“Miko, shoot anyone that looks threatening,” he said over the radio. “Everyone else, through the gates!”
Selene broke cover first, sprinting straight for the gate. Zach followed close behind, hefting his carbine. Danny brought up the rear, providing cover fire for them, though with the tower out of commission it was less necessary. An enemy solider peeked out from behind the gatepost. Zach eased his weapon up and pulled the trigger. The NPC dropped like a stone, hit with a perfect head shot.
It was something he had noticed while playing through the beta. Early on, Zach had been a terrible shot. He had struggled to hit anything further than point-blank range. After hours spent practicing and getting himself killed, however, he had steadily gotten better. And it seemed to have improved in the real world as well. He had played paintball with friends a few weeks ago and had been able to score a reasonable amount of hits, whereas before he had struggled to make more than a kill a game.
He and Selene reached the gates, each taking a side to provide full coverage of anyone lurking within the outpost. Zach saw movement and responded by putting a burst of gunfire into a enemy lining up for a shot. He saw another one in cover and started to shift his aim, but the NPC was cut down by a head shot just as he was lining up his sights.
“You were worried about being able to make the shot?” Zach said to Miko over the radio.
“The auto aim makes it much easier than I thought it would be,” she replied.
That was true enough. He had forgotten just how easy the auto aim had made firing a gun in World at War. Beta players like him, Selene and Danny had started out at level 2, but had the auto aim function disabled in order to level the playing field. They had more than enough practice to prepare them for the fighting in the game.
“Loading!” Danny said. “I'm down to one belt after this one.”
Zach gripped his carbine. They hadn't taken the time to earn cash and buy more ammunition for their weapons. They could loot the bodies of the fallen NPCs for more, but that would prove difficult in the middle of a firefight. At least they would be given more if they died and respawned at a hub, but that would serve as a severe setback. They would have to succeed with what they had, or they would start to fall far behind other players.
“I have four magazines left,” Selene said.
“Two clips left here,” Miko said. “I see a group of six of them behind a low stone wall in the courtyard, but even if I get all of them I'm going to be useless up here.”
“How close together are they?” Selene asked.
“Pretty close together. The wall isn't that big.”
“Grenade them?” Zach asked. “I've got one shot if we try that.”
“There's not many better ideas,” Danny said as he finished reloading. “And we either succeed or go back to killing monsters in the ruins.”
“Cover fire, then! Make your shots count!”
Danny leaned around the gate pillar in a prone position. This time he used short, controlled bursts. They weren't going to be nearly as effective in suppressing the enemy, but their ammunition situation left them with no choice.
Zach loaded his launcher with the last grenade. It was now or never, and he was going to have to hit at least half of the enemy behind cover to make this worth it. He stood up and aimed, then prepared to pull the trigger. A burst for fire forced him to duck back into cover. But he had to do it now. Every second waiting was a waste of ammunition. Zach took a deep breath and leaned back out around the corner. Bullets whizzed by him, but he did his best to ignore them. He took careful aim at the stone wall and fired at a spot just above it. A second later the grenade went off. It looked like he had managed a good lob, but he wasn't in the best position to judge.
“Did I get them?” Zach asked Miko over the radio.
It was silent for a moment. “Almost all of them. I had to snipe the last one, but the others are down.”
“Alright then. Are you both ready?”
Selene and Danny nodded.
Zach loaded a fresh magazine in his gun. “Let's take this place!”
CHAPTER 3
Wolf's Lair
There wasn't much more to be done. Only three enemy soldiers had survived their initial onslaught and had been quickly dispatched. Zach had severely underestimated just how powerful the beta had made them.
Their fireteam had begun to explore the base, scavenging ammunition and looking for resources, weapons, and anything else of value. The post-apocalyptic setting really did suit the nature of an MMO, Zach thought. Standard procedure for any player was to steal everything in a room not nailed down. In World at War, living in a world where technology and the last vestiges of civilization had to be scavenged suited that ethos perfectly.
Selene had found a key on one of the dead soldiers that opened the locked weapon storage. The rest of the complex was in run-down but functional condition. It had electrical power provided by a pair of generators in the back of the complex, though they were run off some sort of fuel that he couldn't identify. There was a small lounge area in the front, along with storage lockers. Behind that was a machine shop for upgrading and repairing weapons, as well as a furnace for smelting metal. It also had what looked like an ammunition press, though none of them had the materials or skill to do anything with it. Zach also found several offices and a briefing room. As he stepped in the briefing room, his wrist alert went off.
Everyone had a holographic interface mounted on their wrist, from which they could access their inventories, message friends that were out of radio range, check statuses and a myriad of other things. Zach opened his interface. New Discovery, it said. Zach opened the message and scrolled through it.
“Do you all see me on the radar display?” Zach asked through the radio.
“Yes,” the rest of the fireteam said.
“Could you come join me? There's something important we need to go over now.”
“More important than looting the armory?” Danny asked.
