by Michael Ryan
They slaughtered another hundred enemies, and then the onslaught ended.
“Let’s try again to get Brian down before the boss decides to attack,” Smith said.
The queen remained a couple of meters away from Brian, watching and waiting.
“Same idea as before?” Dale asked.
“Yes.” Smith took a knee and held out his hands. “On three. One, two, three!”
Dale leapt to the web and approached Brian hand over hand as if he were on a set of monkey bars.
“Brian, quit struggling,” Dale ordered. “You’re making it worse.”
“Get me out of here!” he screamed. “She’s going to eat me!”
“Hold on,” Dale said.
“She’s moving!” Smith shouted from below.
Dale turned his head towards the queen. Apparently, the big spider realized he was trying to steal her meal.
“Help me!” Brian struggled more as the spider approached.
“Dammit, Brian,” Dale said. “Stay still.” He began cutting the web around his friend. The spider crawled closer.
A flash of steel flew past Dale.
“I got her!” Smith yelled. “I nailed that bitch with a throwing knife. Hold on, I’ve got another one coming.”
Smith threw a second blade, but she swatted it aside.
The queen leapt over Dale and landed near Brian. She appeared ready to strike.
“Brian, take my knife,” Dale offered. Brian took the combat knife with his free hand.
“Stab her,” Dale said.
Instead of following Dale’s command, Brian cut the rest of the webbing holding him in place and fell to the floor.
The black widow queen bit Dale in the chest.
A fierce burning pain shot through him. He attempted to drop to the floor, but the boss had already spooled Dale’s hands with sticky webbing.
There was no escape.
He felt drowsy.
Dale heard Smith yell at Brian, “We’ve got to save him right now!”
But Brian was among the piles of dead spiders, retrieving the loot.
The pain in Dale’s chest spread as the poison moved down his arms and into his belly. He wanted to scream, but the sticky mess covering his body gagged him.
Everything went dark and silent.
Then he heard his own pulse as his heart labored to get oxygen to his brain. As his blood rushed through his body, the sound in his ears amplified into a rhythmic drumbeat.
The misery he felt intensified, and Dale wondered if the sensation of this bodily fluids boiling and his skin peeling off was what it felt like to be burnt alive.
Then his breathing stopped and he died.
Chapter Eighteen
Blame the military.
~ Brian Daniels
Dying was painful, Dale thought. But being dead was worse.
He didn’t feel physical pain, but the emotional trauma remained. His mind flooded with scars from his past.
There was the time he’d been lost at the mall when he was three. The sensation of being abandoned, unloved, and unwanted entered his consciousness like a vomit-triggering smell.
He was forced to relive a moment during recess in elementary school when a pretty girl he had a crush on called him a “nerdy butt-face,” and the other children laughed at him.
There was a memory of an infatuation during his freshmen year of high school. She’d rejected him publicly.
He felt like crying, screaming, or pleading, but he had no physical body.
Dale agonized over the memory of his last and most destructive heartbreak. He’d thought she’d loved him back. He couldn’t bring himself to name her, but his memories betrayed and compelled him to feel rejection all over again.
He wasn’t sure he even existed, but he couldn’t stop thinking, remembering, and hurting. His hell continued for what seemed like forever.
Perhaps no time had passed; he didn’t know. But he was sure he’d re-experienced every painful memory of his life.
If he wasn’t truly dead, he wanted to be.
He saw an image as if he was in a dream world. At first, it was fuzzy, but then it morphed into focus: Brian extending his hand.
Dale tried to shake the image out of his mind.
“Let’s be partners; we’ll watch out for each other,” Brian said.
Dale felt himself spin out of control. He was on a rollercoaster, and nobody would let him get off.
Around and around his mind spun with nausea and vertigo.
Then hopelessness struck.
His dreaming faded into darkness, then unconsciousness.
When he woke, knowing he’d dreamt, he attempted to recall the memories, but none were forthcoming. He did, however, feel refreshed.
He was no longer in pain.
He heard an unrecognizable voice say his name.
Dale opened his eyes and said, “Hmm, hello?”
He tried to focus on the face belonging to the speaker, but he couldn’t adjust his eyes; the lights in the room were too bright. He was reasonably sure, however, that the voice belonged to a cute young woman wearing a nurse’s uniform.
“Dale, you’re awake,” she said. “I’ll notify the doctor.”
“Where am I?” he asked.
“Golden Hawk Military Hospital. It’s the very best,” she said. “You’ve been in good hands.”
“How long?” Dale asked. He felt anxious as he tried to focus his eyes and his mind.
“Stay still,” the woman said. “The doctor will be here shortly. He’ll explain everything to you.”
Dale shut his eyes and fell back to sleep. After a dreamless sleep, another unfamiliar voice said his name. “Dale, can you hear me?”
He grunted.
“I’m Dr. Ando,” the man said. “Can you hear me?”
Dale nodded his head and tried to speak. All he could manage was, “Water…”
The doctor put a straw in Dale’s mouth.
He drank half the cup. “That’s better,” Dale said.
