Ghost Platoon

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Ghost Platoon Page 11

by Xavier P. Hunter


  “That brings me to my second point,” Chase continued. “Melee is all player skill. The juggernaut is entirely under your control. There aren’t fudge factors keeping the twitch kiddies from cross-map sniping like they did in old FPS games. Fire any precision weapon, and you’ll see a hit percentage, even if you’ve got them dead to rights. You can miss a 99 percent shot one time in a hundred, but the odds aren’t usually even that good. Throw in max-tier pilot perks, and you’re looking at mid-80s to low-90s as your targeting ceiling.”

  “Good old brawlin,’” Frank said with a grin. “Never misses.”

  “Well, it can,” Chase corrected. “But it’s down to piloting skill and juggernaut specs. I’m not sure we wouldn’t have won that last match if not for the fact that we tore those Jackals apart in close quarters.”

  Lin snorted. “They were noobs.”

  Chase shook his head. “That’s the thing. They weren’t. I checked their old matches. Those guys are good with their axes.”

  “But that haven’t played 5,000 hours of Silent Shuriken, either,” Reggie reasoned, cutting ahead on the path to an eventual explanation out of Chase. “So, you’re saying that we’ve got a melee advantage, and we should press it.”

  “Something like that,” Chase said. “But more importantly, it’s not a tactic that’s easy to plan against. It’s not like we’re playing rock-paper-scissors with our anti-missile defenses. I mean, we could write Tough Occupation a manifesto, tell ‘em straight up that we’re planning on closing to melee range and gonna throw them out of the club like a drunk at last call.”

  “I’ve actually done that,” Frank mused aloud. “Back in Korea, we had this—”

  “Later,” Reggie told him. He turned to Chase. “What about the second match scheduled for tomorrow?”

  Chase brought up a new slide on his PowerPoint presentation. It showed a 5-Titan platoon in rainbow colors, each juggernaut a different vivid hue. “Lucky Outlaws. These punks are one of the ones I flagged as dangerous. This is a tournament-specific build. We won’t stand a chance slugging with them, and I’m not even sure brawling is a great idea. This is going to be a tactical battle. Reggie, we’re going to need you to be on the ball for this one. Scuttlebutt is that there are dozens of arenas for the last two phases of the tournament, and we won’t know where we’re fighting until we get there. You’ll be our wild card. We need to adapt from the load-in to the end of the countdown.”

  Reggie gave a curt nod. “Right. That’s my job, after all. But lay it out. What do these guys run?”

  “Lucky Outlaws are running a variety of builds, changing it up to match their opponents. They’re packing Anti-Matter Projectors, MRMs, Beam Cannon-Ms, and standard swords. I didn’t see them put those swords to use in their preliminary match, and I don’t think they bring them every match. My gut tells me, if Gremlin or Yulong gets up against one alone, go for it in melee. If it’s me or Reggie, we fall back and use our mobility to keep things at range.”

  “And the elephant in the room?” Lin asked.

  Reggie squeezed shut his eyes. “We didn’t register any alternates. I didn’t dream we’d need one. I mean, once we got Lin on board, I didn’t think there was a team on the server more stable than us.”

  “Wait…” Chase said. “You’re saying that…”

  “Yeah,” Reggie said. “Even if we can find someone willing to join up midway—”

  “Easy enough,” Lin reported unenthusiastically. “Plenty even in Wounded Legion. If not, I’ll put out a call on my stream.”

  Chase shuddered. “Stream viewers…”

  Reggie raised his voice before continuing. “Even if you can find someone to replace June, we’ll need some kind of waiver to get Valhalla West to allow them onto the squad.”

  Frank grunted. “Easy peasy. Your buddy Ken can fix us right up.”

  “He’d be a fool to lose the PR from having you in,” Lin agreed.

  Chase remained silent—pointedly silent.

  “What?” Reggie demanded.

  “I don’t know,” Chase admitted. “I don’t get the idea that Mr. Bradley is going to be keen on playing favorites. You already get accused of being CEO’s pet.”

  Reggie was taken aback. “I what?”