“Yeah, much more.”
“Be right there, then.”
Miko arrived first, followed by Danny and Selene. All of them took a seat in the various chairs of the briefing room.
“What's up?” Danny asked.
“You all got alerts when you came in here, right?”
“Haven't checked what it is, but yeah, I did,” Danny said.
“Just how important is it?” Selene asked.
“This outpost? It can be claimed as a stronghold once you're defeated all the guards. Which naturally, we just did. And it's free.”
Danny let out a low whistle.
“Um, the new player would like to know what exactly that means,” Miko said.
“You can form more permanent groups here in the game world called companies. You can then do things like open a shared armory or resources stockpile. But you need to have a stronghold in order to form a company, and the strongholds in settled areas cost money to rent,” Selene said.
“How much money are we talking?” Miko asked.
“For a small one? Two thousand per day,” Danny said.
“Jeeze, that seems extremely high,” Miko said.
“Well, if you have four players it works out to five hundred apiece per day, which is achievable. And it's not like you can't form fireteams or squads if you're not in a company,” Danny said.
“Still, this place is better than anyone is going to be able to afford for a long time. And this will give us a great jump on everyone else.”
“You have grand plans, I'm sensing?” Selene asked.
“Just think about it. What does a stronghold in the city come with?”
Danny cycled open his display and looked in the codex. “Armory and bank space depending on the size of the stronghold, and not much else.”
“Exactly. We have a fully equipped workshop in place. And we have a good amount of armory and storage space here,” Zach said.
“But there's one problem with that idea,” Danny said. He was still ski
mming through the codex. “This stronghold can be taken by other players. If we're logged out when someone comes here, we'll lose our stronghold. We can hire NPC guards, but putting a decent force here could get really expensive really quickly.”
“Well, we should try to attract more members. That will give us more people and more resources to fend off any kind of attack.”
“In my opinion, it's a good idea,” Selene said. “I mean, we already took on this place with the bare minimum of ammunition and no preparation. What's to say we can't do this too?”
“While we're recruiting, what happens if a group decides they want to take this place from us? What's the upside of joining our company instead of just forming their own once they have the stronghold?” Danny asked.
“Money.”
“Where are we going to get that?” Danny asked. “Killing monsters isn't going to do much for us.”
“Have you looked in the machine shop?” Zach asked.
“Briefly, yes. How is that going to help us?”
“Come on. I'll show you.”
The other three followed him into the shop. Zach led them in front of the ammunition press.
“That's going to be our trump card.”
“None of us can work that. And we have no resources to use either,” Danny said.
“Every one of us leveled up in the last fight, right?” Each of them confirmed Zach's question. “Then we each have a skill point we can assign. You noticed that mineral quarry we passed on the way here, right?”
“So one of us puts a skill into mining, and another puts a point into metallurgy?” Selene deduced. “That still leaves the ammo press.”
“That requires machinist. And I can put a point into that,” Zach said.
“Why can't I see that option?” Miko asked.
“It's a class specific skill. You'll have some that we don't as well.”
Danny looked at the codex again. “Ammunition press. Can be used to make pistol ammunition with one skill point in machinist.” He looked up. “So your plan is to sell pistol ammunition? That's actually a pretty good idea. I noticed a lot of the players were using pistols to hunt the smaller monsters. Though you'll have to compete against the NPC stores that have infinite stock.”
“Can't you set prices on what you sell, though?” Miko asked.
“Bingo. A box of twenty bullets sells for ten credits. If we sold them for, say, eight credits, we still stand to make a decent profit, and it will be a good deal for the other players. That will be how we build up our treasury.”
“This is sounding good. How do we want to break up our responsibilities?” Danny asked.
“Well, I have to be a machinist, naturally. I think you should be the miner since you're also a heavy.”
“So should I choose metallurgy?” Miko asked.
Zach shook his head. “I think that Selene should do that. You should invest your skill point in some sort of combat skill.”
“Why me? I'm the weakest fighter in the group,” she said.
“The skill point will help you to get better. Plus, we need at least one guard for Danny when he's mining, and a sniper would be well suited for that.”
“I agree,” Selene said. “Given time I think you could end up as one of the company's best fighters.”
“So I guess it's settled, then.” Danny said. “Since this is your idea, I think you should found the company.”
“Right.” Zach opened his menu and navigated to the option to start a company. “Huh.”
“What?”
“It already has a name filled in, I wonder why...”
“What's the name?” Miko asked.
“Black Wolf.”
Miko pointed to the wall. “Like that?”
All of them looked. Sure enough, painted on the wall was the faded but still visible head of a wolf.
“Huh, the logo here even matches it.” He looked around. “Any objections?”
There were none. Zach approved the founding of the company in his menu screen. Congratulations, it read. He noticed that the company markings appeared next to his profile picture.
“Alright, guys. Black Wolf Company is in business.”
