, too.”

  “I’m not really angry with you,” I shrugged, forgetting the grudges I had been holding while she was away.

  “Great. Let’s have sex then.” Her lustful glance made me shudder. I forgot about my game plans the moment she began to strip.

  “I’ll use this opportunity to punish you for what you recently did.” I undid my bathrobe belt. “I was really angry with you back then.”

  Her eyes widened, but then became playful as she beckoned me to the bedroom.

  Chapter 24

  Happy with the reconciliation, I got into the capsule. I don’t need much to be happy. Just a tasty meal and my beloved back home. Who would have thought?

  As Masha left to take a shower and get some rest, I remembered my plans for that day and went back to them.

  Loading…

  A global game patch has been issued. Please take a look at the list of changes.

  That was how the system greeted me. Two messages flashed before my eyes, followed by the list of changes. In large font, it reported the addition of a new game location, Free Zone, the modified range of goods in shops, and new apartment prices.

  The patch enabled the owners of the De Luxe and top-class apartments to connect to shops and other services, previously available only from city spots. Now you could order a home delivery. By installing the shop module, you could also view all stock and pricing updates in real time.

  Not so long ago I thought how great it would be to have this feature. The developers seemed to overhear my thoughts, introducing it that fast, although only for upper-class residents. They might enable it for everyone later. Who knows?

  I skimmed through the whole list, noting the increased rewards for machine operators in all level 3 or higher quests. There were also additional coefficients for how well-developed the player’s machine was compared to the others in the party. For example, if your tank was ten levels higher than any other one, you got more money for quest completion. Before, all party members of the same class used to be paid equally.

  Not all changes were good, though. One of the less pleasant ones was reduced loot prices. Besides, there was a mention of what I already knew—the shop prices were lower than those offered immediately after combat. Next came some skill nerfs and sub-skill branches that I didn’t care about; and higher prices for new systems and weapons. The tank and vehicle components went up by 20% and ship parts by 30%. Seeing that, I praised myself again for doing my shopping before these changes came into force. Had postponed them I wouldn’t have been able to pay these new prices.

  The new features intrigued me and I was itching to test them, particularly the new location, but with zero account balance—I didn’t even have enough money h to fuel my ship—I had to complete a few quests before testing anything or checking the prices. So I headed to my apartment building to select a quest from there. I was not really surprised at seeing that the prices for the De Luxe apartments and penthouses go up, matching the new opportunities they provided.

  Falling onto the bed, I took my tablet. What’s new? I scrolled through the list.

  Three level 5 quests highlighted in blue caught my attention. Two of them just started to accept infantry and machines, while the third one was only pending ten fighters; all the other slots had already been filled.

  Selecting the fighter icon, I opened the quest info to see another change—instead of a mere system message the player was now presented with a large table detailing the task, additional requirements, bonuses and fines. You could also see the future battlefield map and select a starting spot from several options. I really liked that.

  Choosing the only starting spot available to fighters, I saw the table update:

  Mission level: 5

  Mission name: The Shipyard of Al’de’ral

  Duration: 8h

  Mission reward: 100,000 credits

  Extra mission reward: +20 reputation points

  First attempt bonus: none

  Superiority bonus: x50

  Fine for failing the mission: 50,000 credits

  Fine for leaving the mission: 30 reputation points

  Holy shit. I all but whistled at the new prices. 100,000 for a single mission! Plus the new superiority bonuses. As my ship was the only one on this mission, the best-ship bonus was all mine.

  Alas, the mission wouldn’t start with a single ship present. I had to wait for the other pilots to join the party. The wait was long, but once my fighter icon in the mission menu was joined by three more, the remaining six pilot slots were filled within just ten minutes.

  Once the countdown started, the table changed again. This time only the line showing the superiority bonus was affected. Sadly, the bonus was reduced. Although my ship remained the best one in the group, I now got only x30 bonus. Upgrade, upgrade, upgrade the ship. Or I’ll see myself at the bottom of the pilot list one day.

  Apart from the reduction, I saw a golden crown sign atop my fighter icon. This sign denoted me as the group leader, according to the newly arriving system message. The mission had not yet loade
d.

  Military task: Provide air cover to the troops landing onto the shipyards, then to the planet. Fierce enemy resistance expected, combined with its strength in machines.

  Ready to be a leader? If not, the leadership role will be transferred to another player.

