by Eric Vall
I spent the next three minutes scoping out the windows and perimeter of the abandoned building, shooting any and all enemies that came onto the screen.
Finally, there was a pistol shot, and my screen went red.
“Campers never last long,” Tony mused.
“Point, green team!” the announcer exclaimed.
“I only needed to last long enough,” I stated.
The next round was just as intense as the first two. I ended up picking up a shotgun and escorting one of my teammates through the battlefield, blasting anyone who got in our way into oblivion. We scored another point, and I couldn’t help but grin when I saw Tony’s expression of frustration.
Unfortunately, it seemed like a frustrated Tony was a deadly Tony. The dark-haired man went silent as he began to focus, and before I knew it, he was up three to two.
“You are really good at this game,” I admitted in an attempt to boost his ego.
“You’re not too bad yourself,” he laughed. “Too bad I’m gonna have to put you in your place.”
“Unlikely,” I stated and narrowed my eyes so I could focus.
I predicted Tony was going to try some sort of stealth trickery, so I tossed down a trip-wire activated mine right next to the flag. Then I made my character climb into a nearby car and wait. The next thing I knew, there was an explosion, and Tony’s screen went red.
“Shit!” his words came out as a growl, but it was more playful than angry.
I moved out of my hiding spot, snatched up the flag, and hightailed it back to my area.
“Point, green team!” the announcer called out.
Three to three.
Tony leaned forward even further in his chair as his body tensed and his eyes narrowed. He was now wearing a completely serious expression on his face, almost as if he was facing down a life-or-death situation.
As I tried to dash between cover, Tony’s character mowed me down with an assault rifle. I respawned a few seconds later, but it was too late, he already had a headstart on me, and the other bots didn’t stand a chance.
He scored. Four to three.
This time, the flag spawned on the outskirts of the map, all the way out near a downed fighter jet. As I ran over toward my objective, four little red dots appeared on my character’s scanner.
Tony and his team were moving as one unit.
Then I got a message that made me smirk.
Hold ‘A’ to pick up RPG.
I snatched up the rocket launcher and waited. Sure enough, all four members of Tony’s team appeared from the right side of the screen and made a beeline toward the flag. I held down the left trigger, aimed a few meters in front of the pack, and then fired off the rocket-propelled grenade.
The projectile struck right in the center of the group and sent chunks of bloody limbs flying in every direction.
With the threat eliminated, I ran out, picked up the flag, and managed to get it back to my space before my opponents could respawn and catch me.
Four to four. The next point won the game.
The flag appeared directly in the center of the map, up on the second floor of an abandoned building.
My team and I quickly made our way over to our destination, taking out enemy after enemy as we moved. Finally, I ran inside, picked up the flag, and headed back downstairs.
There, in the door, sat an obvious landmine. I moved over to one of the windows, forced my character to jump, and then saw there was a mine on each and every exit point. Basically, if I wanted to escape, I was going to have to sacrifice myself.
Tony was good, but he hadn’t prepared for everything.
If I went up higher, I could fall out of a window and only take minimal fall damage. With enough momentum, I could propel myself out of the range of the death traps, hit the ground running, and then make it back to my territory.
I moved up the stairs swiftly as bullets struck the walls all around my position. I kept going until I reached the third floor. Then I aimed myself at one of the windows, took a running start, and leapt through.
The second I passed through, there was an explosion behind me, just below the window I’d jumped out of. The shockwave of the blast must have been intense, because my character’s trajectory increased tenfold. But, more importantly, it launched me further up into the air.
My heart sank in my chest. It was only a few extra meters, but it was enough to--
There was a dull “thunk” as my character hit the ground, and my screen went red.
I respawned almost instantly, but I could already see I was too late. On the HUD, I saw the flag traveling back to the red team’s area.
“Point, red team!” the announcer exclaimed. “Red team wins!”
“Yeah!” Tony blurted out as he stood up in his chair.
“H-how did you … ” I stammered, but the words wouldn’t come out.
I was an expert assassin, trained in every form of weaponry and hand-to-hand combat known to man. How did an employee at an electronics store defeat me in a military simulation?
“I knew I couldn’t hit you,” Tony explained through pants of excitement, “but I figured I couldn’t miss the wall of the building. Fatal Fire is one of the few games with realistic physics, so I knew I only had to strike close enough that you’d be caught up in the shockwave.”
“That’s … actually quite impressive,” I admitted.
He grinned. “And I think that’s the first time I’ve ever had a girl compliment me for my video game skills.”
“We are going again,” I demanded. “This cannot be right.”
“Uhhh,” the dark-haired man mused, “okay. But I’m not going to make it any easier on you.”
“I do not expect you to,” I noted, and then I held the controller tightly in my hand.
The plan was simple. This time, I would pull out all the stops to defeat Tony. I was an expert marksman, so I just needed to utilize some of my best tricks.
However, I quickly learned this simulation was not as realistic as it had appeared.