CHAPTER 4
A Call To Arms
The start-up process for Black Wolf Company had initially been slow. With only one miner, Zach and Selene were often forced to spend time at the stronghold waiting for Danny and Miko to come back with the ore. They had taken the time to sort through the contents of the armory. There was a good stock of basic assault rifles, submachine guns, and plenty of ammunition. Zach had also found a dozen claymore mines in a crate and put them to good use. The overlook that Miko had used was booby-trapped, as were the ruins in front of the stronghold.
The money had come in, first in a slow trickle and then in a steady stream. Their ammunition was being sold out as soon as it reached the markets of Old Chicago. Zach had leveled up enough to start producing basic assault rifle and submachine gun ammunition as well. The income had given them enough gold to beef up their defenses. Black Wolf headquarters was now a formidable obstacle to anyone trying to take it. The stronghold has protected by a platoon of thirty NPC guards. They weren't especially capable, but they would at least serve to give most players pause. They had also put two automated turrets in the courtyard in case any attackers got that close. And most important of all, Black Wolf had started recruiting new members.
There were only three so far, but they added considerably to the power of the company. Xavier was another soldier added to their ranks, who also doubled as a miner. Miko and Danny had met him in the quarry and had asked him to join, which he had accepted. Another addition had been Gavin, an assault class. He had become their runner, taking their goods to market quickly and effectively. Lastly, there was Nora. She was a soldier, but her real value lay in her administrative ability. She kept track of both the treasury and the operations of the base. Unusually, she had chosen to invest skill points in logistics, which gave her access to better data tracking equipment. Things would not be going nearly as smoothly if she wasn't around.
“We've just earn another three thousand credits,” Nora said to Zach as she looked over her data feeds.
“That's plenty to keep our guards paid and make sure everyone gets the stipend,” Zach said.
Each member of the company was given two hundred credits a day as a stipend. Players would have to kill monsters for almost sixteen hours if they wanted to earn that much.
“I'm surprised we don't have more members,” Nora commented.
“I want to keep the number under control, until we get a better source of income. Otherwise, we're going to be unable to pay them all.”
“I think we should start raiding,” Gavin said. “That will give us access to good loot that we can sell.”
“Is it going to be enough to offset the number of guards we'll have to keep here, though?” Selene commented.
“It gets boring just running ammunition back and forth, you know,” Gavin said. “I mean, I like the company, but I'm playing this game for the action too.”
“We can organize a raiding group soon enough,” Selene said. “Maybe send a fireteam-”
“Black Wolf, Black Wolf. Is anyone there?” Danny's voice came over the radio. He had opened a channel to the entire company.
“What's going on?” Zach asked.
“Get up to the quarry. We're about to have trouble.”
“We'll be there. Give me details on the way.” He looked at the rest of them. “You all heard that. Let's go. Leave the the base to the guards.”
Zach's fireteam grabbed their weapons and took off for the quarry. It was only a mile away, but from the sound of things Danny's fireteam was in trouble.
“OK, we're on our way. What's up?” Zach asked.
“There's a player being chased by six other players. The six look like they're in the same company. The other guy is unaffiliated. Xavier is trying to get the situation under control, and I'm going to-”
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The sound of gunfire erupted in the background.
“Danny!”
“They're shooting! None of us are hurt, but Xavier is separated from us.” he paused for a moment. “Xavier just killed one of them.”
“Move!” Zach shouted. His fireteam picked up the pace and ran to the lip of the quarry. Gunfire was crackling ahead of them all the while.
There were five enemies down below in the quarry. They were laying down a steady, concentrated fire on Danny's fireteam. Zach could see that Xavier was separated from the other two, and about to be flanked. Selene saw it too and raised her assault rifle.
“They have a sniper! Get down!” Danny warned them over the radio. All of them took cover a split-second before a bullet cracked over them. Zach peered over the cliff's edge. Xavier was fighting gamely, but there were too many. One of the enemy got a bead on him and opened fire. Xavier fell behind the rocks, shot.
But then he saw another movement. Someone was crawling toward Xavier's stricken form. Oblivious to the bullets, the stranger crawled up beside him and pulled a medical kit off his back. Zach could see him start to treat Xavier's wounds.
“We need to get down there,” Gavin said.
“Yeah, but the first one to try is going to get shot,” Zach said.
“That's a risk we're going to have to take,” Selene said. “Otherwise, Xavier is going to lose a lot of experience points.”
“Can all of you move down here at the same time?” Miko asked over the radio.
“Yeah, why?” Zach answered.
“I don't think they know I'm here. I've been camouflaged, and I haven't fired yet. I can use my hawk eye ability to spot him, but it only lasts for a few seconds and I need to know where to look. If I can get a muzzle flash I can concentrate on that area and take care of him.”
Zach grinned as Selene, who smiled herself. “Good plan. Alright, on the count of three, everyone slide down the cliff. One. Two. Three!”
The four of them jumped up and leaped down the slope of the quarry. A shot rang out, and a bullet impacted where Zach had been seconds before.
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