  Remembering my past battle and the other players’ utter confusion about what I was doing, I decided to remain a leader. Maybe I could cooperate with them in this role. Confirming my obligations and readiness to join the battle, I stood up and entered the teleport circle. In a moment, I passed out and, experiencing that weird and unbalancing tunnel effect, found myself sitting in the cockpit.

  The carrier inside was different from what I had seen the last time.

  Now the fighters, including mine, stood on a landing that quivered as if large waves were passing beneath it. On my left and right was the outer space; there were no ramps blocking the exits.

  I started looking around to understand where exactly I was, but the place was just too weird. I couldn’t fathom how this space shuttle could function at all; it had no ladders, no galleries, no pipes, not even the fish-like creatures I had seen on the past mission. Nothing but the bumpy, quivering floor; its swaying moves rocked my ship.

  The only thing this carrier had in common with the past one were the installed square teleports and supporting equipment placed beneath each ship, indicating that we would have no trouble coming back to the city. But still, being god-knows-where on such a bizarre ship was unnerving.

  This is crazy. I shook my head, giving up on my attempts at understanding what weird sort of a carrier this was.

  I should to use all those skill slots and points, I suddenly recalled. I’ll do it right after battle, I decided, seeing the countdown start.

  Attention, fighter pilots. Start in 04:59…

  Attention, fighter pilots. Start in 04:58…

  Attention, fighter pilots. Start in 04:57…

  Another weird thing was not hearing the usual hubbub of voices. Remembering that I had muted the chat in the past battle, I un-muted it.

  “…our lead silent? He deaf or what?”

  “Maybe he’s jerkin’ off before the fight. Dunno.”

  This reminded why I would usually turn the chat off. The chat had been patched as well; it now had several “folders”, allowing you to switch off the groups you didn’t need. I disabled all the voice chats except that of my fighter group; I had zero interest in the rest of the fleet.

  I stopped the outburst of laughter in the chat with just one phrase: “Your task is to distract the enemy units while I kill them from a distance.”

  “Oh, he’s alive!” some group member rejoiced. Others seemed displeased.

  “Why should we risk our ships in close combat while you camp?”

  “You’re right, bro. That puny leader is nuts.”

  Before replying, I took a couple of deep breaths, overcoming the urge to mute them all and do everything on my own as usual. “Because my ship does more damage in one shot than you’ll do in half an hour, Nine,” I said as calmly as I could. “So the less I get distracted, the sooner we’ll be done with them. Is that clear?”

  “Yeah, Nine, get off his back,” the second fighter, listed right below me, intervened. “Let’s see how he does in battle. If he’s bad, we’ll think of something else...”

  “What systems do you have, Leader?”

  “Good ones,” I replied, inflicting another wave of mockery upon myself. However, it subsided once the mission start countdown reached zero.

  “Let’s go,” one of the pilots said.

  I felt one of the waves coming over the floor of the troopship become stronger, pick up my fighter, and carry it beyond the deck into the outer space.

  Scan, I commanded the AI at once, touching the ship joystick gently to make space for the other fighters being thrown out after me.

  “Scanning complete. Fifty targets found. Start destroying?” the mechanical response came in a moment.

  “Zoom in on the image ne thousand times.” Once I said that, the space around me shuddered and the planet leaped up as if I had already come very close to it.

  Over the green surface approached by our fleet of some hundred carriers, hovered a giant thing that looked like a layer cake with holes in between its layers where the cream should have been.

  In some of those holes I saw bulks of spaceships under construction. Part of the ships had just been started on, while others neared completion. They hung between large metal structures, with smaller ships, assembly platforms, and even smaller spacecrafts of obscure purpose flying along.

  “Zoom in five thousand times,” I commanded, hoping to get an even better look.

  “Maximum zoom.” The AI enlarged the picture, proving my initial guess true; that was the shipyard mentioned in the mission name.

  And we were expected there.

  Hurriedly but orderly, the shipyard was preparing for our attack. Some battle-ready ships came out to intercept us, holding perfect cube-shaped ranks. At the shipyard itself, a couple of fully assembled, giant spacecrafts repeatedly flashed with lights, trying to turn their noses toward us.

  “Take your positions. Start shooting at the closest ships,” I marked fighters closest in ranks and also those that, from the look of them, carried long-range missiles. Those were the most dangerous ones and had to be destroyed first.

