The Feedback Loop (3-Book Box Set): (Scifi LitRPG Series)

by Harmon Cooper

  “Gramogun!” Frances shouts as she swoops up to me. We hover close to it, careful to keep it between us and its unfrozen buddies. I access inventory item 558; the long brass Victrola horn of the Gramogun mounts itself to my shoulder. Frances has hers up as well, does a finger count three-two-one-GO and we blast away at it.

  Or not, apparently. Nothing happens.

  The horn on my shoulder vibrates some, but it doesn’t seem to be putting out any noise. However, the Boilerplate infantry that had moved up when it stomped the land ironclad suddenly cover their ears, scream, and run away. The lenses on all of their stupid steampunk goggles have shattered, and with a sudden, gentle, noiseless poof, the frozen Steam Enforcer shivers into powder and collapses.

  The three juggernauts are not particularly pleased at their compadre’s treatment, and hurl staggering volumes of fire up after us. We dodge and twist and flit away, gain altitude, and suddenly there’s fire coming at us from in front. Two fragile, ridiculous biplanes are hosing streams of lead at us. One flies into the Steam Enforcers’ outgoing and explodes like a puffball; Dolly lands on the other, and with her glittering mantis appendages rends it to lint and sawdust.

  Irish Shorty twists in the air in front of me, heading straight for the leading Enforcer. A gaudily painted triplane quarters in on him from the rear, fires on him, and wheels away even as it gets several hits on Shorty’s jetpack, which sputs, fizzles, gouts steam and quits flying.

  “Shorty ya wee bastard!” Scotty stoops after him, his leather kilt slapping in his slipstream. He nabs him like a kestrel on a field mouse, zoom-climbs above the triplane, and drops Shorty right into the cockpit. Shorty lands on the pilot’s shoulders, and in a superb demonstration of Road Runner Physics, takes his place at the controls when he knocks the pilot through the bottom of the fuselage. The pilot flaps his arms, fails to fly on his own, logs out.

  Shorty executes a snap roll and fires on friend and foe alike; everybody scatters, an Air Enforcer flies into a pusher biplane which crumples around him and falls from the sky. The sky is suddenly filled with dodging, ducking, twisting fliers most anxious to be somewhere Shorty isn’t, except for a woman wearing traditional hunting pinks, white breeches and a cap with the ribbons down, who is mounted sidesaddle on a genuine twig besom. She flies up to Shorty, shoots a stream of goldy-purple sparkles at him from a star-tipped wand, and dives away cackling like a mad thing when he transmogrifies into a five-foot three inch anthropomorphic toad.

  Toadish Shorty loops around and goes after the Flying Fox Huntress, and fires short bursts at her as he chases her lower and lower. She tosses vile yellow flying caltrops back at him which explode as they get close. He continues to pepper her with machine gun fire and finally gets her good; she’s suddenly falling and spinning rather than flying. She hits the ground and disappears in a sparkly purplish explosion. Toadish shorty remains toadish, despite the alchemist’s demise.

  The three Steam Enforcers move at a slow walking pace, and smash through the center of Morlock; no subtlety or finesse – just crush the defenders and flatten a path straight through. They unleash a deluge of Gatling gun fire on anything that fires at them, and they pulverize every bunker and strongpoint they encounter. Both sides are putting all kinds of nasty flying stuff in the air, and we’ve all caught bits and pieces; the steam pack barely keeps my life bar topped up.

  Burly, Pip, and Quiet Man loop off to the left of the oncoming behemoths; Aiden, Bucket Hat, and Scotty go right as Toadish Shorty dogfights with … well, everybody. Neon blue lightning bolts streak up from a clock tower on the right and zap right through Bucket hat. Just like in the cartoons, he’s brilliantly illuminated from within, his skeleton is briefly visible, and then he dissipates in a falling cloud of dust. His hat spins to the ground.

  Toadish Shorty executes a turn that almost pulls the wings off his triplane and dives directly into the lightning, firing as he goes. He never pulls out and never tries to; he smacks into the clock tower like a wood and canvas thunderbolt, accelerating all the way in. Great gouts of green and blue fire erupt from the tower as it explodes outward and collapses.