“We’ve been observing you for three days. You took quite a shock to your system.”
“But…”
“Don’t try to think too hard about it. You’re doing great. Your vital signs are strong, and your body has no permanent injuries. You need rest. I’m ordering sedatives for one more day.”
“Okay…” He felt drowsy and couldn’t keep his eyes open.
He fell asleep and had another nightmare.
Giant spiders came at him from every direction.
He screamed, but then said to himself, “It’s only a dream.”
“No, it’s not,” a wicked voice stated firmly.
“Who are you?”
“It’s me.”
He tried to wake himself. “I thought it was only a game. Help me, someone. Please.”
Nobody responded.
Then he couldn’t breathe, and unrelenting terror struck.
“Dale! Dale, wake up,” a familiar voice said. “You’re having a nightmare.”
“Mom?”
“Yes, honey, it’s me,” she said. “Your dad and I are right here.”
He opened his eyes and the room came into clear focus. The groggy feeling and vertigo were gone.
Dale wasn’t sure he could trust his senses, and he thought: Erin, are you there? But there was no answer.
He turned toward his mother. “Mom, is this real?” he asked. “Are you real?”
“Of course, dear,” she answered. “Don’t be silly. You had a little seizure in training, that’s all. The doctor said you’ll be one hundred percent in a few more days, a week at most. You look good, honey. I’m proud of you.”
His mother touched his face and smiled brightly.
“You scared us there for a moment,” his father said. “The doctors weren’t sure if they’d be forced to put you into an induced coma, but it looks like you just needed more time to recover.”
“I’m…so confused,” Dale said.
“It’ll pas
s,” his mother said. “That’s what the doctor told us.” She patted him on the arm.
His father gave him a reassuring smile.
He returned to his slumber.
Some indeterminate time later, Dale awoke again.
It was morning, or at least it seemed like morning.
He wasn’t sure.
“Mom?” he asked.
There was no reply.
“Dad?” he called out.
He opened his eyes and tried to focus. “Dad? Mom? Hello?”
He reached for a cup of ice water that sat on a bedside table, and drank it empty.
Dale craved a cup of coffee.
“Hello?” he asked again.
The room was silent except for the rhythmic sound of a medical pump and an occasional beep from the monitoring equipment.
He concentrated and thought the name Erin?
There was no answer. He wondered where he was, and whether his parents had actually visited.
Maybe everything he’d experienced was part of a dream?
The door opened, and an officer walked in. “I’m Lieutenant Brinkmann.”
“Sir?” Dale wasn’t sure if he was awake or asleep.
“Be at ease, soldier.”
A second figure entered the room. Dale thought he could make out captain bars on the man’s uniform, but his eyesight was blurry.
“Dale, I’d like you to meet Captain Stone,” the lieutenant said.
“Sir.”
“Good morning, Private Brown. You look good.”
“I feel like shit,” he said.
“To be expected,” the captain said. “The doctors tell me you’re going to be one hundred percent.”
“What happened?” Dale asked.
“You were bitten by a level ten spider. A real snafu, but part of war preparation, I’m afraid. There wasn’t supposed to be something that toxic in the training scenarios, of course, but sometimes these things get away from us.”
“Snafu, sir?” Dale asked.
“Situation normal, all fucked up. You’ll get used to it,” the captain said.
“That is, Private Brown, if you decide to continue,” Lieutenant Brinkmann injected. “That’s what we’re here to discuss with you.”
“I don’t get it,” Dale said. He was still wondering if he were in a dream. “Fuck my life,” he thought, but the sentiment came out of his mouth in the form of words. “Sorry, sirs,” he added.
“Well, Private, it’s kind of like this. The army screwed up. You went through a lot of misery. We’re aware of how that could affect your ability to continue, and we desire to field the best possible units. War’s a serious business.”
“War, sir?” Dale asked.
“Yes, war is something we need to be vigilant about, Private Brown. The Nagant War is no exception, and–”
“Nagant Wars, sir?” Dale said. “I’m confused. The game, sir?”
“It’s just what some clever marketing guy came up with, Private,” the captain answered. “Don’t read too much into it.”
“But, sir,” Dale said, “I’m not sure I understand.”
“We have authority under the EUDA to retain you, Private Brown. But we want to avoid being counterproductive.”
“What does that mean?” Dale asked.
“It means you can go back to school if you want, but we hope you’ll consider advanced training instead. We’ve prepared some incentives for you if you’ll remain in uniform.”
“I want to go back to PTU. I never wanted to go to war. Not that I don’t want to help. I mean, I’m not…”
“Dale, we understand,” Lieutenant Brinkmann said. “We completely understand how important your plans are. But we want you to consider the bigger picture: the consequences of losing.”
“Yes, Private,” the captain added. “You might win a small battle if you go back to school, but to continue the metaphor, you could lose the war.”
“I’m confused again,” Dale said. He scratched his head and looked around the room. “Why can’t anyone be more straightforward?”