  “I’m starting to shoot. I’ll be hitting those with missiles first. You engage the rest. If they get me, we’re done for,” I informed the chat. Some pilots agreed. Some doubted that I could hit anything from a distance like that. Most were silent.

  “Camouflage system on. Optimal position taken. Starting fire.” Following the AI message, my ship shuddered as it always did after a shot. The engines could not fully make up for the inertia, so I could feel each shot with my whole body apart from seeing it on the screen.

  The ammo stock on the ship was large as was the energy reserve, so the fire rate was only limited by the time the AI needed to calculate the trajectories of enemy ships. From a distance like that, they were like sitting ducks and were going down one after another.

  “Active scanning,” the AI warned me between shots.

  “Start maneuvering. Distract the enemy,” I dropped into the voice chat but none of the other fighters moved. All were waiting for the enemies to come even closer.

  I cursed. I’m doing more than all of them combined, and they still won’t move to make my life a bit easier.

  “Change position. Withdraw to the maximal shooting distance,” I commanded the AI, my gut feeling telling me that I was about to be detected. Once that happens, they’ll shoot all of their missiles at me.

  As the AI was busy keeping the camouflage on while withdrawing from the group, I saw that the rest of the fleet was waiting for us to cope with the task. Not a single carrier tried to break through and drop its troops to the shipyard or the planet. Everyone froze, waiting for the outcome of our confrontation. I could physically sense the weight of their hopes. If we fail, the infantry and tank crews will shower us with such heavy swearing no ear can endure.

  “Position taken. Starting fire.”

  Chapter 25

  The fighters eventually clashed with the enemy, stopping missiles with their shields and somersaulting away from the line of fire. I was the only one in relative safety.

  “Cruiser scanner irradiation!” the camouflage system screamed. “Camouflage de-activated.”

  What cruiser? I grit my teeth so hard that I bit my tongue; tasting something nasty, I saw the blue liquid stream down my chin.

  My ship started off so abruptly I all but bit my tongue off.

  “Main caliber fire. Evasive maneuver,” the AI informed tardily once I was already cursing aloud.

  What damn main caliber? Where’s that cruiser? I looked around, zooming in and out, then, recalling what I had seen before the clash, I turned my optical scanners toward the shipyard.

  There was the cruiser, with its nose poi
nting at us. Judging by its glowing shields, it was firing in my direction, deeming me as its most dangerous opponent.

  Before I could figure out what to do, its shields blinked and faded. It then got hit by something large that tore it to pieces. The flashes of light started to fade; the fire that had flared up in some places vanished instantly as it was devoid of oxygen that was rapidly escaping into outer space. In but a minute, just two broken fragments remained of the ship that had been ripped apart by an unknown force that had apparently come from our fleet’s side. Among the large ships was probably at least one equipped to deal with the enemy cruisers.

  Activate the camouflage, I commanded.

  “Impossible,” the AI said. “The ship has been exposed by enemy scanners.”

  Keep firing. That left me with no choice but to continue the combat. The AI got down to it while I activated the spacesuit’s first-aid kit and got injected with something that quickly subdued the distracting pain in my tongue.

  “I’m hit! I’m hit! Leaving for the ship,” a new, hysterical voice burst into the voice chat already filled with shouting. “Cover me, please! I don’t want to lose my ship!”

  I looked at the speaker’s ship; it was sparking and had only one working engine and a ragged hole in its side. No other ship came to his aid, despite his begging. Everyone was too busy surviving and trying to hit as many enemies as possible.

  “AI. Support this ship,” I marked it on the map. “Attack the enemies following it.”

  I did that not out of the goodness of my heart — I remembered just how “eager” all of them were to help me when I asked them to — but because of my leader status. I would rather not lose the ships under my command if I could save them.

  The AI immediately started firing at the chasers, allowing the hit fighter to fly into the carrier and land onto its floor without even reaching the teleport.

  “All enemy ships hit,” the AI informed while I looked at the fighter lying on the deck. I could see it pretty well as the carrier that had brought us here was a total mess from the construction perspective. It was shaped like a whale, with lots of gaping holes in its hull. I had no idea how it was managing to fly. Not to mention the weird material it was made of. I had never seen anything like that. Zooming in on it, I still couldn’t figure out what exactly I was looking at. The material looked like flesh, but I dismissed that idea right away. A living spacecraft? That sounded ridiculous.