  “It’s the whole being dead thing,” Chase said, holding up his hands to avoid being killed as the messenger of bad news. “Hey, I’m not saying you did it on purpose or anything, or that you prefer it to being flesh and blood, but plenty of people out there think it’s not fair that you have unlimited login privileges and no medical safety logout. He’s already gotten signed waivers from the rest of the competitors that cover the duration of the tournament.”

  “Wait,” Reggie said, ignoring for the moment that Chase was a little shit for never telling him any of this before. “You’re saying that you can stay logged in this whole tournament if you want? You can fill the entire off-hours portion with practice.”

  A nervous chuckle preceded Chase’s reply. “No. I have work. Valhalla West can’t give me time off to play. They’re catching enough heat for me being in the game already. If I was on Armored Souls instead of working Silent Shuriken, they’d never have let me. Again, strike… like, five… against us getting an exemption for replacing June.”

  “What are you trying to tell me?” Reggie asked. “I’ve already messaged June half a dozen times. She hasn’t logged back in since those elevator doors closed behind her.”

  “I’m saying that without June, it’s four on five tomorrow,” Chase said. “Make it a half-dozen plus two. I can see us maybe pulling out a miracle against Tough Occupation, but Lucky Outlaws will straight up murder us.”

  Reggie sighed and nodded. “Fine. I’ll do it.”

  Lin perked up as the meeting looked to be drawing to a close. “Once you send that message off, got a minute to stop by my livestream for an interview?”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Reggie hadn’t known what he was getting into. All Lin had asked was that he show up in a special staging area of the Valhalla West servers fifteen minutes after they left the casino. He envisioned something like the Tonight Show. Digital desk. A couple comfortable chairs. What he found looked more like one of those crazy Japanese game shows that were always popping up on the Internet. The backdrop was a startling array of pastel and neon colors in geometric patterns that suggested rays of sunshine and rainbows without actually depicting them.

  If he hadn’t known Lin for years, he never would’ve recognized her. She still had the glowing blue hair that had become her new trademark. Her face was the same as always. But after that, she turned into some sort of cartoon character. Not literally, of course. Valhalla West always strove to keep its character models human realistic. But her dress was hot pink and heavily stylized, cut as if it had been made by a five-year-old with blocky square edges and oversized buttons but styled to appeal to the greedy eyes of men. It covered just enough of her breasts to avoid a mature rating and enough of her legs to hide her undergarments and no more. Lin wore white boots that came above her knees and matching gloves that stopped past her elbows. She wore a pearl choker, and her hair was teased out in pigtails.

  Reggie crept onto the set like a foreigner who got off his train at the wrong stop.

  Despite the fact that this was all digital, there was a camera set up pointing at Lin against the backdrop. Beckoning with her fingers below the level of the camera, she summoned Reggie over. Feeling out of place in his Wounded Legion uniform, he reluctantly joined her.

  “Hello, everybody! I’m Lin Chen and with me today is Sergeant Reggie King,” Lin said in a childish voice filled with saccharin. She gave a big smile, and a shining glint flashed on her teeth, accompanied by a soft ping. “Reggie here is the leader of Ghost Platoon, the team I joined for the Valhalla West Ragnarok Showdown. Thank you for joining us today, Reggie.”

  Reggie shifted uneasily. “Um, hi. Glad to be here.”

  “Reggie, can you share with our viewers what it’s like
to live 24/7 inside the Valhalla West universe?”

  Without moving the rest of his face, Reggie shot Lin a glare. This was out of bounds. She was supposed to be asking questions about the tournament. But his glare got him nowhere. Lin faced him down, never letting go of that innocent, wide grin that showed off a pair of dimples he’d never known she had.

  He was stuck. Stranded. Taking a deep breath, he gave it a try. “Um, I guess it’s like it is for everyone else. Imagine you go to sleep, log in, do all your game stuff. But when you wake up, you’re still there. I mean, people can get used to anything, can’t they? Eventually, you just get used to the idea that there’s no ‘out there’ out there. At least not for me. I think the hardest part is realizing that the outside world is still there for everybody else. You get spoiled a little.”