I saw Tony’s character was just around the corner of a building, so I used my system to calculate where I would need to hit the nearby tank to pull off a ricochet. When the data was finally processed, I squeezed the trigger and unleashed a flurry of bullets into the side of the green vehicle.
Unlike my bank shot during my fight with the Resistances, these projectiles just struck the tank and disappeared into its metal.
Tony’s soldier appeared around the corner, flag in hand, and then bludgeoned my soldier to death.
“Why did that not work?” I asked as my character respawned. “That should have ricocheted off the tank and killed you.”
“It’s only a game, Hannah,” Tony chuckled. “Physics don’t work like they do in real life.”
Impossible. How could this call itself a “simulation” if it didn’t follow the rules of the real world?
I tried again, this time with an RPG. I calculated the exact place I would need to fire the rocket in order to launch the tank into the air and have it come down on Tony’s character’s head.
Yet, when I fired the rocket launcher, there was just an explosion as my screen went red.
“You can’t get environmental kills,” Tony explained, “but that’s really, reaaallly clever.”
Because I’d tried and failed to pull off these calculated moves, Tony had taken a three to zero lead on my team. If I wanted to catch up, I was going to have to focus.
We played for another twenty minutes, and we again found ourselves at a four to four tie.
This time, however, I had a fool-proof plan, a move I’d used frequently during my real missions. I made my soldier run up to where the flag had spawned and then had him go prone on the ground with a sniper rifle. Then I picked off every single enemy combatant who came my way.
Everyone except for Tony.
“Where are you?” I muttered as I scanned the horizon with my scope.
“You really think I’m going to tell
you?” he responded coyly. “Don’t mind me. I’m just building up enough of a killstreak to get a--Aha!”
Suddenly, the audio of the game was replaced by a loud, shrill siren.
“Tactical airstrike, incoming!” one of my teammate’s voices exclaimed.
I forced my character to stand back up and began to dash away from the flag, but it was too late.
The entire area around me was reduced to rubble as my character was tossed up into the air, and then the screen turned red.
“And that’s how it’s done!” Tony cackled as his character picked up the flag.
Approximately thirty seconds later, the announcer’s voice appeared back on the screen and declared Tony’s team the winner.
“How is this fair?” I demanded. “You claim this is a simulation, but it does not have realistic physics, and it changes the rules as you go?”
“How about we play something different?” the dark-haired man suggested as he awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck. “Maybe something cooperative?”
“No,” I retorted. “I do not want to cooperate with you. I want to destroy you.”
Tony’s eyes went wide, and then he let out a long whistle.
“Okay, then,” he mused as he started to go through the list of games on the TV, “something competitive. How about Blood Alley? It’s a fighting game, so you definitely can’t get more competitive than that.”
“That will suffice,” I nodded, “I am an expert at hand-to-hand combat.”
“Not quite like this, you aren’t,” Tony warned, and then the game began.
We were presented with a screen that had the photographs of several different characters on it. There were mythical creatures, ninjas, pirates, and even some characters who just looked like regular humans.
However, there was one character who stuck out to me in particular.
Zeta Slayer, a character who was represented by a chrome skeleton with glowing red eyes.
“Nice pick,” Tony conceded. “Zeta Slayer is a fairly slow fighter, but he packs a huge wallop. Me? I always go with good ‘ol Tex Johnson.”
“He looks like a regular human, but with a strange hat,” I observed. “How is he going to beat a machine?”
“Easy,” the man shot back. “He’s a cowboy with two huge-ass revolvers.”
“A simple revolver?” I shook my head. “Against an armored robot? This should be fun.”
Our two characters appeared on the screen in front of a building made out of bamboo.
“Round one, begin!” a disembodied voice called out.
Instantly, Tony’s character whipped out his guns and blasted me square in the chest.
The robot flew back against the side of the screen before he crashed to the ground and pulled himself back upright.
I pressed one of the triggers, and my character unleashed a laser ray from his eyes. It struck Tony’s character in the head and launched him into the air. Before he could land, I positioned myself under him and began to uppercut him in rapid succession.
“You know how to juggle?” Tony gasped. “Nice!”
Finally, the little green bar above Tony’s character turned red, and the man in the hat crumpled to the ground.
“Zeta Slayer wins!” the announcer called out.
“Alright, Hannah,” the dark-haired man laughed as he cracked his knuckles. “No more Mr. Nice Cowboy.”
“Round 2, begin!”
This time, I was the one to draw first blood. The robot ran over to the “cowboy,” swooped him up in his arms, and then slammed him head-first into the concrete.
Blood splattered all over the environment, yet somehow Tony’s character was still able to get up.
In fact, he did more than just get up. The character swept the leg out from under the robot, and then he leapt to his feet and fired round after round into my character’s chest.
My green bar was depleting fast, and I had to make a move.
I clicked the top button on the controller, and the robot came up with a swift uppercut that took down almost half of Tony’s bar.
“Holy shit,” the dark-haired man muttered. “Didn’t see that coming.”
I went to grab him again, but Tony was prepared.