  Burly, Pip, and Quiet Man get in behind the Steam Enforcers and let go with their Almost Universal Solvent throwers, aiming to saturate the extra super huge steam packs and power them down. Aiden and Scotty tangle with the Air Enforcers that provide air cover for their unstoppable colossi. The Air Enforcers attempt to swarm them, which only provides Aiden with more targets.

  Supersonic fireflies whistle past my ears; someone’s on my tail with unfriendly intent.

  Rocket: Frances! Get the guy that’s on Quantum!

  Frances’ steam-powered rocket cuts through the air and swats the plane from the sky. I dive on the mechanical monstrosity on my right; the wind forces tears from my eyes, and I seriously consider actually using my steampunk goggles.

  “Thanks!” I yell over my shoulder. “I’m going in!”

  The huge Enforcer smashes through another building, fires at the fleeing defenders, and then pivots at the waist to bring both Gatling guns to bear on me, even as it continues its unstoppable way forward. My Freeze-O-Hack is on deck again, and the blue stream of ultra-cold envelops it.

  “Now!”

  Frances and I activate our Gramoguns, and the Steam Enforcer silently erupts into soft, powdery ice crystals which gently settle on the troops fighting below – damn if it doesn’t look like a big-ass Christmahanukwanzivus snow globe!

  The remaining two behemoths grind through the city like metallic glaciers on legs, pulverizing buildings and human fighters below. I tuck in my arms and point my toes for better streamlining, increase my speed and aim for the nearest one.

  An Air Enforcer collides with me hard enough to disorient me and partially deplete my life bar. He hangs on; even as we spin out of control he tries to shoot me in the face with an oversized hand cannon.

  Wickedly serrated mantis appendages catch us, slow our spin, pull him off me and shred him like pulled pork. They snag another nearby Air Enforcer and rip him in half; he gouts steam and disappears – logged out.

  “Are you okay?”

  I look left and there’s Dolly directly next to me, her eyes shining orange as she smiles.

  “Okay … okay … ” I tell her. “You’re a badass.”

  “That’s all I wanted to hear,” she says, and zips away.

  As much as I’d like to enjoy the vision that is Dolly in motion as she heads off to break things and hurt people, I’ve got company at two o’clock and they’re closing fast.

  “Ya bloody shitehawks!” Burly roars as he whooshes in to intercept. The Big, Bad, Battling Brit grabs an Air Enforcer in either hand and smashes them together like he’s a kid making his Generic Joe corporate action figures fight. Pieces fly off of them; steam vents from every orifice. Burly’s left with a double handful of nothing when they both log out. He shakes his fist and bellows, “Wankers! Quitters! Cheese-eating surrender monkeys!”

  Yellow fireworks explode all around us.

  “Down! Down!” Burly shouts.

  ~*~

  I see a six pack of Hogwarts wannabes on the flat roof of a turreted tower. Five of them are in hooded black robes decorated with silver stars and moons and other cabalistic graffiti, and one is seated at each of the five points of a glowing star pentagon. Big number six stands tall in the center of the group, all decked out in a Gandalf the White outfit, complete with pointy hat and staff. Mr. Wizard wields the staff like a rocket launcher, and fiery yellow spheres of thaumaturgical nastiness shoot from the end and whiz up at us. I turn and fall towards them with the terminal velocity of de-orbiting space junk.

  Let me! Let me!

  The hack ax forms and morphs to hack gun without my calling it from inventory, points itself and fires a tremendous blue-white sphere of incandescence. The top third of the tower vanishes in a blinding flare; what’s left of it has run and melted like a candle in the August Texas sunshine.

  Voices in my head is usually
not a good thing, but every time this little voice pipes up, my mutant hack ax does something unexpected … and becomes orders of magnitude more effective …

  The Steam Enforcer spins up its Gatling guns and burns through ammo like it’ll be fined for every cartridge it doesn’t expend. It tracks me and puts up a blizzard of fist-sized pellets; expended shotgun shells the size of kindergarteners pile up around its feet. Frances is on the edge of the cloud and flits through with the agility of a double-jointed hummingbird. No such luck for the kid; what’s coming at me is so dense that an anorexic mosquito couldn’t get through.

  This is going to hurt!

  Real men don’t log out.

  Dolly pixilates in front of me in a flash. Wings balloon from her back, shielding me from the Wall O’ Lead. I speed forward and we lock arms, amidst the explosions below us, the enemy Air Enforcers swirling all around us, the huge mechanized monster spraying us with its Gatling shotgun.