  Clearly an experienced interviewer, Lin picked up on the comment. “Spoiled? How do you mean spoiled?”

  Reggie tugged at his collar. “I dunno. I guess… I don’t have to head off to a job I hate. You hear a lot of that from other players as they’re about to log out. I haven’t had any health problems.” He forced a shy, nervous chuckle. “I mean, technically I’m dead, right? What more can happen to me?”

  “I know, right?” Lin agreed. “Do you think that gives you an unfair advantage in Armored Souls? Most of us have to log out for our health. You don’t. You don’t even need to sleep, do you?”

  Lin damn well knew that he did. Reggie forced himself to remember that Lin was conducting an interview, not conversation. It didn’t matter what she knew. It mattered what her viewers knew and more importantly what they didn’t. “Well, I think calling it an unfair advantage would be to imply that I got something for nothing. That Valhalla West was giving me some boost the other players would take if they could get. I know there’s probably a few sick people out there who would claim that they would make the trade, but no one wants to give up their life to live in a video game. And yeah, I need to sleep. It’s not my body that needs the rest; it’s my mind. I tried seeing how long I could stay awake, and the mind starts playing tricks on you after a while.”

  “How long did you make it?”

  “Eighty-five hours,” Reggie replied. “After that, I started seeing weird shit.” Reggie winced. He spoke through closed lips. “Can I say that?”

  Lin’s smile widened if that were even possible. All around them, music rose. Reggie must’ve triggered something because he suddenly found himself in the middle of a Broadway show tune set to an ear-piercing J-pop beat. Lin sang along to possibly the most vulgar song Reggie had ever heard, incongruous against the innocent-sounding electronic instrumentals. It was fast-paced, and Reggie couldn’t keep up listening to the rapid-fire lyrics, but he caught the gist of it. The only part that sank in was the refrain.

  “… It’s the Internet, and we can say anything we like.”

  The song finished, and Lin acted like nothing happened. “So, you don’t find that having extra hours in the day unavailable to other players gives Wounded Legion and advantage?”

  Reggie shrugged. “I mean, maybe it made leveling up easier—quicker anyway. But Wounded Legion is a huge outfit. Me putting a couple extra hours a night doesn’t matter a hill of beans. Hell, I bet a lot of my commanders would rather I logged out a bit more. You know, give them some autonomy. I try not to micromanage. Half the time I spend in game, I’m not even playing it the way most people play.”

  Lin bit her lip and looked at Reggie coyly. “How do you play?”

  Reggie wanted to strangle her. This was her idea of an interview? “Living. I hang out in the common areas with my troops. I watch TV, both the real world and Valhalla West channels. Once in a while, I log over to one of the other games.”

  “Anything else…?”

  Reggie knew exactly what she was looking for. She wanted dirt. She wanted salacious. Reggie had half a mind to give her exactly what she wanted. Everyone knew that Armored Souls had full functionality for players who paid for the extended package. It was no secret that many couples who played together preferred sex in-game. No mess. No risk of injury trying crazy shit. No worries about little birth control “accidents.” And, if Reggie was one to judge, it felt about the same.

  The prying into his sex life was out of bounds even if Lin had wanted to know in private. Fuck her if she wanted him to spill details of what he and June did in private. “You know… hanging around. Shooting pool. Shopping for upgrades to my apartment. That kind of stuff.”

  Lin was a pro. She shot him such a glare that in a game like Silent Shuriken it might’ve scored a critical hit. But not for an instant did the perky, upbeat expression falter on her face. Spinning a pirouette, an Armored Souls blaster pistol appeared in her hand. She pointed it at Reggie’s head, still smiling. “So, tell me about the tournament itself. Your first battle against Dark Ocean Pirates was a close call. You pulled quite a little stunt to win it.”

  The knot in Reggie’s stomach untied itself. This is terrain he could handle. “My buddy Frank would dispute that,” he said with a forced chuckle. “It was down to two on two. A pair of heavies against me in my Wolverine and Frank in his Tiger. Straight up, I liked Frank’s odds going against that Jackal. As for me? I was screwed. But you and Chase have ragged on me to change to Commando spec before the tournament. I was Command for years, even before I was running my own faction. It was a big change for me. But there isn’t room for a Command spec pilot in a platoon-based arena tournament. The respec was fresh in my mind. I was thinking like a guy who just spent an hour tearing down a build he’d known for years and going over every perk of his new Commando build.”