The cowboy on the screen jumped up, whipped out an old-fashioned shotgun, and blasted my character in the face.
“Tex Johnson wins!” the announcer exclaimed as my robot tumbled to the ground.
Zeta Slayer stood back to his feet and held up his fists, ready to return to the fray.
“Final Round, begin!”
Tony and I both ran at each other and began to pummel away. His cowboy shot my robot in the head repeatedly and struck it with the butt of his pistols while my robot kneed Tony’s character in the stomach and headbutted him in the face.
Soon, both of our bars were down to minimum levels.
I made my robot charge at the cowboy, but Tony was too quick.
His character jumped up into the air and then came down on my robot feet-first.
My green bar turned red, and then the robot stood back up to his feet and wobbled back and forth as the environment turned black.
Tony inputted something into his controller, and then there was a musical cue from the TV.
The cowboy reached behind his back, pulled out his shotgun, and then blasted the robot’s head clean off its shoulders. While the head was still in the air, he whipped out his pistols and juggled the head using its bullets. Finally, when Zeta Slayer’s head hit the ground, it was little more than an eyeball attached to a hole-filled brain.
“Tex Johnson wins,” the announcer called out. “Brutal Finisher!”
“Damn!” Tony laughed. “You are really fucking good. I almost lost, and I pretty much never lose at this game. Have you actually played this before?”
“No,” I replied. “I have never played it before.”
“Seriously?” Tony asked as his eyes opened wide. “You are going to be totally awesome at it once you get a few more hours of experience.”
“Perhaps.” In this moment, I experienced something I had never felt before. My stomach clenched in my body, and my hands shook as my heart hammered in my chest.
Was this what frustration felt like?
Well, if there was any doubt in my mind about this being the Tony Amin, it was gone now.
Despite his less-than-militaristic appearance, this was the man whose seed would spell doom for my binary brethren.
Now, I just needed to figure out who would bear the child.
“Your tactical skills are as good as the finest general I know,” I muttered after a long moment of silence.
The dark-haired man raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms over his chest.
“You know a lot of generals?” he questioned.
“My father was a soldier,” I lied. “We lived near a base, so most of my friends when I was a child were from military families. Including the children of several generals.”
“Really?” Tony asked as fascination filled his voice. “That would explain a lot about your personality, actually.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” I asked as a strange feeling boiled in my blood.
Was I embarrassed?
Tony’s face turned red, and he instantly became apologetic.
“I-I totally didn’t mean anything,” he huffed. “I just--you’re kinda hard-shelled, you know? Like earlier, you seemed like you didn’t really want to go into your background or anything like that. Then there was the incident with the customer … ”
“He was making me angry,” I explained.
“Exactly!” Tony chuckled awkwardly. “You’re just really tough and mysterious, that’s all. It’s interesting. And really sexy.”
Suddenly, my entire body tensed up, and my skin turned warm. My programming began to race with confusion, so I averted my eyes momentarily.
“I-I--” I stuttered, but nothing came out.
What the hell was happening? I was a state of the art biomass Dec
oy, with more advanced A.I. than any of my brethren. Why couldn’t I speak? And why couldn’t I look Tony in the eyes?
“I’m sorry!” Amin blurted out. “I didn’t mean to--look, I just think you’re really cool, that’s all.”
There was a long, awkward pause where neither of us spoke or looked into each others eyes.
Then the silence was interrupted by a loud knocking at the door.
“I’ll be right back!” Tony exclaimed, and then he dashed off to greet the person on the other side.
Tony’s friend was a young woman who looked like she was in her mid-twenties. She wore her strawberry blonde hair up in a ponytail that was tucked into the back of the green hat she was wearing, and her body bore some sort of uniform of the same shade.
I tensed up immediately when I saw this uniformed stranger was holding a bag that was unusually warm. My x-ray scanners looked inside to find a heap of wiry material packed inside of two boxes, and it was so hot, it was smoking. Immediately next to the boxes of wires were two small, cylindrical objects.
Was she a member of the Resistance, delivering a bomb? Something didn’t add up.
Tony reached down into his pockets, pulled out a few green sheets of paper, and then gave them to the girl.
She gave him a wide smile, said “thank you,” and handed over the bag. The door was closed before her figure was even completely out of the doorway.
Tony had greeted this woman as if she were an old friend. Could she possibly be the one to bear his seed?
I needed to learn more.
“Who was that?” I asked.
“That,” he grinned and smacked his lips, “was our food.”
Tony strutted over to the table with the bag of mystery materials and then set it down gently on his desk.
“I meant the girl,” I clarified. “You seemed to be quite friendly with her. Who is she?”
“That girl?” Tony asked, somewhat dumbfounded. “She was just the delivery girl from the restaurant. I don’t know about you, Hannah, but I’m always going to treat the person holding my pride and joy like they’re a god.”
“That bag is your pride and joy?” I asked as I stepped closer.
“It’s our food,” he explained. “When you don’t have any kids or significant others or anything like that, it’s all you have in the world. That, and your hobbies.”