  “You’re wonderful, Doll,” I tell her as we kiss, “my everything.”

  “Your everything?” she asks as more pellets hammer into her metallic wings.

  “My everything. We need some time alone, a long time alone … ”

  “After the battle, Quantum,” she says.

  “After the battle.”

  I jet into the air, up and over her wings and arrow down into the dead space where the Steam Enforcer’s guns won’t bear. It spins and twists and tries to swat me with its Gatling gun arms. As I dodge, my Freeze-O-Hack comes up. I hover over its shoulder and give it the mother of all brain freezes.

  Frances waves at me from her vantage point over its other shoulder and points to her Gramogun.

  She finger counts three-two-one and we activate our banshee horns. The giant, frozen, metallic head silently Chicxulubs into a bazillion icy pixels; the monstrous decapitated body locks up in mid step, wobbles and falls with a thunderous impact, like King Kong landing on West 33rd Street.

  I hover in place and spend just that little bit too long admiring my handiwork. Another Air Enforcer attempts an intercept and swipes at me with a boarding cutlass as she swoops past. She makes a short banking turn and comes back for a second pass.

  Let me handle this.

  “Who said that?” I shout as my hack ax grows spikes and blades and hooks, and seemingly of its own volition eviscerates her as she dives at me. The screaming, steaming, mortally wounded Air Enforcer spirals away and disappears as she logs out.

  One Steam Enforcer left.

  ~*~

  Aiden and Dolly flank me now. Frances is behind us; the remaining UK Assassins form up on the four of us.

  “Bloody ‘ell, mate!” Burly cries as he zips past me. He takes out a Boilerplate Air Enforcer with a throwing star the size of a turkey platter. “Number nineteen, boys!” he shouts over his shoulder to the battling Brits whooshing in the air behind him.

  The final Steam Enforcer fires its enormous Gatling shotguns at us, the barrels blur around a central axis with one mission, and one mission only – complete annihilation. Our group parts down the middle and we zip wide to avoid the pellets. Aiden beelines towards the Steam Enforcer, firing his Slice Bang.

  I’m in front of the big metal bastard seconds later, and hose its Gatling guns with my AUS sprayer – best to deal with them first.

  An Air Enforcer rockets directly at me, ko-wakazashi in one hand and trench hawk in the other. He is so focused on me that he never sees Scotty blindside him from behind. Scotty hovers, laugh, forks two fingers at Burly and darts away to seek another target.

  The Gatling guns soften into uselessness and the clunker swats at me like I’m a particularly annoying stinging insect. While its attention is focused on me, Frances Euphoria scissors in behind the Steam Enforcer at top speed. She cuts loose on it with her Freeze-O-Hack and doesn’t let up until it’s ceased all motion and frozen solid. Again with the Gramogun treatment, and Frosty the Five Story Snowman collapses into a whopping great heap of fluffy powdered retro robot ice crystals.

  “We did it!”

  I do a twist in the air and regroup with Dolly.

  “We did it!” I shout.

  Frances smacks into me a few moments later, latching onto me.

  “We won!” She hugs me tightly, uses her jet pack to twirl me in the air. I look over her red hair to catch Dolly watching us.

  Aiden zips by and fires on one of the remaining Air Enforcers, who apparently decides that he who fights and runs away, lives. He’s trailed by Burly, who pumps his fist in celebration and Pip, who sprays his Hose Gun like it’s a bottle of cheap champagne. From our vantage point above Morlock, I can see the battle has changed beneath us. There are fires and clouds of smoke, but what’s most important is that we’ve smashed their giant game-changers and crushed the Boilerplate Army’s morale – the NPCs are surrendering and the human players are logging out.

  “What now?” I ask.

  Lightning cracks above us. A portal appears in the sky, rimmed in yellow. It pulsates, grows in size until it’s thirty yards in diameter.

  “We got company!” I say, aiming my hack at the portal.

  Reapers spill out, riding steam-powered motorcycles, followed by Reapers in jetpacks. A figure in a blue orb of actinic fire floats out of the center of the portal.

  “It’s him … ” Frances says. “It’s him!”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Strata Godsick.