  “And what did having a fresh build in your mind do in the heat of a losing battle? Did you think of something using one of your new skills to save the day?” Lin asked. In any courtroom in America, she’d have been chastised for leading the witness. But right then, Reggie welcomed all the leading she was willing to offer.

  “Actually…” Reggie admitted, scratching the back of his neck. “I’d been thinking about Empire Strikes Back. You know… the part where Luke takes out one of those giant walkers by himself?”

  Lin glanced up at the ceiling with a silly grin. “Who doesn’t?”

  “Well, for some reason that flashed through my head when I was thinking of the climbing and rappelling gear I’d brought along. I think maybe the idea even came to me when we were in the game shop, figuring out the equipment I’d want for the spec change. But it wasn’t until I saw myself facing off against a juggernaut I couldn’t beat in melee that I had the idea to actually try it.”

  “Is that the sort of fearless play you couldn’t have made while you were still alive?” Lin asked. “When I polled my viewers, more than half wanted to know what it’s like to no longer fear death.”

  Reggie felt his face warm. This was too personal. This was worse than asking about his sex life. Holding up a hand in a vain effort to block the camera’s view of his face, Reggie stormed off the set.

  Lin caught up with him in the dressing room—which was for show as much as anything. She knocked on the open door before letting herself in. Gone was the phony smile and the vapid expression. Aside from the sexualized outfit and neon makeup, it was the Lin Reggie knew again. “Hey, you all right?”

  “Warn a guy, maybe?” Reggie replied without looking.

  Lin hopped up and sat on the dressing table, kicking her saddle-shoed feet distractedly. “Sorry. Figured you’d know what the public was interested in. It’s never the deep tactical stuff, the prep work, the practice and repetition. It’s always the smut and adrenaline. You happened to have the added appeal of having survived death. I’d have gotten my spleen cut out live on camera if I’d let you go through the interview without asking.”

  Reggie looked her up and down, still unable to get over the ridiculousness of her getup. “You do this every day?”

  Lin shrugged. “Normally, I’ve got a headset on and a controller or mouse in my hands. Interviews are a little di
fferent, and I can get a little more outlandish here in VR space, but even out in the meat world, I’ve gotta dress for the camera. I’m not stupid. A good quarter of my audience probably watches with the sound off. I can stomach dressing like a pop idol and letting half the viewers think I’m Japanese; it’s an acting gig when it comes down to it. It also lets me play video games twenty hours a day.”

  With his soul too exhausted to maintain any anger, Reggie let out a sigh. “Well, I let people shoot at me while I drove a steel box on wheels. Can’t really point fingers at what someone does to earn a paycheck. Sorry, I ruined the interview.”

  Lin offered a wink. “Hey, don’t sweat it. That went better than I expected.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  The first day of group play had arrived, and Reggie was seated in the cockpit of Vortex, waiting for the countdown to commence. Surrounding Vortex in the Wounded Legion main hangar were Diablo, Yulong, and Gremlin. There was no sign of Artemis or June. Reggie attempted to calm himself.

  June will be here.

  Sure, she hadn’t logged in or responded to any messages since the incident in the casino after battling Dark Ocean Pirates. Sure, the last words she’d uttered had been for them to replace her—and they hadn’t.

  We’ll pull this off without her—somehow.

  Chase had floated a number of desperate-sounding plans ranging from IDF artillery builds, praying to take someone out before the battle came down to visual contact, to Jump Boosts for everyone and a kamikaze aerial assault that was more likely to get them killed than take out enemies.

  But on a lucky strike, it could level the playing field.

  It’s not the end of the tournament if we lose. Two teams make it, and someone’s got to lose when the two eventual top teams meet.

  That was their best option right now: hoping June was watching somewhere and pulled her head out of her ass after seeing them lose.

 

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