“It’s like this, Private Brown,” the captain said. He took a step closer and laid his hand on Dale’s shoulder. “We want you and your skills. However, we don’t want the resentment and bitterness that could arise if we…” The captain took a step back from the hospital bed. “It’s not good for morale.”
“What he’s trying to say is that we don’t want to be forced to use our EUDA authority to–”
The captain nodded. “Mistakes were made.” He gave Dale a fatherly look. “You understand how these things can go.”
“We’ll ask you to sign a waiver,” the lieutenant said. “You’ll be agreeing to volunteer again. You’ll be stating that none of this post-traumatic stuff, you understand, none of these PTSD claims about a game–”
“You’ll be promoted, of course,” the captain interrupted. “To a corporal. You’ll have a choice of units.”
“We’d like you to consider what’s ultimately at stake,” the lieutenant said.
“And what is that, sir?” Dale asked.
“Why, the fate of everyone, son,” the captain said.
“The whole world,” Lieutenant Brinkmann added.
They went silent.
Eventually, the door opened.
A soft voice said, “Excuse me, gentlemen.”
A pretty nurse entered. Dale was sure he recognized her.
She walked up to his bed and smiled.
Her sparkly green eyes glowed against her flawless, milky white skin. She flashed a flirtatious grin at Dale and winked. “I’ll only be a minute,” she said. “I need to get your vital signs and check all these tubes. I’ll be out of your hair in a blink.” Her hand brushed against his skin.
Dale wished she’d take her time.
“Everything is looking good, Dale,” she said. She adjusted the bedsheets, and her warm fingers brushed against his bare leg.
He blushed.
“Your recovery is coming along spectacularly. You’ll be back to duty in no time at all.”
Dale swallowed. “You think I–”
Not allowing him to finish his sentence, she said, “Yes, of course.”
She placed her hand on his knee.
“You’ll be completely fine. One hundred percent recovered. You’re a hero.”
“I…”
She placed her other hand on his shoulder and squeezed him.
“You really think so?” he asked.
“Of course,” she said. “And thank you for your service, Dale. It’s not anybody that can go through what you did and then still get back up and fight on. It’s the very definition of heroic.”
“I sort of meant–”
“You wait and see, Dale,” she said, smiling. “When this war is over, you’ll have a hundred pretty girls chasing after you.”
“Well, I…”
She moved her hand to his cheek and turned his face toward hers. “Don’t think so much. You’re a man of action.”
Dale blushed.
She dropped her hand.
“What’s your name?” he asked.
“Tina,” she said. She put her hand back on his shoulder and gently massaged. “It’s been my pleasure helping you recover so you can return to duty and help save the world.”
She flashed brilliantly white teeth.
Dale smiled back; he couldn’t help himself.
She walked away from the hospital bed and whispered, “Captain, he’s all yours.”
“You’re at a crossroads, Dale,” Captain Stone said once Tina had left the room. “We hope you’re the hero we think you are. What do you say?”
“Okay, sir.”
Dale was released from the hospital two days later.
Before returning to duty, he was given another three days to finish recuperating at home.
His mother tried to pamper him. “Eat your soup.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Well, if you need anything, just ask. It’s
wonderful to see you home.”
“I have to leave tomorrow,” Dale reminded her.
“I know. Be nice to your brother while you’re here,” she continued. “He misses you.”
“I have. I will,” he said.
She took away a half-eaten bowl of tomato soup. “And please don’t let him near that damn suit.”
“Yes, Mom,” he answered.
After she closed his bedroom door, Dale went online and messaged Brian.
“I heard you were home,” Brian said.
“Don’t be mad at me,” Dale said. “I’m not the reason you were booted.”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Okay. I’m headed back tomorrow. I guess I’ll see you around?”
“Maybe,” Brian answered, “I might get sent to Argentina.”
“That should be interesting. What for?”
“Something to do with cattle farming, I think,” he answered. “You know how the government is; they don’t actually tell you anything. They just send you somewhere. I’m still thinking about contacting the Tro–”
“You idiot!” Dale yelled. “You realize they probably monitor this stuff.”
“I don’t care,” Brian muttered.
“You should.”
“I don’t. I’ve got to go. Good luck with your Nagant thing. I hope you don’t get hurt again.”
“Is that your apology?”
“I wasn’t the one that put a level ten spider into a training instance,” he answered. “It wasn’t my fault–”
“But you were the one who–”
“It’s just a game, Dale. You take it–”
“It’s not just a game. I was in a real hospital. I had real injuries. You’re so fucking stupid. You think it was fun being hooked up to monitors and lying in a hospital bed for days?”
“Still not my fault.”
“Partially,” Dale said.
“How many times did you ditch me in Green Death Online chasing after rare drops and loot? And flirting with–”
“That didn’t have pain!” Dale screamed. He stared hard at his laptop camera, hoping Brian could see his anger. “I was nearly in a coma,” he hissed. “I was tortured.”
“Blame the military,” Brian spat. “Not me!”
“I’ve got to go,” Dale said.
“Bye.”
The following day Dale returned to the EUDA base.