  My mutant hack comes up and I zap the blue orb with everything I got. My blast hits the orb and dissipates; a squirt gun would have had more effect. Frances takes a shot – still nothing.

  “What do we do, Rocket!?”

  I back away; the steam from my jetpack billows out in front of me.

  Rocket: His stats are off the charts! Look at his life bar, his advanced abilities bar!

  “Glad to see you’re a fan,” I yell, “but what do we do?”

  The blue orb fades. Godsick’s Reaper mask resembles a deer’s skull, elongated to cover his face and topped with massive antlers. He’s in black back-and-breastplate armor with a large blue jewel mounted over his heart. A black cowl and cloak fastened to the shoulders of the armor hangs past his floating feet.

  Electricity zigzags between Godsick’s antlers forming a lightning ball at the apex of his headgear. It smashes into me before I can move and hurls me into the city below.

  Rocket: Holy crap!

  I smash through the bell tower of a cathedral, through the leaded roof, through a wall, another wall and through a ceiling into a classroom. My life bar drops to 25%. I would have been dead at least twice if Ray Steampunk hadn’t boosted my life bar to 250%.

  I’m cradled in a nest of debris, which is lumpy and uncomfortable. My everything hurts, my eyes won’t focus, my pocket watch broke, and I think I may have peed in my garish steampunk costume.

  “Geez! Did anybody get the transponder code of the aeros that hit me?” I ask, and I track my trajectory into Our Lady of Great Agony cathedral through the series of perfectly aligned Quantum-shaped holes. I idly wonder how they managed to get the stars, planets, and tweety birds inside to circle around my head like that. I move to shake it off and get back in the game.

  With a thunderous, dubbed-in, special effects roar, a Reaper astride a steam-powered motorcycle crashes through the classroom door to make his obligatory dramatic and über-masculine entrance. He backflips off the bike and it smashes through into the next classroom and explodes. All he needs is a spray can of Rutting Buck air freshener and the Arlington AT&T Cowboys Cheerleaders in a kick line behind him to complete the effect.

  I sigh at the predictable lameness of it all.

  “Quantum Hughes,” he rumbles, as he cracks his knuckles and takes a menacing step towards me. He’s all leather and muscles and spikes and horns and sharp things, and veins crawl and swell on the side of his bull neck.

  I am so not in the mood for this no-neck mofo.

  I shoot him down with my wrist gun and step over him, not even stopping to crush hi
s skull mask with my stomper. Sometimes, the pleasures in life must be postponed.

  Rocket: Equip the binoculars I gave you. There’s a bunch of added features and scanners that aren’t exactly world appropriate, but should help. Look for a power source, a discontinuity, anything …

  My hand comes up and I find item 557.

  The rubber eyecups mold to my eye sockets, and the tableau in the sky magnifies 5X, 10X, 20X, 40X, the images razor sharp and gyro stabilized. Dolly hovers between Strata Godsick and Frances Euphoria now. Her appendages have multiplied, the sharpened points bending over her body like multiple scorpion’s stingers.

  Rocket: Never mind her! Focus on Strata – look for the red indicator.

  The image jumps to 80X, 160X. My former partner’s eye coverings are red; black makeup occludes his facial features. A green line moves left and right as it scans his body. It stops over the jewel on his chest and a blinking red reticle appears.

  “The jewel,” I say aloud. “I think I found his weakness.”

  ~*~

  I’m in the air seconds later. The Steam Pack has boosted my life bar to 30%, but if Strata does the Flaming Antler Blast on me again, then stick me with a fork cuz I am done! There’s only one solution: I’ve got to get to the jewel on his chest.

  My mutant hack morphs into a large blade as I begin my ascent.

  I’m ready.

  The voice comes to me and I glance left and right. An enormous explosion overhead; the shock wave buffets me and I see double-ended mushroom cloud of steam.

  “Dolly!” I shout, as soon as I realize what Godsick has done. Advanced abilities activated, I appear next to Frances moments later. In front of both of us is a slowly dissipating cloud of steam.

  “Let me handle this, Frances,” I say, moving in front of her.

  “I’ve got your back,” Aiden says, on the other side of Frances now.

  “Is Dolly … ?”

  I can’t even form the words.

  “No, she’s not,” he says, “she’ll respawn in The Loop.”